Patching question

[Punk Monk]

Sooo patching sucks lol

Can a large thumb drive be used to be the space needed for the patch action... my hard drive does not have enough space to hold the game twice over so I have to reD/L every time.

[Yujah]

If you add a secondary library on the thumb drive (Steam -> Settings -> Storage) then, yes, Steam should retreat to the download/temporary folders in that library if there's not enough room in the game's own library. Just delete that secondary library again from that same place once done. A thumb drive can be particularly slow; especially large cheap ones.

By the way: https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/10/4843148768111011068/

[CZBGR Icepick]

Your hard drive isn't taken up by double the space just for downloading updates. If it were necessary, it would just overwrite the existing files of that capacity, with more or less whatever the patch does. You would barely get any difference unless the developer made major changes. So you really don't need to do anything at that point.

Though if you're out of space for new games, you can use other drives to expand the library space. Else, if you're really desperate for space, many games are on cloud platforms like GeForce Now that let you play games from Steam, standalones, and other platforms. That does not require extra space at all, and you can practically remove the original downloads on your system, provided there's cloud service supported on that game.

[rawWwRrr]

Originally posted by Punk Monk:

Sooo patching sucks lol

Can a large thumb drive be used to be the space needed for the patch action... my hard drive does not have enough space to hold the game twice over so I have to reD/L every time.

Terrible solution.

Originally posted by CZBGR Icepick:

Your hard drive isn't taken up by double the space just for downloading updates. If it were necessary, it would just overwrite the existing files of that capacity, with more or less whatever the patch does. You would barely get any difference unless the developer made major changes. So you really don't need to do anything at that point.

Patching typically requires someone to maintain at least enough empty space on the drive as their biggest game due to the process. Original files are moved to a temp location. The patch applies via copy process to create the new files from the original files. When finished with patching there are two copies of the game's files on the drive. The new files are verified that they are correct. Finally the original files are deleted.

EA recently announced a new patch process that eliminates this copy aspect to the process, calling it in-place updates.
https://www.ea.com/news/in-place-updates

Steam isn't doing that and in a lot of ways won't be able to unless all of the other devs structure their game files the same way EA does.

Until that can happen, the old advice still applies: do not try to fill every byte of storage. Drives should always carry some empty space to allow for updates, normal file copy/move processes, etc. to do so efficiently. I know that's more difficult for some than others.

[CZBGR Icepick]

Originally posted by rawWwRrr:

Patching typically requires someone to maintain at least enough empty space on the drive as their biggest game due to the process. Original files are moved to a temp location. The patch applies via copy process to create the new files from the original files. When finished with patching there are two copies of the game's files on the drive. The new files are verified that they are correct. Finally the original files are deleted.

EA recently announced a new patch process that eliminates this copy aspect to the process, calling it in-place updates.
https://www.ea.com/news/in-place-updates

Steam isn't doing that and in a lot of ways won't be able to unless all of the other devs structure their game files the same way EA does.

Until that can happen, the old advice still applies: do not try to fill every byte of storage. Drives should always carry some empty space to allow for updates, normal file copy/move processes, etc. to do so efficiently. I know that's more difficult for some than others.

As I said, you're not downloading the whole game when you're patching your existing installs. I've tons of games that have been patched over the years. They are usually worth a few MBs, nothing to write home about. You're not downloading the whole install all over, which is precisely why I covered that unless they are doing a whole makeover, this is not generally an issue.

[Yujah]

Originally posted by CZBGR Icepick:

As I said, you're not downloading the whole game when you're patching your existing installs.

Not downloading no, but writing yes. As rawWwRrr said, an update is "streamed into" a temporary copy; read N_0 bytes from the existing original, write those to the temp, download U_0 bytes and write those to the temp, read N_1 bytes from the original, write... -- so on.

Only when all's done with is the temporary copy (checked and) moved over the original whence the process needs at least the size of the updated version free, and is e.g. the reason for these forums having seen many complaints from owners of the 150G game BG3 a while back. Games are generally getting big enough that needing (up to) at least their own size free for purpose of updating is getting ridiculous.

What EA's IPU is doing is skipping the temporary; this of course can not other than at least potentially make for some truly disgustingly heavily fragmented game files after a while -- but that is not in fact too much of an issue in these SSD times (and HDDs are defragmented as a matter of course anyway) so yes, definitely good, doubly if it could be arranged to use it only when little space is in fact available.

Yes, (unlike rawWwRrr's comment...) Steam could use same/similar. For purposes of a possible later restore if a final check fails you'd keep the original file-blocks around (generally no more than those "few MBs" you also downloaded new; think of "clusters" in old FAT terms) but otherwise insert new blocks immediately. Huge space savings, and as far as I'm concerned perhaps even more importantly, time savings, since we're skipping all that read-original / write-temporary I/O.

[CZBGR Icepick]

Originally posted by Yujah:

Originally posted by CZBGR Icepick:

As I said, you're not downloading the whole game when you're patching your existing installs.

Not downloading no, but writing yes. As rawWwRrr said, an update is "streamed into" a temporary copy; read N_0 bytes from the existing original, write those to the temp, download U_0 bytes and write those to the temp, read N_1 bytes from the original, write... -- so on.

Once again, this is about patching. You really do not need to keep arguing over an irrelevant matter to try to "correct" a response that is literally the opposite of what you're saying. That temp file is temporary and isn't large enough to be significant. It is gone by the time the download completes. You're not copying the entire game in any meaningful way.

[Yujah]

You are wrong. But clearly from your response I can't help that so i wont try further.

[CZBGR Icepick]

Originally posted by Yujah:

You are wrong. But clearly from your response I can't help that so i wont try further.

No. From your ignorant response, I'm not wrong. You are. You've fundamentally failed to comprehend.

I've already covered the question by saying that "unless you're required to re-download the whole game", the problem of that simply doesn't exist. Ever.

It's literally physically impossible to be downloading the whole game and be doubling that space when you're actually just patching up some files, or even one for that matter, for a few MBs. You're NOT literally replacing the whole thing. It simply doesn't happen, period. It's virtually insignificant. The fact temp files exist is a negligible factor at that point due to its size and the fact it is merely temporary. That's it.

The OP was not talking of actually re-installing the game. For the majority of the time, they are not re-downloading the whole thing either. They're simply talking about when they're patching components of the game, which is literally what the patching process does. I reiterate, as I've covered that "unless you are re-downloading the whole thing", you are mainly not. Huge difference.

[Yujah]

Originally posted by Yujah:

Not downloading no, but writing yes. As rawWwRrr said, an update is "streamed into" a temporary copy; read N_0 bytes from the existing original, write those to the temp, download U_0 bytes and write those to the temp, read N_1 bytes from the original, write... -- so on.

Now that I aimed to be helpful by sketching the process like that but seeing the thread cut short again by the usual Steam-forum ignorant loud "gamer" grandstanding let me by the way say that the above in fact is likely only a conceptual rather than literal description, i.e., as a result of the delta-file application. In practice it might and probably is worse, with the to be patched file and the until it's done patched file existing as duplicates, i.e., needing up to two rather than one times the size of the largest to be patched file as free space.

Am a Linux user and not deeply familiar with NTFS, but I also don't believe copy-on-write adjustment to that is going to feature anywhere, so all pretty bad...

CZBGR Icepick: You have no idea what any of this is saying / is about. I linked EA's news article in the Ideas / Suggestions post I linked above and rawWwRrr did as well. Try and at least read that for a description of what (mostly) also Steam does and what EA has now changed so as to forego OP's problem. I will not respond to you again.

[CZBGR Icepick]

Originally posted by Yujah:

CZBGR Icepick: You have no idea what any of this is saying / is about. I linked EA's news article in the Ideas / Suggestions post I linked above and rawWwRrr did as well. Try and at least read that for a description of what (mostly) also Steam does and what EA has now changed so as to forego OP's problem. I will not respond to you again.

This is Steam, not EA. What the two do in comparison or not is entirely irrelevant. I can read,
and you're insulting my intelligence while failing to understand the point. You aren't typically doing a full game download just for patching. That is hardly a thing, and I do look at what I'm patching from time to time. Don't gaslight me. You are not in the right here.

[Yujah]

Originally posted by Yujah:

Yes, (unlike rawWwRrr's comment...) Steam could use same/similar. For purposes of a possible later restore if a final check fails you'd keep the original file-blocks around (generally no more than those "few MBs" you also downloaded new; think of "clusters" in old FAT terms) but otherwise insert new blocks immediately.

Okay, and now that I got myself interested (thanks, "gamer") this would on Linux and if a new section takes up more or less space be a job for fallocate() but admittedly fallocate() is nonportable. Linux' standard filesystem ext4 (and btrfs, and XFS, and undoubtedly bcachefs) support it so that'd be fine but whether or not Windows/NTFS is going to have an equivalent available I do not know.

That's to say that there might be something to rawWwRrr's comment that this at the very least ideally wants cooperation from the games themselves as to their file structure and, then, that this would be something that Steam couldn't do as easily as EA could, what with everything in-house...

[smokerob79]

Originally posted by CZBGR Icepick:

Your hard drive isn't taken up by double the space just for downloading updates. If it were necessary, it would just overwrite the existing files of that capacity, with more or less whatever the patch does. You would barely get any difference unless the developer made major changes. So you really don't need to do anything at that point.

Though if you're out of space for new games, you can use other drives to expand the library space. Else, if you're really desperate for space, many games are on cloud platforms like GeForce Now that let you play games from Steam, standalones, and other platforms. That does not require extra space at all, and you can practically remove the original downloads on your system, provided there's cloud service supported on that game.

you must be new to gaming so lets explains somethings to you....first and for most many games do NOT delete anything when a patch is put out.....

[CZBGR Icepick]

Originally posted by smokerob79:

you must be new to gaming so lets explains somethings to you....first and for most many games do NOT delete anything when a patch is put out.....

Uhh, what was just described to me is in conflict with your statement. But what you're quoting is not precisely what I even said. I've been gaming and computing for decades. It seems you're new to what temp files are for (psst: they are called "temp" for a reason).

[Yujah]

Originally posted by CZBGR Icepick:

It seems you're new to what temp files are for (psst: they are called "temp" for a reason).

Yet significantly more important to the subject at hand, they are called files for a reason.

Anyways; I said I wouldn't...

[CZBGR Icepick]

Originally posted by Yujah:

Originally posted by CZBGR Icepick:

It seems you're new to what temp files are for (psst: they are called "temp" for a reason).

Yet significantly more important to the subject at hand, they are called files for a reason.

Anyways; I said I wouldn't...

You're missing a very important mstter: what files are being downloaded. The OP was talking about patching a game, while being worried about whether it downloads the whole game twice over. Fact is, it rarely ever is the case, because the purpose isn't whether you're downloading the whole game. You're actually just replacing, adding or even removing specific components. They are usually a fraction of the whole thing. The specific size will vary, but very rarely, and extremely unlikely, it involves a total overhaul. That's why I specifically said "unless it does...". It just doesn't involve that. There's no reason you should be arguing.

That whole thing about temp files is negligible because in the end, it's merely used to decompile to the destination file that is being built/rebuilt/removed. In the end that temp file is just virtual space and dematerializes. Basically the only time it is taking up space is while the patching is active, but this doesn't mean it's the whole game. At minimum, it's one file. That's it. No need to make a mountain out of a molehill.