[MatthTheGeek]

it's painfully easy, for example, to extract something to Freespace2/mymod/mymod by accident unless you understand how it's meant to be structured, and then not know what has gone wrong). I think the problem is that a lot of people correctly estimate their modding capability as near-zero and as such will stick to automated procedures almost religiously (this is a fairly sensible attitude most of the time, but it does mean we'll be losing potential players until the shiny new installer comes about).

Which means the installer isn't going to solve the main problem. People that will use the installer will get what ? FSO, The MVPs, maybe a few mods. They'll play that. Then what ? They still haven't all the other mods and campaign available and they still don't know how to install them. They probably don't even know about them, which would have been avoided if they went to the forum in the first place to follow the tutorials.

In the end, not only all those people won't play your campaign if it's not in the installer, but you'll also loose the people that could have followed instructions but went for the installer instead. You're just shooting yourself in the foot here. And we can't realistically cram every single campaign and their kitchen sink into the installer.

[jr2]

It's just hard for people to judge how much prior knowledge is expected of them when they spot "manual", and unfortunately "more than I know - forget it" is probably a common guess (maybe this could be addressed in the thread title?).

I believe the term you are looking for is "Walkthrough".  Usually involves pictures with red circles and arrows drawn at appropriate spots, and clear, numbered directions.  Someone's gotta put another one of those up.  I might next week if no one else feels inclined.

PS Protip: if someone does a walkthrough, remember, in MS Paint, if you click the button to draw a circle or an arrow, when you go to draw it over the picture, holding the shift key is your friend 

EDIT: Matth, the Installer we had actually installed quite a few mods (BP, Derelict, a slew (20?) of others) -- this was because it was rather easy to set up the installer to also download your mod.  BtRL also used the Installer, as it was customizable enough to allow you to use it for your own TC.

[FelixJim]

In the end, not only all those people won't play your campaign if it's not in the installer, but you'll also loose the people that could have followed instructions but went for the installer instead. You're just shooting yourself in the foot here. And we can't realistically cram every single campaign and their kitchen sink into the installer.

I think the hope is that after playing a fair number of the bigger names through the installer, people will be in love enough with FSO to go the extra mile that you want them to. If it's considered a major problem maybe someone should nag the wxlauncher people to include a big "Get More Mods!" button somewhere, just linking to the Missions and Campaigns forum (or a specific thread, I'm not sure). The links and highlights already on it might already be enough to get people looking though.

I believe the term you are looking for is "Walkthrough".  Usually involves pictures with red circles and arrows drawn at appropriate spots, and clear, numbered directions.  Someone's gotta put another one of those up.  I might next week if no one else feels inclined.

Even the current instructions would classify as a walkthrough as far as I can see - but yeah. I'd actually be happier to see the word "walkthrough" on the title of the instructions as they are - I think it would make it look a little less daunting... maybe? I'd consider offering but I'm sick of writing walkthroughs - I'm halfway through a rough and ready one for an almost horrendously complicated Gamemastering aid program.

[MatthTheGeek]

If it's considered a major problem maybe someone should nag the wxlauncher people to include a big "Get More Mods!" button somewhere, just linking to the Missions and Campaigns forum (or a specific thread, I'm not sure). The links and highlights already on it might already be enough to get people looking though.

I like that idea. Ideally, new highlights should be added and older highlights removed in order to better deal with the expected larger amount of newbies that will transit through it.

Might even be the occasion to create a whole new subforum acting as a portal, to which the new launcher would link, and with all the tutorials and the campaign list easily accessible. Or just a wiki page, although a subforum could receive all the "It don't work FIX NAO" posts from newbies hitting trouble, in order for them to not swarm the rest of the forum with such posts.

That's probably the best way to ensure "little" mods/campaigns that aren't included in the installer don't get underplayed compared to what they would be without the installer "shadowing" them.

[MatthTheGeek]

Installer is depreciated. Install following this until the new installer is released.

[Specular]

Appreciated. Thanks for the quick response, wasn't expecting anything for a week-ish.

[erentil]

This seems like an old thread but it's still directly linked for instructions on installing and can't find a better place to post this...

I downloaded the installer and selected the "install everything" option.  It's been going for a while now, installing version 3.6.18.

Until I come to VPMage.exe.  Then my antivirus (Avast) throws an alarm and blocks that file, saying it has a virus in it.  The details say:      Infection:   Win32:Evo-gen [Susp]

Is this a known false alarm?  Or is this actually a problem?

[Goober5000]

VPMage is a modding tool, not a campaign or hosted project.  You can safely delete it without missing anything.

VPMage as originally written is fine, but it's possible that a) the site that hosts VPMage may have gotten infected, or b) Avast may be throwing a false alarm.  Not having used VPMage myself, I couldn't say.

[Aesaar]

Why is the installer still available for download, given that the first thing we usually tell new users is "don't use the installer"?

[jr2]

Because the new, working installer will be available soon^TM!

[Androgeos Exeunt]

This Installer is known to work on Windows, Linux(tested on Gentoo and Fedora, should work on others), and Mac (OSX Panther, with a hacked install of Java 1.5)

Just thought I'd mention this. I'm not a fan of the installer, but given that we're now on Java 7 Update 45, it's definitely come a long way.

[Fury]

Officially there is no such thing as Java 1.5. What became Java 1.5 is Java 5. Which essentially makes Java 7 same as Java 1.7. Doesn't change the fact that 7 years has passed since though.

[James Razor]

Installer is depreciated. Install following this until the new installer is released.

Dont get me wrong, but the installer was one of the things that allowed me to stick to the game until i learned how stuff works. I still have problems with the tutorial, simply because it aint written in german and my english is only so good.

It has improved a lot over the years (playing eve and having to talk to a lot of ppl from all around the world helped me a lot, also i always try to get movies in the original (english) version if i can).
But there where times where the installer was the only thing that allowed me to play FS2 and benefit from the Mods and Upgrades.

[wolfen]

Help I tried to download the zip from page 1 and its not found, can somebody help please?
I had to wipe windows XP again and re install both Linux and windows and I need mt freespace

[Mongoose]

That's not the installer you're looking for...not anymore, anyway.  Goober has been working on a fully-revamped installer, and while it's still a few tweaks away from its final public release, you can grab the beta version here.

[wolfen]

Thanks