A question on Addons, from the beginning please!

[possumboy]

I have been playing WoW for a little over a month now, and I have a question about how the Addons work.

I came to WoW from EQ, and although I was by no means an expert on UI's there, I felt comfortable with switching whole UI's/components. With WoW, things seem significantly different.

For example, I am having trouble getting my head around whether Cosmos (for instance) is a 'program' that addons plug into, and whether Cosmos is a separate program, to say, Ace2.

To try and explain what I'm getting at; I have been using Cosmos with Auctioneer, Gatherer and MapNotes among others, as recommended by RL friends that play WoW. Tonight I tried to DL and use something called TradeSkillInfo, which looked fab! I couldnt get that one to work, kept throwing up errors.

I am unsure as to what all the dependancies are, and whether the probs are linked. When I first setup Cosmos, I just downloaded a job lot of things, under the assumption that if I try to self teach myself, I wont have to bug people here as much! Heh, worked with EQ!
I understand that the dependancies are required for certain addons (they are stated in the addon window), what I dont understand is how interchangeable addons are (if indeed there are addons written for specific progs, IE Cosmos OR Ace2 etc)

I guess one of the questions I am asking is will addons cause conflicts with each other?

As you can see, I have gotten my head into quite a spin over these questions, and I wouldnt be surprised if you want me to clarify a few points! I have tried looking for info on these issues, both in these forums and elsewhere on the net, but I couldnt find the basic info, only what things do in-game and where to get them from.

ANY help would be great really! I always think that you cant understand just bits of info, you need to work from the ground up. Now I just need the facts to build some foundations!

Thanks for reading

[Farook]

Originally Posted by possumboy I guess one of the questions I am asking is will addons cause conflicts with each other?

Some... but not many.

A lot of people I know that started playing WoW started with the Cosmos-Addon-Collection (so did I). It is a collection of addons containing most of the things needed... but unfortunately it also contains a bunch of really unnecessary mods, and that's why I got rid of it, and that's what I recommend to others as well.

It's probably best to delete the Cosmos-addons, and then tell us what mods you are especially looking for. I'm sure we can give you at least some recommendations then.

[Pigl33t]

Cosmos is a really great way to start off with mods I think. I did and now I'm pretty good at figuring out what I need to make my UI look like I need/want it to. Although if you don't want 40+ or so of memory for add-ons I'd recommend you start off with either just a few everyday mods that you don't really need but will teach you what can be done, like Simple Minimap and Bongos for instance. Or you can get cracking on a compilation straight from the begin, like cosmos only more lightweight (if you don't go with a Discord compilation that is) and usally not with alot of stuff you will never use.

[possumboy]

Ooh, nice prompt responses! that bodes well!

Anyhoo, I would really like the TradeSkillInfo addon as I am a tradeskill nut. I like MetaMap, and use Gatherer on some of my alts. Aside from that, I dont think I need anything else atm.

The addon I was looking for, and that started all this off in the first place for me, was something that would allow me to cheeck the contents of my bank without having to leave, for instance, the Leatherworking Supplier!
I dont need to do anything fancy like the ability to sort my banks contents by alphabetical order, or by AC/DPS or anything like that, just to check to see how much Heavy Leather etc I have in the bank.

I think I will take the advice of geting rid of everything and starting again from scratch, only adding the bits I use. Hopefully this will fix my map, after losing the ability to right click and zoom out on the zone/world map. I think this had something to do with TradeSkillInfo, hence the thread in the first place! As I said, I found that in the Ace section of WoWInterface I think. The addon in question can be found here

If you could point me in the direction of a basic guide on Ace, that would be fab!

Thanks again guys =)

[Theon]

All info about ace'd addons can be found over at http://www.wowace.com

Most bag addons have the possibility to view the bank from distant location, personally I use the onebag/onebank/onestorage combo =)

[Cairenn]

Originally Posted by possumboy The addon I was looking for, and that started all this off in the first place for me, was something that would allow me to cheeck the contents of my bank without having to leave, for instance, the Leatherworking Supplier! I dont need to do anything fancy like the ability to sort my banks contents by alphabetical order, or by AC/DPS or anything like that, just to check to see how much Heavy Leather etc I have in the bank.

Check out CharactersViewer. Nice because it allows you to not only see what you are wearing/carrying/have in the bank on the current character, but also on *all* your characters.

[Kodewulf]

Originally Posted by possumboy The addon I was looking for, and that started all this off in the first place for me, was something that would allow me to cheeck the contents of my bank without having to leave, for instance, the Leatherworking Supplier! I dont need to do anything fancy like the ability to sort my banks contents by alphabetical order, or by AC/DPS or anything like that, just to check to see how much Heavy Leather etc I have in the bank.

You can also have a look at Advanced Tradeskill Window. It will check your / alt inventory and bank. It can also buy all the needed reagents from the vendor you are at.

Good luck with your search...

-- Kodewulf

[robthedude]

Originally Posted by possumboy The addon I was looking for, and that started all this off in the first place for me, was something that would allow me to cheeck the contents of my bank without having to leave, for instance, the Leatherworking Supplier!

I highly reccommend Bagnon

puts all your bags into one window, lets you check your alts, and lets you check your bank anywhere (but of course, not withdraw items)

and while I agree that Cosmos is good for the beginner to get started, I hate it, and also reccommend getting rid as soon as possible and hunting down addons that do specifically what you want, it'll be less hassle in the long run

[possumboy]

Thank you all for your replies and support

I have looked at a few of the suggested addons, and found some I like, ones that will do the job for the time being at least. I will continue to look for more stand-alone addons that would do the specific job I need, rather than having too much going on that I don't really need.

Once again, thank you all for your input. I rest assured that next time I have a problem I will get it answered here.

Good hunting, my friends.