Saving Data To File

vola313 · 09-18-16, 03:46 PM

Hi, I'm pretty new to coding in general so apologies if this is a simple task.

I'm experimenting with web dev and am trying to make a "completionist" website for WoW, which will require plenty of data. At the moment I'm working with lua (I'm aware it's probably easier to pull data from the Armoury instead, but I'd like to know how to do this in case I also develop an addon).

I've written this basic code which lists mount info in-game:

local mountIDs = C_MountJournal.GetMountIDs();

for i = 0, #mountIDs do
print(C_MountJournal.GetMountInfoByID(mountIDs[i]));
end

What's the easiest way to save this info to a file so I can work with it later? (With mounts I could feasibly copy-paste it all, but it would be useful to know how to do this if I end up working with bigger data sets for other things - transmog etc).

I've done a bit of research already and have read about SavedVariables being the only option. Is there any other way at the moment? Either way, what's the best way to go about it?

Sample code would be awesome, but I'm also happy just to be pointed in the right direction and work it out from there

Many thanks

myrroddin · 09-18-16, 04:12 PM

The only way to save to file is using saved variables. The link is to wowpedia.org which has multiple tutorials and an extensive reference to the game's API.

Keep in mind a few things:

You cannot choose when to write to file. Only the game can do that, and the most common times are logging out, exiting altogether, and reloading the user interface. You can do the last one manually with the /reloadui command.
Saved variables are global in scope, so name them something unique in your ToC. BillsExcellentDB is preferable than myDB, or worse, savedvariable. Appending "DB" to the end of the name is optonal, as it is a variable and can be called anything. You will notice most AddOns' SV is named after the AddOn: Bartender4DB, for example.
While the linked example uses the event "PLAYER_LOGOUT" to create a timestamp, registering for this event is not necessary. The game will write your SVs automatically during the event. You'd really only register for PL if you needed some data that was only available during the event.
World of Warcraft has no access to your hard drive in general, nor internet access outside of Blizzard servers. That means you cannot read/write to My Documents, nor can you surf the web.

Phanx · 09-18-16, 07:15 PM

#1 - You should familiarize yourself with the list of things addons/macros can't do.

#2 - Here is the code I use to dump pet journal data to saved variables:

Code:

## Interface: 70000
## SavedVariables: SANDBOXSV1
Sandbox1.lua

Code:

function DumpPets(t)
	t = t and wipe(t) or {}
	for i = 1, C_PetJournal.GetNumPets() do
		local _, speciesID, _, _, _, _, _, speciesName, _, _, npcID = C_PetJournal.GetPetInfoByIndex(i)
		tinsert(t, strjoin(";", speciesName, speciesID, npcID))
	end
	print("pet dump complete")
	return t
end

Code:

/run DumpPets(SANDBOXSV1)
/reload

The saved variables file for this addon then contains the following:

Code:

SANDBOXSV1 = {
	"Anubisath Idol;1155;68659", -- [1]
	"Arcane Eye;1160;68819", -- [2]
	...
}

... and I can easily convert that to CSV (just strip off the table wrapper, comments, and indentation) and do whatever I want with it.

You should be able to adapt this to mount journal data (or any other data) quite easily.

Torhal · 09-19-16, 12:00 AM

Originally Posted by vola313

Code:

local mountIDs = C_MountJournal.GetMountIDs();

for i = 0, #mountIDs do
	print(C_MountJournal.GetMountInfoByID(mountIDs[i]));
end

Also keep in mind that Lua array-style tables start at 1, not 0.

vola313 · 09-19-16, 03:55 AM

Thanks for the replies, all very useful info. I'll have a play around with it later!

vola313 · 09-19-16, 12:49 PM

Phanx I got your code to work fine with both mounts and pets - managed to end up with some nice CSV files using them. However I must've changed something and it's not working any more - the saved variables file is just defaulting to COMPLETIONISM = nil every time I run the function. Can't seem to work out what I've broken since I'm sure the code is exactly the same as before!

The table is populating fine, it's just not saving to the SavedVariables file any more. Any idea what might be causing this? Thanks

Edit: Got it working again, not really sure what the problem was! :S