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Christian edited this page Jun 13, 2020 · 4 revisions

Here you will find very basic and also very important hints you should know as server admin, who wants to edit missions for their group or community. Please read this things very carefully, as they'll prevent yourself from doing errors which can cause major issues due to your edits.

When you want to edit the KP Liberation mission file, it's recommended to download the released and prepacked pbo files from the releases page instead of messing with the downloaded Workshop files from Steam.

Path Cheat Sheet

  • PBO files go to (local machine): <yourPathForSteamGames>\steamapps\common\Arma 3\MPMissions
  • PBO files go to (dedicated server): <yourArmaServerRootDirectory>\mpmissions
  • Unpacked PBO files go to: <yourHardDrive>\Users\<yourWindowsProfileName>\Documents\Arma 3\missions

So for playing you would have e.g. \steamapps\common\Arma 3\MPMissions\kp_liberation.Altis.pbo and for editing via Eden Editor you would have the folder \Documents\Arma 3\missions\kp_liberation.Altis\ which would contain a mission.sqm and the script files.

Useful Programs

This are some very useful programs for small edits and most common things admins would do.

PBO Manager

With this program you can unPBO a pbo missionfile to a folder where you'll find all scripts of the mission and the mission.sqm inside. It will be available in your context menu inside the normal filebrowser.

UnPBO:

Right click on myMission.Altis.pbo -> extract to myMission.Altis\ -> creates the folder myMission.Altis which the mission.sqm and scriptfiles

PBO:

Right click on the folder myMission.Altis -> pack into "myMission.Altis.pbo" -> creates the mission pbo, which you can use inside your mpmissions folder inside the arma 3 folder

Download: Armaholic

Notepad++

A very basic editor for small coding work, so an ideal lightweight program for you as a ArmA 3 server admin, who mostly only do smaller edits less than 100 lines of code. Also available with a SQF syntax and autocompletion plugin.

Download Notepad++: Official Site

Download SQF Additions: Armaholic

Preventing Common Mistakes

Always be sure to follow these basic rules concerning sqf syntax. This will prevent issues due to mistakes in the syntax which cause script errors or broken missions.

Commas inside an Array

Inside an array there has to be a , between every element. But after the last element just before the closing bracket ]; you should never put a , or it won't work due to an error in the sqf syntax.

Example:

someArray = [
    Element1,
    Element2,
    LastElement
];

Semicolon at end of the line

Always end a line with a ;. So if you edit a value, be always sure that after the value you'll have a ;

Example:

configVariable = 100;

Comments inside the files

Comments start with // as a single line comment or are written between a /* and */ as multiline comments. These comments are fully "invisible" inside the files when it comes to using it in ArmA. Also most editors like notepad++ will show them also in a different color, so you can see what's code and what's a comment.

Example:

/* this is
a multiline comment */

// this is a single line comment
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