How do you keep track of your addons?

[ThrottleUp]

Im starting to get overwhelmed and confused now and then when trying to figure out what addons I have and dont have. Freeware or payware. An hour ago I was on the FTX freeware page and wondering if I had all those cool airports. Fortunately in my downloads folder were all the zip files and I had put the word "installed" at the end of the filename so I now knew I had them all. Of course you could just fire up the sim or check the scenery.cfg

Its a tougher job when it comes to airplanes. Sometimes I see loads of great freeware there and shortlist them in a Bookmarks folder for later download only to discover I have the lot of them. Again you could just dive into the Aircraft folder to check or put the word "installed" on the downloaded zip file.

Something more efficient is needed though. Im debating the idea of a spreadsheet to keep track of it. Or even a simple database. Theres so much out there and within no time you have hundreds of airplanes, scenery etc. Perhaps that would be over-complicating things? Best to keep track of them by checking what you have downloaded?

What do you guys do? Will be interested to hear ideas

[Iain Emms]

Mines simple i only have all the ORBX and OZX  scenery things installed and only twelve payware aircraft thats all i need.

cheers

Iain

[Jay Kae]

Categorising in folders, which are all backed up daily, excel sheet to keep track of all versions and types, per company, per addon

[mburkhard]

I'm using the old and simple method of making a list

Of course I use more modern methods than paper and pencil, using "Numbers" (same concept as Excel) to list everything I have installed. I add the ICAO code to sceneries making it simpler to start a flight there. Additionally I use colours to mark what airport has a concrete runway and what airport has grass only, dark green and dark grey. Simple but effective to keep an overview of what types of airports I have. Of course they're grouped by region and country. Furthermore I can mark them whether they have AES added to them and whether I have charts available for them.

There's also a list for installed aircraft. Again those certified to land on grass are marked dark green.

And there's another table of add-ons I intend to buy. There are so many releases and announcements, listing the ones I intend to buy makes following them much easier.

Oh and should the need arise to completely delete my FS9 or FSX and do a complete re-install, I'll just mark everything bold, and each time I install an add-on I reset the font to normal. That way I can keep track of what I have re-installed already. You wouldn't want to do a flight only to realise on final that the add-on is not installed yet. That would call for an immediate diversion to the alternate

I admit without that list my simulator would end up in chaos!

Markus

[skypilot]

I get lost with all the service packs - I was a bit surprised that there was not a text file with the SPs, with a bit of an explanation and I took it for granted that I did not have to apply all the hot fixes that came out previously to the service packs and I take it now as the Regions are now designated with a SP I do not need to apply the service packs that have been released (have not unzipped the individual Regions SP so I do not know if there is an explanation file)? Then I have to keep up with the airfield service packs too (not your problem, it is mine).

[John Dow]

I go flying unless I absolutely desire an add-on.  Was getting sucked into the must-have brigade every time something new came out.  Not any more. 

Now I sit at the computer and after turning it on I ask myself "Do I want to go and visit the online download store, spend some time downloading, validating and tweaking, and add to my cc bill, or do I want to jump into one of my favourite half-dozen aircraft and do circuits around an FTX field or cross country with OZx?"

I'll let you guess which answer wins 99% of the time.

[Turbineflyer]

Ohhh, you want me to expose my sins. Here goes. I don't. I'm so lazy about it. At least I can keep everything in my "Downloads" folder. I finally bought a 250gb USB portable drive just to drag everything onto about once a week. I used to burn everything to DVD once in a while, but it got so overwhelming so quickly with all the FS9 and FSX stuff from Avsim and Flightsim freeware and then all the payware stuff. I really need to re-think my plan but for now, Pandora is already out the box and there she shall stay. At least I know where shes at.

[grumman]

I maintain a simple "installation" text file, divided into scenery, aircraft and other. It contains details of each product's authentication codes and any special comments. Every time I install something new in FSX, including service packs, I update the file with Notepad. A separate folder structure contains the relevant binaries, with a backup copy on an external drive. This makes it very easy to do a complete re-install of FSX if necessary. 

For passwords I use a brilliant freeware password keeper called PWSafe.

Greg

[swraymac]

i'm like Turbineflyer, i've done nothing. just keep the original files on a a seperate 640g usb drive. worked fine until i knocked it off the desk about 2 weeks ago. now it doesn't work! > that being said, i particularly like grumman's notepad system. ;)    

[Matthew Webb]

Aircraft folder, scenery folder, other addons folder.  Each add-on get a folder in one of 'em.   Each  add-on folder has receipts, installs, service packs and a text file with everything required to register/activate.   Best time to organise it is when you're installing something.

For e-mail, I just have 1 folder that everything related to a purchase goes into...

[Maurice_King]

Complete Catelogue of all software I poses on a 1 Tb drive and all passwords etc bundled up in Keypass which is further protected by truecrypt

[Taph]

I use one folder called downloads, which has subfolders, scenery, aircraft, AI, tools. Another called Installed which contains my zip files.

When I find a download I like I first try to download to installed folder, if it asks me if I wish to replace an existing file then I know I already have it, if not i change the path to download folder required.

I extract files into download folder, copy or install from exe, check that they work in FSX if all okay, then delete the unzippped version, copy the zip file into Installed, and then delete the zip file from the download folder.

If I then need to do a reinstall I have copies of all the original zip files

[Edward Boyte]

My addons are in my 500GB external HDD. There listed in folders eg:

F:\Documents\Flight Simulator X Files\Orbx, CaptainSim, ThomasRuth, Posky, Pairbus, Ants Aussie Aiport, World of Ai, Others etc.

[Mal Walker]

I have my FS stuff backed up on two different portable hard drives, just incase,

I also type out everything I have in notepad and the ones that are installed I put a / after and the ones yet to be installed I put an X after, you can't go wrong.

[Blitzer]

Like a few others on here I tend to have specific download locations for my FSX add-on, most importantly the payware ones are treated with extra care. Generally, I download into drive:/downloads/fsx related/payware/type of add-on/company/folder for actual file/downloaded file. For addons that require them - usually payware aircraft I have a simple text file that has the associated unlock codes etc.

I must admit thought at fist I was just buying and using rather than thinking about the consequences of what if things went wrong and I had to re-install. I have quite a few add-ons now, most of them payware that obviously when added up cost quite a lot of money, does not bear thinking about if I were to either lose the files or was unable to unlock them again. Probaly not to bad if the company is still in business and you can download and unloack again, but some companies apply limits or may well go out of business.

[caribou]

Two ways:

1. Hand written list of addons installed - but will probably transfer that to notepad or whatever in future.

2. I copy addons to relevant folders on my backup HDs (2)  - Main folders is labeled "Files to be installed in case of system reload"

then i have detailed folders such as:

Non Flight Sim programs etc.

FSX download (also aircraft, scenery,utility, cfg files etc)

FTX and related

etc.

This way I know that i only have to look at these folders to determine what has to be installed in case of a complete system reload  or even a FTX or FSX reinstall.

Howard

[Naji]

Three simple Notepad text files:

1. Aircraft installed

2. Scenery installed

3. Utilities installed

Any patch or Service Pack installed is listed as well.

I use IDM (Internet Download Manager) which distributes downloads according to their nature (Compressed, Documents, Programs, Video, etc). I keep all downloads in their folders. For compressed files (which is the majority of downloads), I right-click and use Extract-all with the default settings, this way I can quickly see the downloaded file itself in the Compressed folder and its extracted contents in a sub-folder of the same name in Compressed.

This method has helped me a lot, and has permitted me to set up fsx afresh quickly whenever I want to try a new Windows version or after purchase of a new PC.

Hope that helps.

Naji

[ThrottleUp]

I thank you all for taking the time to respond. I have had good fun reading your most interesting replies and have definetly taken note of them. I am kind of in a good position to start with FSX because I have very few addons - just Orbx, some other freeware scenery & some payware planes I bought on CD (Aerosoft Otter, Catalina etc). So not too late to start keeping a record!

I note with interest the different ways you all backup and keep tabs on your payware stuff. I need to do that. I make regular full-image backups of my entire disk (Windows & FSX) and the image can be mounted and is browsable as well so I can grab individual files as well. I must say image-backups are so easy to do and capture everything at one go. But I need to make DVD backups hee hee.

I think I will also use the idea of keeping a detailed Excel spreasheet to track what I have. I shall colour-code it as well. Good points made about keeping the authentication info!!

I got a lot of work ahead...thank you all again for your ideas....will bookmark this thread

[Susto]

Complete Catelogue of all software I poses on a 1 Tb drive and all passwords etc bundled up in Keypass which is further protected by truecrypt

I do that but also keep a copy of passwords in Google Mail, hope it is safe up there in the cloud 

Regards,

J.A.

[Maurice_King]

"Susto"  I would never keep ANYTHING tied up in Mail files. So often in the event of a system wide failure you can sometime not retrieve ANY mail nor attachments from those mail files.

All mail I recieve gets the same treatment, after the obligatory spam scan, any attachments get copied and pasted into an ever growing Local Web Site, local to the PC running mysql. This gives a searchable complete catalog of all software.

All my regular Passwords for just about everything are in a true crypt mountable file on USB Thumb Drive. Where I go It goes along with Mozilla Thunderbird Portable and FireFox Portable.

I never have an issue with getting mail or other stuff as all the regular files are in my pocket.

Backup on the Lappy

   

[Susto]

"Susto"  I would never keep ANYTHING tied up in Mail files. So often in the event of a system wide failure you can sometime not retrieve ANY mail nor attachments from those mail files.   

Of course, that's why I said that was in addition to keeping a local copy under TrueCrypt protection. At any rate, I find much more convenient a quick peek at my GMail account to look for a reg number than going through the hassle of hooking up the external drive and entering the (quite long) decription key.

In a way, I could say the USB drive is the backup and GMail the primary source of data.

But to each his (or her) own 

Best regards,

Juan Andres

[Matthew Webb]

Backup is very important.  For backup, I use QNAP.  QBack at work and TS-109 at home.  All my add-ons and mail on 2 HDD + off site.

[John York]

I have all my stuff backed up to separate CD's or DVD's in addition to a special Downloads Folder separated by subject on my partitioned 1 TB disc.

But am I glad about the discs after what happened to me a fortnight ago.  My computer blew up.  My fault.  Too heavy with the overclocking and too hot!  But it was a good excuse to get me a new I7, 6GB's RAM and 3 new large and fast discs and extra cooling without too many questions asked, if you know what I mean! 

The only trouble is the time it takes to get everything on again!  However, apart from a more powerful system, another advantage is that you load back on to a very clean system and while doing it, leave all the dross out that you thought you wanted and never used.  Specially some of the itsy bitsy pieces of scenery and aircraft that I found I didn't like!

John

[ThrottleUp]

Guys is it safe for me to list my regkey numbers in a spreadsheet? If I protect the spreadsheet with a very strong password it will be safe in there right? The spreadsheet would not open without this password.

I already have the regkeys saved as a list inside my KeePass program (freeware password manager) but I want to list them in the spreadsheet as well.

Thanks!!

[Maurice_King]

I'd suspect your the only one that has access to your PC and in reality it is unlikely for the average Home PC to be pilfered from outside unless you have a nasty trojan that has opened doors.

Key Pass will generally be sufficient but if your really concerned use "TrueCrypt" and for either individual files or folder on your local HDD or as in my case a thumb drive.

Essentially they encrypted and mounted just like an ISO image but without the 128 Bit Key it is totally useless to anyone.

If you have at least 2 backups that are syncronised regularly and you'll be reasonably protected.

Use a GOOD firewall that allows you to see ANY outgoing and incoming connection attempts helps too.

[Penzoil3]

Keep track ??  What a concept!  Back ups on CD as soon as installed, Download folder- Scenery folder, Planes folder, rack the CD. Reg code on CD, and separate folder for codes only. Never thought of a list. Also have back ups on # 2 computer. I play look in the folder, I think I had...

  LOL

  Sue

   

[divad_strebor]

I have a folder in my documents called "backup stuff".  Within this folder is several folders including one called "FSX" within THIS folder is every payware product I have, and their respective product keys, every freeware addon that I have deemed worth keeping, and all the source files for repaints I do.  Every couple of weeks or so, or after each new purchase, I copy the entire "backup" folder onto an external hard drive.  I'd like to back it up to 2 drives, but I only have one...

[ThrottleUp]

@ Maurice - thank you for those great tips I will look into them

@ Sue...hee hee...yea I only just started listing what I got for FSX. I DO have everythign backed up but its not orderly. For example I havent bothered to write detailed lists of whats on my backup DVDs on the DVD itself so now I have to load each one when hunting for something! For FSX Im gonna start fresh and start a new DVD book which will be labelled well!

@ divad - I have an external USB HD but Im gonna fit another internal one as well just for image backups. They are so dirt cheap these days. For that matter even externals are dropping in price big time...

Although I must say my Macrium Reflect image backup is just brilliant. Got it on an external drive and also plan to burn the image to DVDs/

[macca22au]

It's a terrible admission, but I kept all of my downloads in separate folders, all on an external hard drive.  But because I can't help myself downloading all of the freeware sites, I then lost track of those I had processed and those I had not.  As well those many airport sceneries simply tell you to put the .bgl into the Addon Scenery/Scenery folder.  So for the slothful like me I've just plain lost track.

The only thing I insist on now, is to put every airport into a separate folder... Addon Scenery/(airport name and ICAO)/Scenery.  The .bgls go inside the interior scenery folder.  This way at least I know when if I am duplicating airports.  Also they appear in the scenery library list so you are less likely to forget them.  Life's too short for me to be making lists.

Aircraft aren't so bad because if you try to put in a second time, you get the usual duplicate folder warning.

On a separate thought, if you want an interesting approach to flying, try the site "Four flights an hour".  Sure it is confined to the USA but without trying you can get the choice of VFR, Marginal VFR, IFR and deep IFR.  Each has many flights, and all is in real weather.  Can't wait to try REX2.  Some are short and are great for GA aircraft and a night when you can only get away with a short time in front of the computer, but others are longer and you can utilise turboprops and jets.  Get the charts and try it like the real world

[Penzoil3]

One thing I did finally start doing is to puull up the CD asa a list as soon as it's burned, do a screen print, and put the list in the front of the jewel case. I used to do the what is on this, it says airplanes, 2004...  Having the list does help!

  LOL

  Sue

[macca22au]

There is I believe a freeware add-on manager which also keeps the lists for you.  But I am too disorganised to remember where I found it, or how it works.

[macca22au]

PS:  Addit! Pro for FSX from Byteforge is the one I had in mind.  It even keeps a list for you of all and every addon, aircraft, scenery, mission, panel, guage, skins you name it.  It also claims to put the addon in the right place automatically.  Maybe I'll try it now that I have found it again. 

[hendrik]

Thanks Ian - just dloaded it; looks like a pretty powerful app. Will give it try this evening, my FSX system certainly needs a tracker - I have addons spread over 3 HD's 

[Dukester]

Its a paid app is it not?

[hendrik]

Its a paid app is it not?

Nope, freeware.

[ThrottleUp]

Oh cool thanks for mentioning that macca22au I shall check that out now

[hendrik]

Beware - if you have a ludicrous number of addons (as I have!) you will (like me) break the database limit.

Serves me right - I really should prune my installation 

[Milamber]

My copy is certainly payware and I have yet to "break any limit".  See here http://www.byteforge.com/

Maurice.

[macca22au]

It is shareware, but to get an unlimited data base and other goodies, then registration costs $24+.  If you have a small inventory of addons the freeware will do, but if like me you have gone over the top with free and payware extras then the price is little enough.

[Dukester]

Umm, didn't think it was totally free, so do you know what the limit is before you need to pay for all its goodness?