Windows 2000/XP Users ONLY

[Mr.Frag]

In looking into Roger's problems, it finally dawned on me what might be the cause of a lot of peoples patching problems, saving game, etc.

Windows over the years has tightened up the default file permissions on C:\

Matrix installs their games to C:\Matrix Games\<game name>

This will inherit the permissions from C:\

If these are set too restrictive (in a lot of cases they will be) then future attempts to overwrite files will certainly fail.

This will result in failures of patches, failures creating save files, etc.

[Roger Neilson]

A HUGE thank you to MR Frag and his magic mouse! I was in despair that my favourite game may be unplayable and along he came and sorted it for me!

Such effort and timely intervention cannot be praised enough.

Thanks again.

Roger[&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o][&o]

[Mr.Frag]

Going to be seeing a lot more of this as Microsoft continues to tighten up security settings with each new security patch.

Much as people probably don't want to hear it, you are going to have to learn some "How To" stuff for taking care of your computer's operating system.

One of the uglys that can come and bite you is this wonderful logic of Microsoft permissions:

Moving a file transfers file permissions with it. Copying a file adopts the permissions of the location the file was copied to.

Try and sort that one out in your head. [8|]

ie: If you get an attachment in your email and save it on your desktop then *move* it into your save directory, it will have the file permissions of your desktop. If you had saved it directly to your save directory, it would inherit the permissions from the save folder itself.

This applies to any version of windows that uses the NTFS file system instead of the old FAT system.

[Titanwarrior89]

[X(]

[bradfordkay]

I play WITP on both W98SE and XPHome edition (desktop/laptop). I use a 128MB USB chip to transfer the files between the two, but transfer them directly into the WITP save folders without any interim locations. This has caused no problems so far.

[rogueusmc]

I run Win2000 with Outlook Express(I have a dedicated e-mail address for game turns and it is using Outlook Express)

The last time I had a file save as 'read only' was when I tried saving the file from the preview pane in Outlook. If I opened the email in it's own window and use the 'save as', it doesn't save as 'read only'.

If ya ever get it 'read only', ya have to delete the file in the file system and resave. If ya try to overwrite, it will still be 'read only'.

[scout1]

I've transfered files between W2000 & XP. I'verun into the change to read only files. Just got into the practice of checking the files afterwards ....

[pad152]

If what your saying is to copy a patch/mod.etc to the \matrix\witp directory before installing, then this is a good ideal, but does not fully explain the save game crash.

The saved game crash only began to happen after the release of 1.4x, with or without Service Pack II installed on XP. The save game crash never seems to happen if you wait several seconds before exiting the save game screen, waiting will not change or effect file permissions. The cursor changes back to normal before the list of saved files is updated when you have a large number of saved files.

[Cmdrcain]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag

In looking into Roger's problems, it finally dawned on me what might be the cause of a lot of peoples patching problems, saving game, etc.

Windows over the years has tightened up the default file permissions on C:\

Matrix installs their games to C:\Matrix Games\<game name>

This will inherit the permissions from C:\

If these are set too restrictive (in a lot of cases they will be) then future attempts to overwrite files will certainly fail.

This will result in failures of patches, failures creating save files, etc.

Yes I've noted that, I have an admin acct and a limited acct, when I use limited I had failuires in trying to save over a previous save that I created with the admin acct, the game runs under both but the limited acct cannot save or over write previous saves unless that account did the save itself.

I've always patched while in my admin acct so haven't had a patch problem, any acct with admin rights shouldn't have a problem
with any c:\ restrictions, it would be problemic if
trying under a limited rights acct.

[Cmdrcain]

ORIGINAL: rogueusmc

I run Win2000 with Outlook Express(I have a dedicated e-mail address for game turns and it is using Outlook Express)

The last time I had a file save as 'read only' was when I tried saving the file from the preview pane in Outlook. If I opened the email in it's own window and use the 'save as', it doesn't save as 'read only'.

If ya ever get it 'read only', ya have to delete the file in the file system and resave. If ya try to overwrite, it will still be 'read only'.

You should be able to under admin acct go into the files properties and change it from read-only however.

[Mr.Frag]

You should be able to under admin acct go into the files properties and change it from read-only however.

Not that simple. If you look at the permissions, you will see they are inherited from C:\

Each time a new file is created, it will pick up the permissions once again.

The correct way to deal with it is to break the inheritance, not just a quick one shot toggling of the read only.

[Brausepaul]

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag
...
Moving a file transfers file permissions with it. Copying a file adopts the permissions of the location the file was copied to.

Try and sort that one out in your head. [8|]...

Btw, this is very logical behaviour: If you move a file to a different location there is no need to change permission settings for this specific file. The user will probaly do the same things with the file as before, just at a different place. But there is (or should be) usually a reason to create a copy somewhere else, especially WHY you want to have a copy at a specific place. That's why the copy (by default) inherits the destination's security settings. I agree that most user's don't think about reasons or security settings, but that is this time not Microsofts's fault[:)]

[Captain Ed]

ORIGINAL: Brausepaul

ORIGINAL: Mr.Frag
...
Moving a file transfers file permissions with it. Copying a file adopts the permissions of the location the file was copied to.

Try and sort that one out in your head. [8|]...

Btw, this is very logical behaviour: If you move a file to a different location there is no need to change permission settings for this specific file. The user will probaly do the same things with the file as before, just at a different place. But there is (or should be) usually a reason to create a copy somewhere else, especially WHY you want to have a copy at a specific place. That's why the copy (by default) inherits the destination's security settings. I agree that most user's don't think about reasons or security settings, but that is this time not Microsofts's fault[:)]

I use 2 computers one I have hooked to the Internet and I receive my Pbem files with it.
I then burn the file to a disk manually move it to my gaming computer which has more horsepower and is not hooked to the net has no background programs running so it is much faster at executing the game however they have different versions of Win XP one is home user one is pro am I setting myself up for a problem. [&:]

[Mr.Frag]

running so it is much faster at executing the game however they have different versions of Win XP one is home user one is pro am I setting myself up for a problem.

Not as long as you don't play musical users

[madgamer2]

I have changed the way I download patchs after using XP pro. I put a folder in each game folder called"Patchs". I down load the patch directly into the folder.
If it is ZIP then I unzip it into the WIP folder itself. This type of stuff from mother Microsoft is now as you say has changed the way I deal with files. It makes me long for the good old days of FAT..ah well "the more things change the more they stay the same" I think some french dude said that. thanks for the info.
Madgamer

[niceguy2005]

Is there a way to run the game in the backgorund of Windows (XP) so that I may do other things while waiting for the computer to resolve the turn?

[Mr.Frag]

Is there a way to run the game in the backgorund of Windows (XP) so that I may do other things while waiting for the computer to resolve the turn?

If you run windowed, it is a little more forgiving, but it is still going to peg your machine at full out while the turn runs.

[herwin]

I'm playing WiTP 1.6 on my high-end Mac using VPC (yes, I know, but it runs Windows XP at about 500 MHz equivalent,
and it has high quality components), and it's stalling during turn one of the first year campaign at the point that ship
crews are trained. The CPU appears to be about 75% for a sustained period. WTFO?

[Mr.Frag]

I'm playing WiTP 1.6 on my high-end Mac using VPC (yes, I know, but it runs Windows XP at about 500 MHz equivalent,
and it has high quality components), and it's stalling during turn one of the first year campaign at the point that ship
crews are trained. The CPU appears to be about 75% for a sustained period. WTFO?

Thats normal ... the ship training routines do serious number crunching. Takes quite a while

[herwin]

Thanks, that turned out to be the case.