[JorD1]

Hi all,

The following problem came along a Dutch forum.

Somone installed MSTS on Win 8 and it works perfectly, he also installed Route_Riter and Openrails and maybe some other things, but it all works so no problem.
Then he made some consists using the default editors and tools. No problems, they appeard in Route_Riter and MSTS and functioned.
Strange things happened when OR was fired, it did not show the consists.

As the guy installed MSTS in the default program files location, I remembered some issue about compability files in Vista and 7. This were files which a program tries to write to Programfiles and can be accesed after pressing a button "Show comparabilityfiles"
In win 8 the button has been removed (According my google results)
These files are stored in C:\Users\<gebruikersnaam>\AppData\Local\VirtualStore
Inside that folder are the 2 program files (for 64 bit systems) which have the same folder structure of the normal programfiles and hold the compabilityfiles.

It's interesting OR doesn't look in this location while MSTS and rout_riter do. (These are pre-compability files porgrams, so why do they look there and OR not?)

Here is the topic on the dutch forum (offcourse in dutch): http://forum.treinpu...ic,70436.0.html

Cheers Jordi

[markus_GE]

It always advisable to keep programs from pre-compatibility-files-times out of the Program Files and Program Files (x86) folders. Whatever MS was intending to do, having a duplicate folder somewhere else is not only confusing and hard to work with (especially if the button you referred to has been removed), it also is, IMHO, complete nonsense. I have most everything I installed on my own sitting in it´s own folder of C:\Programme, which is the translation of Program Files to German (note that even if you read "Programme" on the default Program Files folder, internally it´s referred to as "Program Files")

I´m not saying it won´t work - in fact, my MSTS installation worked inside Program Files (x86) for years on a WIN7 PC, before I had an issue myself and was told to move it out of those folders. BUT: Better do the move as soon as possible, before too many add-ons are gathere in the current location - all these will have to be moved elsewhere before un- and re-installing MSTS.

Cheers, Markus

[copperpen]

The problem with having MSTS in a program files folder in Vista. Win 7 or Win 8 is the operating system security habit of moving files to the Virtual Store. This is fine for programs that were written to take this into account, but MSTS is not one of them and does not recognise the existence of this folder, certainly true for Vista and Win 7. The only way to avoid problems is to install as per the tutorial on the steam4me site.

If you are one who has already installed to the program files or program files(x86) folder the solution is simple.. Rename your current simulator folder. Now install the sim/game to its own folder outside of any program files folder. Mine is in F:\Train Simulator . Check that the basic game is working, then move your old installation files into the new location. Now go and retrieve those other files from the Virtual Store and put them where they should be.

[James Ross]

 JorD1, on 16 July 2014 - 11:13 PM, said:

These files are stored in C:\Users\<gebruikersnaam>\AppData\Local\VirtualStore
Inside that folder are the 2 program files (for 64 bit systems) which have the same folder structure of the normal programfiles and hold the compabilityfiles.

It's interesting OR doesn't look in this location while MSTS and rout_riter do. (These are pre-compability files porgrams, so why do they look there and OR not?)

The Virtual Store is a Windows compatibility feature for applications developed before directories had security settings (e.g. Windows 9x) and users ran with limited write access (e.g. Windows XP). You can see whether this feature is being applied to an application by enabling the "UAC Virtualization" column in Task Manager.

Open Rails is a new application and thus does not get UAC virtualization, which means that it cannot see the Virtual Store files without going in to that directory itself.

The best fix for me is to find out which folders in Train Simulator need write access (I'd guess ROUTES and TRAINS are key) and grant write access to those specific folders in the game installation directory. That way, MSTS (and other old tools editing those files) will be able to write back to the real location instead of the Virtual Store - allowing newer applications like Open Rails to see them in their intended location. (You can move the files from Virtual Store after making the change.)

The common fix (which I happen to dislike) is to install MSTS in to a folder that is not protected, i.e. not in to Program Files. This is much more fiddly to do after installation though.

[copperpen]

Installing outside of the Program files folder is the preferred choice for those who are not comfortable with making changes to file and folder settings. If installing into the Program files locations in Vista upwards, to prevent usage of the Virtual Store one must take ownership of the sim/game installation folder. These two methods are the only way to retain ones sanity while dealing with the quirks of an ancient bit of software in a modern OS.