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Using the Loki Update Tool FAQ
Last Updated on: 2001-05-16 16:01:42
This is where you will find useful information about the Loki Update Tool.
The following are answers to some frequently asked questions about this game.
Please read these before e-mailing Loki Technical Support - Chances are your question is answered here too!
1. Introduction
- 1.1 How to use this FAQ
This FAQ allows you to navigate through the answers by category, or individually, or to view the entire FAQ at once.
The full view is also suitable for printing.
This FAQ is modelled on the Linux HOWTO documents for consistency and ease of navigation.
- 1.2 Authors
The maintainers of the FAQ can be reached by e-mailing faqs@lokigames.com.
Please send all correspondance directly related to the FAQlist tool to that address.
4. Usage
- 4.1 What command-line options are available for the Loki Update Tool?
(Also available with loki_update --help )
The options can be any of:
--verbose Print verbose messages to standard output
--noselfcheck Skip check for updates for the update tool
--tmppath PATH Use PATH as the temporary download path
--update_url URL Use URL as the list of product updates
You may also specify a product (e.g. tribes2 , or loki_demos ) on the command-line, to force an update of only that one product, e.g.:
loki_update [options] tribes2
and you can specify a directory to re-register with ~/.loki/installed , e.g.:
loki_update [options] /path/to/game
- 4.2 Can the Loki Update Tool be used with a proxy server?
Yes. loki_update is based on libsnarf ,
and so it understands all the environment variables that snarf does.
This includes:
SNARF_PROXY
HTTP_PROXY
FTP_PROXY
The format is typically protocol://host:port/, e.g.:
export SNARF_PROXY=http://proxy:3128/
for a fairly default configuration.
A proxy using authentication should be able to be used with protocol://userid:password@host:port/, e.g.:
export SNARF_PROXY=http://my_id:my_passwd@proxy:3128/
- 4.3 Can the Loki Update Tool be used without X?
Yes, loki_update can be launched when X is not running, but currently only in a non-interactive mode.
(There is also a library dependency, see below.)
You will need to specify the product name on the command-line, e.g.:
loki_update tribes2
The available product names are:
loki_demos
loki_update
loki_uninstall
civctp
descent3
eus
heretic2
hg2
myth2
rt2
sc3u
sof
tribes2
Note that loki_update currently depends on three X libraries: libXi.so.6 , libXext.so.6 , and libX11.so.6 .
These dependencies will be removed in a future version, but in the meantime an installation of those client libraries should be enough to allow loki_update to launch on systems entirely devoid of X.
- 4.4 Can I tell the Loki Update Tool to use a different temporary path to store the downloaded files?
Yes. Use the --tmppath option, e.g.:
loki_update --tmppath /path/to/somewhere/with/space/
This will use the specified directory to store the temporary files. (The default location is ~/.loki/loki_update/tmp ).
You may also use the TMPDIR environment variable.
(This feature was fixed in 1.0.10.)
- 4.5 It's not finding some of my games when it looks, how can I fix that?
Usually, this is because the games are earlier versions, and they are not installed in one of the automatically probed directories:
/usr/games/ ,
/usr/local/games/ ,
/home/ ,
/home/games/ ,
/opt/ ,
/opt/games/
If you have the games installed somewhere else (for this example, /mygames/ is used),
you can launch loki_update from inside that directory and the games will be found.
For example:
cd /mygames
loki_update
Doing a scan of the entire hard-drive has been suggested in the past, but for obvious reasons, it is impractical and, in many cases, problematic -- with Linux mounting everything into a single filesystem, a search could (theoretically) bog down a large network using NIS+ if not very carefully pruned.
Since we offer the ability to launch it from within the directory in which the games are installed, it should cover all bases at this point.
If the games have been patched with loki_update -compatible patches (or the games were released after loki_update was introduced), they will have a .manifest directory.
This is a very important directory, as it stores the product version and paths to the associated files.
Information from this directory is sym-linked to the installing user's ~/.loki/installed/ directory.
If this symbolic link is lost, or the installing user's ~/.loki/installed/ directory becomes inaccurate, loki_update can be run this way:
loki_update /path/to/game/to/restore
and loki_update will refresh ~/.loki/installed/ for that particular product.
- 4.6 Is it possible to download the updates without loki_update?
Yes. All of the new patches are in pub/updates/ on our ftp site ( ftp://ftp.lokigames.com/pub/updates/) and the various mirrors.
You can download the patches by hand and apply them, or you can download all the updates for a given product, burn them onto a CD, and use the --update_url switch to use the CD's contents to update your Loki programs.
- 4.7 Is it possible to tell the Loki Update Tool to not delete the patch after downloading and applying?
At present, the way to do this is to uncheck the "Quick-update" button, and after the download (but before the update),
copy the file from ~/.loki/loki_update/tmp (or whatever alternate temporary directory you specified) to some safe location.
5. Source
- 5.1 Can I get the source to the Loki Update Tool?
loki_update is an Open Source project, and you can get the source from http://www.lokigames.com/development/loki_update.php3
You will also need setupdb
Both are available from the Loki CVS server (http://cvs.lokigames.com/)
Building the tool from source is not supported, and the Loki Update Tool will not be able to update itself automatically.
If you choose to install loki_update this way, you will need to keep it current yourself.
- 5.2 I just want to use it, should I build from source?
Probably not. This is not because we don't want people to look at the source.
However, if you build the binary yourself, you will not be able to take advantage of the self-updating features (since the patches only work against our released binaries).
If you want to look at how it was done, or make your own personal tweaks, please do so!
Just be aware that you will need to manually update your copy from source whenever we release a patch (if you want to stay current).
Support inquries should be addressed to support@lokigames.com.
FAQ's maintained by faqs@lokigames.com.
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