Better Oblivion Sorting Software
A simple "one-click" program for users that quickly optimises and avoids detrimental conflicts in their Oblivion, Fallout 3, Nehrim - At Fate's Edge and Fallout: New Vegas mod load orders.
Features & Introduction
- Correctly positions over 10,400 Oblivion mods and counting, including all the mod files found in such popular mods as FCOM, OOO, MMM, Better Cities, Open Cities, Race Balancing Project and many other large mods.
- For Oblivion, it can provide specific messages for when using OOO and Better Cities, and differentiates between FCOM and non-FCOM setups. It also detects common FCOM installation mistakes and warns the user about them.
- Correctly positions over 1,800 Fallout 3 mods and counting.
- Provides support for sorting mods used in Nehrim - At Fate's Edge and Fallout: New Vegas installs.
- Provides useful load order notes for many mods.
- Displays the version number of mods when it is available.
- Allows easy user customisation of mod positions and the messages provided.
- Provides Bash Tag suggestions that are automatically applied by Wrye Bash (for Oblivion), Wrye Flash (for Fallout 3) or Wrye Flash NV (for Fallout: New Vegas).
- Sorts mod files ghosted by Wrye Bash/Flash.
- Is under constant development and improvement by a team of modders and experts on all supported games.
Better Oblivion Sorting Software (BOSS) will reorder your mods to their correct positions (as listed in the masterlist.txt database file), putting any mods it doesn't recognise after them, in the same order as they were before BOSS was run.
BOSS is designed to assist in the installation and usage of mods, especially more complex mods such as FCOM, MMM and FOOK, and help mod users avoid serious conflicts. It is not a complete solution to load ordering issues, as there are far more mods out there
(estimated at about 30,000 for Oblivion, and about 11,000 for Fallout 3) than BOSS knows about. To properly place mods BOSS doesn't know about, a good working knowledge of mod load ordering for the relevant game is still necessary, for which some research and documentation reading will go a long way.
Installation & Basic Usage
BOSS can be installed for use with Oblivion, Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas or Nehrim - At Fate's Edge (a Total Conversion mod for Oblivion). Installation may either be automated, using the BOSS Installer package, or manually, using the archive package. Either method is simple, and instructions for manual installation are given below.
For Oblivion:
- If you have Wrye Bash, make sure the "Lock Times" function is deactivated.
- If upgrading from an earlier version of BOSS, delete your BOSS.bat, modlist.txt, modlist.old, masterlist.txt and BOSSlog.txt files in your Data folder. If you have an edited masterlist, make sure to keep a backup so that your edits are not lost.
- Extract the BOSS archive you downloaded to your ..\Oblivion\Data folder, so that BOSS.exe is in the same folder as Oblivion.esm.
- Run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" file to get the latest masterlist from the Internet and sort your mods.
- When running BOSS normally, do so from the BOSS.exe, but remember to run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" regularly to ensure you have a recent masterlist.
For Fallout 3:
- If you have Wrye Flash, make sure the "Lock Times" function is deactivated.
- If upgrading from an earlier version of BOSS (also known as BOSS-F), delete your BOSS-F.bat, modlist.txt, modlist.old, masterlist.txt and BOSSlog.txt files in your Data folder. If you have an edited masterlist, make sure to keep a backup so that your edits are not lost.
- Extract the BOSS archive you downloaded to your ..\Fallout 3\Data folder, so that BOSS.exe is in the same folder as Fallout3.esm.
- Run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" file to get the latest masterlist from the Internet and sort your mods.
- When running BOSS normally, do so from the BOSS.exe, but remember to run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" regularly to ensure you have a recent masterlist.
For Nehrim - At Fate's Edge:
- If you have Wrye Bash, make sure the "Lock Times" function is deactivated.
- Extract the BOSS archive you downloaded to your ..\Nehrim\Data folder, so that BOSS.exe is in the same folder as Nehrim.esm.
- Run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" file to get the latest masterlist from the Internet and sort your mods.
- When running BOSS normally, do so from the BOSS.exe, but remember to run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" regularly to ensure you have a recent masterlist.
For Fallout: New Vegas:
- If you have Wrye Flash NV, make sure the "Lock Times" function is deactivated.
- Extract the BOSS archive you downloaded to your ..\steamapps\common\fallout new vegas\data folder, so that BOSS.exe is in the same folder as FalloutNV.esm.
- Run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" file to get the latest masterlist from the Internet and sort your mods.
- When running BOSS normally, do so from the BOSS.exe, but remember to run the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" regularly to ensure you have a recent masterlist.
Once BOSS has finished running, the output will be displayed automatically. Read any notes, errors if applicable, and make any relevant changes that are suggested by them. Wrye Bash/Flash will automatically import and apply Bash Tag
suggestions from BOSS. Some Bash Tag suggestions can come with conditions and notes that require human intervention though, so read the suggestions makes thoroughly and adjust tags by hand in Wrye Bash/Flash if necessary.
You will need to reorder "unknown" mods by hand using OBMM/FOMM or Wrye Bash/Flash.
You can update your masterlist to the latest version by running the "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" file. This will replace your copy with the latest available online, and then run BOSS as normal using the updated masterlist. If you
have an edited masterlist, using this updater will cause you to lose all your edits.
Uninstallation
Delete BOSS.exe, "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat", "BOSS - Undo Last Run.bat", "BOSS - Print Debug Info.bat" and, if BOSS has been run, the BOSS folder in your ..\Data folder.
Further Details
Command Line Arguments
BOSS has a number of command-line arguments. The syntax is:
boss [-hVuosnd] [-r [level]] [-v [level]]
-h [ --help ]
This prints a short description of BOSS and some information on the function of the command line arguments, then exits.
-V [ --version ]
Prints the a banner displaying the program name and version number to the command line, then exits.
-u [ --update ]
Automatically updates the local copy of the masterlist using the latest version on the Google Code repository, and then sorts your mods. Since this replaces your current
masterlist, don't run this if you have an edited copy and wish to keep the changes. The "BOSS - Update Masterlist.bat" runs BOSS with this switch.
-o [ --only-update ]
Automatically updates the local copy of the masterlist using the latest version on the Google Code repository, and then does NOT sort your mods. Since this replaces your current
masterlist, don't run this if you have an edited copy and wish to keep the changes.
-s [ --silent ]
Stops BOSS from automatically opening up the BOSSlog in your web browser after it has finished running.
-n [ --no-version-parse ]
Disables the parsing of each mod's description to extract the author's version information, so it is not printed alongside other data in the generated BOSSlog.html. This can be used if the version
parsing is not working properly for some of your mods, and you wish to remove the version notes.
-r [ --revert ] [ level ]
Revert to a previous load order. This parameter optionally accepts values of 1 or 2, indicating how many undo steps to apply. If no option is specified, it defaults to 1. A value of 1 will restore the load order to that stored in modlist.txt.
A value of 2 will restore the load order to that stored in modlist.old. If the modlist that you are reverting to does not exist, BOSS will cancel the undo and display an error message. The modlist files are not updated when BOSS is run with this parameter.
-v [ --verbose ] [ level ]
Specify verbosity level (0-3). 0 is the default, showing only warning and error messages. 1 (warning, error and informational messages) is implied if this option is specified without an argument. Higher values increase the verbosity further.
-d [ --debug ]
Adds source file references (filenames and line numbers) to logging statements.
BOSS Changes and Files
The only changes BOSS makes to your game install are to re-date the .esp and .esm files in your Data folder, to create a BOSS folder there, and create a few text files in that BOSS folder. Your game's master file (Oblivion.esm, Fallout3.esm, Nehrim.esm or FalloutNV.esm)
is never touched, and all dates are derived from it.
The files that are used and created by BOSS are all found in the ..\Data\BOSS folder, and they are:
- masterlist.txt - This is the master list of mods that BOSS recognises, listing them in order and which includes notes attached to them. It is the most frequently updated component of BOSS, receiving updates almost every day.
- BOSSlog.html - This log is where the output that BOSS generates and displays once the program ends is stored. It is replaced every time you run BOSS. You can view it in any web browser.
- modlist.txt - This file contains the list of your mods in the order they were before you last ran BOSS, which can be used to undo changes to your load order.
- modlist.old - This file contains the contents of your modlist.txt before you last ran BOSS, providing a second level of undo for load order changes.
- userlist.txt - This file contains your custom rules to be implemented by the User Rules feature.
To undo the changes BOSS makes to your load order, you can use the included "BOSS - Undo Last Run.bat" file.
The .bat file will, by default, revert to the load order before the last run of BOSS, as stored in modlist.txt. If you want to revert back to the load order before that, as stored in modlist.old, you will need to edit your "BOSS - Undo Last Run.bat"
file:
- Right-click it and select "Edit" to open it up in Notepad.
- On the line containing "
BOSS.exe -r 1", replace the 1 with a 2 to give "BOSS.exe -r 2".
- Then save the file and run it to revert your load order back two levels.
The best way that users can customise how BOSS works is by using the included User Rules feature. This feature allows you to define the positions of mods not in the masterlist, and to override the masterlist positions of mods,
as well as edit the output messages of mods, and more. In addition, this is all done without editing the masterlist.txt, so when you update it using the built-in updater, your changes shall not be lost. All the information on the User Rules feature can be found in the "BOSS User Rules ReadMe.html" file.
An alternative is to use the BOSS Master List Manager (BOMM) by Surazal, which is a Word 2003, 2007 and 2010 Macro that provides similar features, and is compatible with both Oblivion and Fallout 3.
Contributions & Help
General discussion, and the submission of questions, suggestions and unrecognised mods, takes place in BOSS's official threads for Oblivion, Nehrim, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas.
User contribution of additions and corrections to the masterlist are vital to the upkeep of BOSS. Let us know what you know.
Lists of unrecognised mods are welcome but the only way we can include them in the database in a timely way is if we get:
- The ESP/ESM file name(s).
- A link to where the description, mod or readme can be found to read or download.
- A brief description of each mod will also help. Feel free to make load order suggestions.
Troubleshooting
Under some circumstances, BOSS may not be able to run properly due to a variety of reasons. In such cases, BOSS should be able to provide an error message detailing the type of fault. If the program unexpectedly crashes, the crash and the circumstances in which it occurred should be reported to the official BOSS thread (linked to in the Quick Links section below), so that we may fix it.
Here is a list of the error messages and their common causes:
- Message: ERROR: Sub-directory 'BOSS' could not be created;
- Issue: BOSS does not have permission to write to the Data folder.
- Solution: Make sure that your Data folder is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See later on in this section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
- Message: ERROR: file 'filename' could not be accessed for writing;
- Issue: BOSS does not have permission to write to the BOSS folder, or the given file if it exists.
- Solution: Make sure that your BOSS folder (and the file, if it exists) is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See later on in this section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
- Message: Critical Error: Master .ESM file not found!
- Issue: BOSS is not being run in the correct folder.
- Solution: Move BOSS into your Data folder.
- Issue: Your master .ESM file is deactivated and ghosted by Wrye Bash/Flash.
- Solution: Re-activate your master .ESM file.
- Message: Critical Error: Master .ESM file cannot be read!
- Issue: This error should never occur. If you see it, please report it to the BOSS team as soon as possible.
- Solution: If this error is displayed, it means that your master .ESM file exists, but its date cannot be read. This can only take place under very specialised circumstances, such as corruption of your master .ESM file, and probably means you will have to seek expert help.
- Message: Error: Masterlist update failed.
- Issue: Masterlist cannot be opened.
- Solution: Make sure that your BOSS folder (and masterlist.txt if it exists) is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See later on in this section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
- Issue: Curl error.
- Solution: There was a problem in getting information from the Internet. Depending on the error given, make sure your Internet connection is working correctly, or try again later.
- Issue: Cannot find online masterlist revision number.
- Solution: The layout of the Google Code page has changed, and a program update will be required to take account of this. Please report this issue in the official forum thread.
- Message: Critical Error: filename cannot be read!
- Issue: Your masterlist.txt does not exist, or is in the wrong place.
- Solution: Make sure that your masterlist.txt is in your Data\BOSS folder, or use the masterlist updater to download a new masterlist to the correct place.
- Message: Error: Could not change the date of "filename", make sure you have write access to it.
- Issue: BOSS does not have permission to write to the plugin given.
- Solution: Check that the plugin is not read-only, and that you have write permissions. See later on in this section for details on how to obtain write permissions on Windows Vista or 7.
- Issue: The plugin filename may contain letters that are not found in the English alphabet, or other such symbols (non ASCII characters). These letters and symbols are not currently supported by BOSS (which only supports ASCII characters).
- Solution: Rename the affected plugin, removing any suspect characters.
In addition to the specific error messages above, BOSS may also fail to work properly, or appear to do so, for a few general reasons:
- Symptom: BOSS won't run.
- Issue: Using BOSS version under 1.6.
- Solution: Update to version 1.6.
- Symptom: No change in load order.
- Issue: Wrye Bash's "Lock Times" load order locking feature is enabled.
- Solution: Disable "Lock Times" before running BOSS.
The Data\BOSS folder and all the files in it must not be read-only. If a file in this folder, or the folder itself, is read-only, BOSS will not function correctly, resulting in some of the errors listed above.
If you are running Windows Vista or Windows 7, also in some situations limited users accounts on XP, BOSS (and other modding programs) may be prevented from working correctly by the UAC security feature. There are four common workarounds to this problem:
- Install the game outside the Program Files (or Program Files (x86) folder if on 64 bit Windows). UAC prevents unauthorised edits to these folders, so by installing the game outside of them, you remove it from UAC's reach, allowing you to use mods more easily.
- Deactivate UAC. This can be done from the Control Panel, and will turn UAC off across the whole of your computer. It is up to you whether you feel that you have adequate security measures in place to do this without risk.
- Give yourself Full Control permissions over your game install folder. This will allow you to make any edits you desire while keeping UAC active and on guard for any edits made by programs you do not run, and also means that you do not need to reinstall your game to a new location.
- Run BOSS as an Administrator. Right-click the BOSS.exe, and select "Run as administrator".
For those that wish to take the third option and give themselves Full Control permissions, here is a guide:
- Right-click the folder you wish to change the permissions for, and select "Properties".
- In Properties, select the "Security" tab, and click the "Edit..." button. A UAC prompt may appear, simply allow yourself to continue.
- In the "Group or user names" box, select the "Users" option.
- In the lower box, check the box opposite "Full Control" in the "Allow" column. Press OK to exit. If a UAC prompt appears, allow the change.
- In the Properties window, select OK to exit. You should now have Full Control permissions over your chosen folder.
For dealing with limited accounts on XP you can run this console command: cacls drive:\path to relevant folder\*.* /e /t /p users:c. However note that if you set it wrong it can mess things up so if you decide to do so, use care (and do so at your own risk).
If the above information does not help you to solve any problems you are experiencing, please seek further support in one of the official BOSS threads.
Running BOSS Under Linux
It is possible to run BOSS on Linux through the Wine compatibility layer, though no official support for doing so is given. Installation and usage is as on Windows. While all the features work as they do in Windows, there are a few issues:
- BOSS runs noticeably slower on Linux through Wine than it does natively on Windows.
- The BOSSlog is not automatically displayed once BOSS has run. In this case, you will have to open
Data/BOSS/BOSSlog.html manually to see it.
It is also possible to compile BOSS from the source code as a native application on Linux. Again, no support is given for doing so, and this has the disadvantage of making the masterlist case-sensitive, so if the case of a plugin's name in the masterlist does not match the case of the plugin in your Data folder, it will remain unrecognised. If you come across any such plugins, let us know and we will update the masterlist to use the correct case.
The BOSS Team does not supply pre-compiled Linux binaries or instructions for building BOSS in Linux at this time, although a makefile is included in the source code to ease the process.
Credits
Sources for the mod list and its order include: Agiel's Annotated Load Order; Fivefries load order; dev_akm's official expanded FCOM load order (FCOM 0.9.9); suggestions and instructions from Mart's Monster Mod,
Better Cities, Open Cities and Open Better Cities developers; suggestions and instructions from many other modders; lots of advice and information from users. Some people have gone out of their way and provided
continuing, expert and detailed help - thank you very much!
Thanks go to Wrye and the rest of the Wrye Bash Team for implementing the importing of BOSS's Bashed Patch tag suggestions into Wrye Bash.
Thanks also go to the Beta Testing & Analysis Guild at TESAlliance and Surazal for testing and giving feedback on v1.6 prior to release. Thanks also go to myk002 for extensive code contributions.
Project Members
Since June 2009, BOSS has been a collaborative project on Google Code using the SVN version tracking and editing engine. In alphabetical order, the project members are:
Google Code Administrators
- Arthmoor
- PacificMorrowind
- Random007
- WrinklyNinja
Oblivion Masterlist Developers
- Alithelord
- Arthmoor
- PacificMorrowind
- Random007
- RiddlingLynx
- Tokc/Tokc.D.K.
- Vacuity
- WrinklyNinja
- ZiggyX
Fallout 3 Masterlist Developers
- Alithelord
- Arthmoor
- SpaceOden
- Mosanger
- PacificMorrowind
- Valda
Fallout: New Vegas Masterlist Developers
Nehrim - At Fate's Edge Masterlist Developers
Source Code Developers
- Alithelord
- Leandro Conde
- Leus
- PacificMorrowind
- Random007
- WrinklyNinja
Most project members can be contacted on the Bethesda Game Studios forums, in the Oblivion Mods and Fallout 3 Mods sub-forums. Most can also be contacted on TES Nexus/Fallout 3 Nexus.
License
Better Oblivion Sorting Software and periodic updates are distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported copyright license,
some rights reserved, 2009-2010. Copyright is owned wholly by the Better Oblivion Sorting Software development team (see list of project members).
- BOSS may be copied and distributed freely as long as it is not changed and includes all the original files including this documentation.
- Commercial use of this software or masterlist.txt file is not permitted without permission.
- Publishing derivations and customisations of the program or masterlist.txt file is not permitted without permission. Ask first.
Version History
Only updates to the BOSS program are recorded here, not masterlist updates, as that is updated far too frequently to be concisely recorded. A full record of changes made to the masterlist may be viewed by browsing the Google Code repository.
Version 1.65
- Fixed userlist parser giving incorrect error messages for rules inserting mods into groups.
- Fixed BOSS reporting some plugins as unknown when they are ghosted.
Version 1.64
- Added --only-update, -o parameter to only update the masterlist without then sorting any mods.
- Added "BOSS - Print Debug Info.bat" file to make debugging of BOSS errors simpler.
- Added Nullsoft Scriptable Install installer for simpler BOSS installation.
- User rule keywords and objects now have preceding and trailing spaces trimmed to prevent keywords, mods and groups being unrecognised if they are padded by spaces.
- Slight improvements to user rule error reporting when sorting groups that do not exist.
- Fixed non-ASCII characters in mod filenames causing crashes.
Version 1.63
- Fixed a crash when updating the masterlist if downloading an incorrectly formatted masterlist.
- Fixed mods with duplicate masterlist entries causing load order errors.
- Fixed another crash when parsing an incorrectly formatted userlist.
- Added check to userlist application of override rules to prevent incorrect usage resulting in load order errors.
- User rule keywords are now case-insensitive.
- User rules can no longer sort a mod relative to a mod that is not in the masterlist and has not been sorted by another rule.
Version 1.62
- Added support for Fallout: New Vegas.
- Added ability to insert mods into groups to user rules functionality.
- Added ability to sort mods relative to mods that are not installed, but are in the masterlist to user rules functionality.
- Fixed crashing when userlist contains badly formatted lines.
- Changed command line processing to use more standardised parameters:
- Changed --disable-version-parse,-V- parameter to --no-version-parse,-n.
- Changed --silent-mode,-s parameter to --silent,-s.
- Changed --revert-level,-r parameter to --revert,-r.
- Added logging statements to cover all BOSS processing, enabled by --verbose,-v <N> where N goes from 1 to 3 with increasing verbosity.
- Added --version,-V parameter to show BOSS version.
- Added --debug,-d parameter which adds filename and line numbers to each log message.
- Many code portability enhancements.
Version 1.61
- Added silent -s command line switch to suppress the automatic opening of the BOSSlog when BOSS is run.
- Added version info to BOSS.exe to make Wrye Bash integration/debugging easier.
- Fixed non-lowercase plugin extensions not being recognised and causing crashes and load order mistakes.
- Fixed a potential bug with the masterlist updater causing memory issues.
- Fixed several compiler warnings when compiling on Linux.
- Increased timout delay for the masterlist updater to prevent the updater failing when Google Code is slow.
- Reworked masterlist updater error reporting to be more verbose, and to take messages directly from curl when curl fails.
Version 1.6
- Added Fallout Wanderers Edition (FWE) specific message type for the Fallout 3 masterlist.
- Added masterlist updater functionality to BOSS, accessible via a command-line switch and a .bat file.
- Added mod version display to BOSSlog output, with command-line off switch.
- Added sorting of ghosted plugins.
- Added hardcoded undo functionality to make it easier to undo BOSS's changes.
- Added custom user rules functionality to allow users to customise how BOSS sorts their files, and more.
- Added support for use with the Nehrim - At Fate's Edge total conversion.
- Removed need for BOSS.bat.
- Moved BOSS's input and output files to Data\BOSS\.
- Converted Readme from RTF to HTML format.
- Converted BOSSlog from plain text to HTML format.
- Fixed Fallout3.esm being reported as an 'unknown mod file'.
- Improved error support to catch more errors and provide more useful error messages when BOSS doesn't work properly.
- Improved portability of source code.
- Merged BOSS and BOSS-F source code, allowing one EXE to support both Oblivion and Fallout 3.
- Major refactoring and rewrite of BOSS source code, resulting in a significant performance improvement.
Version 1.5
- Added OOO-specific message type.
- Added requirement message type.
- Added incompatibility message type.
- Added Better Cities-specific message type.
- Switched source code project and solution files to Visual Studio 2010.
- Added a masterlist for Fallout 3.
- Added masterlist version numbering when exporting via SVN.
- Added Fallout 3 specific BOSS source code (BOSS-F).
Version 1.41
- Fixed incorrect master file defined for Fallout 3.
- Fixed error messages not being displayed on some machines.
Versions 1.0 - 1.35
Changes Not Recorded.