Your data

Where things are

Everything the studio keeps is in one folder of your own: %LOCALAPPDATA%\ProjectIGIStudio (paste it into the Explorer's address bar to open it).

Folder or file	What it holds
missions\custom\	Your missions: each one's plan, name, picture, history and AI designer chats
missions\groups\	Your saved groups, and the designs the AI designer made that you kept
pristine\	The reference copy of the game's levels, made when you connected the game
data\	The level data the map is drawn from, built from your game
backups\	Copies of the game's language files from before the studio first wrote to them, and mission slots you removed from the game
cache\	Things that can always be made again, such as textures and ground height maps
config.json	Your settings: the game folder, your saved AI models and which one does each job, and so on
secrets.json	Your API keys, one for each saved model that has one, and your community sign-in, encrypted for your Windows account
cache\community\	Pictures and missions fetched from the community, kept so each is fetched once

The program's own log is in %APPDATA%\Project IGI Studio\logs\studio.log.

Uninstalling the studio leaves this folder alone, so installing again picks up where you were. To remove everything, delete it by hand.

Your missions belong to you

A mission lives in the studio's folder, not in the game. The game only receives what Apply builds from it: the compiled mission in its slot, and its texts.

But every Apply also writes the whole mission, plan and all, into its slot, so the game carries a copy of everything it was given. That is what lets the studio bring missions back when its own folder is lost (see below).

To keep a mission safe or give it to someone, export it: Share, Export mission file, or Export all my missions in one file. Import mission file... adds a mission, or a whole pack of them, to your library.

When something goes missing

The game folder is gone (a drive unplugged, the game moved or uninstalled). The studio says so and names the folder, and keeps working: your missions open and edit as before, because the levels are read from the reference copy. Only Apply and starting the game need the game, and Apply says why it can't, having written nothing. Plug the drive back in, or point Settings, Game at the new folder.

The studio's folder is gone (a new computer, a fresh Windows). Install the studio and connect the game again. The setup lists the missions the game is carrying, and Bring them back restores them. A mission already in the studio is never overwritten by the copy in the game.

The reference copy is gone. The next Apply makes it again from the game, checks it, and only then builds.

Checking the original missions

Settings, Game, Checks and setup, Check built-in missions compares the game's fourteen original missions with the reference copy. If one has changed (another tool wrote to it, for example), the studio can put it back, byte for byte. Besides mission 14's link to your missions (below), that is the only write to an original mission the studio will ever make, and it can only restore what the game shipped. A deliberate change is recognised and left alone.

The game you connect

The studio writes into the game you connected and nowhere else, and only into:

• its own mission slots, missions\location0\level15 and up, which it created: the mission, the models it brings in, its own textures, and the order the missions come in;
• the three language files that hold missions' names and descriptions, objective texts and messages, under keys of each mission's own, after backing them up;
• the game's settings, config.qvm, where only the line that says how far the mission list goes is changed, after backing it up, so that the game offers your missions;
• mission 14's link to the next mission, which leads on to your first one, after backing it up; with no mission of yours left, it goes back as the game shipped it;
• the pictures of the mission list, menusystem\missionsprites.res, where a mission with a picture of its own has it under its number, after backing the file up.

Nothing else of the fourteen original missions is ever written, nor anything else in the game's shared folders, nor the reference copy.

Don't mix in the old ToolKit

Don't edit a level the studio built with the IGI ToolKit afterwards. The ToolKit rebuilds the level from its own copy and throws away anything changed outside it. The studio has its own compiler and does not need the ToolKit at all.

Your API keys

A key typed in Settings, AI models is encrypted with Windows' own protection for your account, and stored in secrets.json. It is never written to the settings file, and the studio's page never gets it back: it only shows its last four characters. Requests to the AI provider are made by the studio itself, with your key, straight to the provider you set.

Your community account

The community is the one part of the studio with an account, and you need one only to pull, share, vote or comment. It is kept by the community's own service (a database and its sign-in, on Neon): your email and password (or your Google sign-in), the username and name others see, and what you share, pull, vote and write. Your email is never shown to anyone. Delete your account, on your profile, removes all of it, and the missions in your studio stay.

On your computer, the studio keeps your sign-in encrypted for your Windows account in secrets.json, for 30 days after you last use it (or until the studio closes, with Keep me signed in unticked), and the pictures and missions it fetched in cache\community\.

Privacy

The studio collects nothing. It sends only three things over the network, each when you use it:

• The AI designer's requests, to the AI provider you chose, with your key, only when you use it.
• The community, when you open it, sign in, pull, share, vote or comment. When the studio starts, it asks the community only if you are signed in (to keep the sign-in) or have missions pulled from it or shared to it (whether they have a newer version). Nothing else of yours goes: what is shared is what you choose to share.
• The update check, which asks GitHub whether a newer version exists and sends nothing about you, your game or your missions. Settings, Updates turns it off.

The code signing policy says the same, in the words the signing service asks for.

Next: troubleshooting.