How to patch the sim and update your .ini files (if you have the old ones).

[Blackdog_kt]

I spend most of my time testing stuff instead of actually flying the sim and i occasionally come up with some worthwhile stuff that might be beneficial to others.

I got a lot of positive reaction about this subject when posting it on another thread, along with fears that it will get buried among other posts, so i took the liberty of re-posting it here on its own thread.

You can also find it hosted on airwarfare.com and i thank Gamekeeper for copying whatever posts of mine he finds useful over there, as the more visible some fixes are the more typing time it saves me (i don't have to retype every solution as much if more people know about it) to actually fly instead of just test things out

First of all, a small note on the issue of the .ini files: If you have download your copy from Steam after the previous official patch was applied (around the end of May i think it was), then most probably you have the new configuration files. If you have installed the sim earlier than May or had Steam apply at least one official patch before the June 21st beta patch, then it's possible that your installation has the old config files.

You can just uninstall and download the whole thing again from Steam if you find the instructions confusing, but they are pretty simple and they will save you time (and bandwidth, if you are not on a unlimited bandwidth ISP package).

So, let's get to it then!

This is the Install, Patching, Repair & Backup section of Airwarfare.com where you can also find other useful guides: http://airwarfare.com/sow/index.php?...=66&Itemid=156


And this is my original post:

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

Just had a very small test and will keep flying during the night to see if there's any gameplay-issue improvements (Ju88 gyrocompass, bomb release joystick buttons working from bombardier's seat, etc).

I got my first launcher.exe crash today but i fixed it simply by restarting the sim, it plays the same as before (smooth on mostly medium settings on my 2 year old PC:i7 920, Ati 4890 1GB and 3GB of RAM, win7 64 bit) and everything looks good in regards to FPS, i even bumped one of my low settings to medium.



I also had to get the new .ini files (i didn't do it in the previous patch) that do away with a lot of redundant fields. I prefer to get everything in a working order first so i can actually test stuff, instead of having preventable errors give me "false alarms". There is by now a standard routine i do and every patch has been an improvement for me.

First, how to get the new .ini files (the configuration files). If you have only recently downloaded your copy from Steam you probably don't need to do this, i had mine installed early though so i had to change them:

1) Launch the sim, go to controls and select "save as", then tell it to save an .ini file somewhere you can easily find it. I had actually done this a long time ago, saving a "mycontrols.ini" file in my documents folder.

2) Go to documents\1c softclub folder and move the files conf.ini, confs.ini, confuser.ini to a backup folder.

3) Do the same for the files of the same name in steam\steamapps\common\IL-2 sturmovik cliffs of dover, moving them to their own backup folder.

4) Run the steam file verification tool . This will spot you are missing the .ini files (since you moved them to another location) and download the new ones. I have opened and compared the old and new files and their structure is different, so i can confirm this will give you the new files without having to mess with steam cloud settings, just keep the cloud thing off altogether.

5) Probably all your settings have now been reset. Go to controls and load the .ini file containing your previously saved control bindings, then click on the apply button. In my case it happened to keep them stored anyway. My realism settings and graphics options had also been reset so i had to reselect them and i think my transparent on-screen windows also changed so i'll have to customize them again. All in all it's less than 5 minutes of work for a cleaner, leaner config file structure so it's worth it.

I don't know if all this affects single-player career progress but i think it doesn't: i accidentally skipped a mission once and i manually edited another file to revert back to the previous "step" in the campaign but it was a completely different file, so i don't think campaign progress has been affected.

6) EXIT THE SIM. This is probably why i got a launcher crash the first time around (i had just applied the beta patch too, further complicating things) i didn't exit after changing graphics options and tried to fly a mission right away. Next time i just changed settings, restarted the sim and all was fine. It's generally a good habit to restart the sim when changing graphics options.


To get the beta patch up and running:

1) Assuming you have up to date .ini files keep reading, otherwise follow the above routine first.

2) Even if you have current .ini files, make sure you are as close to a stock installation as possible. I run with no mods (i am waiting for the SDK first) so it's relatively easy. I just backup anything i might want to keep or fear i might lose (mainly my controls settings), then run the Steam file verification tool.

3) Extract the beta patch file into the main game folder (steam\steamapps\common\IL-2 sturmovik cliffs of dover) and let it over-write anything it asks you to.

4) Go to documents\1c softclub\cache, select everything under that folder and delete it. This forces the sim to rebuild the shader cache and will prevent problems with graphic glitches and/or FPS that may be caused by running a newer version with cached shaders of a previous version.

Please do this before claiming visual bugs, reduced performance, etc, as it helps A LOT: i've never had degraded performance ever, every new patch is smoother than the last and i'm running a two year old PC.

This cache clean-up happens automatically when you install a live, official patch from Steam but i'm not sure if it happens with beta patches, so i do it manually just to be sure.

5) Start flying


When the patch goes live on Steam:
1) Either revert to the previous version by using the file verification tool, or just patch on top of the beta one.

2) Clear your cache

3) Go flying


I hope it helps some of the people having problems, it's been immensely helpful for me so i thought i'd pass it on.

Important Edit: Whatever you can test OFFLINE, do so. It's perfectly possible to join a server running a previous version when you are running a newer version beta patch and this will give you all sorts of glitches. You might be able to join but that doesn't mean the two versions are always compatible with each other. Luthier himself said so in one of the previous updates. So, test the aircraft behavior offline and when you go online to test multiplayer specific issues, make sure the server is also running the same version as you are.

Bug reports from multiplayer are pretty much worthless if the server and client are not running the same version. It's also why i don't go online yet, i spend most of my time not flying/playing the sim but testing, bug-hunting and compiling a FAQ for when the US release happens to help get people up to speed fast, so i don't want to have all kinds of "false alarms" caused by incompatible versions and/or mods when trying to see what works, what doesn't and how i can work around any remaining issues.

I would urge everyone who is having problems to try this out. I'm not claiming it will work for everyone, but a couple users already reported better results and so i guess it's no harm to try it.

It is also useful for another reason that TUSA/TX-Gunslinger pointed out: if we follow a more or less standardized way of updating our sim, it's much more probable that our individual installations will be on the same page.

This makes for a greater commonality among the user base and eliminating problems that might simply be setup/installation issues and not directly problems of the underlying code. For example, a lot of bugs (especially display/graphics bugs) and even launcher.exe crashes can be prevented by forcing a rebuild of the shader cache when updating to a new version.

If we can prevent these bugs we can not only enjoy a better simming experience, but we can also spot the true bugs in an easier manner and report them to the developer team for fixing.

Feel free to try this out, copy it on your fansite, sticky it, etc: the more visibility it has the less likely it is i'll have to retype it sometime down the road when another user is having troubles with updating or getting preventable bugs

Hope it gets at least some people who are facing problems up and running