Thread Tools Display Modes
09/24/14, 09:37 AM   #1
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
Minion occasionally bombs versions of addons

I'm not sure what the root cause is, and this isn't constant. I've had several instances lately of end users bombing out on my addons when updating through Minion and more often than not the fix is to update manually and then wait a few days and everything seems to go back to normal.

This seems to happen most frequently with collections, like Wykkyd's Framework and Wykkyd's Gaming Suite. Both collections save the users a LOT of time and effort, and even the largest collection I have, Wykkyd's Gaming Suite, is less than half the total size of some other individual addons (it's only 221k, some addons are 1m to 5m). Individually all of those same addons total up to much more download size (upwards of 400k).

For some reason some addons just show old version numbers for days on Minion. I'll update and check and even hours later, sometimes days later, I see an old version in Minion but the website has the latest.

Had a user just this morning alert me that his Minion was showing a 5 day old version of Gaming Suite, yet the website has a new version from last night. And when he tried to update, he ended up with 2 copies of every included addon.

To a savvy user all of this is fine and can be worked around or bypassed. The tool, Minion, is most valuable to people who don't know how to, or don't want to, cope with all of the manual stuff though. So this should probably be investigated.

Tossing this up as a thread so others can chime in. Probably 2/3 of my support issues helping users lately have been resolved via manual install of my latest versions, circumventing Minion's provided versions. That shouldn't be the case (which I think you'll agree).
  Reply With Quote
09/24/14, 10:07 AM   #2
Dolby
Every day I'm shuffling
 
Dolby's Avatar
Premium Member
WoWInterface Admin
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 1,276
How long ago has this started happening? About 3 - 4 weeks ago I switched to feeds to use our CDN which has a 10min ttl. Maybe some of the CDN servers aren't listening to that ttl so thats why some people are fine and others are having trouble? I've gone ahead and disabled the CDN for the ESO feeds. Let me know if it continues.

Also if you find any one having the problem and willing to help us test please send them my way. Seeing whats going on in the logs would help a lot.

Last edited by Dolby : 09/24/14 at 10:12 AM.
  Reply With Quote
09/24/14, 10:25 AM   #3
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
Ravenslock had it happen this morning. Guys by the name of JGoss and Cowthulu in game (in Mostly Harmless, DC) have complained about this for about the past month. There were others on twitter.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 03:46 AM   #4
Ravenslock
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4
Screens

Hi, how do I post logs?
Just now I have manually deleted all OLD files and folders from PC, downloaded all addons from WEBSITE and restarted Minion. This is the Screen I got from Minion



How do I give you more information?
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 07:06 AM   #5
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
In addition to seeing things like Ravenslock's screenshot there, I'm also noticing something else (and this is likely simply caused by the way I packaged things):

- I bundled 2 addons together for most of my addons recently, trying to work my way around this embedded library bloat (my concern exclusively, I'm sure).
- I re-embedded libraries in all of my stand-alone addons, and left the dependency addon inside my collections
- I think some users (as of last night/this morning) were upgrading from the double addon downloads to the embed downloads of standalones, while also using a collection and I think this resulted in:
- - The collection download carried over the Core Libraries folder just fine
- - The subsequent standalone addon downloads wiped out the Core Libraries folder because they no longer contained them

I think this is because, and correct me if I'm wrong Dolby, Minion is destroying what it last installed for a particular addon (in this case Core Libraries and say Full Immersion) and then installing the new copy of the addon (which only included Full Immersion this time). And since the collection installed by the user was attempting to maintain that Core Libraries folder, the other addon install(s) basically stepped on it and made all of the internal addons for that collection go inactive.

^^ sound probable? I don't even know what the solution would be from the Minion side of things. I won't be making big changes like this much more in the future but that doesn't mean this kind of scenario can't play out again through other means.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:03 AM   #6
Dolby
Every day I'm shuffling
 
Dolby's Avatar
Premium Member
WoWInterface Admin
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 1,276
Ravenslock, if you don't delete the addons through Minion (right click uninstall) or at least load Minion once after you manually delete so it can see those AddOns were removed then AddOns listed in Minion are going to have the old cached version numbers like you show. Minion has no idea that the AddOns have changed on your system because you bypassed minion and the folder/files look the same to Minion.

You can delete your minion.xml and that will reset Minion and force it to redirect every AddOn when you restart the application.

Your minion.xml and minion0.log is located in your user directory here:
PC: C:\Users\<windows user name>\.minion\
OSX: ~/.minion/

--

Wykkyd, yes Minion remembers the folders included with the currently installed AddOn. When an update is issued it deletes those folders and unpacks the updated AddOn. The reason for this is authors were changing the folder names and Minion wasn't deleting the old folder names thus causing the user to have multiple copies of the addon installed under different folder names. So now Minion remembers the folders so it can remove them when an update is sent out.

Its best if your going to use Minion that you install and delete the AddOns with the app. IF you do delete AddOns manually you'll want to restart Minion so it can detect those changes. It does check to see if AddOns are missing and removes them from its cache in the minion.xml if they are.

Maybe we should add a button to the game options page to trigger a AddOn re-detection? This would blow away the cache and make Minion re-detect everything in the AddOn folder.

Another idea I just thought of is taking a checksum of the addon folder, if the checksum changes Minion should do a sanity check.

We also have some features in the works so Minion can identify dependency's and make sure those are installed.

Last edited by Dolby : 09/25/14 at 10:31 AM.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:10 AM   #7
QuadroTony
Banned
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Apr 2014
Posts: 828
wykkyd's Core Libraries dissaper from the addons ingame
but in minion all okay

strange



reinstall of the addon helps

Last edited by QuadroTony : 09/25/14 at 10:15 AM.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:21 AM   #8
Dolby
Every day I'm shuffling
 
Dolby's Avatar
Premium Member
WoWInterface Admin
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 1,276
Originally Posted by QuadroTony View Post
wykkyd's Core Libraries dissaper from the addons ingame
but in minion all okay

strange

reinstall of the addon helps
Thats because the old addons included the dependency right? When minion updated those addons it deleted the old folders (including the dependency as minion thought that folder belonged to the addon that was updated) and unpacked the new update that didnt have them.

The reason we remember the folders that are included with an addon is because if an addon author changes the folder name of an addon we need to then delete the old folder so the user doesn't have 2 addons installed after updating.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:22 AM   #9
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
Exactly what I was describing, Tony.

Dolby, that didn't really address the issue, though you did confirm the folder thing.

Example:
- Addon 1 includes 2 folders. 1 folder is named Bob.
- Addon 2 includes 9 folders. 1 folder is named Bob.
- User A installs both addons 1 and 2
- Addon 1 is updated and Bob is removed.
- User A updates both addons 1 & 2.
- Addon 2 updates fine.
- Addon 1 removes Bob when it updates (even though addon 2 still wants Bob).
- User A now has a disfunctional addon 2, because addon 1 stepped on it.

^^ that's tricky, and should be rare. But it needs some way of being addressed.
Perhaps have the addon upload list cross-reference root folders from the entire installed list and if any addon still contains a reference to root folder Bob, don't delete Bob even if the addon being updated dropped it out of inclusion.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:23 AM   #10
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
Originally Posted by Dolby View Post
Thats because the old addons included the dependency right? When minion updated those addons it deleted the old folders (including the dependency as minion thought that folder belonged to the addon that was updated) and unpacked the new update that didnt have them.
See my response above (posted at the same time I think). You're seeing half the picture, I think.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:25 AM   #11
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
I also posted this today:
http://www.wykkydgaming.com/blog/201...upgrade-notice

Which is the top post in my ChangeLog feed:
http://www.wykkydgaming.com/blog/?category=Change-Log

But not everyone will RTFM when asked to. So...
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:26 AM   #12
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
Side note to QuadroTony:

I think you use more addons than anyone on the planet.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:29 AM   #13
Dolby
Every day I'm shuffling
 
Dolby's Avatar
Premium Member
WoWInterface Admin
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 1,276
Originally Posted by Wykkyd View Post
Example:
- Addon 1 includes 2 folders. 1 folder is named Bob.
- Addon 2 includes 9 folders. 1 folder is named Bob.
- User A installs both addons 1 and 2
- Addon 1 is updated and Bob is removed.
- User A updates both addons 1 & 2.
- Addon 2 updates fine.
- Addon 1 removes Bob when it updates (even though addon 2 still wants Bob).
- User A now has a disfunctional addon 2, because addon 1 stepped on it.

^^ that's tricky, and should be rare. But it needs some way of being addressed.
Perhaps have the addon upload list cross-reference root folders from the entire installed list and if any addon still contains a reference to root folder Bob, don't delete Bob even if the addon being updated dropped it out of inclusion.
Oh I understand and yes that is what is happening. Was just trying to keep it simple in my reply.

Since we remember/cache the folder structure of installed AddOns maybe we could have Minion not delete folders if it still sees another addon that is install requiring that same folder in its structure.

If any one has any better suggestions on how to handle that let me know.

Last edited by Dolby : 09/25/14 at 10:38 AM.
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 10:39 AM   #14
Wykkyd
Are you Wykkyd Gaming?
 
Wykkyd's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 107
Originally Posted by Dolby View Post
Since we remember/cache the folder structure of installed AddOns maybe we could have Minion not delete folders if it still sees another addon that is install requiring that same folder in its structure.
That would be ideal (and what I suggested above, heh).

Toss me some source code if you want help. I'll help, if it helps. O.o
  Reply With Quote
09/25/14, 03:29 PM   #15
Dolby
Every day I'm shuffling
 
Dolby's Avatar
Premium Member
WoWInterface Admin
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 1,276
Opps yes you did suggest that. Sorry about that, was reading and responding to this thread from my phone. Was in the waiting room of a doctors office.

I appreciate the offer to help and may take you up on it later but I think we should be able to squeeze it in this sprint or for sure next sprint.
  Reply With Quote
09/28/14, 08:45 AM   #16
Ravenslock
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4
I have updated the addon Wykkyd collection tonight using Minion and went to sleep. When I logged in just now today one 2 addons were in the folder, all other addons from tehcollection were missing and there was still a file named 1411842651-_GamingSuite.zip in the addon folder. I had to remove teh 2 folders again and manually install it.
  Reply With Quote
09/28/14, 10:31 AM   #17
Dolby
Every day I'm shuffling
 
Dolby's Avatar
Premium Member
WoWInterface Admin
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 1,276
Hi Ravenslock,

For me to know what happened I would have needed the minion0.log and minion.xml when the problem occurred

PC: C:\Users\<windows user name>\.minion\
OSX: ~\.minion\

That said I would suggest deleting your addons (right click on each addon and choose uninstall in Minion) and then use Minion to install them. It does a better job keeping track of AddOns it has installed then trying to detect them in the wild. There are more points of failure if Minion has to try and detect what AddOn is manually installed versus letting Minion install it for you because then it knows for sure what AddOn it is.

As for the 1411842651-_GamingSuite.zip sitting in your addon folder that usually happens when Minion does not have permission to delete the addon folder (lots of times its because either the game client or a virus scanner has that folder open so Minion is getting an in use error but thats only guessing with out seeing the error log) its trying to update, or the zip file didn't finish downloading? More details would be in the minion0.log at the time (minion0.log gets over written every time you restart the Minion client so if you've restarted Minion since that issue it won't be in the log any more).

Last edited by Dolby : 09/28/14 at 10:48 AM.
  Reply With Quote
09/29/14, 02:17 AM   #18
Ravenslock
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4
Ok I will save the log files next time it happens!
  Reply With Quote
10/23/14, 04:16 AM   #19
gillysan
Join Date: Apr 2014
Posts: 5
After reading some of this I see my problem why 8 addon's kept wanting to update every time I started Minion. Today is Oct 23, but minion.xml was dated Oct 8th yet I have used it multiple times since the 23rd. After the ESO 1.4 update I did a few manual updates.

Deleted the minion.xml and everything is back to normal with the file dated Oct 23rd.

Before I found this post I did look in Minion Options to see if there was a way to reset it.
  Reply With Quote

ESOUI » Site Forums » Minion » Minion occasionally bombs versions of addons

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off