Libs redundancy in addons

corradini.lucab16_ESO · May 2020

Heya,

I have the following doubt: I unzipped various libraries in the appropriate folder ("addons" in documents; I actually created a subfolder in there called "libraries" to keep them divided from the proper mods) and everything works correctly. But what about those mods that still include a "libs" folder with libraries I already have? Can I safely delete those "libs" subfolders from the mods directory to keep everything a bit more ordered and clean?

Thanks

daim · May 2020

I assume you're not using Minion then. I would lose my mind updating them manually ^_^

TBH I would ask this at ESOUI if you wont get an answer here. As far as I know for the most part it should be ok but some addons might break at least.. but I might be incorrect. There's probably no benefit for doing so except keeping things tidy.

You can of course experiment by taking a backup of your live folder and restore it if things go wrong.

Or then https://www.esoui.com/downloads/info2466-DeleteRedundantLibs.html

Baertram commented there though and said:

I agree with you the author should maintain this but if your tool is deleting the libs and is not making the addon be dependent on it anymore (as direct calls to the lib files in the addon's txt is not creating any dependency in the ingame addon manager) it most likely will just break the addon.

So at least adding/changing an exisitng line and add to the end of would be needed, or your tool got just a 25% chance to make things better (depending on how and when the authors included the libs in their code):

corradini.lucab16_ESO · May 2020

Ahh, yes, I went to the link you wrote and I see why it could cause troubles, thanks

Personally, I don't find manual updates particularly troublesome: I download all the zipped addons in folders with the related name; Then I simply unzip them in the "addons" folder in documents. ESOUI warns if mods were updated, anyway.

But yeah, Minion is convenient too: the only problem is that it doesn't detect subfolders in "AddOns": like I said in the previous message, I created a subfolder there called "libraries" to keep them apart from mods, so when I open Minion I can see the normal mods, but not the libraries because they're located in a subfolder

Baertram · July 2020

Libraries included may be okey if they use their own txt file.
If not, they most likely always load and break other addons:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/6859733/#Comment_6859733

Read this e.g.:
https://wiki.esoui.com/Libraries#Providing_libraries_.28standalone_.2F_bundled_with_addon.2C_but_how.3F.29

And important:
If you manually update addons and libs ALWAYS delete the old folders FIRST! Or it may keep old files and load them, destroying the addons/libs.
Minion e.g. will always delete the folder in AddOns before updating them.
Oh and once you switch from manualy to Minion it will most probably not find the libraries in your AddOns/libs folder!
You need to install them directly to AddOns.