openmw.cfg data= line on Mac and "smart" quotes

[Koolasamoose]

Struggling a great deal with adding in official mods "masterindex" and other official ones (Helm of Tohan and Adamantium Armor). If you go download those, you find they fit the description of how a mod folder is supposed to be organized, with the .esp in the top level of the folder and the subsidiary folders for meshes and textures and the others (that are used by that mod) all organized correctly.

Yet, no matter where I put them, the mod would not show up.

Another note, I am not exactly youthful and my eyes are are not quite as good as they used to be, so I missed this until I really got to looking...

I finally saw it

When I use TextEdit.app to add the data="..." line, I finally noticed the fact that, when I typed the closing double-quote mark, just like the "helpful" capabilities in word processors, the text editor "helpfully" changed them to smart quotes. I then had to go in and "highlight" each smart quote and change them back to " (by just highlight them and typing over them - and NOT hitting a space bar - by clicking AWAY rather than space bar, I do not allow the TextEdit.app program to modify what I typed).

Anyway, when I did that, it worked. Then I decided to "double-check" it by doing the next one (ebartifact, Helm of Tohan). I opened up the configuration file and manually typed the line and, lo and behold, when I typed that closing double-quote, it changed them to be smart quotes on that new line - like this:
encoding=win1252
data="/Users/charlesmeade/Library/Application Support/openmw/data"
data="/Users/charlesmeade/Documents/openmw/masterindex"
data=“/Users/charlesmeade/Documents/openmw/ebartifact”
content=Morrowind.esm
content=Tribunal.esm
content=Bloodmoon.esm
content=master_index.esp

LOOK VERY CAREFULLY at the quote marks around the ebartifact data line - you will see they look SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT than the ones on the other lines.

Of course, this is NOT a problem with OpenMW - it is just a "helpful feature" (I mean that sarcastically) that thinks that it is OK for a text editor to behave like a word processor. Oh well, at least I figured it out - select EACH of those and make sure they are normal double-quote marks by overtyping them and making sure the normal double-quote mark appears.

Now, I will try it by copying the earlier line and only editing that last part (I am designating one place to put all mods that I want working like this).

Just thought it might help some future MAC user - to understand that the TextEdit.app is "helping" you in a very unhelpful way in this case.

[AnyOldName3]

And here I thought I was getting another tester for the weird data= quotes bug...

Anyway, I'm glad that you managed to sort out your issue. Thanks for posting here so others can find out more easily.

[silentthief]

Should this be added to the FAQ or stickied? (any opinions? Unsure who handles FAQ but perhaps sticky. moderators, psi29a?)

It sounds like an annoying niche problem that would be hard to troubleshoot (kudos to the OP for the find, btw) which MAC users may run into in the future.

ST

[Jyby]

Stickied. Although we may want to put this in a better place.

Perhaps note in the wiki where we discuss adding omwmods.

In the future hopefully we shouldn't have to mess with data strings.. A mod directory would do..

Perhaps even compressing mods and their data into the omwaddon file

[Koolasamoose]

Thanks for the comments and I am glad that this may help others. This is not my first coding/configuration troubleshooting exercise. I do remember, vividly, the COBOL dumps we had to read through, all that EBCDIC hex code, way back before all my hair turned gray. Hmm, how are those related?

Anyway, I wanted to come back in and thank this team for what you have done. Morrowind was the first game I played like this and it still draws me back. I find that this software is well done indeed. Morrowind on Windows XP played well. But on Windows 7, it just crashes from time-to-time, so I had developed a strong "stop-and-save" habit. I still have it, but I have yet to experience that "teleport-and-crash" or "finish-a-quest-and-crash" behavior that I was getting on Windows 7. Now I will just play it all on OpenMW

Thanks for the wonderful recreation and I hope you all have great fun.

[Atahualpa]

Anyway, I wanted to come back in and thank this team for what you have done. Morrowind was the first game I played like this and it still draws me back. I find that this software is well done indeed. Morrowind on Windows XP played well. But on Windows 7, it just crashes from time-to-time, so I had developed a strong "stop-and-save" habit. I still have it, but I have yet to experience that "teleport-and-crash" or "finish-a-quest-and-crash" behavior that I was getting on Windows 7. Now I will just play it all on OpenMW

That's more or less the same for me.
While recording the release videos or testing mods, I have to go back to vanilla Morrowind from time to time. -- It's horrible. Not the game, of course, but the overall handling and the engine's stability on Windows (7). Anyway, it's nice to get such positive feedback, especially for our hard-working developers!

Should this be added to the FAQ or stickied?

Well, come up with a nice FAQ entry and upload it here. I bet lgro will add it to our FAQ section.

[Ravenwing]

The most appropriate place for this is in the modding documentation we've started on ReadTheDocs. I personally think unless another person or two comes across this we shouldn't add it to the FAQ as it's quite long already. It's hard enough getting people to understand the fact that OpenMW isn't a mod I'll go ahead and add a note explaining this in the documentation next time I get a chance.

As a side note, if anyone comes across stuff like this that we might want to add to user docs, please PM me to look at the thread. I try to keep up but I don't read all the forum sections and almost missed this.

[Jyby]

The most appropriate place for this is in the modding documentation we've started on ReadTheDocs. I personally think unless another person or two comes across this we shouldn't add it to the FAQ as it's quite long already. It's hard enough getting people to understand the fact that OpenMW isn't a mod I'll go ahead and add a note explaining this in the documentation next time I get a chance.

As a side note, if anyone comes across stuff like this that we might want to add to user docs, please PM me to look at the thread. I try to keep up but I don't read all the forum sections and almost missed this.

Post a link when you get it in and I'll unstickie this topic.

[Atahualpa]

The most appropriate place for this is in the modding documentation we've started on ReadTheDocs. I personally think unless another person or two comes across this we shouldn't add it to the FAQ as it's quite long already. It's hard enough getting people to understand the fact that OpenMW isn't a mod I'll go ahead and add a note explaining this in the documentation next time I get a chance.

That's why we should improve the FAQ section and add a dedicated trouble-shooting subsection. I don't think that anyone is going to read the documentation first, leading to more identical questions in our forums.

[Jyby]

The most appropriate place for this is in the modding documentation we've started on ReadTheDocs. I personally think unless another person or two comes across this we shouldn't add it to the FAQ as it's quite long already. It's hard enough getting people to understand the fact that OpenMW isn't a mod I'll go ahead and add a note explaining this in the documentation next time I get a chance.

That's why we should improve the FAQ section and add a dedicated trouble-shooting subsection. I don't think that anyone is going to read the documentation first, leading to more identical questions in our forums.

We could have FAQ point to an OpenMW installation instructions and configuration section. With an FAQ question that's general, "I'm having trouble installing mods." and "how do i install the game?"