Workshop Ship Organiztion question

[Loki]

Is it at all possible to organize my workshop ships I've downloaded into separate folders in order to make it easier to find specific ones? I kind of got a little "Subscribe Happy" with some of the good ones, and wanted to reorganize them so I can find specific ones a little easier.

[Fichom]

You could always manualy move the files inside your ships folder...

[Warrax]

Yes, you can go into the computer files, and then sort them manually, in folder.

You could also do the same, in-game, but could be painful saving, deleting and re-saving.

If you DO go into the game files, keep in mind there are three pieces for a ship file. The XML and two others.
I cannot recall the pathway to get to those files, as I had set up a shortcut a long while ago.

Perhaps someone else can recall the file/folder pathway for you.
Cheers

[Fichom]

The 'fastest' way to get to them(on a Windows machine) is to search '%appdata%', which will open a folder called 'Roaming'. Or you could go the manual way of C:(OS drive) > Users > YourUsername > AppData > Roamin. Do note that the 'AppData' folder might be hidden for you, so you might have to enable 'show hidden files and folders' in your windows settings.

Anyways, once you are in the 'Roaming' folder, there should be a folder there named 'Avorion', and inside it a folder named 'ships'. Inside it you will find all the designs. As Warrax mentioned, each ship design has 3 files connected to it:

1. ship_design_name.xml - an .xml file, usualy named only 'ship_design_name',
   
2. ship_design_name.xml.meta - a .meta file
   
3. ship_design_name.xml.png - a .png file containing the thumbnail picture of the ship, usualy named only 'ship_design_name.xml'.

I'm pretty sure you can actually omit the .png file while moving ships, since it's generated in-game when a design is loaded, but if you don't want to risk it, make sure to move all three of the files together. Keep in mind you can also rename and create new folders here directly, rather than create them in-game.

This is also a great place to delete all those pesky auto-saves if you are bothered by them, since you can quickly simply select all the designs and delete them in seconds(rather than waste minutes or even hours with the in-game UI). Do make sure there is nothing in there that you do not wish to delete(since it can't be returned unless you make your own backup).

[EzRyder]

no it is not possible to sort the Workshop downloads the way you describe afaik
the others are talking about saves you create from them not the workshop bp itself, these you can 'sort' but you would have to save them from the workshop first as local saves

[Fichom]

Originally posted by CaptRyder:

no it is not possible to sort the Workshop downloads the way you describe afaik
the others are talking about saves you create from them not the workshop bp itself, these you can 'sort' but you would have to save them from the workshop first as local saves

Idk how other's people game is working, but I have a folder called workshop which has all of the workshop items in it. I guess there is a problem of names, but they are tehcnically there. Though I haven't downloaded any workshop designs lately myself, so this might have changed?

[Fichom]

Originally posted by Fichom:

Originally posted by CaptRyder:

no it is not possible to sort the Workshop downloads the way you describe afaik
the others are talking about saves you create from them not the workshop bp itself, these you can 'sort' but you would have to save them from the workshop first as local saves

Idk how other's people game is working, but I have a folder called workshop which has all of the workshop items in it. I guess there is a problem of names, but they are tehcnically there. Though I haven't downloaded any workshop designs lately myself, so this might have changed?

I stand corrected, it might have worked like that in the past. I'm looking into where the workshop downloads folder is right now :)!

[Fichom]

Yeah I just digged a bit, and found that the workshop items are actually downloaded to the 'workshop' folder of the steam instalation folder. So first check where your steam library is located: press 'Steam' button in top left menu of Steam, open 'Settings', then 'Downloads', and finaly 'Steam library folders'. Here you will have a list(most likely only 1 item in it) with where steam is installing your games. Go to that folder, and the path of it should be something like 'C:/Program Files/.../SteamLibrary', or something like that(you should know how to get to it if you changed it).

There you can find a folder named 'steamapps', and inside it a folder named 'workshop', and inside it a folder named 'content'. Now comes the tricky bit. Games and individual files are not named based on the games and files name, but rather(I'm guessing) the game's/file's ID number. For me, Avorion's folder is named '445220'. It might be the same, or totaly different for your system(again, not sure). Once inside this folder, each new folder is representing one workshop item you downloaded. Again, you will notice they use numbers and not actualy workshop names, for both folders and the files inside those folders. This is unfortunate, but you can use two methods to distinguish different ships:

First, you can use the date modified - if you know in which order you added things from the workshop, it might also be in more or less that order in the folder(if items are ordered by date).

The other method is to open each individual folder, and open the .png file. It contains a thumbnail picture of that workshop item, so you might use it to distinguish between different ships. You can then rename the files and move them to apropriate folders in the aforementioned folder with you personal designs(located in the 'Roaming' folder).

Good luck ':D.

[EzRyder]

:-) its easier to just save them in the builder if you ask me, they save everything you subscribe to even if you unsubscribe in that folder, but yea it is possible to pull them from there but will also take renaming anyway

[Fichom]

Originally posted by CaptRyder:

:-) its easier to just save them in the builder if you ask me, they save everything you subscribe to even if you unsubscribe in that folder, but yea it is possible to pull them from there but will also take renaming anyway

Yeah I agree it might be easier to do it through the game's UI, was just listing another relatively viable method! Thanks for the correction btw.

[FuryoftheStars]

IMO, it all boils down to "too complicated to be worth it for what little benefit it gives".

:P

[Fichom]

Yeah I agree, of course when it comes to workshop ships. Organising your own folder is, in my own opinion, still much easier via the direct method, compared to the game's UI :D

[Fousicek]

I have a a bit of issue with the moving files from workshop desings to my own file. If i want to move only the desing then it does move those three files Thats OK.... HERE comes the issue... IF i want to move next ship , it tells me the files have same name....


How does the file folders from workshop dont show the number but name of the file ? Is it because it refers to workshop ide which has a name and then it shows it in game UI ?

Is there a way how to have the name of the ship saved in the file ? Because renaming all the files i have downloaded to have the name from workshop will be a big NO NO.


There has to be a way how to sort those desings.

[EzRyder]

Originally posted by Fousicek:

I have a a bit of issue with the moving files from workshop desings to my own file. If i want to move only the desing then it does move those three files Thats OK.... HERE comes the issue... IF i want to move next ship , it tells me the files have same name....


How does the file folders from workshop dont show the number but name of the file ? Is it because it refers to workshop ide which has a name and then it shows it in game UI ?

Is there a way how to have the name of the ship saved in the file ? Because renaming all the files i have downloaded to have the name from workshop will be a big NO NO.


There has to be a way how to sort those desings.

not exactly sure what your having trouble with but yes, afaik the workshop uses an id number (the folder name) and uses these 'folders' to allow the same name for all bp's so short of placing them all in seperat folders such as the workshop does you will have to type a name in somewhere either in the builder or in the file browser
there is no way to have it 'autoname' them afaik, you will have to type that in somewhere either in the builder or in the file browser
there is no 'easy' way to do this for tons of workshop bps all at once afaik
i usually just save/rename them as i use them so i am always 'caught up' but yea its gonna be a bit of work and typing in your case

[Fichom]

Yeah, it(the file 'names') most likely reference some sort of hidden workshop ID.

I don't know of a way to easily change names. It would be nice if the name was somehow contained in the META file, but it appears to be a binary(so I can't really tell). The name being contained in the XML file would be even better, but it is not the case.

I mean including the name in one of the files would make it possible to write a script that would simply run through your whole workshop folder and rename all of the files. The only problem would be 'what if there are multiple designs with a same name', but I think those would be super-rare cases, so you could handle those manualy.

[EzRyder]

@Fichom
its possible it is not even in the meta file
this could be handled on steams end using just the id number from the folder name
but i agree it would be great if they included the xml and your suggestion might work if they did