Build 2880: addon management issues

deus-ex · 2018 Nov 21

I have separate folders setup for my games and addons. Today I renamed some addons for Doom, for consistency I renamed similar addons in the other game folders (Heretic, Hexen) as well. Doomsday has issues to list all addons, while multiple addons with the same file name exist, although each addon is located in a separate subfolder.

Example:

1. Multiple addons with same file name

Doomsday\data\Doom\Addons\SFX_(deus-ex_edition).pk3
Doomsday\data\Doom\Addons\SFX_Secret_(deus-ex_edition).pk3

Doomsday\data\Heretic\Addons\SFX_(deus-ex_edition).pk3
Doomsday\data\Heretic\Addons\SFX_Secret_(deus-ex_edition).pk3

2. After renaming the addons for Doom

Doomsday\data\Doom\Addons\jDoom_SFX_(deus-ex_edition).pk3
Doomsday\data\Doom\Addons\jDoom_SFX_Secret_(deus-ex_edition).pk3

Doomsday\data\Heretic\Addons\SFX_(deus-ex_edition).pk3
Doomsday\data\Heretic\Addons\SFX_Secret_(deus-ex_edition).pk3

skyjake · 2018 Nov 21

The file name is used as the basis of the file ID. If two files have the same name, even though they are in different folders on your hard drive, they are considered two different versions of the same mod.

The reasoning being, the parent folder(s) cannot be considered a part of the ID because they may change and almost certainly will be different depending on the computer the file is being used.

If the PK3 contains metadata in an Info file, the version could be defined there manually. (The Info is also used to determine the default tags for the mod.)

In the first case, I think it should have shown the two different versions of the file, though... I'll give this a test.

deus-ex · 2018 Nov 21

The SFX addons in question currently don't have any info file. Apart from differing in file size and content, both addons have their soundfiles stored in the required folder structure "Data\jDoom\SFX" respectively "Data\jHeretic\SFX".

skyjake · 2018 Nov 21

In that case, wouldn’t it be possible to merge it into a single Doom+Heretic compatible PK3?

deus-ex · 2018 Nov 21

Sure it would, but I like to keep them separated for organizational reasons. So the solution is to either use individual file names or adding info files? I have no objection to do that, I just wanted to make sure your addon management system is working consistently.

skyjake · 2018 Nov 21

Adding the Info should enable you to specify a unique title and version for each PK3, so that should help at least. It may not be the best solution, though, because the file ID is still the same, so one of the files will be considered a newer version of the other one (which doesn't make sense in this case).

So the best approach would be to have unique file names.

deus-ex · 2018 Nov 21

Alright. I was going to add info files later anyway, and using unique names for the addons helps to avoid confusion, not only for the addon management system, but for the user too. I'm going with the game identifier (jDoom, jHeretic, jHexen) as the leading part of the addon file names, like I used to do in the past.

Build 2880: addon management issues

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