WoWInterface - Comments for morrigahn's AddOn(s)

AggroNotifier abandoned (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 16:56:51 +0000

I've been told that AggroNotifier is no longer compatible with the latest WoW version. I no longer play, so I will no longer be supporting this mod. If someone else wants to pick it up please feel free.

Is there an addon that would pop up... (AggroNotifier)

bdlt — Sun, 14 Nov 2010 07:47:39 +0000

Is there an addon that would pop up a target frame (or grid for multiple targets) when a mob aggro's a player, group or raid member?

AggroNotifier 1.2.6 is out (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 00:30:19 +0000

I've updated AggroNotifier to 1.2.6 to support WoW 4.0.1. No changes were made other than fixing compatibility issues. I haven't done extensive testing but everything seems to be working.

Re: AggroNotifier 1.2.3 is out (AggroNotifier)

vpr — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 18:50:59 +0000

Originally posted by morrigahn
AggroNotifier 1.2.3 is out. The main change is that AggroNotifier now considers you to have aggro from an enemy if the enemy is targeting you or if Blizzard's new aggro information function indicates that you're at the top of the enemy's aggro list. This means that fear, stun, and other mechanics that cause an enemy to stop targeting you briefly will not cause AggroNotifier to think you've lost aggro as long as you're at the top of the enemy's aggro table.

Hmm, I've been unable to reproduce this problem. I've been in normal parties and raids with MSBT enabled (and AggroNotifier sending the aggro messages through MSBT) and if I have the "disable built-in visual notifier" checkbox checked I do not see the built-in aggro notification, and if I uncheck it then I do see the built-in notification. If you're still experiencing this problem could you take some screenshots of your options panes with whatever settings you have selected, and a screenshot of the bug in action (i.e. MSBT aggro message and built-in message on the screen at the same time)? There may be some weird combination of settings that causes the bug that I haven't hit on yet, and getting screenshots of all your settings and what you're seeing onscreen could help me reproduce the problem.

I had quit playing for several months - just tried this again and it's working fine now.

Any way to change the sound that's... (AggroNotifier)

Aquentvp — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 06:38:25 +0000

Any way to change the sound that's played? I have a .wav file I'd like the addon to play when I have aggro, but don't know enough about the code to "point" it at this file.

Add support for Parrot aswell (AggroNotifier)

p3lim — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 22:52:43 +0000

Add support for Parrot aswell

AggroNotifier 1.2.3 is out (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 20:02:48 +0000

AggroNotifier 1.2.3 is out. The main change is that AggroNotifier now considers you to have aggro from an enemy if the enemy is targeting you or if Blizzard's new aggro information function indicates that you're at the top of the enemy's aggro list. This means that fear, stun, and other mechanics that cause an enemy to stop targeting you briefly will not cause AggroNotifier to think you've lost aggro as long as you're at the top of the enemy's aggro table.

Originally posted by vpr
Confirmed:

Using AggroNotifier w/ MSBT and Selected to Disable built in display both displays will display while in a party. This does NOT happen during solo play though.

Hmm, I've been unable to reproduce this problem. I've been in normal parties and raids with MSBT enabled (and AggroNotifier sending the aggro messages through MSBT) and if I have the "disable built-in visual notifier" checkbox checked I do not see the built-in aggro notification, and if I uncheck it then I do see the built-in notification. If you're still experiencing this problem could you take some screenshots of your options panes with whatever settings you have selected, and a screenshot of the bug in action (i.e. MSBT aggro message and built-in message on the screen at the same time)? There may be some weird combination of settings that causes the bug that I haven't hit on yet, and getting screenshots of all your settings and what you're seeing onscreen could help me reproduce the problem.

Originally posted by vpr... (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 20:25:13 +0000

Originally posted by vpr
Confirmed:

Using AggroNotifier w/ MSBT and Selected to Disable built in display both displays will display while in a party. This does NOT happen during solo play though.

I'll look into these issues as soon as I can. In the meantime you can probably get the builtin to "go away" by setting its fade time to 0, or make it as small as you can and shove it somewhere you won't notice, or change the colors so it's completely transparent. Sorry for the hassle.

Thanks for the research!

Confirmed:Using AggroNotifier w... (AggroNotifier)

vpr — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 16:17:10 +0000

Confirmed:

Using AggroNotifier w/ MSBT and Selected to Disable built in display both displays will display while in a party. This does NOT happen during solo play though.

Originally posted by morr... (AggroNotifier)

vpr — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 16:49:52 +0000

Originally posted by morrigahn
AggroNotifier shouldn't give you the all clear signal once you've gained aggro until one of three things happens:
1. The enemy AggroNotifier was tracking died and no new aggro was detected for you.
2. The enemy AggroNotifier was tracking has switched focus to something besides you and no new aggro was detected for you.
3. WoW sent the "out of combat" event for your character, which AggroNotifier notices and interprets to mean that you are really out of combat.

Do those talents end up forcing the mob to stop targeting you, or do they "officially" take you out of combat, even briefly? If so then they would trigger case #2 and/or #3. If we can figure out what exactly those talents are doing to trigger AggroNotifier's all-clear message then I can look into modifying the logic to be more intelligent. I also might just have a bug. =)

I'll look into it when I get a chance. Thanks for the heads up, and any extra info you can provide on those talents and why they might be triggering one of the 3 all-clear options would be appreciated. My guess, just with a quick glance at the links you provided, is that blizzard made it so that when the mob is stunned they drop focus from you (to nothing maybe?), and when AggroNotifier sees the mob and detects that you are no longer the mob's focus it gives the all clear. If this is what's going on then blizzard's new aggro API might be able to help. I'll have to play around with it.

Well, I did some testing today. I went to some dungeons w/ a friend of mine and I tried to pay attention to the Target of Target window of mobs (something I don't normally pay attention to) - It seems to me that whenever one of these situations procd (Impact/Frost Bite) the mob's ToT window would go empty AFTER the proc ended (could have been lag maybe?). So it looks like it is dropping focus - at least that's what I could have guessed.

If that doesn't help, I'll see if I can duel someone and ask them to be a guinea pig and tell me what happens.

I also ran into a bug - I noticed this at the end of our session together, so it could have just been a glitch. In a party, with the other addon intergration enable and disable internal notification system selected - I was still getting both notifications... One from MSBT and one from AN's own messaging. I checked several times to make sure it was setup correctly. I even /reloadui and it was still happening. No pets were involved, but I setup that one the same way.

Again, I noticed this at the end of testing - I didn't notice in the beginning, probably because either a) it wasn't happening or b) I was too busy watching the Target of Target window :p

Originally posted by vpr... (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 19:47:40 +0000

Originally posted by vpr
I've noticed a slight annoyance - nothing too serious though.

I play a mage with the Impact and Frostbite talents... Whenever these proc AggroNotifier thinks I've lost agro and shows the "- Agro -" display. Which might be exactly what's happening in game, as these talents *might* make you drop your target... I don't really know.

....

AggroNotifier shouldn't give you the all clear signal once you've gained aggro until one of three things happens:
1. The enemy AggroNotifier was tracking died and no new aggro was detected for you.
2. The enemy AggroNotifier was tracking has switched focus to something besides you and no new aggro was detected for you.
3. WoW sent the "out of combat" event for your character, which AggroNotifier notices and interprets to mean that you are really out of combat.

Do those talents end up forcing the mob to stop targeting you, or do they "officially" take you out of combat, even briefly? If so then they would trigger case #2 and/or #3. If we can figure out what exactly those talents are doing to trigger AggroNotifier's all-clear message then I can look into modifying the logic to be more intelligent. I also might just have a bug. =)

I'll look into it when I get a chance. Thanks for the heads up, and any extra info you can provide on those talents and why they might be triggering one of the 3 all-clear options would be appreciated. My guess, just with a quick glance at the links you provided, is that blizzard made it so that when the mob is stunned they drop focus from you (to nothing maybe?), and when AggroNotifier sees the mob and detects that you are no longer the mob's focus it gives the all clear. If this is what's going on then blizzard's new aggro API might be able to help. I'll have to play around with it.

I've noticed a slight annoyance - n... (AggroNotifier)

vpr — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 07:47:35 +0000

I've noticed a slight annoyance - nothing too serious though.

I play a mage with the Impact and Frostbite talents... Whenever these proc AggroNotifier thinks I've lost agro and shows the "- Agro -" display. Which might be exactly what's happening in game, as these talents *might* make you drop your target... I don't really know.

Would there be a way for this to not happen? I was just going to suggest a check to determine if they're dead or not, but then I realized that sometimes you just run away from a mob without killing it, so that wouldn't work. Hmm I don't know - I'm not a programmer :p

Don't know if it matters or not, but I'm using the MSBT settings for display. Which has been working out great, btw.

Thanks,
vpr

1.2.2 is out - optimization release (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 02:00:51 +0000

1.2.2 is out. From the changelog:

1.2.2
* Optimized CPU usage - AggroNotifier now uses significantly less CPU power at all times. Additionally there is now a slider option in the behavior options panes that allows you to specify the delay between aggro searches for player and pet, which you can use to tweak CPU usage if necessary.
* Optimized memory usage - AggroNotifier's memory usage is now stable and no longer has a creeping memory footprint.
* Thanks to Zidomo for bringing the optimization issues up and pointing me at an addon to help with the profiling (OptionlessHouse).

FYI for anybody interested - I chose 0.1 second updates as the default for aggro searches, and 0.05 seconds as the default for text fade updates. These values seemed like a good compromise between CPU usage while still feeling smooth and snappy.

Zidomo - Thanks again for bringing this to my attention. Try again with AggroNotifier 1.2.2, I think you'll be pleased with the results. I never go above about 0.4 CPU/sec now even when in combat with my pet and the notification text on the screen fading out.

If anyone happens to profile this in a decent sized raid (10+ people), let me know how it performs. It'll be a while before I can test that kind of situation myself.

Originally posted by morr... (AggroNotifier)

vpr — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:54:06 +0000

Originally posted by morrigahn
So as you can see, searching for aggro when you're in a party or raid means doing a *lot* of gyrations on each search if you want to be thorough (and what's the point of installing the mod if you don't want to be thorough?) Regardless, thanks for the info. I wasn't aware of OptionlessHouse or any other performance measuring tools like that. I'll see if there's something I can do about the CPU usage. It may just be the price you have to pay for thorough aggro detection, or I may have missed something. At the very least I can add an option to let you specify how often you want AggroNotifier to do its aggro searching (assuming you're in a position where it *should* be searching, such as while in combat, or out of combat with the pvp option on). Right now it searches every update tick so that you get notified as early as possible, but I could give you a slider to specify how often you want it to search. Increasing the time between searches would lower CPU usage but also make it possible for there to be a delay between when you gain aggro and when you're notified about it. Oddly, I'd guess that since AggroNotifier is searching every tick right now, the faster your computer the more CPU AggroNotifier takes up since you get more ticks. Of course the faster your computer the less important AggroNotifier's CPU usage would be, but I'll still do the profiling and add the "delay between aggro searches" slider option. It can't hurt.

For those people who don't play on a PVP server, this might be a useful feature. I play on a PVP server, and I appreciate that AggroNotifier lets me know I have aggro before I even see the Target of Target window of my selected enemy :p

After a quick look at BanzaiAlert's... (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:53:39 +0000

After a quick look at BanzaiAlert's code, here's what I found:

The major difference between AggroNotifier and BanzaiAlert is that Banzai is only checking for aggro every 0.2 seconds. AggroNotifier is currently doing it every available tick, which on my machine is about 0.02 seconds. The faster your machine the more AggroNotifier is going to work. Putting in the slider to let you determine how often AggroNotifier does its updates will let you tweak as much as you want if you think AggroNotifier is using too much CPU. By hardcoding 0.2 seconds into AggroNotifier I limited my in-combat CPU usage, with a pet, to about 0.3 CPU/sec.
Banzai is not checking your mouseover or mouseovertarget units when searching for aggro, AggroNotifier does.
Banzai is offloading its visual notification to builtin blizzard functions (like the blizzard error frame or chat channels), which means none of that work shows up in Banzai's CPU usage statistics. AggroNotifier draws its own aggro notifications (and calculates fadeout, etc) so that you can have more flexibility over its appearance, but therefore this work shows up in AggroNotifier's CPU usage since the game isn't handling it. This is why AggroNotifier's CPU usage seems to "jump" a little when in combat.

So basically with a little hand-optimization and adding in the slider to let you control how often AggroNotifier checks for aggro, I should be able to get AggroNotifier to the same ballpark CPU usage as Banzai when using the same update frequency (i.e. it should be very low CPU usage). If you want more update frequency it'll cost you more CPU usage, but at least you'll have the option.

I did some testing yesterday. If yo... (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:30:07 +0000

I did some testing yesterday. If you uncheck the "Search for Aggro when Out of Combat" option (for both player and pet!) then it drops down to almost 0 when out of combat (.2 or so on my machine). Of course you'll lose out on the benefit of out-of-combat searching for pvp aggro, but that is definitely why it's using so much CPU when out of combat. I did find one major inefficiency - I need to turn off pet searching if you don't have a pet (oops!).

Besides the big one of not searching for a unit if the unit doesn't exist, I thnk there are only minor lua hand-optimization tweaks that can be done to speed it up. I'll do my best but I think a thorough search is simply an expensive proposition. I'll check out BanzaiAlert's code but I expect it's not being as thorough as AggroNotifier and therefore not using as much CPU. I'll be happy if I'm wrong though. It would be great if it was just some "hey, you're not using lua 'correctly'" problem. Since this is my first lua project it's certainly possible.

For reference, on my machine when idle or in combat, with a pet, AggroNotifier was using about 2-2.5 CPU/sec according to OptionlessHouse. CT's bar mod was using 3-3.5 CPU/sec at all times. I'm very interested to know what happens to AggroNotifier's CPU usage while in a large party or raid....

It was tested on a level 1 alt solo... (AggroNotifier)

Zidomo — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 07:52:53 +0000

It was tested on a level 1 alt solo both idle and in combat, not in a party/raid. Which means in a party/raid--based on what you have said--its going to be substantially worse.

BanzaiAlert (which does not have this CPU issue) has been around/updated for years. May be worth looking at its code (primarily its LibBanzai-2.0 library, which does the aggro detection work and which is used in a few other mods, like Grid) to see areas in which you could make things more efficient.

Yes, naturally, the faster your PC the less of an issue a single mod's CPU usage is. But when you run a lot of mods, it all adds up. I'll check out the slider options as you suggest the next time I test this. Thanks for the reply.

Originally posted by Zido... (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:52:33 +0000

Originally posted by Zidomo
On first glance, this looks like a nice expanded update/replacement of BanzaiAlert. In testing here, though, it has a major problem.

v1.2.1, USEng client/server, WoW 3.0.3 live. Measured with OptionlessHouse, this consumes a gigantic 2.8 to 3.2 CPU/second when a character is idle. More in combat.

Mods like this (combat mods/damage meters/etc.) should consume 0 CPU when a character is idle. And it shouldn't use as much as it does in combat. Anyway, nice idea; hope you are able to make this more efficient than it currently is.

I'll check out OptionlessHouse and see what I can do. I'm guessing you're in a raid or party when you did the testing idle? If so, there's an option in the behavior settings for "Search for Aggro when Out of Combat" (necessary for picking up PvP aggro *before* they get the first shot off). Normally you'd be correct about mods like this consuming 0 CPU when the character is out of combat, however in order to detect "PvP aggro" (which amounts to an opposing PvP player targeting you) you have to do the same expensive searching while out of combat too, and the more people you have in your party/raid the more expensive it is. Turn this option off and you should see idle CPU time drop significantly when you're out of combat, probably to 0. Make sure you do this for the pet behavior settings as well. Also, make sure you drop the "Extra Target-of-Target Search Depth" slider to 0. Increasing this above 0 may double, triple, or quadruple the search time and it's not likely to give you much benefit. It's there for people who absolutely want to be as thorough in the aggro search as possible but defaults to 0 because it's not necessary except in rare circumstances. I'm not sure if you changed this slider from its default of 0, but if you did that could be contributing to the CPU usage you're seeing.

The bottom line is that in order to do aggro searching blizzard forces addon authors to jump through a lot of hoops to even attempt to perform the task, and it's expensive. The more thorough you want to be the more expensive it is, and the more people you have in your party/raid the more expensive it is. Here's my explanation of the process from the AggroNotifier faq:

Q1. How does the aggro detection work?
A1. Blizzard heavily restricts what addons are allowed to know. An addon can't just ask "what is targeting me right now", and you can't get targeting info on any arbitrary unit. Blizzard only gives you programming access to a few units: the player (you), the player's pet, the unit you're currently mousing over, your focus target, your party members, your party members' pets, your raid members, and your raid members' pets. For any of those units you have programmatic access to, you can look at their targets, and their target's target, etc, as many target-of-target levels you want. So to detect aggro we look at all the units you have programmatic access to, and look at those units' targets. If any of those units' targets are non-friendly and targeting you (the player), then you have aggro from those units. A similar process is used to detect pet aggro. AggroNotifier lets you specify how many target-of-target levels you want to search, however you'll only get aggro hits off deep searching when shallow searching wouldn't find the aggro in very rare circumstances.

So as you can see, searching for aggro when you're in a party or raid means doing a *lot* of gyrations on each search if you want to be thorough (and what's the point of installing the mod if you don't want to be thorough?) Regardless, thanks for the info. I wasn't aware of OptionlessHouse or any other performance measuring tools like that. I'll see if there's something I can do about the CPU usage. It may just be the price you have to pay for thorough aggro detection, or I may have missed something. At the very least I can add an option to let you specify how often you want AggroNotifier to do its aggro searching (assuming you're in a position where it *should* be searching, such as while in combat, or out of combat with the pvp option on). Right now it searches every update tick so that you get notified as early as possible, but I could give you a slider to specify how often you want it to search. Increasing the time between searches would lower CPU usage but also make it possible for there to be a delay between when you gain aggro and when you're notified about it. Oddly, I'd guess that since AggroNotifier is searching every tick right now, the faster your computer the more CPU AggroNotifier takes up since you get more ticks. Of course the faster your computer the less important AggroNotifier's CPU usage would be, but I'll still do the profiling and add the "delay between aggro searches" slider option. It can't hurt.

On first glance, this looks like a... (AggroNotifier)

Zidomo — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 08:36:58 +0000

On first glance, this looks like a nice expanded update/replacement of BanzaiAlert. In testing here, though, it has a major problem.

v1.2.1, USEng client/server, WoW 3.0.3 live. Measured with OptionlessHouse, this consumes a gigantic 2.8 to 3.2 CPU/second when a character is idle. More in combat.

Mods like this (combat mods/damage meters/etc.) should consume 0 CPU when a character is idle. And it shouldn't use as much as it does in combat. Anyway, nice idea; hope you are able to make this more efficient than it currently is.

Originally posted by vpr... (AggroNotifier)

morrigahn — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:25:18 +0000

Originally posted by vpr
...
The only other thing that I can think of is if it would be able to display Aggro Gained by Party Members if grouping. Although I mentioned that before - but since I've already hit 80 it's not THAT critical for me anymore... Although I plan to level some alts ;)

Other than that, it's great! Love it!

~Vpr

Thanks for the feedback! I can't see how the "Aggro Gained by Party Members" thing could work without it being horribly spammy and unreadable using the builtin visual system, however it might work if funneled through SCT or MSBT.... I'll look into it but don't expect anything too quickly since it *may* require quite a bit of rewrite on the code. If it requires too much rewrite then it won't happen, but if I can find a clever way to do it without it taking too much time then you might get your wish.