Symlinks

[astra12]

Hi all this is my first attempt on multiboxing and I must say that after reading up here on the communityforums, it seems to be SO much fun :)
The system I'm gonna go with is a Q6600 OC to 3Ghz with 4gb RAM, 750gig SATA drive and ATI 4850 GPU. I am gonna box 4 elemental shammies all on RAF with a prot pally powerleveling me.
Now I havent got started just yet but I would like to be prepared before the journey begins.
Since I'm gonna run 4 clients on one HD (I might get a 150 gig raptor as well) I understand after some reading that Symlinking different wow directories is the way to go about. I will be running Vista 64x ultimate but I am not sure about how to set up symlinks.

I have searched the forums and I have found several posts on the subject. So far I understand that I should symlink only the data folders in the different wowdirectories in order to use separate addons and whatnot. The thing is that I am fairly new to symlinks and for me it's just a world of pain! I was just wondering if anyone has made a "Set up symlinks for complete tards" guide?

What I would love is instructions in style with:
1. open cmd
2. do this do that
3. lalala

I know it's much to ask for and I just want to say that I have looked in the forum but the guides that I have found so far are way above my experticelevel at this.

Sorry for any typos since english is not my main language.

Thanks in advance! :)

[kadaan]

WoW clients ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&postID=103224#post103224')


To create a symlink in XP, I used software called NTFS Links (http://alax.info/blog/ntfslinks).

You just copy over everything except the data folder into a new folder ("World of Warcraft 2", in my case.) Drag and drop the data folder with the RIGHT mouse button and select "Create soft link here." There's a screenshot on that webpage that explains it pretty succinctly. Now when you patch your main WoW install the data files get updated on all your other installs automatically, you only have to copy over the root directory files (wow.exe, launcher.exe, etc.. there's 7 files and only ~10m.)

[astra12]

WoW clients ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&postID=103224#post103224')






To create a symlink in XP, I used software called NTFS Links (http://alax.info/blog/ntfslinks).

You just copy over everything except the data folder into a new folder ("World of Warcraft 2", in my case.) Drag and drop the data folder with the RIGHT mouse button and select "Create soft link here." There's a screenshot on that webpage that explains it pretty succinctly. Now when you patch your main WoW install the data files get updated on all your other installs automatically, you only have to copy over the root directory files (wow.exe, launcher.exe, etc.. there's 7 files and only ~10m.)Hi and thanks for the rapid answer! I use Vista do you think that I should use this software or any other? Thanks!

[kadaan]

Actually it looks like Vista has symlinks built in:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTFS_symbolic_link

[astra12]

Actually it looks like Vista has symlinks built in:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTFS_symbolic_link



Yes so it seems. Anyone know how to set this up? Let's say that i put my "main" wow folder to C:\wow\ and my other directory to C:\wow2\ and I want to create a symlink regarding the DATA folder in C:\wow\ would i then use the command:
mklink [[/D]] DATA C:\wow\data ?

Then will the new symlink directory be created in the directory I am at in CMD when running mklink?

Thanks for the help guys.

EDIT:

Ok I found a site that explains a bit more (http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/using-symlinks-in-windows-vista/ ('http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/using-symlinks-in-windows-vista/')) and this is how to do it:
C:\mklink /D C:\wow2\ C:\wow\DATA

Could anyone confirm that this is how to do it? It seems a bit too easy :D:D

[kadaan]

It _should_ be easy :). Try it and see if it works? I'd test it out but don't have any machines with Vista on them, which is why I had to install that other app.

[astra12]

While I'm at it waiting for uberleet help :D I might as well ask whether to use /D command in MKLINK to create a softlink to the DATA dir or if I should use a "Directory junction" with the /J command? What difference does it make?

Thanks again

[astra12]

It _should_ be easy :). Try it and see if it works? I'd test it out but don't have any machines with Vista on them, which is why I had to install that other app.

XD Yeah I guess it should. Right now I'm at work but tomorrow I'm heading over to a mates house. He has a very similar setup that I'm going to use and I'm gonna try it out on his system. I'll report back in about 7 hours.

;)

[Binaryzero]

there is also a powershell script here that is well written that will help with that.

[dirjax]

and in the same thread as the powershell is also a dos batch file that explains it

that batch file works perfect, and you don't need to install anything extra on your computer