Tired of refreshing your KSP install?

[Kerbart]

I’m in the camp where I think “best practice” is to leave my Steam™ installation alone, and copy the entire KSP folder to a different spot and use that to play KSP with. That also has the advantage that you can keep your existing 1.1.3 install while frolicking around with the 1.2 pre-release.

Of course there is the boring act of copying over the files from Steam when a new pre-release-release has taken place. A simple file copy will do, but there’s always the theoretical risk of leaving files from a previous release that are no longer needed. More thorough is to remove all existing files, but keep your mods and saves, and then copy the new release over.

To get a clean update, every single time, I’ve written a simply Python script that does all that for me. I’m sure there is room for improvement—let me know!

The advantage of using a script like this is the ability to extend it. This weekend I'll add a function to change some of the settings (notably using IJKL to steer rovers, and running KSP in window mode) for instance. That will be easy at this point.

Anyway, I thought sharing wouldn’t be harmful. Enjoy!

# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
# update KSP installation by copying over from steam
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

import os, shutil
from zipfile import * 

# source is the location of your steam (squad?) copy
SOURCE = r'C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Kerbal Space Program'
# dest is the actual install you're playing with
DEST = r'C:\Users\Kerbart\Documents\Kerbal Space Program 1.2'
# zipfile is where the data is temporarily saved. your system temp folder 
# would be good. or a ramdrive, if you have one.
ZIPFILE = r'R:\kspsave.zip'
# the exception list of directories NOT to back up
EXCEPT = ['saves\\scenarios','saves\\training','gamedata\\squad']

def main():
    exec('Backup', makeZip)
    exec('Clear', clearDest)
    exec('Copy', copyAll)
    exec('Restore', extractZip)
    print('Done')
    
def exec(title, function):
    print(title)
    function()
    
def clearDest():
    shutil.rmtree(DEST)
    
def copyAll():
    shutil.copytree(SOURCE, DEST)

def extractZip():
    myZip = ZipFile(ZIPFILE, mode='r')
    myZip.extractall(DEST)

def makeZip():
    myZip = ZipFile(ZIPFILE, mode='w')
    process_sub_path(DEST, 'gamedata', myZip)
    process_sub_path(DEST, 'saves', myZip)
    myZip.close()

def process_sub_path(base_path, sub_path, zipfile):
    full_path = os.path.join(base_path, sub_path)
    for name in os.listdir(full_path):
        short_path = os.path.join(sub_path, name)
        if short_path.lower() in EXCEPT:
            pass
        else:
            full_name = os.path.join(base_path, sub_path, name)
            if os.path.isfile(full_name):
                zipfile.write(full_name, short_path, ZIP_DEFLATED)
            elif os.path.isdir(full_name):
                process_sub_path(base_path, short_path, zipfile)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

 

Edited September 24, 2016 by Kerbart
Ugly sentence.

[klgraham1013]

My current KSP folder.