wain71 Posted December 2, 2022 Share Posted December 2, 2022 I am looking at getting this but there are a few things I am not sure about... Is it needed for Orbx scenery or does central do the same thing? Do products with their own installers like PMDG, fenix and aerosoft allow you to install using add-on linker? What's the situation with GSX? I really need to be able to empty my community folder quickly and easily during BETA testing of stuff but not sure what's the best option, I know on here we have very helpful people so I'm hoping you come back with some sound advice.... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Cooper Posted December 2, 2022 Share Posted December 2, 2022 Hello, I can't speak for GSX, as I don't have it, but everything else that you mention will work with it. I don't do beta testing but I do lots of product testing when customers report problems. You can of course get orbx Central to add links, if you have used an Orbx Central Library, but you can also discard them and use the Addons Linker to make the same links from your Orbx Central Library. If you do that, you can deselect them all at once, if that is useful to you. The way to do it with your other add-ons seems to be to move the files into folders, organised as you want them to be and then add them back to the Community folder as links, as and when you want to. 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wain71 Posted December 2, 2022 Author Share Posted December 2, 2022 Thanks Nick, that's very helpful, appreciate it..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andrew22222 Posted December 2, 2022 Share Posted December 2, 2022 I use it and very happy. You can make your own folders so have something like Airports, then folders inside that for countries that you fly and within a country folder add more for States / Provices. Then if I want to fly in Australia and perhaps only Queensland I only activate just the QLD folder and start up MSFS. Quick loading times. Having custom folders also makes it easier to update addons that I get from flightsim.to as you have them neatly organised. I'm sure there's loads more you can do with Add-on linker and my use is probably just super basic but works great for me. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
renault Posted December 2, 2022 Share Posted December 2, 2022 Hi Wayne I've been using it ever since it was available Just to add to the discussion , I find the ability to create presets with it invaluable. For example you can create a preset with everything you have in your community folder The to delete everything , is just a right click and your community folder is empty . Load the preset you just created and everything is back or ... Something I do a lot. I create presets for individual geographical areas. Then if I plan on flying in just Europe as an example I just load that preset and all my European airports and addons are brought into the Community folder, but nothing else is. It does save loading time, if you have a lot of things in your community folder. Here is a short video that gives a good overview of how it is installed and works... Cheers Pete 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Heaton Posted December 3, 2022 Share Posted December 3, 2022 Just for curiosity - because I wonder what the benefits of doing this extra work of separating each addon gives I realise that from Start - to First screen - is slowed by MS uploading all that is contained in the Community file but does that matter ?? I just started MS and it took 2 mins 45 secs - wo to go - and my Community is 260GB at the moment I don't know how long MS takes to load without Community - but it can't be much less? - Let's say for arguments sake - it takes 1min 30 secs - is another minute that important to risk NOT finding what you want to load in less time?? When it is update time - as Nick says - just rename the Community folder - or place it elsewhere until you have updated Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wain71 Posted December 3, 2022 Author Share Posted December 3, 2022 12 hours ago, John Heaton said: Just for curiosity - because I wonder what the benefits of doing this extra work of separating each addon gives I realise that from Start - to First screen - is slowed by MS uploading all that is contained in the Community file but does that matter ?? I just started MS and it took 2 mins 45 secs - wo to go - and my Community is 260GB at the moment I don't know how long MS takes to load without Community - but it can't be much less? - Let's say for arguments sake - it takes 1min 30 secs - is another minute that important to risk NOT finding what you want to load in less time?? When it is update time - as Nick says - just rename the Community folder - or place it elsewhere until you have updated John, my need is not one of speed, but of eliminating conflicting add ons during Alpha / BETA testing....take this week I am testing a product that was constantly not working, I had to remove addons and bring them in one by one until I found the culprit and we then were able to get an option it to avoid the conflicts, so if I had an option to click a few things and MSFS was almost vanilla it would be easy, Xplane is a whole different ball game as I can have 2 copies installed thanks everyone for the comments / advice and Pete for the video...... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
renault Posted December 3, 2022 Share Posted December 3, 2022 13 hours ago, John Heaton said: Just for curiosity - because I wonder what the benefits of doing this extra work of separating each addon gives I realise that from Start - to First screen - is slowed by MS uploading all that is contained in the Community file but does that matter ?? I just started MS and it took 2 mins 45 secs - wo to go - and my Community is 260GB at the moment I don't know how long MS takes to load without Community - but it can't be much less? - Let's say for arguments sake - it takes 1min 30 secs - is another minute that important to risk NOT finding what you want to load in less time?? When it is update time - as Nick says - just rename the Community folder - or place it elsewhere until you have updated Hi John I understand what you are getting at, but I think in a sense, this ultimately comes down to very specifically what do you have as a MS2020 installation and what is your machine hardware. In that respect, each of us are unique. For example on my system my community folder is 910 GB . Admittedly I do have a lot of addons. With a clean community folder , my load time (MS2020 Premium Deluxe edition) from a test today is 1.07.21 mins. If everything is activated, my load time is 4:16:39 . Therefore, for my particular installation it makes sense to me to split things up. Is this applicable to everyone. No of course not, as each of us are different. It is a completely personal decision, if you feel the "risk" of not finding something to load is important verses load time. However, it does really depend on your particular personal situation. Somedays, loading everything, doesn't matter as I go off and make a "cuppa" while MS2020 is doing its thing. Depending on what I am doing, I may decide I don't want to wait and generally loading a subset is done in less than 1 ½ - 2 mins. For me, its not really a major issue if I then need to do a restart to load another area , if I want to do something else. I have participated in many MS2020 betas now, and the ability to selectively bring new addons in or delete potentially offending ones in that situation is important. In a normal situation, Nicks advice as always is spot on, and a tool like Addons linker is not necessary. However, there are other situations that are the unique to each of us, where I feel such a tool is very useful. All the best Pete Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Heaton Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Pete said - partly in answer to my query:-- "" I understand what you are getting at, but I think in a sense, this ultimately comes down to very specifically what do you have as a MS2020 installation and what is your machine hardware. In that respect, each of us are unique. For example on my system my community folder is 910 GB . Admittedly I do have a lot of addons. With a clean community folder , my load time (MS2020 Premium Deluxe edition) from a test today is 1.07.21 mins. If everything is activated, my load time is 4:16:39 . Therefore, for my particular installation it makes sense to me to split things up. Is this applicable to everyone. No of course not, as each of us are different. "" No arguments Pete with anything you say - which I summarise to my Query as - "Horses for Courses" - and as in Wain's case - being one of the volunteers to do the beta testing - is as good a reason as any - due to the number of errors Guaranteed to need some source finding 910 GB community ? - wow - I fell of my chair - and 4mins + - would probably make me think again about a linker - as to which I have given it some thought recently - even as to actually taking the path of sectional analysis - especially the separation of toooo many aircraft and liveries - since my scenery consists mainly Orbx - and is almost one complete block - separated into Oceana and the UK. Apart from that exercise - I don't feel the need as yet to introduce another piece of software that would test this old brain in it's setting up - to save a few mins. - even if it took as long as your does - in any case - my missus does the coffee I always check the installation of every addon to the Community - and that it has been accepted in the sim and I keep record to help me check if any addon might cause a problem which - after all - should surface pretty quickly Also - I use the ".to" facility of advising updates that I feel is an important facility - not to be ignored 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvdboomen Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Addons Linker helps me with organizing my addons so I can find them pretty fast if they have to be updated. Second, Addons Linker also makes it possible to install scenery on a different disc than where my Community folder is. I do not run out of SSD space too fast then. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wain71 Posted December 5, 2022 Author Share Posted December 5, 2022 On 12/4/2022 at 3:34 AM, John Heaton said: 910 GB community ? that is a big old folder you have there John...just checked mine, 81.7 GB.... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Heaton Posted December 6, 2022 Share Posted December 6, 2022 12 hours ago, wain71 said: that is a big old folder you have there John...just checked mine, 81.7 GB.... Not mine mate - see Renault above - mine is 260GB soooh - Mine is bigger than yours - but not as big as Renault's 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cbcdesign Posted January 11, 2023 Share Posted January 11, 2023 (edited) For me addons linker is a very good way of managing add-ons. I fly as near to real as I can, no random spawning at airports, I fly to them and my next flight will be from where I landed on the previous flight. Right now my planes are in Australia, at YBSU, I flew to Australia from the UK over a three week period. I have all my airports in folders by country so everything is disabled apart from Australia and New Zealand whilst I am flying in that region of the world. This way of managing add-on scenery speeds up the boot time, makes crashing or clashes far less likely and makes disabling all the add-ons far easier if one scenery causes an issue and I have to find out which of my hundreds of add-ons is causing a problem. I have 277GB of add-on scenery, having all that in a single community folder is just chaotic. Edited January 11, 2023 by cbcdesign Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Abernathy Posted January 11, 2023 Share Posted January 11, 2023 I find the use of Addon Linker be valuable for my testing. I have an outside Library for all Orbx products that is in Addon Linker. With one click I can disable all of the entries and then with one more click activate a single scenery. Other than that I have any outside addons in folders grouped by regions. Bottom line is that it just makes my life easier! lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmb Posted January 11, 2023 Share Posted January 11, 2023 My MSFSAddons folder - managed by Addons Linker - is 1.3GB. Expectedly, the sim just doesn't start when I have all addons active at the same time, at least not within 1/2 hr, and yes, I tried once. I manage all addons bought via Orbx Central by installing them into the Simulator (Community folder) and shifting them into the proper country directory in the MSFSAddons folder using the Linker. From that point on, maintenance is easy, I just activate all country folders using the linker before starting Orbx Central, and it saves updates directly to the proper places, based on the links. Not all of the management tools by other vendors provide this convenient upgrade path. When flying, I typically only activate a hand full of directories (a country, some global addons like the Marinas, AIG or FSLTL etc). I had perhaps a couple of addon-based CTDs over the years, which I could isolate using a nesting procedure. IMO, the Addon Linker is indeed the most useful single addon I got for MSFS. Kind regards, Michael 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BrianT Posted January 12, 2023 Share Posted January 12, 2023 18 hours ago, pmb said: My MSFSAddons folder - managed by Addons Linker - is 1.3GB. Expectedly, the sim just doesn't start when I have all addons active at the same time, at least not within 1/2 hr, and yes, I tried once. Michael, have you got your decimal point in the wrong place? I've got individual airports that are bigger than 1.3gb and a lower spec PC than yours and MY MSFS opens up with everything in about 5-7 mins if I leave everything enabled. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmb Posted January 12, 2023 Share Posted January 12, 2023 2 minutes ago, BrianT said: Michael, have you got your decimal point in the wrong place? I've got individual airports that are bigger than 1.3gb and a lower spec PC than yours and MY MSFS opens up with everything in about 5-7 mins if I leave everything enabled. Argh. Thanks for the hint. This was meant to be 1.3 TB. Kind regards, Michael 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BrianT Posted January 12, 2023 Share Posted January 12, 2023 That makes more sense I began to think I was running a colossus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvdboomen Posted January 12, 2023 Share Posted January 12, 2023 1.3 TB? O my... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davenicoll Posted August 10, 2023 Share Posted August 10, 2023 On 12/3/2022 at 4:11 AM, John Heaton said: When it is update time - as Nick says - just rename the Community folder - or place it elsewhere until you have updated Going to be honest guys I have never done anything with my community folder and never had an issue after updates.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wain71 Posted August 11, 2023 Author Share Posted August 11, 2023 23 hours ago, davenicoll said: Going to be honest guys I have never done anything with my community folder and never had an issue after updates.. yeah in the end I didn'y go linker route and I do nothing on update day except - update... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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