Play withSIX Community Preview [Evolution of SIX Launcher and in time also SU]

[Sickboy]

Play withSIX Community Preview Released!

- Now with ARMA 3 Alpha support! http://forums.bistudio.com/showthrea...a-Support-more!

Play.withSIX.com

Feedback and reports warmly welcome, we await your participation! http://getsatisfaction.withsix.com/

Introduction

Play withSIX is a brand new application, providing several new features, some of which are unseen before,
while others are majorly enhanced compared to our previous projects, namely SIX Launcher.
One of many new features and enhancements are the included social features like buddy list, see your friends playing and join them, or have a chat.

All presented in a brand new UI and improved user experience.

With the community preview we would like to gather feedback, bug reports, and basically test our new code base and infrastructure.
In the coming weeks we will be releasing fixes and improvements based on your valued feedback,
While design and functionality is also still being improved and finalized.

Also, starting at a future milestone release, we will start introducing functionality that has currently only been available in SIX Updater,
eventually making the old tools obsolete.

Noteable changes in usage/behavior compared to SIX Launcher:

• The software no longer forces or requires Administrator rights to run or operate.
  (Though if you wish to install to protected folders, currently you'll have to run the program manually as admin, or change the permisssions)
• The default Mod installation path has moved to the My Documents\ArmA 2 folder, the by BI recommended location for custom files
• Verify is no longer a required step after each start of the program
• The auto-update experience should be much enhanced

[Banshee]

I love it!

[kylania]

Congrats on yet another awesome tool.

[[TcB]-Psycho-]

Awesome!

[VirtualVikingX]

Wow. This seems most excellent. Cant wait to get back home and try it out. Outstanding work SB.

[[APS]Gnat]

Great work SB.

The default Mod installation path has moved to the My Documents\ArmA 2 folder, the by BI recommended location for custom files

Huh? Can you explain this please. You mean all @Mod folders should be moved to the MyDoc/ArmA directory, not in the root directory of ArmA?
.... if so, a lot of other tools are going to stop working ..... not sure I like that.

[Sickboy]

Great work SB.

Thanks, it's a team effort really!

Huh? Can you explain this please. You mean all @Mod folders should be moved to the MyDoc/ArmA directory, not in the root directory of ArmA?
.... if so, a lot of other tools are going to stop working ..... not sure I like that.

It's only a default, if you prefer a different folder, like the game folder, just change the Mod Path override to that folder, it's available in the Game Selection screen.
However in that case make sure the program has permissions to write to that folder, or manually start the software as administrator (can also make it always start as admin by changing the option in Compatibility settings of the shortcut/exe).
This will be detected and handled automatically in the future

[zoog]

oh yes looking good so far

Maybe it just needs to get some getting used to, but I'm not sure if I like how the programs interface is dynamic depending on what you click on the left hand side (select game, select mods, select server). This makes it a bit disorganized if you know what I mean. Suddenly expanding the interface depending on where you click. Maybe it's more intuitive if you have the tabs like "games" "servers" all together in the top right? Instead of only the tab once you've selected that particular part with the big buttons to the left?

I don't know. Interfaces are very hard to design, especially intuitive ones. Need to toy with it some more. All in all GREAT STEPS FORWARD! We need this stuff.

[doveman]

[[*]The default Mod installation path has moved to the My Documents\ArmA 2 folder, the by BI recommended location for custom files

Yeah, I wish devs (i.e. BI) wouldn't do this as having My Documents filled with tons of folders for games/applications makes it hard to find your actual documents (I've had to make a sub-folder called Personal to put all my documents in, to separate them from all the technical junk). Some games now put stuff in Users\x\Saved Games but that's a bit obscure and hard to find. I guess we really need a My Games folder that's as easy to get to as My Documents (and then for devs to observe it!).

Anyway, I ran into a bug after changing the Mods path to D:\Games\ArmA 2 Operation Arrowhead as it still looked to My Docs\Arma 2 which didn't have anything in it so it downloaded the beta and PR to there. After restarting Play withSIX the change seems to have taken and now it recognises I already have ACE installed (which I synced with SU the other day), and recognises I44 and wants to update it (this hasn't been synced and doesn't have a rsync subfolder) but doesn't recognise Unsung (which also has never been synced). I don't know if it's because @I44 has two files in the root as well as the addons folder (i44mod.paa and mod.cpp), whilst @Unsung only has the addons folder).

It seems PWS only supports a few complete overhaul mods, so I'm still going to need to use Arma II Launcher most of the time for Single Player, so that I can enable a set of mods required by specific missions/campaigns, COWarMod, etc.

Don't want to sound too negative though, for what it does PWS looks very good and I'm sure the Server Browser in particular will be a great help

[Sickboy]

oh yes looking good so far

Maybe it just needs to get some getting used to, but I'm not sure if I like how the programs interface is dynamic depending on what you click on the left hand side (select game, select mods, select server). This makes it a bit disorganized if you know what I mean. Suddenly expanding the interface depending on where you click. Maybe it's more intuitive if you have the tabs like "games" "servers" all together in the top right? Instead of only the tab once you've selected that particular part with the big buttons to the left?

I don't know. Interfaces are very hard to design, especially intuitive ones. Need to toy with it some more. All in all GREAT STEPS FORWARD! We need this stuff.

Cheers mate and gotcha! Will stay tuned ;-)

---------- Post added at 00:02 ---------- Previous post was at 23:59 ----------

Yeah, I wish devs (i.e. BI) wouldn't do this as having My Documents filled with tons of folders for games/applications makes it hard to find your actual documents (I've had to make a sub-folder called Personal to put all my documents in, to separate them from all the technical junk). Some games now put stuff in Users\x\Saved Games but that's a bit obscure and hard to find. I guess we really need a My Games folder that's as easy to get to as My Documents (and then for devs to observe it!).

Anyway, I ran into a bug after changing the Mods path to D:\Games\ArmA 2 Operation Arrowhead as it still looked to My Docs\Arma 2 which didn't have anything in it so it downloaded the beta and PR to there. After restarting Play withSIX the change seems to have taken and now it recognises I already have ACE installed (which I synced with SU the other day), and recognises I44 and wants to update it (this hasn't been synced and doesn't have a rsync subfolder) but doesn't recognise Unsung (which also has never been synced). I don't know if it's because @I44 has two files in the root as well as the addons folder (i44mod.paa and mod.cpp), whilst @Unsung only has the addons folder).

It seems PWS only supports a few complete overhaul mods, so I'm still going to need to use Arma II Launcher most of the time for Single Player, so that I can enable a set of mods required by specific missions/campaigns, COWarMod, etc.

Don't want to sound too negative though, for what it does PWS looks very good and I'm sure the Server Browser in particular will be a great help

Cheers mate, and understood, the limitations and issues will be resolved in the coming time.
Support for the full set of mods as available on the SIX Updater network will be available to PwS as well as "Local Mods", aka mods that do not exist on the network, but the user has them manually installed.