OK, first up.. the settings mock-up.
Settings pages, by their very nature, are terrible from a UI perspective. So many options, so many words. So the solution is to group options together and only display a few at a time. There are many ways to do this, but I went with more of a one-page design because we don't really have all that many options and most of these should be filled in by Knossos automatically. Click anywhere on the title, HR, or arrow to rollout/rollup groups.
I'm wary on Flag Defaults because in order for user simplicity, these should come from the mod on a per-mod basis (especially since mods will be able to list an FSO build as a dependency). But having Flag defaults for mods that don't list flags is good. This could also be changed to more of a "Flags Addendum" for the user to specify flags they ALWAYS want appended to the commandline for every mod. But then Knossos needs to be able to check those flags against the launched mod's FSO Build and take appropriate actions.
Additionally, the Details page has a Settings button.. that was intended to display popup window where a user can change mod-specific settings and flags for that mod. I never mocked up that smaller window, but I would use a similar layout to this one, but showing only Flags and maybe Exec. Unsure if end-users really need that. I'm currently of the opinion that Video/Audio/Joystick are global enough that they don't need to be mod specific settings really ever (outside of the Development tab).
Now for the installation details.
So, everywhere in the UI I designed, there is an Action button and a Sub-Action button. This includes the Home tab, Explore tab, Development tab, and Details page. There are a few exceptions which I'll get to in a moment.
The Action button can be Play, Install, Error, or Updating depending on context. Install, for example, is only ever visible on the Explore tab and it's in the place of the Play button that's on the Home/Development/Details tabs. If a mod has an error it switches from Play to Error (and Development tab needs to, in this case, remove the FRED button as well). Clicking on Error gives you a small pop up describing the error.
If a mod is updating the Play button switches to Updating...
Continuing on the contextual design of the UI then I'm thinking that you can click the Updating button (no matter what tab you're in) and it displays a pop up similar to the error one. Except here it shows the progress of each download pack in a simple list.
PACK 1 ----------------50% Downloaded
PACK 2 -----------------------------------75% Downloaded
PACK 3 ---------------------------------------Installing
PACK 4 ---------------------------------------Installing
PACK 5 ------------------------------------------Complete
We could also display this same list in a separate view (like Steam) with the install progress of each mod sublisting each download pack. This view would be accessible by a contextually visible button top right next to the Filter button "Installation Status" or something. If nothing's currently installing, this button is not visible.
MOD 1 LOGO/MOD1 NAME
- PACK 1 ----------------50% Downloaded
- PACK 2 -----------------------------------75% Downloaded
- PACK 3 ---------------------------------------Installing
- PACK 4 ---------------------------------------Installing
- PACK 5 ------------------------------------------Complete
MOD 2 LOGO/MOD 2 NAME
- PACK 1 ----------------50% Downloaded
- PACK 2 -----------------------------------75% Downloaded
- PACK 3 ---------------------------------------Installing
- PACK 4 ---------------------------------------Installing
- PACK 5 ------------------------------------------Complete
MOD 3 LOGO/MOD 3 NAME
- PACK 1 ----------------50% Downloaded
- PACK 2 -----------------------------------75% Downloaded
- PACK 3 ---------------------------------------Installing
- PACK 4 ---------------------------------------Installing
- PACK 5 ------------------------------------------Complete
The Sub Action button is usually Details, but on Details page it changes to Settings for that particular mod. The one exception to the Action/Sub-Action rule is if a mod has an update available.