The Comprehensive Kerbal Archive Network (CKAN) Package Manager; v1.18.0 [19 June 2016]

[True Incompetence]

oh my God! This is such an AWESOME tool!!!

Took me an hour to figure out how to get the GUI to work. (I'm brain dead when it comes to computers stuff that's not related to CAD.)

I was messing around with command prompts... kept saying it couldn't find an install folder... read through 20 or so pages of posts. Then found that all I needed to do was drop the ckan.exe in my KSP directory. So easy!

Anyway, fantastic job on this! It will make my life so much easier now that .90 is out! Thank you!

[linuxgurugamer]

hey. I have run into issues with CKAN. I get this error during the installation process

http://i.imgur.com/aJhcB8V.png?1

Thanks in advance,

Hoaz.

I'm not one of the developers, but a little more information would be helpful:

OS you are running (win32, win64, OSX, Linux)? If windows, which version?

Version of KSP (0.25, 0.90, 32 bit or 64 bit)

How much memory you have?

It appears that you are running on Windows, based on the file name. It is trying to access a file, but the file is unavailable due to being used by another process.

I'd suggest rebooting and trying again.

[Hoaz]

I'm not one of the developers, but a little more information would be helpful:

OS you are running (win32, win64, OSX, Linux)? If windows, which version?

Version of KSP (0.25, 0.90, 32 bit or 64 bit)

How much memory you have?

It appears that you are running on Windows, based on the file name. It is trying to access a file, but the file is unavailable due to being used by another process.

I'd suggest rebooting and trying again.

Hey, thanks for responding. I am running KSP steam edition so 0.90. I am running windows 64 BIT (but KSP.. idk it has both 64bit and 32bit.exe file in the KSP folder (I suppose steam launches it in 32BIT)

EDIT: Rebooting did not help.

I have 18GB of DDR3 RAM at 1600 Hz.

I am trying to reboot the system. I'll report back should the installation fail again. Thank you.

Edited December 22, 2014 by Hoaz

[linuxgurugamer]

Great tool, but still a few small problems:

1. Minor, but on the About page, the Forum Thread directs you to the old thread

2. It appears that if you are managing multiple installs, it will download the zip files for each install. Would it be possible to have a common directory where zip files are downloaded a single time?

[marce]

Just got informed, that one of my mods (or mod component rather) is on CKAN.

While I'm not against CKAN per se, the license permits it and it says 'unofficial' in the version string I have to admit that I would have preferred to be asked if it's ok first.

Or at least informed about it.

Don't know who did it, but I have to say that I'm a little bit displeased about the way it was done.

[Diazo]

Just saw the same thing as marce, someone's added a couple of my mods to CKAN for me.

I have worked with the CKAN people previously to add a few of my mods myself so I know that there is no restrictions on adding mods, any player can go and add a mod to the CKAN database.

While I'm mostly pleased by this, the person who added those mods for me did so by adding a copy of them to KerbalStuff (which I don't use personally) and they messed up the profile so my mods are broken when installed by CKAN.

I'm currently changing all the profile stubs for my mods to point at my GitHub page (my master location) to fix this, but this does raise the point of talking to the actual devs when a mod is added.

To be clear, I'm okay with anyone being able to add mods, I'm talking about some sort of contact with the actual dev of the mod when it happens.

D.

[Ippo]

...

Hey Hoaz, how's it going? Is the issue still present? If so, I encourage you to open a github ticket, it's harder for us to miss / forget it

...

Hi! Thanks, I just fixed #1. #2 is on a feature request somewhere and I guess we'll get around to implement it eventually The number of open tickets is... interesting, at the moment

...

Hi marce, sorry to hear about this. If you want we can discuss this privately on IRC the next time I'm around, or as always open an issue and we'll sort it out.

Sorry about the poor communication: we'll try to keep an eye open in the future to try to ensure that forks have the author's consent.

[Ippo]

...

Hey Diazo! Let me repeat the apologies I gave to marce and extend them to you too. If you'd like to open an issue on github, I'd be grateful so we can take a close look at what happened. Is redistributing of that mod permitted? If not, let me know and I'll pull it from the index immediately.

Sorry again :/

[Diazo]

It is certainly permitted, the only reason I had not added those mods to CKAN myself already was that AGX was a PITA to update for 0.90 and I had not found the time to add them yet.

I've gone and fixed up all the NetKan files for all my mods now (or will as soon as I can get them to pass the build checker) and once those pull requests are merged everything will be fine.

D.

[pjf]

Just got informed, that one of my mods (or mod component rather) is on CKAN.

While I'm not against CKAN per se, the license permits it and it says 'unofficial' in the version string I have to admit that I would have preferred to be asked if it's ok first.

Or at least informed about it.

Don't know who did it, but I have to say that I'm a little bit displeased about the way it was done.

CIT-Util? That would be me. I absolutely take responsibility for this. The CIT Utils are a dependency of other mods, notably many by RoverDude. One thing we try not to do is use bundled mods, it breaks our consistency model, and it means if a mod author releases an update, players can access that update immediately. What's more, making sure that a mod has its own metadata means that the author gets proper attribution for the work in question; players can visit the mod homepage and source repository, view the license and author, and otherwise see information which is more obscured when the mod is bundled.

Unfortunately, this was during a time when we were gearing up for launch. At approximately ~300 hours into development, with a growing team of developers, and myself being chronically low on sleep to make sure that our system worked, I certainly can and did make slip-ups. Not contacting you was impolite of me, and I wholeheartedly and unreservedly apologise for that. I am sorry.

While I'm mostly pleased by this, the person who added those mods for me did so by adding a copy of them to KerbalStuff (which I don't use personally) and they messed up the profile so my mods are broken when installed by CKAN.

Oh dear, I don't suppose you can tell me which ones? There's really no reason to be doing this, and if they're already on github then we can index them from there, and if they're not we can always do a manual index. I've been off the net for a few days for mental health reasons, and it looks like we've had a huge influx in contributions, so I've got quite a CKAN backlog to catch up on. I've noticed a few tickets from you so I'll be prioritising those first. Thank you so much for bringing this to my attention.

~ Paul

[Hoaz]

Hey Hoaz, how's it going? Is the issue still present? If so, I encourage you to open a github ticket, it's harder for us to miss / forget it

Hey. it still persists, but there is something peculiar about it. So, I tried downloading something on steam at the same time and , of course, my download went significantly down on CKAN (as expected)... but the error still happened. This time it happened a lot earlier into the download. The error seems to be based on time. After a certain amount of time has passed the error I posted above will pop up. Of course, downloading larger packs like the Realism Overhaul would prompt me that error. Is there anything you could do? Thanks! also, I will post a ticket just in-case ;-)

EDIT: Sorry, I cannot make a ticket because I am not a registered member on github. I certainly hope you'll notice this post! Thanks.

Edited December 22, 2014 by Hoaz

[Diazo]

Oh dear, I don't suppose you can tell me which ones? There's really no reason to be doing this, and if they're already on github then we can index them from there, and if they're not we can always do a manual index. I've been off the net for a few days for mental health reasons, and it looks like we've had a huge influx in contributions, so I've got quite a CKAN backlog to catch up on. I've noticed a few tickets from you so I'll be prioritising those first. Thank you so much for bringing this to my attention.

~ Paul

I've gotten the fix in and all the typos fixed so it passes the build check now, that thing's strict!

It's NetKAN pull request 281 for reference.

Thanks for this,

D.

edit: Which apparently you were adding as I typed this post, everything's good now.

[Ippo]

EDIT: Sorry, I cannot make a ticket because I am not a registered member on github. I certainly hope you'll notice this post! Thanks.

It's okay, I can open one for you

I'll just need you to give me detailed reproduction steps: can you please tell me step by step what you are doing exactly to trigger the error? We need to know so we can replicate it and figure it out

[marce]

CIT-Util? That would be me. I absolutely take responsibility for this. The CIT Utils are a dependency of other mods, notably many by RoverDude. One thing we try not to do is use bundled mods, it breaks our consistency model, and it means if a mod author releases an update, players can access that update immediately. What's more, making sure that a mod has its own metadata means that the author gets proper attribution for the work in question; players can visit the mod homepage and source repository, view the license and author, and otherwise see information which is more obscured when the mod is bundled.

Unfortunately, this was during a time when we were gearing up for launch. At approximately ~300 hours into development, with a growing team of developers, and myself being chronically low on sleep to make sure that our system worked, I certainly can and did make slip-ups. Not contacting you was impolite of me, and I wholeheartedly and unreservedly apologise for that. I am sorry.

~ Paul

Hi Paul,

thanks for your apology. Rest assured I don't have any hard feeling.

I didn't have time to look at what I have to do to use CKAN yet plus I finished my own mod download page about a day before you went public with CKAN so I wasn't too motivated to change everything immediately again.

Well, I was just a little upset to hear from a user "hey, since CIT-Util is already on CKAN can you add the others as well" today without me knowing about it.

I understand your point since I avoid bundling myself at all costs (not even MM or Toolbar are bundled with my mods but I request the user get them by themselves).

You can certainly keep the package you have now, breaking peoples mods is nothing I want to do. But please make sure to update it to the latest version every time I release one (mostly hotfixes/recompiles at the moment).

I will try to look into CKAN as soon as I can and create official packages. However, since I'm still swamped with work I don't expect that to happen soon^TM

Nevertheless, I'd like to ask not to add more packages of my mods until I'm ready to do it myself. To support my user base I want to be in control of what gets distributed where and when.

So, I'll eventually come to it, but want to do it myself.

[Hoaz]

Step 1) Get a fresh install of KSP (delete everything in steam folder and reinstall)

Step 2) put CKAN.EXE in the installation folder of KSP

Step 3) MAKE SURE you throttle your download speed to say 1 mb/s for CKAN.exe

Step 4) Run CKAN.exe, REFRESH and find your way to "Realism Overhaul"

Step 5) Check the "installed" box and press "go to changes"

Step 6) Press Continue on the first page

Step 6.1) Uncheck the TACLS on the second page and proceed

step 6.2) Make sure nothing is checked on the third page and proceed

Step 7) Wait and pretend it is a normal process.. Towards the end of the download (sometimes it can carry into the installation process) The error posted earlier will pop up. Prompting you to dismiss it. Pressing dismiss will crash CKAN.exe.

KSP version 0.90 - Steam edition

WIN 7 64 BIT

18 GB DDR3 1600 Mhz

(yes I have more than enough space to download the mods)

I believe it is a timed error. Good luck!

Sincerely,

Hoaz.

Edited December 22, 2014 by Hoaz

[pjf]

So, I'm still catching up on everything, so apologies that this post will be a lot of responses together.

Sorry about the poor communication: we'll try to keep an eye open in the future to try to ensure that forks have the author's consent.

Oh drat. So I was going to say that we didn't fork anything, but it looks like I did exact that. Marce, I doubly apologise. I honestly thought that we had just indexed the file directly from your site. Doing a repack and indexing that absolutely breaks good etiquette, and having that come from me is particularly bad form. I am so sorry.

You rock. I'm so glad you reported this, because I know exactly what this is. I'll open an issue now, and with luck we'll get it fixed by the next release. In the meantime, the command-line shouldn't have these timeout issues (although it's not as easy to use).

nlight said something on IRC about travis (our build system) acting up and doing strange things...

That was originally due to CKAN and travis being great friends, and them both having very particular ideas about what CKAN version numbers should look like, and that they must start with a v. They did the right thing when a build was accidentally created which was missing this. (We use the build internally for a number of things, including figuring out which spec files to read.) However they were just plain stubborn when a release was made with the correctly formatted version number, but sharing the same commit ID as the malformed number. (The solution here is to manually remove the oopsed tag and get travis to restart the build, but we've only had to do that once.)

Oh drat, 04:30am in Australia! I'm going to have to dash again. Thank you all for your support and bug reports, you all rock!

~ Paul

[Ippo]

Quick question on the CKAN/Kerbalstuff integration, and the presence of mods in the CKAN list...

I saw that Ambient Light Adjustment updated on KerbalStuff and has a "CKAN" tag next to its name. However, I don't see it in CKAN at all.

On the other side, my mods, such as Modular Rocket Systems, which is in CKAN for sure, doesn't have a tag on KerbalStuff.

Just curious how all of this is controlled, and why I'm not seeing some mods in CKAN that supposedly are there (I checked the various filters, such as incompatible, all, not installed, etc).

Thanks!

Hey, I just remembered seeing your post and forgetting to reply

So, at this moment KS integration is only and completely done on KS' side of the thing, and we have no control over it. What's happening is that the awesome SirCmpwn has written a bot that, when a new mod is created, creates a pull request to our NetKAN repository (example) and adds a badge to the mod's page on KS, apparently without checking if we have already accepted the file or not. Older mods have not been added by the bot and thus have no badge yet, althout SirCmpwn has stated in the KS thread that he'll do it eventually.

Hope this answers your question

[Hoaz]

Hey thanks for the reply PJF. I was wondering, however, how do I access the command-line through CKAN?

[Beetlecat]

Hey thanks for the reply PJF. I was wondering, however, how do I access the command-line through CKAN?

simply run the exe from a shell prompt (with the proper commands)

[Diazo]

Alright, this is a confluence of several threads, but it's crystallized into the question of mod version vs. KSP version control.

Specifically, my AGX mod must install version 1.24c to run on KSP 0.25 and the latest version (1.25d currently) to run on KSP 0.90

I currently have AGX tagged as "KSP Version: any", so at the moment if CKAN is being run for a KSP 0.25 install, it will install AGX 1.25d which will fail to run as 1.25d requires KSP 0.90

Is CKAN capable of handling this? If so, how? If not, should it?

D.

[hakan]

Actually, pretty easily.

AGX-1.24c.ckan has

...
"version" : "1.24c",
"ksp_version" : "0.25"
...

in it, and AGX-1.25d.ckan has

...
"version" : "1.25d",
"ksp_version" : "0.90"
...

If you write a netkan for AGX and have your releases on Kerbalstuff, and mark your releases with the proper version numbers, there is a pretty good chance that the netkan-bot will automatically create the above ckan files for you.

What I am not sure is, though, whether it would go and create ckans for all the releases, thereby giving you both, or considers only the latest release. Need to experiment here.

[Diazo]

Ohh, I missed a step in that the NetKAN is not the file the client downloads, rather the server uses that to create the actual files downloaded and tags it appropriately.

Checking my AGExt files in the CKAN Meta repository, it looks like the version are tagged correctly, so I assume that if the NetKAN has a KSP version of "any", that CKAN assumes the most recent version of KSP when it makes the meta data. (Big assumption, but looks right.)

Also, is there any provisions for cleaning up old meta data? I have 13 entries for my AGX mod alone in there already.

D.

[Ippo]

Ohh, I missed a step in that the NetKAN is not the file the client downloads, rather the server uses that to create the actual files downloaded and tags it appropriately.

Checking my AGExt files in the CKAN Meta repository, it looks like the version are tagged correctly, so I assume that if the NetKAN has a KSP version of "any", that CKAN assumes the most recent version of KSP when it makes the meta data. (Big assumption, but looks right.)

Also, is there any provisions for cleaning up old meta data? I have 13 entries for my AGX mod alone in there already.

D.

Actually, it is our policy to avoid deleting metadata unless there's a really compelling reason to do it. Having metadata for old versions allows users to downgrade to a given version if they so desire, plus it creates a real "archive" of mods and their relative versions.

So we'd like to keep the old metadata (the client will install the latest by default anyway), unless there's some particular reason to want those unavailable

[hakan]

Checking my AGExt files in the CKAN Meta repository, it looks like the version are tagged correctly, so I assume that if the NetKAN has a KSP version of "any", that CKAN assumes the most recent version of KSP when it makes the meta data. (Big assumption, but looks right.)

Aaaaaaaaaaah, yes, big assumption on my side too that the version checker code would consider an empty "ksp_version" as infinitely big... But don't quote me on it

Also, is there any provisions for cleaning up old meta data? I have 13 entries for my AGX mod alone in there already.

Nope, we try to keep version indefinitely. If something really really needs to be deleted, you need to set up a pull request with a "git rm" in it, but the consensus is to keep the ckans, assuming we can download the zip files, too. If the zip itself is gone, there is not much we can do about it anymore.

Besides mirrors of course, but that's another can of worms that you never did hear me opening

[Diazo]

Okay, it turns out my assumption was wrong. The KSP Version in the netkan is ported straight across to the CKAN meta data.

What tripped me up in my last post is that someone else updated AGX NetKAN from KSP Version 0.25 to Version 0.90

Are there procedures for updating the meta data? Because I've been using the KSP Version 'any' tag, there are some wrong tags on my mods.

TWR1 for instance, verison 1.15 is ksp 0.25, version 1.16 is ksp 0.90, but the meta data for both have a ksp version of 'any'

D.

Edited December 22, 2014 by Diazo