Changing mods in game directory gets them deleted

[Guest deleted34304850]

It's not supposed to revert the changes. It's supposed to ask if you want to revert or save the changes. The problem appears to be that it is not doing so.

I'm aware of that, but thanks for answering a question no-one asked.

[omena007]

 

my question would be why are you manually editing files that are controlled by your mod manager? that would provoke the manager to say this has changed in a way i don't know about, so i am going to restore it back to how i know it should be.

can you make edits to your file outside of the folder, then add your changed file into vortex to allow it to deploy your changed file to the game directory? this would, i think, stop the issue you're seeing, because it would control the file with your edits in place, replacing the unedited file?

As I explained earlier, when I make mods and edits to mods I use direct files because it's a lot quicker bc i don't have to run "deploy" Every Single Time I make a change to the texture to see the change when I preview the file in nifskope, simple as that. It's just not realistic to manually move files and deploy Everything with every step and the thing is usually Vortex handles it very well. If edit is made in game directory Vortex asks if I want to use the newer file, it's that simple.This is issue has only started to happen lately and it only happens randomly or at least seems to. So the point here for me is not "what if I should do mods in the most inconvenient way" but is Vortex doing this randomly and why, like is it a bug or something. But if you do have a method of editing textures that's more convenient I would be happy to hear it out.

 

The vortex normally deploys the changes made in either game or vortex directory, like said before.

[showler]

My advice at this point would be to wait until the next time you make changes (or go in and make some changes anyway if you have some spare time) and then get some detailed screenshots of the message boxes from Vortex, in particular making sure you choose the option to have Vortex show the individual files that it has detected changes on. Knowing which files and what options you are being given might be helpful, especially if your editing tools might be creating backups or temporary files that Vortex is reading as having been deleted.

[omena007]

My advice at this point would be to wait until the next time you make changes (or go in and make some changes anyway if you have some spare time) and then get some detailed screenshots of the message boxes from Vortex, in particular making sure you choose the option to have Vortex show the individual files that it has detected changes on. Knowing which files and what options you are being given might be helpful, especially if your editing tools might be creating backups or temporary files that Vortex is reading as having been deleted.

Thank you for your reply! I can give an example of one case that happened. I edited a player home esp file in creationkit which always edits the files directly in game directory. When the Vortex started to deploy files it gave me option to delete the edited esp file or restore the old version of it. there were other unrelated dds files I had also edited and with each of the files Vortex asked me to "accept" they had been deleted (they had not I checked the game directory) or restore the old one. I have tried to close and reopen Vortex after it does this but it won't deploy normally unless I choose delete or restore. there are no other options. I can put a screenshot here next time it happens but it will just show you the same options you get when you delete a file in the game directory. No errors, nothing weird. Does creationkit or photoshop do the backup files you mentioned? bc it seems weird when it happens rarely and not all of the time. I wanted to make this topic just in case it's a bug and also because it's really bothersome when there's many files in question when it does this.

[showler]

I wonder if it's a problem with the VFS? When you load the file into the CK or image editor it correctly follows the link file and loads from the deployment folder, but when you save it saves a real file in place of the link file? Vortex detects this as the link file being deleted and asks if that is correct. If you say no the original file from the deployment folder overwrites your changed file on the next deployment?

[Tannin42]

Depending on the application you use to edit a file (let's say "foobar.dds"), it might change the file in-place or create a new file with a new name (usually something like foobar.dds.tmp), then, only when writing the file was successful, it moves foobar.dds.tmp -> foobar.dds.

 

In the first case (file edited in-place) Vortex should not prompt at all because the original file is edited so there is nothing to restore/apply anyway.

In the second case, what Vortex detects is that the file exists but is no longer a link but a "proper" file, Vortex simply deduces that this means it was edited, for performance reasons we don't actually compare content.

 

Now if this worked as expected, you would get a choice to apply or revert the changes but you seem to be getting the option to restore or delete the file instead so Vortex believes the file no longer exists (in the directory and with the name it previously had).

There isn't really any magic in how it works, it just checks the existence of the file path it previously deployed to. There are a few obscure things I can think of that might be adding confusion there could be

a) permissions: Are you editing the files with a different windows account/as admin such that the account running Vortex can't access the files after they were changed?

b) directory links aka junctions: Do you have your own setup of "virtual" directories using directory junctions that might make files appear with a different path in a different location?

c) weird filesystem setup: What filesystem are you using on the drive? NTFS can be configured through the registry in a way. Vortex tries to determine whether the filesystem is case sensitive on the fly but maybe there is a combination of settings where Vortex thinks the filesystem is case sensitive (e.g. "foobar.dds" would be a different file than "FOOBAR.dds") when your filesystem actually drops case information thereby automatically renaming "foobar.dds" -> "FOOBAR.DDS" when you edit the file.

 

This last one being possible would be new to me but it wouldn't be the first time windows "surprises" me...

 

 

As mentioned earlier: It would be really good to get a screenshot of the dialog or the exact wording in the dialog, does it say "Source files were deleted" or "Links were deleted"?

Further, please go to settings->mods and check which "Deployment Method" is selected.

[omena007]

Depending on the application you use to edit a file (let's say "foobar.dds"), it might change the file in-place or create a new file with a new name (usually something like foobar.dds.tmp), then, only when writing the file was successful, it moves foobar.dds.tmp -> foobar.dds.

 

In the first case (file edited in-place) Vortex should not prompt at all because the original file is edited so there is nothing to restore/apply anyway.

In the second case, what Vortex detects is that the file exists but is no longer a link but a "proper" file, Vortex simply deduces that this means it was edited, for performance reasons we don't actually compare content.

 

Now if this worked as expected, you would get a choice to apply or revert the changes but you seem to be getting the option to restore or delete the file instead so Vortex believes the file no longer exists (in the directory and with the name it previously had).

There isn't really any magic in how it works, it just checks the existence of the file path it previously deployed to. There are a few obscure things I can think of that might be adding confusion there could be

a) permissions: Are you editing the files with a different windows account/as admin such that the account running Vortex can't access the files after they were changed?

b) directory links aka junctions: Do you have your own setup of "virtual" directories using directory junctions that might make files appear with a different path in a different location?

c) weird filesystem setup: What filesystem are you using on the drive? NTFS can be configured through the registry in a way. Vortex tries to determine whether the filesystem is case sensitive on the fly but maybe there is a combination of settings where Vortex thinks the filesystem is case sensitive (e.g. "foobar.dds" would be a different file than "FOOBAR.dds") when your filesystem actually drops case information thereby automatically renaming "foobar.dds" -> "FOOBAR.DDS" when you edit the file.

 

This last one being possible would be new to me but it wouldn't be the first time windows "surprises" me...

 

 

As mentioned earlier: It would be really good to get a screenshot of the dialog or the exact wording in the dialog, does it say "Source files were deleted" or "Links were deleted"?

Further, please go to settings->mods and check which "Deployment Method" is selected.

Here's a screenshot.

The situation with this case was that I checked the first mentioned Nithi's esp was not deleted, it was still in the game directory. with other esp's they were in fact deleted from game directory but I don't know how since I didn't do it myself. a) I'm the admin. b) My game folder is under my username's folder "Games". c)All files are on my internal c drive. I'm using windows. I also checked the deployment method is the default. When I replace a file or when creationkit or xedit replaces the file it should always have the very same name. The problems have only occured in these last 2 months and I have used vortex many years actively. I hope I understood these questions correctly, I'm not a native speaker. Thank you for the help in any case.

[Aasmodeusss]

 

Depending on the application you use to edit a file (let's say "foobar.dds"), it might change the file in-place or create a new file with a new name (usually something like foobar.dds.tmp), then, only when writing the file was successful, it moves foobar.dds.tmp -> foobar.dds.

 

In the first case (file edited in-place) Vortex should not prompt at all because the original file is edited so there is nothing to restore/apply anyway.

In the second case, what Vortex detects is that the file exists but is no longer a link but a "proper" file, Vortex simply deduces that this means it was edited, for performance reasons we don't actually compare content.

 

Now if this worked as expected, you would get a choice to apply or revert the changes but you seem to be getting the option to restore or delete the file instead so Vortex believes the file no longer exists (in the directory and with the name it previously had).

There isn't really any magic in how it works, it just checks the existence of the file path it previously deployed to. There are a few obscure things I can think of that might be adding confusion there could be

a) permissions: Are you editing the files with a different windows account/as admin such that the account running Vortex can't access the files after they were changed?

b) directory links aka junctions: Do you have your own setup of "virtual" directories using directory junctions that might make files appear with a different path in a different location?

c) weird filesystem setup: What filesystem are you using on the drive? NTFS can be configured through the registry in a way. Vortex tries to determine whether the filesystem is case sensitive on the fly but maybe there is a combination of settings where Vortex thinks the filesystem is case sensitive (e.g. "foobar.dds" would be a different file than "FOOBAR.dds") when your filesystem actually drops case information thereby automatically renaming "foobar.dds" -> "FOOBAR.DDS" when you edit the file.

 

This last one being possible would be new to me but it wouldn't be the first time windows "surprises" me...

 

 

As mentioned earlier: It would be really good to get a screenshot of the dialog or the exact wording in the dialog, does it say "Source files were deleted" or "Links were deleted"?

Further, please go to settings->mods and check which "Deployment Method" is selected.

Here's a screenshot.

The situation with this case was that I checked the first mentioned Nithi's esp was not deleted, it was still in the game directory. with other esp's they were in fact deleted from game directory but I don't know how since I didn't do it myself. a) I'm the admin. b) My game folder is under my username's folder "Games". c)All files are on my internal c drive. I'm using windows. I also checked the deployment method is the default. When I replace a file or when creationkit or xedit replaces the file it should always have the very same name. The problems have only occured in these last 2 months and I have used vortex many years actively. I hope I understood these questions correctly, I'm not a native speaker. Thank you for the help in any case.

 

I get this same issue quite frequently even if I haven't edited anything so it's a Vortex issue, not just an editing issue.

[omena007]

My additional info for this bug is that using Wrye Bash esl-fication with Vortex gets esp's deleted but not always. Not sure if related.