PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

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Snake_Man

PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Snake_Man » 2005-11-19 23:15:59

We have now slight problem with VTE open beta 11-03-05 Patch #1. It is too big for the PboPatch.exe by rom. When I try to test-patch my VTE install here, PboPatch will puke a Out of Memory error.

I tried out the Our Weapons PatchGenerator, its useless. Also I looked at the BIS forum topic for WinPBO tool, but even the topic had so many posts about errors in the util that I didn't even bother to try it out.

Are there any good PBO file patching utilities around other than the above mentioned?

If there is no other pbo patch utils we could use, there is three options left. 1) release only FULL 400mb releases. 2) do only hardcore manual patching (very, very difficult). 3) get someone to code new pbo patcher.

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Polish_GI
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Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Polish_GI » 2005-11-20 03:54:11

What about issuing Patch 1.1 and 1.2 etc by breaking up the patches into two? Smaller files?

Is this an option?

Mike
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Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Mike » 2005-11-20 04:27:56

my DePbo.dll avaialable at ofpec.com wouldn't have an issue with it, but what is it you actually need to do?

I'll write it for you as a quick 'n dirty providing I understand what it is you actually need

for instance are you (simply) trying to replace specific file entries in one pbo with one from another? or just insert an extra file, or delete some entries? All of it sounds obvious, but if you detail what you're expecting, this sort of thing isn't a tuffy as it's just a gui wrap-around the DePbo.dll

contact me offline Snakeman if you dont't want to clutter the forum with this.

Snake_Man

Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Snake_Man » 2005-11-20 05:34:01

Okay the ultimate PBO Patching utility would be very very simple to use. Lets take an example of fictional PMC_island.pbo file which we need to patch.

In the PMC_island.pbo we have 15 .wrp files all on large size, this is why we cannot release FULL pbo every week when small updates are done. Now, lets say we have 3 wrp files which we want to update.

These 3 wrp's would be packed up along with the patching utility using winrar self-extracting method. When the winrar package is run by end user, the pbo util inside would be executed which then would simply read the 3 new wrp's from what ever directory (temporary un-rar win dir?) and then would ask user which PBO file he wants to patch, user then browses to PMC_island.pbo and then the patcher would do its magic patching work. This patching would would be what ever the utility/code can do, but obviously it would be to open the PBO, put the updated .wrp files inside and pack the PBO back up.

I'm not sure if I clearly described all that stuff. If you are familiar with rom's PboPatch util which came with the bas Tonal patches and now I used it for the previous two VTE patches. That is the most simplistic workings of pbo patcher, I would be very happy with such operational functions, if it would just work with large, very large PBO's, ie up to 500mb or so (VTE_isles.pbo is now 338mb). Also I believe in future there will be mod groups that release large pbo's which could find good pbo patching utility a great asset.

Ok quick recap of the patch utils work using example of the rom's patcher. In the root dir you have .txt file and the utility itself like this;
PatchFiles.txt
PboPatch.exe

Then there would be several directories like PMC_island/ and what ever else needs to be patched. These directories would be written into the PatchFiles.txt one dir per line, which the util would read and try to patch. The utils cannot know where these pbo's are located, so it will ask end user to browse into these pbo's.

Mike
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Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Mike » 2005-11-20 09:47:20

ok, I'm onto it, i'll give you something in a day or two. It wont compress the inserted file(s), just tack em in there (or replace them) as it finds it. To make compressed stuff easy, one suggestion would be to suppy everyhting wanting to be added/replaced inside one single pbo. Eg patch.pbo. That way, supplier can elect whether files stay compressed or not. It's small potatoes, main issue is to get you something that doesn't crash with memory overruns.

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.pablo.
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Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by .pablo. » 2005-11-20 20:52:11

the wargames mod has been using pbo patcher v0.9 with no problems encountered.
"When in doubt, empty the magazine." -Murphy's Laws of Combat

Mike
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Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Mike » 2005-11-20 21:24:09

ok, because you've been very good 8-), you can grab Mikero's PatchPbo version 1.0 here

[s]http://www.andrew.nf/ofp/tests/PatchPbo1.0.zip (73k)[/s]

edit:

added ability to REMOVE a pbo when patching. It's all in the readme.

http://www.andrew.nf/ofp/tools/PatchPbo1.1.zip (74k)


Enjoy
Last edited by Mike on 1970-01-01 00:00:00, edited 1 time in total.

Snake_Man

Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Snake_Man » 2005-11-21 02:10:56

If I understood correctly the Mikero's util is cmd line driven, if so then I guess with fancy .bat file we can do wonders. We just need to be sure with the batch file that all destination pbo's are in right places etc. You know, these stupid user errors.

I'll see what can be done with that util. Thanks for letting me know about it.

Mike
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Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Mike » 2005-11-21 02:56:57

Mikero == Bungleware

Snake_Man

Re: PBO patching utility, are there any good ones?

Post by Snake_Man » 2005-11-21 07:22:36

Mikero == Bungleware
Snake Man != understand. Heh, you're using two names in forums, umm why? Ah nevermind, up to you, just bit confusing :)

Indeed, I was baffled why the cpp comment said something about me, wondered how the heck some strange guy from ofpec writes comment relating to me in his brand new util version :)

Anyways back to topic. I just tried out the util and it works great, good work. It runs nicely our VTE_isles.pbo which is right now 338mb in size, no memory errors. I created a batch file for it and so far it seems to work ok.

Thank you very much for PatchPbo, its really a great help for me/VTE right now as there is no other simple/effective patcher available.

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