Mod request: Quicker game startup with many mods.

[DerGolgo]

I had this idea.
I couldn't find anything similar through a search, but I'm sure that's just a fault on my side and that somebody must have had this idea before.
The way I understand it: I start game. Module manager goes through the installed mod, umpteen thousand patches are applied.
Those who, like me, are totally kid-in-candy-store when visiting Spacedock and have dozens of mods installed. Or hundreds. That whole startup procedure isn't quite quick.
Which makes sense if I installed a new mod, or there are updates, etc., etc.
But if that is not the case. If I didn't install anything new, if there are no updates or I just don't want to update. It'll basically do the exact same stuff it did last time I started the game, right?
So, my idea/request/delusion/feverish-dream: A mod or addon that takes an image/makes a copy of whatever was patched together. So that, next time I start the game, I can chose to just use that stuff. And the mod will make the game use the image/copy of the thing that was run last time.
Might not be a thing for a mod, more like a new game-launcher, maybe.

Obviously, I have no real clue what happens in detail, nor understanding of that. So I won't be surprised if it's not remotely possible.
Ideas, imho, shouldn't usually go to waste, so I'm just throwing this out there.

[SpaceMouse]

First loads are generally slower because the game has to store files. Modders really can't do much to speed up load times. You might wanna consider reducing the number of mods you use.

[Benji13]

It's not so much that the game can't remember what mods you have installed. When the game first starts, it moves all the game's files (or the ones it needs) from your hard drive to your RAM. This allows the game to use all the files faster than if they were all still in the hard drive. For example, fileX takes 2 seconds to load from the hard drive to the RAM, but only 0.2 seconds to move from the RAM to the CPU and back (when the game uses the file). I know this isn't exactly how it works but it's the simples way I can explain it. So the only way to make it faster would be to:

1) Get a faster hard drive or an SSD so the files leave the hard drive/SSD faster or/and

2) Get faster RAM so the files load into the game faster. 

Thats about it. There isn't much a mod could do to help. It's just up to the mod makers to use low-memory textures and models. I wouldn't recommend getting rid of mods you like just for faster loading times though. It's not really worth it. I hope this helped,

Benji13. 

Edited November 9, 2016 by Benji13

[Deimos Rast]

Well, there is this thing called the Module Manager Cache. If you don't change your GameData directory between loads, it loads your MM patches from the Cache, which is faster than loading them from scratch. Otherwise, you can trim down on unused parts (less parts to load but also less parts to have patches applied to), or ensure your parts mods use DDS textures I guess.

Raw horsepower is probably the easiest route: as mentioned above, RAM is cheap, and SSD's aren't too bad either.

How often do you need to reload the game though? I usually leave it running for a while, even while AFK. But back in the day, my loads could take 30 minutes, with frequent CTD's, it got pretty bad, yeah.

[DerGolgo]

5 hours ago, Deimos Rast said:

Well, there is this thing called the Module Manager Cache. If you don't change your GameData directory between loads, it loads your MM patches from the Cache, which is faster than loading them from scratch. Otherwise, you can trim down on unused parts (less parts to load but also less parts to have patches applied to), or ensure your parts mods use DDS textures I guess.

Raw horsepower is probably the easiest route: as mentioned above, RAM is cheap, and SSD's aren't too bad either.

How often do you need to reload the game though? I usually leave it running for a while, even while AFK. But back in the day, my loads could take 30 minutes, with frequent CTD's, it got pretty bad, yeah.

Ah, see, that cache bit, didn't know that.
Just feels agonizingly slow to load ... since the 1.2 update, and it doesn't crash seventeen times in fifteen minutes anymore, I'll let it run, just in case I wanna play later. Before starting it off, I'll check for any mod updates, and there's always at least one, isn't there. Guess that's probably the source of my agony.
Had to restart it a bit ago, I got hung up in the space center and couldn't even get the save menu to come up. Didn't change the Game Data bits, it started up in a little over ten minutes. MUCH faster than earlier today when I did my updates.
Well, as I'm illustrating here, my own "solution" wouldn't have solved nothing for me to begin with. Sorry for taking up everybody's time, and many thanks for explaining stuff!

[Ser]

Actually, there's a thing modders can do about it: put all of the plugin stuff especially .cfg files which are not mm-configs into PluginData subfolder for Module Manager hadn't to scan them over and over again. That could help alittle.

Edited November 9, 2016 by Ser

[paul23]

@Ser: Wouldn't that make it impossible to "patch mods" - ie to smooth gameplay between mods I often write a patchf for the mod config file, would this still be possible?

[TheRagingIrishman]

10 hours ago, paul23 said:

@Ser: Wouldn't that make it impossible to "patch mods" - ie to smooth gameplay between mods I often write a patchf for the mod config file, would this still be possible?

 

Ya putting a mod 'settings.cfg' file into /PluginData only means that MM won't check the file to see if it has any MM commands in it. Your patch would still affect it.

[Ser]

Don't know for sure but I have a suspicion that cfg-s from PluginData aren't automatically loaded by the game into GameDatabase so the mod has to load its configuration explicitly. And doesn't MM work with configs from GameDatabase, otherwise how would it know that some configuration was loaded and used somewhere? So @paul23 may be right but if you want to speed up the game's loading process it's a good idea to edit cfg-s by hand rather than via MM patches.

Anyway, the most harm comes from cfg-s that change over time (when you change settings in game and a mod saves them), so MM cache appears useless against such files. That's why people insist that such configs were moved to PluginData. But even having cache I guess MM has to touch every .cfg at least to calculate its checksum.

And a good solution, I think, would be having a fixed extension for MM patches, e.g. ".mm" or ".patch", if Module Manager wouldn't touch anything else, skipping those hundreds of cfg-s for numerous parts and props.

Edited November 10, 2016 by Ser

[sarbian]

I doubt it would help and it would only break any old patch. Mods just need to save in PluginData things that change all the time (windows position and the like). It s not hard to have a config file with gameplay settings that you can patch with MM in the usual dir and an other for the live data.

When the cache is used the MM part of the loading is fast.

[Ser]

6 minutes ago, sarbian said:

I doubt it would help and it would only break any old patch. Mods just need to save in PluginData things that change all the time (windows position and the like). It s not hard to have a config file with gameplay settings that you can patch with MM in the usual dir and an other for the live data.

Of course that would break existing patches but what if we had an option for MM to use only a specified extension? A person that suffers from long loading time could enable that option and go for looking into every cfg changing extension for patches to specified one (could be automated). So the profit would be in having distinguished a dozen of patches from hundreds of other cfg-s and not having to beg mod authors to move their changing properties to PluginData (that could be hard if the author hadn't appear for half a year).

29 minutes ago, sarbian said:

When the cache is used the MM part of the loading is fast.

But as I can see it's still significant. Looks like most of the MM time is taken just by the huge amount of patches that need to be applied. Just hope to save may be 10%-20% of it.

[sarbian]

I don't see how being able to know which file are patch would change anything with the caching and patching speed. The pluginData problem would remain exactly the same since MM would still have to detect if those file changed.

 

Uh ? If you load the cache you do not patch anything....

[Ser]

19 minutes ago, sarbian said:

I don't see how being able to know which file are patch would change anything with the caching and patching speed. The pluginData problem would remain exactly the same since MM would still have to detect if those file changed.

 

Does MM look into .cfg files or at loaded ConfigNodes to find what needs to be altered?

Disregard that, I've got it: if the config is changed it isn't cached anymore.

Edited November 10, 2016 by Ser

[Thygrrr]

I have an SSD that reads at 1GB/s and the game with about 5 major content and 15 small feature mods takes over a minute to load. The raw transfer to memory from disk would be under ten seconds, so there is a lot of processing going on.

 

also, between scenes I often get really long loading screens recently. I'm afraid SVE and SVT have to go.

 

i have a 1080 so unless I have 200 parts in a base FPS is around 90.

i have the suspicion that module manager spends a long time parsing strings to apply its patches.

Edited November 11, 2016 by Thygrrr