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Frequently Asked Questions about the Binary Release

Chris Collins edited this page Jul 21, 2020 · 3 revisions

Common

Where should I install mods?

Mods can either be placed in a mods folder in the SAIS installation directory (except on macOS), or in a mods folder in the user-specific preferences directory (see the section for the specific OS).

Are there any known issues?

  • Mods are not particularly well safeguarded right now. They can use names or strings that are too long for the game's internal buffers resulting in buffer overflows and likely crashes. (Fixed prepared for 1.7.0).

    • Some of theses crashes can potentially persist by writing maximum length captain or ship names into the save file. (Fixed prepared for 1.7.0).
  • If something causes SDL2 to fail to get an audio device, SAIS gives up and quits without warning.

SAIS just quit without warning. Is there anywhere I can find out why?

SAIS GPL emits debug information through the SDL_Log mechanism, including the internal error message when it gets a failure from SDL. These can be reasonably informative.

On Windows, you'll need to use a tool like SysInternals DebugView to see this information.

On macOS, it will be recorded in Console.app.

On Linux, you'll be able to capture it by starting SAIS from a terminal.

Windows

Where does my user information and preferences get stored?

This information is stored per user and can be found in %APPDATA%\FreeSAIS\SAIS

(Windows will expand %APPDATA% in most places to the Roaming AppData directory).

Linux

Where does my user information and preferences get stored?

This information is stored per user and can be found in ~/.local/share/SAIS

What libraries do I need installed to run the Linux binary?

  • SDL2
  • SDL2_mixer
  • physfs
  • libstdc++6

On Ubuntu 20.04, the corresponding packages are:

  • libsdl2-2.0-0
  • libsdl2_mixer-2.0-0
  • libphysfs
  • libstdc++6

macOS

Where does my user information and preferences get stored?

This information is stored per user and can be found in ~/Library/Application Support/SAIS

How do I right click using standard Apple peripherals?

At this time you'll need to enable the secondary click option in the appropriate panel of System Preferences - as Control is used to bring up the magnifier, we can't use the support in SDL2 for simulated right-click via Control-Click.