Projects and saving

An edit in the Studio first lives in memory. What happens next depends on whether you work in a mod project. If you are making a mod, use a project: it is the simplest and the safest.

Mod projects

A project is a folder with three things in it:

Path	What it holds
<id>.twrk	The project file: every edited package and .dat file (as deltas against the game folder's files), the mod details, your open tabs, history and pane layout.
mod-files/	Files shipped with the mod exactly as laid out: scripts/main.lua, dlls/64/…, files/ChaosGame/…. A README inside explains the layout.
builds/	The .tempest files you build, named <id>-<version>.tempest.

Create one with New mod project (welcome screen or the project menu). In a project:

• Edits save themselves. About a second and a half after a change, the project file is written. The header shows Edited while a save is pending, Saving…, then Saved. If saving fails (the folder was moved, the disk is full) it shows Not saved in red; Ctrl+S retries.
• The game folder is never written. Your edits stay in the project, so the game files remain the originals your mod is compared with. When you want to test without building a mod, Write the edits into the game folder (in the Save menu) overwrites the game's files after asking; the Studio remembers the originals first.
• The project lists only its own files. The mod cooker shows the game files you edited while the project was open, plus the ones you added to it, never unrelated edits made elsewhere.
• Ctrl+S saves the project immediately.

To continue later, open the .twrk from the welcome screen, the project menu's recent list, Open project… (Ctrl+Alt+O) or your file manager. The game folder opens, the edits are applied again and you land where you were.

Close the project (project menu) returns to plain editing. It asks first:

• When everything is saved, Close the project confirms. Your edits are unloaded from the Studio, so the game folder's files show as they are on disk, and nothing of the project can be saved into the game by mistake. They come back when you open the project again.
• When a save is still pending or failed, choose Save and close, or Discard and close to drop the changes made since the last save.

Opening or creating another project closes the current one the same way.

TIP

Moving the project folder is fine. The project file refers to the game folder by its path, so if the game moves, the Studio asks where it is now.

Without a project

When you open a game folder directly, edited files are marked unsaved and the header's main button is Save:

• Save (Ctrl+S) writes the current file into the game folder, compressed like the original. The first time a file is saved in place, the Studio records what the original looked like, so the mod cooker can still make a delta later.
• Export a copy… (Ctrl+Shift+S) writes the file somewhere else. The edits stay unsaved in the Studio, and the copy is remembered as a modified version of its game file, so it shows up in the mod cooker.
• Save all into the game folder saves every unsaved file.
• Save as a workspace file (Ctrl+Alt+S) keeps everything for later without touching the game folder (see below).

Undo and discard

• Undo (Ctrl+Z, outside text fields) reverts the last change of the current file. Each package keeps its last 50 changes, and undo still works after saving: undoing a saved change marks the file edited again. The history is lost when the package is closed or the Studio quits.
• Discard (header button) throws away every edit to the current file and reloads it from disk.
• Discard all changes (Save menu, or the edited-files list) does the same for every file.
• The mod cooker's … menu on a file has Discard my edits to this file….

Every discard asks first. Discarding in a project also removes the edits from the project file.

Workspace files

A .twrk file holds a whole working session: the unsaved packages and .dat files, and where you were (the open package and object, the assembly table and row, tabs, history, panes, the mod details). A mod project is a linked workspace file with a folder around it; you can also save one on its own with Save as a workspace file. The first time, you choose the kind:

• Linked: small (kilobytes). It stores deltas against the game folder's files, so it only opens on a game folder with the same files. Script packages, and files whose delta could not be made cleanly, are stored whole.
• Portable: every changed file whole, plus packages opened from outside the game folder and the recorded originals. Larger, but it opens on another computer or another copy of the game.

Opening a workspace file reopens its game folder, applies the changes in memory (one undo step, "load workspace") and restores where you were.

Crash recovery

While anything is unsaved, the Studio writes a recovery copy every two minutes. If it closes unexpectedly, the next time you open that game folder a banner offers Restore it; Dismiss deletes the copy. The copy is removed once everything is saved.