Online league file clarification

[molarmite]

Ok, it's up and ready for you to try. Tell me how long it takes to download too please.

[sporr]

I've checked the boxes to include Team files, but the archive won't include the txt/teams information no matter what I do. It includes the league and players folders, but not teams. Is this a known issue? Am I doing something wrong?

[battists]

Originally Posted by molarmite

www.globalbaseballleague.com

Is this still the link, molarmite? It's coming up with a 404 error...

[molarmite]

Yea, you must've just missed it. I'm not the webmaster of the site, someone else wanted to do it, and he provided the webspace, design, etc. However he hasn't been around lately and now I guess he didn't make a payment so they shut it down for now. I could upload it some place else if you want. Hopefully I can get this worked out though.

[battists]

molarmite,

You could ftp it to SI's ftp site. There are instructions stickied in the 2006 FAQ forum. Don't have a link handy this instant, but take a peek!

[molarmite]

I'll do that tonight, or maybe I'll get lucky and they'll put the site back up for a little bit for me.

[sporr]

Alright, after using these methods for a month of game time, I have to ask. I notice that names.dat doesn't seem to be necessary after the initial league file is created for the season.

1) Are there other dat files that don't really change? It seems that the modified date on every file changes each sim regardless of whether the file actually changed. For example, all of the messages show the current date/time though not all of them are truly new.

2) Is it true you can delete the message.dat file and the game will recreate it with all messages?

3) Any other tips on putting together a stripped down league file?

4) If you include page_links won't owners only have YOUR bookmarks?

5) What do you upload history wise and how often? I miss the 15+Ks and 3 HR games and stuff, but it seems that you have to create the full history just to get those HTML pages for uploading (and that's a LOT of files!). I'm thinking of just uploading a full history once per season like CATO used to do.

6) When you enter a "Folder to copy files into" directory, isn't it supposed to CREATE the files there? Posts above seem to suggest this, but when I create the reports they still go in the league file folders.

In-game doesn't cut it because it leaves out team news files.

[battists]

Sporr,

This won't answer all of your questions, but the latest revision of the Game Guide has some detailed info on what needs to be in the league file. That might help you shrink the file some...

Steve

[Stu]

I'll comment based on what I understand:

1) I havn't been brave enough to try leaving any of them out.

2) Again, havn't tried it. What I understand is when you delete messages.dat it will recreate it from the current messages, thus getting rid of all those blank messages the game leaves behind when you delete them from in the game.

3) I've been doing it in game. I keep my html files up to date so anything people can't get in the game is on the website

4) Correct. Don't include Page_links or it will overwrite their bookmarks.

5) I upload when I have some extra time, maybe every couple months in game. If you're going to only do it once a year make sure to wait until the offseason is over. The history doesn't click over until you get to next years preseason I think. When you can see the awards in game for the previous year, it's safe to upload. Before then alot of stuff will be left out.

6) Havn't used this option.

[sporr]

Originally Posted by Stu

I'll comment based on what I understand:

1) I havn't been brave enough to try leaving any of them out.

2) Again, havn't tried it. What I understand is when you delete messages.dat it will recreate it from the current messages, thus getting rid of all those blank messages the game leaves behind when you delete them from in the game.

3) I've been doing it in game. I keep my html files up to date so anything people can't get in the game is on the website

4) Correct. Don't include Page_links or it will overwrite their bookmarks.

5) I upload when I have some extra time, maybe every couple months in game. If you're going to only do it once a year make sure to wait until the offseason is over. The history doesn't click over until you get to next years preseason I think. When you can see the awards in game for the previous year, it's safe to upload. Before then alot of stuff will be left out.

6) Havn't used this option.

Thanks for the info. Even though it doesn't state this in the game manual, the archive screen seems to suggest that names.dat is only necessary once per season when new players are created (and maybe once after the amateurs are generated?). Also, if you can safely delete messages and the messages.dat, then where is this information stored in order to allow it to be regenerated? I may have to do some testing with the other dat files to see which of them change and which ones don't need included...

[battists]

Originally Posted by sporr

Thanks for the info. Even though it doesn't state this in the game manual, the archive screen seems to suggest that names.dat is only necessary once per season when new players are created (and maybe once after the amateurs are generated?). Also, if you can safely delete messages and the messages.dat, then where is this information stored in order to allow it to be regenerated? I may have to do some testing with the other dat files to see which of them change and which ones don't need included...

I wish I had better answers for you, but this is one area I'm not quite sure about myself. Please let me know if you do find out more...

[Mosey]

Has anyone made a third party app to do this? My VB skills have gone downhill to the point they aren't useful any more.

Thinking function for:
- game logs vs not
- boxscores vs not
- choose the league (so it is set once and saved)
- Archive old files? or rename to the same file name each time.

If there isn't a third party app that picks and chooses these files and adds them to a zip file so I can just upload that (Windows explorer FTP is actually nice for drag and drop these days).

I'll go so far as to say if there isn't one created I'll put 10 bucks in the hopper to bribe someone to do it.


Also, can php unzip files and put them in the right place for the HTML files?

Originally Posted by Stu

Ok here's what I found. I'm going to go through directory by directory on what should be included, should be left out and stuff you have the option of leaving out.

This test was done with a 20 team league with 3 levels of minor leagues.

Notes:
- Zipped League file at start was 4.7 MB
- Zipped League file at season's end was 7.7 MB, without html box scores and game logs
- You should create and upload your html reports before deleting anything.
- You should keep a "master" copy of the league on your PC that contains all box scores and game logs. You can also divide these up by year.

[sporr]

Alright. Haven't fully tested this, but it appears that the only files that change in size from sim to sim are:

players.dat
messages.dat
scouting.dat
teams.dat

The big ones that we might be able to leave out are world.dat and names.dat. I'll have to check.

[Stu]

Originally Posted by sporr

Alright. Haven't fully tested this, but it appears that the only files that change in size from sim to sim are:

players.dat
messages.dat
scouting.dat
teams.dat

The big ones that we might be able to leave out are world.dat and names.dat. I'll have to check.

Good info Sporr. We're in the middle of the 2nd season and the league file is up to about 10 MB. I can see this is a major problem going forward if it keeps growing by 3 MB a year.