Debian: compiling maps and producing identical files

[apo]

we once used -ffloat-store - but it was slower: link

If this yields reproducible results, would it make sense to activate it only for the final release?

[Mattn]

oh... we are still using it... - so forget what i've said.

[Mattn]

how are other quake based engines doing this? or is none of these in debian?

[apo]

Actually Debian's support for Quake based games and engines is excellent.

We have quakespasm (quake1 engine), darkplaces (quake2 engine) or ioquake3 (quake 3 engine). You can play Nexuiz and OpenArena with them for example. There are also tons of Doom related engines, prboom-plus etc.

I already wanted to ask you (not seriously) if we can replace some UFO code with darkplaces and simply link against this engine but I didn't want to annoy you.

how are other quake based engines doing this? or is none of these in debian?

Good question. So it seems OpenArena sorts all files in a specific order and ensures that e.g. all textures have the same crc32 value to be compatible with upstream. But the package maintainer simply provides upstream's bsp files, the same goes for Nexuiz.

I think I'm going to file some grave bugs against those packages right now....

I have to think this over. If we can't produce identical tarballs for now, I have to rely on your precompiled bsp files and I hope they will be treated like all other quake based games. At least users can compile the maps from source, if they wish, however they can't produce identical map files. I think that's a pity but won't hopefully block the inclusion of UFO:AI for Debian.

[Mattn]

another option would be to just disable the checksum check. i don't think this is really needed in our case... cheating would be possible with it, yes - but very unlikely. the 3 players we have that play multiplayer in general know each other

[apo]

another option would be to just disable the checksum check. i don't think this is really needed in our case... cheating would be possible with it, yes - but very unlikely. the 3 players we have that play multiplayer in general know each other

Thanks for your suggestion Mattn. I also think disabling the checksum check isn't necessary. By the way does UFO:AI has a similar variable like OpenArena, sv_pure, whereby you can enable or disable compatibility to the official release?

I really hope and I'm confident that the inclusion of UFO:AI will increase the visibility of the game and more "casual" gamers will try it too. So maybe not instantly but during a period of several months you should receive more feedback here at the forum. At least I will install the dedicated ufoai-server on my game server, perhaps this boosts multiplayer gaming a little. 

[Mattn]

i've now disabled the check - because it was client side only anyway. so if you want to cheat, it wouldn't stop you from disabling that line and recompile the game.

no, we don't have sv_pure support.

so in either way, you should now be able to compile the maps on your own and connect to a gameserver that is using the map with a different checksum. To be honest i don't see a reasonable scenario where cheating with a modified map would make that much sense. because the vis stuff and the like is done on the server anyway.

[apo]

i've now disabled the check - because it was client side only anyway. so if you want to cheat, it wouldn't stop you from disabling that line and recompile the game.

I see. Thanks for taking care of this.