Ships folder goes into the data folder. BUt like this....

Say you have a ships folder called FIREBASE (example ), and it contains firebases ships models and mat files.

In the mod he will have placed it like this:

\DATA\SHIPS\FIREBASE

So therefore the ships folders are inside the ships folder! (if that makes sense) Basically it follows whatever structure exists in the game. However, this is only done for convinince and such - as the archetype in teh shiparch.ini entry POINTS towards the folder it should be in.........so you can change it to what you want....

(ie shiparch will point to cmp file typically in \data\ships\firebase\slipstream.cmp file - which is the model of the ship. Then it has another line pointing to the mat file, like
data\ships\firebase\slipstream.mat

So you can change it if you want, its just that we all follow convention to make it simple

Next - the script problem i have no idea about really

Try redoing it all manually in the file, and then deleting the original (as in entering the starting headers and stuff) as it might be a space in the wrong spot, or a ' instead of a " or something stupid

Also - you can add scanfile="true" at the end of the append file bit and see if it works

like method="copyfile" scanfile="true">
Just means it will look for something like a genstress name.

OKay - ids and gen stress. The ids problem is that my mod adds 2 custom dll files. Now if you have another mod adding more custom dll files with the info, they will have to fit around mine. At taht point, to make it MORE complicated, you will then have to change all the numbers manually - otherwise you will be getting some very strange results in the game text.........or just IDS? in the game instead...........

The generation of the ids numbers using FLMM means that it will add its own custom dll file after mine, and work the numbers out accordingly! This will mean that it won't clash with my mod. It also won't clash with others, BUT since i have different layouts for ships selling etc, you would have to change the market_ships.ini part of the script to match other mods.......

If you don't do the generation of ids numbers using FLMM - you will have a lenghty conversion process - which will be VERY complex. It will be MUCH easier to generate ids info. For an example about it - download the soulforge train i did - which is in scripting, or download the Fly any ship mod from my website (www.pathfinderstudios.com - downloads section - singleplayer mods). They are all scripted in there.......