Rubble: Modding Made Easy!
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= Overview:
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Rubble is a general purpose mod installer and creation tool. Mod installation is done with an easy to use HTML GUI or a basic CLI front end. Mod creation is facilitated by a powerful template and scripting system that allows automation of many common modding tasks.
Users of Rubble can install many unrelated mods (called "addons") simply by selecting them in the web UI and generating (which takes only a few seconds). Addons are designed to install quickly and cleanly with a minimum of effort on the part of the user (using Rubble is comparable in difficulty to using the Masterwork settings program).
Rubble is specifically designed to make it easy to have several worlds with radically different settings playable at the same time. You can even have things like per-world population cap settings (via the `User/DFHack/Pop Cap` addon) or switching tilesets on worlds in progress (perfect for trying that new tileset you found or changing the tileset of a world you got from a buddy). Tileset switching even works on worlds who's raws were not generated by Rubble!
For modders Rubble automates many common tasks allowing you to create mods in a small fraction of the time using standard methods would take, plus users of your mod can use it together with many other addons, making your mod *much* more user friendly.
If you have ever used a utility like Blast, know that Rubble is a lot like that but *much* more flexible and mature.
Rubble has been in continuous development since mid 2013, and many changes and improvements have been made since the first version (which was a simple Blast clone). All of my mods have been made to use it, so I have extensive experience with Rubble modding and along the way fixed most of the bugs and streamlined things as much as possible both for modders and users.
For modders Rubble cuts down repetition and encourages compatibility, for users it gives easy flexibility and simple customization. In short Rubble is the most powerful and easiest to use modding utility and mod manager ever made for Dwarf Fortress. Enjoy!
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= Where to Find Help:
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All documentation is in the "other" directory of the download, this includes tutorials, template documentation, script documentation, and basic documentation of Rubble's internals. Addon documentation (for users) is accessed from the web UI, just click on any addon name, anywhere addons are listed.
If you want to view the documentation as it was designed to be viewed start the web UI (`rubble_web`) and visit the "Rubble Documentation" page.
General users have no need to read *anything* except the readme! Everything most users need to know (aside from things like how to install Rubble, which can be found in the readme (or here for that matter)) can be found in the web UI addon description pages.
The readme has a comprehensive list of what is most important for the beginning Rubble modder to read (and in what order!).
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= Install:
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If you have anything in your Dwarf Fortress directory that you want to keep back it up! Rubble will delete all your existing raw files, including creature graphics and the DFHack "onLoad.init" and "init.lua" files (and many other things)!
Anything outside of your "data/init" and "raw" directories should be safe, but just in case...
1. Delete or otherwise remove any old Rubble version you may have.
2. Extract the new Rubble to "<DF Directory>/rubble".
3. Install any custom addons you may have to "<DF Directory>/rubble/addons".
4. See the appropriate "Running Rubble" section in the readme.
Now you are good to go!
DO NOT extract a new Rubble version over an old one! This can cause all sorts of hard to find problems!
If you use OSX or Linux, 32 bit binaries for these OSes are included. If you want 64 bit binaries you can compile them yourself, source code is in "other/src" (along with basic build instructions).
To use non-Windows binaries they must be placed in the same directory as the Windows ones (you can delete the Windows binaries if you don't need them). OSX binaries are in "other/darwin_386", Linux binaries may be found in "other/linux_386".
For more help see the "Rubble OS Specific Information" section in "Rubble Basics" (included in the download).
Download (At DFFD)