Saving SC4 on a server

[digitized.abyss 0]

I am accessing SC4 on a network but cannot seem to save the cities to the main server. Does anyone know how to remedy this?

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

You should not be saving your cities anywhere except in your local C:\<you>\documents\simcity 4\regions\

 

The point of most servers is that they are read only for stations unless there is a separate area bound to a writable drive letter.  That is why, on stand alone installations, the program and the user area are in separate directories.

[digitized.abyss 0]

I'm using a desktop as my server, its not an actual mainframe type server. Would that change anything at all?

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

No.  Most servers these days are Xeon processor arrays.  Why are you doing this?  Do you have control of the server?  I have done some serious server work, but the last time was Windows 2000.  I could now well be out of date since I've been retired for 10 years.

 

You may have to invoke some ACLs to get this to work.  End-users are not supposed to be able to write on any server except in given locations.

 

What server software are you using?

[digitized.abyss 0]

The OS I'm using is Vista. Have the desktop tower set up in a back room. I don't want to be tied down to the tower when playing. I want to be mobile but still have the saved cities on the desktop tower if I want to continue on tower. I used windows network set up wizard to get a home network going. I can start and load the game just fine, just can't save it. Thanks for all of the responses. . SC4 is by far an all time favorite game. Wish I could spend all day every day playing it....

[benvoliothefirst 36]

This is a really interesting idea. I hope to eventually have a similar setup for my music and media, so that I can access my music library and movies from any computer in the house. Having all my SimCities 4 in the central server would be very beneficial too. 

 

Unfortunately having said that, I'm a complete amateur at networking so I can't really add much to the discussion. Good luck, though! I'd probably just use dropbox if it was possible.

[MandelSoft 2,769]

If you want to play SimCity4 on multiple devices, you can try an offline method involving external hard drives:

 

1. Install SC4 on all devices you want to play on. You may need a virtual disk image or something if applicable.

2. Get an external hard drive and put a copy of your Plugins and Regions folder on it.

3. Before you start to play the game, sync your plugins folder with the one on your external HDD (if you made any changes in the plugins folder) and sync your regions folder too (only sync the regions you have played in to save time).

4. Do this in reverse after you played the game or downloaded some new plugins.

 

Hope this helps!

 

Best,

Maarten

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Well, Maarten, that's one way.  I call that sneaker-net because you put your gym shoes on and run between devices.

 

If you want this to work on the network with unreserved writes on the city files, you have to give write permissions at the server on the necessary folders.  It is not difficult, but since I am not running Windows, I suggest you look up setting permissions in the windows help files with particular reference to client/server applications.  Generally when setting permissions on a directory (folder) you can propagate them to all the subordinate items (folder and files) by using the appropriate option.  You should be able to do this in the GUI, but it may be necessary to use the console (cmd) to do anything complex.