Old FMs compatibility

[vorob]

Just a quick question. 2.05 is compatible with all FMs, even old? No issues with scripts and smth like that?

[New Horizon]

Yes. In theory, but things can slip through. Let us know if you find anything.

[Springheel]

Backwards compatibility is very important to us (because who wants to map if your mission might not work in a year), but now that there are over 100 FMs, it's become less and less practical to be able to test them all to see if things break. If something DOES break, we'll do what is necessary to fix it.

[vorob]

Is there any known FMs in database that do not work in current darkmod build and need to be patched by mapper?

[nbohr1more]

"A Night to Remember" is currently being fixed. (in beta)

 

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/13177-fan-mission-a-night-to-remember-by-fieldmedic-20111030/page-5?do=findComment&comment=419830

 

"Winter Harvest" needs to be 2.0 (standalone) fixed

"Dragon's Claw" needs to be 2.0 (standalone) fixed

"Q4 Conversion: Yan's Test" was never an official release but it probably needs 2.0 fixes.

[vorob]

Like a year ago i wanna ask if every FM in FM Selector is compatible with 2.06? Does anyone test them?

Edited January 1, 2019 by vorob

[stgatilov]

Like a year ago i wanna ask if every FM in FM Selector is compatible with 2.06?

Like a year ago: in theory, it is compatible.

 

Does anyone test them?

People play TDM regularly.

Plus there are beta testing phases (one of them is going right now) with emphasis on testing all maps.

 

However, I suspect that FM coverage is not very high during beta-tests.

There is no strict plan like "we have to test every FM when releasing new version" (like it was long time ago).

[STiFU]

I couldn't find the automation thread anymore, so I am posting this here.

 

stgatilov, isn't this something we could maybe test with automation? I imagine something like loading up all fms in succession, doing a tdm_end_mission and collecting all warnings/errors.

[OrbWeaver]

Another option would be introduce some kind of multiple version support, at least for the core DLL and scripts (not necessarily every single texture and sound), so that when a known breaking change was introduced, old maps could continue to use their own compatible version of the DLL from a separate directory or PK4.

 

I suppose this would require considerable architectural changes to the installer and the mod loading itself, but in the long run it might turn out to be less effort than potentially needing to manually fix a constantly-growing list of FMs with each release.

[stgatilov]

I couldn't find the automation thread anymore, so I am posting this here.

stgatilov, isn't this something we could maybe test with automation? I imagine something like loading up all fms in succession, doing a tdm_end_mission and collecting all warnings/errors.

Created new thread.

Merely loading a FM does not test anything. FM rarely breaks to the point when it does not load, and most issues do not produce warnings.

So it is a question of serious test suite checked automatically. That is the original dream due to which automation was created.

 

Another option would be introduce some kind of multiple version support, at least for the core DLL and scripts (not necessarily every single texture and sound), so that when a known breaking change was introduced, old maps could continue to use their own compatible version of the DLL from a separate directory or PK4.

I suppose this would require considerable architectural changes to the installer and the mod loading itself, but in the long run it might turn out to be less effort than potentially needing to manually fix a constantly-growing list of FMs with each release.

Multiple version support is a terrible idea from the point of stability: all those old stuff will not be tested. Such change decreases test coverage even further.

People can have several versions of TDM locally, and run older version if they know the mission is broken with the new one.

The main problem is that in most cases players don't know that the mission is broken before they catch an issue. Sometimes they don't know it even afterwards

 

I plan to change tdm_update completely, so that it could be possible to switch between versions. A very rough prototype is already available.

One last step would be to allow saving cache of uninstalled versions on the hard drive. Then it can be used by updater for switching versions (so that you don't need endlessly redownloading same diffs).

I'll keep it in mind for the new updater.