Are you an organised hacker?

Started by Spherical Ice September 17th, 2010 9:23 AM
  • 2312 views
  • 30 replies

Spherical Ice

Age 25
Leicester, UK
Seen 4 Days Ago
Posted February 20th, 2022
5,251 posts
15.5 Years
Do you keep lots of backups, do you have specific folders for specific things, or do you just throw everything into one folder?

As for myself, I am borderline organised. I've got a Backup, Screenshots, Scripts, Sprites and Toolbox folder, all in a folder with the same name as my hack name, where I keep the actual ROMs, and Patches. The reason why it's borderline is because I normally end up just saving stuff in whatever folder I want. Heh, it's a real mess atm, actually.

So, what about you?

Xela

Do you believe in yourself?

Seen November 28th, 2022
Posted May 3rd, 2015
349 posts
15.3 Years
Pretty much. I have folders for tools, unused ROMs, hacked ROMs, type of tools and such. I always create backup of everything except the tools. So I would call myself a little bit organized. :P

Giga Universe

Working on a tool.

Age 28
Male
South Africa
Seen September 30th, 2012
Posted August 15th, 2011
121 posts
15.8 Years
I generally am - I keep each of my tools in a separate folder, and I make regular backups, etc. Sometimes it gets a bit too much for me and I just save everything in one folder though XD. I was trying to make a tool to make organisation easier at one time, because being organised was too much effort XD.
Age 29
Male
Ireland
Seen 1 Week Ago
Posted April 6th, 2023
1,655 posts
14.1 Years
I like to think I'm relatively organised- I pretty much do the same thing you do.
Right at the beginning, I make a folder and name it the Hack's name, then Copy/Paste a ROM into it. Then, as I go along, more and more folders appear in that folder, and then appropriate sub-folders in those ones- for example, the Graphics folder has sub-folders like Tilesets (from A-Map) and Sprites (the latter haveing several sub-folders). It's good to be organised, really. I also ALWAYS back up my files. I make a .zip folder and put the ROM in there. Every time I do maps or anthing to the hack, before switching off the PC I backup the ROM, and I also back it up on a USB Memory Stick in the event of a format (wich has happened before). Organisation and preparation is very important, really.

- - - - - - - - - -
Age 28
Seen April 7th, 2014
Posted April 2nd, 2014
3,977 posts
15.8 Years
Pretty much, I suppose.
Whenever I start a new hack, I make a new folder and have different folders for everything including screenshots, backups and so on. But the folders are really unorganized and there are even things that I probably don't need. I clean up the folders once in a while, so that I don't mix up things; And it's hard working that way.
Age 31
Male
GMT+2
Seen June 19th, 2018
Posted May 24th, 2018
658 posts
13.7 Years
In addition to what everyone said so far, I keep track of all my flags/variables/palettes used, do a plot outline-walkthrough-like, filler scripts for the beta, a to-do list, reminders, all on .txt files. Oh, and a casual test rom included, all in a separate folder.

Spherical Ice

Age 25
Leicester, UK
Seen 4 Days Ago
Posted February 20th, 2022
5,251 posts
15.5 Years
Funny, I expected most of PC to be messy, and it was just me with my OCD. Haha.

Oh, I also keep track of all of my flags and variables used, in XSE's note thing. I also have the directions for "spriteface". I always forget. XD

Edit:
@Manipulation: ...oh.

Logan

Age 28
Male
Salisbury, England
Seen July 19th, 2022
Posted November 12th, 2021
10,414 posts
14.5 Years
You realise for spriteface you could do 'spriteface FACE_DIRECTION', right? If you didn't, you do now.

Anyway, I'm pretty messy. Everything's all over the place. :)

Haz

Haz ya seen my hack?

Female
Australia- Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!, Oi, Oi, Oi!
Seen August 16th, 2011
Posted October 21st, 2010
698 posts
14.5 Years
I'm realitivly organised. I have all of the rombases and hacks I have downloaded in a folder, which is then subfoldered into Ruby/ Spahire, FR/LG, Emereld and Rombasrs. My own hak is in yet ANOTHER folder and I have all my backups in there with it. My tools all have seperate folders which is all in another folder on my Downloads
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Alignment

Revered with the stars

Male
Seen December 25th, 2016
Posted September 30th, 2012
308 posts
13.2 Years
I'm messy as hell. I forgot where I put my ROM once, and ended up having to use the back up I emailed myself a few weeks ago, yeah pretty big setback. I usually just put stuff places and search the entire C drive when I need them :D

I don't know which flags I use, I just use random ones at random times, once I used 800 and realized it was the safari flag, that ended up messing the script at the end cause of it :P

I have only about 5-6 tools so it's not that hard to keep track of. List :

Spoiler:
Advance Map 1.92
PKSV
XSE
NTME
UNLZ
TileEd 2002

I only used TileEd once though, and if ifranview counts then that too...

Kevin

kevin del rey

Age 24
Male
Virginia
Seen February 3rd, 2021
Posted July 5th, 2015
2,686 posts
12.8 Years
Uh-huh ^_^
Alrighty... on Desktop is my hack, Pokemon Destiny folder. Inside is the ROM, and a folder for screenshots for showcasing the hack (later on :>).
Back to Desktop.
Below the hack folder is Pokemon Tools, where all the tools I use are in there.
Below the tools folder is a back-up ROM of Destiny. I update it once I do major stuff, like tile-inserting, scripting, ect.

Guess that's it... =P

TB Pro

Old-timer

Age 28
Male
Midwestern USA
Seen March 6th, 2016
Posted October 4th, 2012
2,707 posts
18.5 Years
Pretty organized, here. This is the breakdown of my folders:

Documents->Hacking->IPS; Maps; ROMs; Tools; VBA
ROMs->Project Z; Mahogany; Unnamed; Fire Red; Ruby; Hacks
Project Z->Palettes; Tilesets; Story Elements; Screens; and the ROM/backups
Mahogany->Old Scripts; Stuff(containing many different text files); Screens; Palettes; Graphics(containing many graphics such as hp boxes ect.); Sprites; Tilesets; and the ROM/backups
Fire Red->Clean Fire Red ROM
Ruby->Same as Fire Red
Hacks->Bugs; and all the hacks I download
Age 27
Male
Best City OCE
Seen October 18th, 2021
Posted April 1st, 2013
5,978 posts
15.2 Years
I'm relatively organised.

Sort of.

I keep all the bigger tools in their own folders (with my ROM in A-Map's, for ease of use) to make reaching them easier, but my main "Hacking Stuff" folder is a pile of junk. :D

...then again, I don't keep backups... :|
Everything ends,
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Age 30
Male
It is for me to noe and all of you to find out
Seen April 17th, 2022
Posted October 16th, 2021
1,318 posts
14.2 Years
I organise my hacking things preety neatly.Like a folder for all the hacking tools.

Then a folder for my hack,seperated to rom,backup rom,extreme backup[refer to before the backup],
imortant sprites[which are seperated to hero sprites,prof,evil team..etc],there are sprites[for normal people]

storyline[all my ideas and story goes here],
then i have tiles[tiles i want to insert and the ones i made are seperate]
Screenshots,World Map,Maps..thats basically covers them..lol

Orinjmate

The Orinj of the Mate

Male
England
Seen September 13th, 2011
Posted September 1st, 2011
120 posts
12.9 Years
I'm very organised I have each thing in it's own folder with updated backups for everything including palettes, sprites and map files. And I have it all backed up on an external device too :)
Currently working on a new hack named Hollow.
Pokemon Sky SD Creator

NarutoActor

The rocks cry out to me

Age 29
Female
Brooklyn/Marlboro
Seen April 2nd, 2016
Posted March 22nd, 2016
1,974 posts
14.4 Years
I started hacking un-organized and I realized rom hacking is a lot more easier if you are organized. So I have slowly became more, and more organized.
~There are those people who understand hex, F the rest
Seen July 19th, 2022
Posted May 6th, 2018
918 posts
15.8 Years
Ehh, I wish I could say I was one of the most organized but I don't know.

Usually I start out backing up at a constant rate that firered rom's take up the majority of my HD... Then I slowly start to fill one folder more and more until I get super lazy and just use a dump space for everything... For Mystic so far I have been good though :)
Hey

Platinum Lucario

The Legendary Master of Light!

Age 30
Male
Warrnambool, Victoria, Australia.
Seen April 2nd, 2023
Posted April 1st, 2021
1,605 posts
15.4 Years
If I was creating a hack, yes I would! All the different folders for making different palettes and all that. And even some Maps if neccisary.

I'm pretty sure the developers are like that too. lol
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Male
The Bay Area
Seen May 18th, 2019
Posted August 13th, 2012
1,588 posts
15 Years
I could've sworn I was just bragging to Vrai about how organized I keep everything.

Anyway, I try my best to keep all of my hacking files in order. I've got separate folders for my hack, other people's hacks, all of my projects, my programs, and my source files, each with a good number of folders within each one (especially "Projects" o_O). I'm moderately obsessive-compulsive so it shouldn't be a surprise. However, if you open any of my folders, you'll see that the contents of each folder are messy. It doesn't help that for every folder in "Projects", I need a copy of VBA-SDL-H, VBA-H, and the three files that compose my ASM assembler. Add to that two ROMs and an .asm file or two (and their assembled, binary files) and you can see why I have trouble finding things.

Oh, I also keep track of all of my flags and variables used, in XSE's note thing.
I use an XSE header file with "#define"s for those. It's a lot easier to remember a name (e.g., "F_OV_MOTHER" (Flag, Oceanview, Mother)) than a hexadecimal number.

Brother of Vrai