Well, thank you all for your feedback, here.

I will definitely check out TES3CMD and compare to the results I get with TESPCD. Sounds like it's worthwhile working in a command line for the benefits.

Now, that still leaves my main question open, however, which is...

Why would you NOT want to clean certain mods? Specifically, is there a reason for having entries identical to those in Morrowind, Tribunal, and Bloodmoon ESM files?

I noticed someone mentioned Darknut's GDR, which I use. Now the reason not to clean it in this instance is that the ESP is a control file of sorts that ensures changes made in the ESM file are not overwritten later by other mods. So you do not want to clean out those GDR ESP records that duplicate what's in the GDR ESM.

However, there are still records that are identical to those in Morrowind.esm in GDR; so my question remains: Why not clean those, or is there a purpose to them?

Thanks,

-RMWChaos

I think most (if not all) "don't clean this mod" type comments come from the days when the ONLY cleaning tool was TESTOOL. It sometimes cleans improperly and likely those are the mods that it does so with and would break them somehow. I don't use GDR (yet) so I can't say what it's deal it except that I will probably clean it with TES3CMD when I do use it. The only reason I could possibly imagine a mod NEEDING duplicates of the main ESM entires is if they want to make sure that the original values are maintained (in case an earlier mod changed them).

That was my thought as well, but I just wanted to confirm. Most of the comments I saw regarding not cleaning certain mods was dated back to 2009 or earlier; so I would tend to agree with your assessment that these comments were based on the results of earlier cleaning tools.

Thanks!

-RMWChaos

I think you meant...

tes3cmd clean --replace %1 > %1-cleaned.log

At least, that's what I had to type to get it to work. So ultimately, I installed tes3cmd.exe to my Morrowind directory, and created my TES3CMD_Clean.bat file on the desktop with the following code...

@echo offrem drag-and-drop-able bat filerem put shortcut on desktop and drag esp onto itrem "clean" file and log will be added to same folder the esp came fromrem The following is my install directory; yours may be different...cd C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\Morrowindtes3cmd clean --replace %1 > %1-cleaned.logtype %1-cleaned.logpause

Now the only thing I may do is to add some code to move the old plugin~1.esp to a different backup ESP/M folder.

The output of cleaning "Immersive Chargen v1.25" is...

CLEANING: "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(QSTS) Immersive Chargen v1.25\00 No Character Maker\Immersive Chargen.esp" ...Loaded cached Master: /morrowind.esm Cleaned duplicate record (BOOK): chargen statssheet Cleaned duplicate record (DOOR): chargen exit door Cleaned duplicate object instance (CharGen_cabindoor FRMR: 6034) from CELL: bitter coast region (-1, -9) Cleaned duplicate object instance (Imperial Guard FRMR: 63431) from CELL: seyda neen (-2, -9) Cleaned duplicate object instance (flora_bc_tree_02 FRMR: 24458) from CELL: seyda neen (-2, -9) Cleaned redundant WHGT from CELL: imperial prison ship Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: seyda neen, census and excise officeOutput saved in: "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(QSTS) Immersive Chargen v1.25\00 No Character Maker\Immersive Chargen.esp"Original backed up to: "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(QSTS) Immersive Chargen v1.25\00 No Character Maker\Immersive Chargen~1.esp"Cleaning Stats for "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(QSTS) Immersive Chargen v1.25\00 No Character Maker\Immersive Chargen.esp":       duplicate object instance:     3                duplicate record:     2             redundant CELL.AMBI:     1             redundant CELL.WHGT:     2

Whereas TESPCD cleans the following records...

(ID), (WARNING), (NAME), (ESP), (ORIGINAL)                                          BOOK, Book Entry Identical to Default Entry. (Unclean Entry), chargen statssheet, Immersive Chargen.esp, Morrowind.esmDOOR, Door Entry Identical to Default Entry. (Unclean Entry), CharGen Exit Door, Immersive Chargen.esp, Morrowind.esm

So TES3CMD does seem to catch more than TESPCD does.

Thanks all,

-RMWChaos

I use several of your mods, BTB, and find them to be great edits; however, it does appear that TES3CMD finds some additional things to clean. Not sure if this breaks any of your edits, though.

As an example, here is the TES3CMD output for the pearl bug edit you made to the "Herbalism for Purists v1.21" mod...

CLEANING: "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(ALCH) Herbalism for Purists v1.21\01 Herbalism for Purists MW Base (BTB Edit)\Syc_HerbalismforPurists (Pearl Bug Edit).esp" ...Loaded cached Master: /morrowind.esm Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-12, 3) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-12, 2) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-12, 1) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-13, 4) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-13, 3) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-13, 2) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-13, 1) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-14, 5) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-14, 4) Cleaned junk-CELL: bitter coast region (-14, 2) Cleaned junk-CELL: west gash region (-15, 7) Cleaned junk-CELL: wilderness (-15, -8) Cleaned junk-CELL: west gash region (-16, 8) Cleaned junk-CELL: west gash region (-16, 7) Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: akimaes grotto Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: ebonheart, underground caves Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: eluba-addon grotto Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: ilanipu grotto Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: koal cave Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: malmus grotto Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: nimawia grotto Cleaned redundant AMBI,WHGT from CELL: zalkin grottoOutput saved in: "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(ALCH) Herbalism for Purists v1.21\01 Herbalism for Purists MW Base (BTB Edit)\Syc_HerbalismforPurists (Pearl Bug Edit).esp"Original backed up to: "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(ALCH) Herbalism for Purists v1.21\01 Herbalism for Purists MW Base (BTB Edit)\Syc_HerbalismforPurists (Pearl Bug Edit)~1.esp"Cleaning Stats for "C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\MW Installers\(ALCH) Herbalism for Purists v1.21\01 Herbalism for Purists MW Base (BTB Edit)\Syc_HerbalismforPurists (Pearl Bug Edit).esp":                       junk-CELL:    14             redundant CELL.AMBI:     8             redundant CELL.WHGT:     8

Whereas TESPCD finds nothing.

Regards,

-RMWChaos

Well in Oblivion those duplicate records are more often called Identical to master records (or ITM for short), but there is another set of records that are even more dangerous and that is deletions. So say a modder doesn't like that tree where he wants to place a house - he deletes it. This is no big deal if his mod loads last but if any mod loads after it that then tries to reference that deleted tree there are problems (usually ranging from crash on exit to an immediate ctd).

Are deletions an issue with morrowind mods too?

thank you RMWChaos for the copy past bat file.

========

[edit] Unfortunately - trying the code above:

@echo offrem drag-and-drop-able bat filerem put shortcut on desktop and drag esp onto itrem "clean" file and log will be added to same folder the esp came fromrem The following is my install directory; yours may be different...cd C:\Games\Bethesda Softworks\Morrowindtes3cmd clean --replace %1 > %1-cleaned.logtype %1-cleaned.logpause

And changing the file path for my morrowind game ... results in it giving me 'tes3cmd' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.

So what am I doing wrong?

Will leave this one to the more experienced modders, but I *think* the answer is "it depends" on how the modder removed the tree. Did the modder just delete the specific reference to the tree in that location or did the modder delete the tree entirely? Does that make sense? I know I'm not using the right terminology here as a "reference" is something very specific.




I ran into this problem at first as well and tried adding "Path=" before I ended up just doing "cd ".

Did you install TES3CMD.exe to the "/morrowind" or the "/morrowind/data files" directory? I put it in the "/morrowind" directory for this to work.

Going to try a reboot to clear my Path= settings and see if it fails on me now. It may be cashed from my previous attempts. If it does fail, then need to add a Path= statement into the batch file. I'll let you know.

Regards,

-RMWChaos


[edit] Just rebooted, so using default Path= statement, which does not contain any references to my games, and this batch file worked.

And to make matters more complicated, none of the ESP files I'm cleaning are installed right now; so they are not in the /Data Files directory, only Morrowind.esm, Tribunal.esm, and Bloodmoon.esm are installed there.

So this *should* work for you, but you can try adding a Path= statement into the batch file to see if that makes a difference.

Also make sure you've installed TES3CMD into your /morrowind directory, not the /data files directory.

Hope that helps.

I put in the Morrowind\data directory.

Moving to the Morrowind directory and it worked.

How should I change the bat to work in the data directory - I prefer that as that is where most esm/esp will go and the general working space for those files.

thanks again

@RMWChaos - sorry I forgot that I changed the filename to experiment some...forgot that I had done that.

About the path stuff... shouldn't be necessary at all.

If the TES3CMD.exe is in the data files folder AND the batch file is in the data files folder too.

Just right click on the bat file....go down to "Send to" and select "Send to desktop as shortcut"

Then you should be able to drop any esp onto that shortcut and I will clean and put the file right back where it came from. There should not be any need for directory or path statements in the BAT file because the BAT file is in the same directory as the EXE...no need to point it to anything.

Nope I get the same error as I put above.

That is with the bat file as this:

@echo offrem drag-and-drop-able bat filerem put shortcut on desktop and drag esp onto itrem "clean" file and log will be added to same folder the esp came fromrem The following is my install directory; yours may be different...cd F:\Bethesda Games\Morrowindtes3cmd clean --replace %1 > %1-cleaned.logtype %1-cleaned.logpause

In the data folder and with a new shortcut pointing to it.

Isn't there a way to highlight the text on the cmd shell window to print here - I knew it once, but not now.

If the bat file is in the data files folder (and the tes3cmd.exe is there too... you need to delete the change directory line (or rem it our).

Also note Yacoby's working on a http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1180562-yacobys-wrye-mash-fork/page__st__40that will incorp this in to the program so that you can right click to clean (as long as the tes3cmd executable is in the data files folder)

OK I changed the bat file to this:

@echo offrem drag-and-drop-able bat filerem put shortcut on desktop and drag esp onto itrem "clean" file and log will be added to same folder the esp came fromrem The following is my install directory; yours may be different...rem cd F:\Bethesda Games\Morrowind\datates3cmd clean --replace %1 > %1-cleaned.logtype %1-cleaned.logpause

Then attempted to a few mods and got the same result (less aggressive critters as an example):
Same effect if I just use the bat file and drop there.

OK, so a little clarification is in order, I suppose...

According to this http://code.google.com/p/mlox/wiki/Tes3cmd, you can install TES3CMD.exe to the /Data Files directory, or to another directory and add a Path= statement.

I ended up installing it into the /Morrowind directory instead of /Data Files because I kept getting the same error that Psymon got with tes3cmd not being a recognized program even with my batch file being in the same directory. Go figure. It seems to work for me in /Morrowind, but not others. :shrug:

Using the "CD " statement in my batch file, I was able to locate my batch file on my desktop and just drag and drop plugins from anywhere, essentially, onto it and it would run. If you are running the batch file from directly inside your /Data Files folder, it should work without any CD or Path statement.

According to the http://dl.dropbox.com/u/26677509/wryemash.2011.05.01.7z that Pinkertonius provided to the version of Wrye Mash with TES3CMD integrated (very nice, btw!), TES3CMD.exe needs to be installed in either the Data Files directory, Morrowind directory, or Mash directory. I am going for the Mash directory, personally.

Going off to test this now!

Take care,

-RMWChaos

Well since I'm obviously a dummy when it comes to reading and altering bat files - any working versions - please let me know.

Testing again and yes it does work in the Morrowind folder, but not the Morrowind\data folder.

I'd prefer the data folder myself as I stated before that is where I do most of the work on plugins anyway.

I'd never have plugins in the Mopy folder.

That is because it's already clean...no need to change anything (tested it myself).



The problem is there should be no path directory statement in the bat file if it's in the same directory as tes3cmd (and in my experience it works best in the Data files folder). Technically speaking, as long as the bat file has a path that accurately points to the executable it should work too.

I was about to post that - perhaps all the mods I tested were cleaned. Went back and tested with original MCA.esm and it worked - yay.

However when I try to clean the accompanying file MCA - Guards Patch.ESP which is dependent on on MCA.esm I get an error in the shell window that I don't see in the log.

So again where is the command to copy and past from the shell window ... ahh here it is: http://amplemoney.blogspot.com/2009/05/copy-and-paste-in-cmdexe.html except it is select all then copy then can paste.

So here is what the cmd.exe showed:


While the log only shows this:


So what do I make of the error?

Shouldn't matter where your plugins are, as long as TES3CMD can find your "/Data Files" folder to locate the masters. My plugins are currently in an "/MW Installers" folder that I use for Wrye Mash, but not under the Wrye Mash directory structure or Morrowind directory structure at all. TES3CMD still cleans the mods.

Here's a version that should work as long as you put your batch file and TES3CMD.exe in the /Data Files folder...

@echo offrem drag and dropable bat filerem put shortcut on desktop and drag esp onto itrem "clean" file and log will be added to same folder the esp came fromtes3cmd clean --replace %1 > %1-cleaned.logtype %1-cleaned.log

I tested it, and it works. Make sure that you are creating a SHORTCUT on your desktop, not copying the actual batch file there. That was my initial error. It works perfectly now with the above code. :facepalm:

Take care,

-RMWChaos

Yeah that worked, but I think Pinkertonius was right in that I was trying with already cleaned mods.

So with this method - if I'm cleaning from my archive and the I clean the master (such as MCA.esm) but the cleaned master (heck even the dirty one) never gets put in the data folder - will it at all be referenced when loading masters to clean an esp that is dependent on it?

Then also still curious about the question http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1184424-q-cleaning-mods-with-tespcd/page__view__findpost__p__17586382:

Thanks you guys for all this help - much appreciated.

That error occurs when TES3CMD cannot find one of the master files that the plugin relies upon. In this case, MCA - Guards Patch.esp relies upon MCA.esm to function. If you put MCA.esm into the /Data Files folder, the error does not occur.

I just tested that to confirm. Thanks for pointing it out. Now I have to go back and re-clean some files ... grrr. :banghead:

Regards,

-RMWChaos

Well in cleaning Oblivion mods with tes4edit - it all has to be done in the data folder - and I think it is just as well to do that here to for these kinds of instances.

With tes4edit though there is the fail-safe that it will load the plugins and if it has a master then it will load them too prior to being able to clean them. If the master is not present then it throws an error.

Perhaps this is a fail-safe that can be put into this as well by Mr. Moonsugar - such that if a master is not present you get a warning saying as much and reflected in the log as well.

So while integration into Wrye Mash is a good thing - the tes3cmd needs more polishing too. Because even if you could initiate the cleaning in mash you would still have to copy out the cleaned version to package again and delete the backup to tidy up the data folder. Personally the log is nice to see, but I'd never save them or the backup - I mean the archive you downloaded the contains the plugin is the backup.

In the mean time I will be using only the bat in the data folder and copying in all files and cleaning masters to dependents then copying back out to BAIN package.

I'm going to test out how Yakoby's integrated version of TES3CMD works in Wrye Mash to see if it will auto-load the master file even if it's in a different subpackage and the mod isn't loaded... It may only clean installed plugins from the Mods page and not from the Installers page.

[edit] BAH! Well that figures. I have the compiled version of Wrye Mash that does not require a separate Python install. Yakoby's version is apparently for the "standard" version, which does require Python. So off I go to reinstall Wrye Mash from scratch. All this, just for cleaning mods that the modders should have cleaned themselves... :swear:

Just go to the http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=22368 and download the package: Wrye Python 03a and run that - it will install all python and python components you need in one fell swoop. So easy.

It will give you all you need for Wrye Bash, Wrye Mash, and Wrye Flash.

Yeah, unfortunately while Morrowind has quite a few tools available for it, most aren't completely done so we have this kind of thing happen. That leads right back to why TESPCD didn't became the "IT" tool to replace TESTOOL despite the excellent GUI

I never used TESPCD before, but I'm curious what it did not do.

Then why is this the case when Morrowind has a long history of modding - Way longer than Oblivion and yet Oblivion has completed and functioning tools.

Well anyway - don't want to come off as bashing.

In cleaning AbotWaterLifeTRAddon without the TR_data present the log only shows this:
No warning that since the master was not present the operation failed. Those not realizing that there was a missing master might assume that the esp did not need cleaning. So I then put TR_data.esm in the data folder and the log read exactly the same. Yeah that could get confusing and lead to much oversight.

Also maybe if a plugin does not need cleaning to state so in the log.

TESPCD just isn't as thorough and apparently breaks a few mods.

Morrowind has a very loyal community but it was never as the break away smash hit that Oblivion became. A larger fan base naturally breeds more opportunities for tools (imagine Fallout 3 after 10 yrs!).

Maybe AbotWaterLifeTRAddon needs TR_Map1.ESM? (and/or map2). I'll check.

EDIT: Nope just TR_DATA.ESM ...it was already clean. But I see what you mean about the ambiguity (sp?).