[RELEASE] New OXP List

[skodarap]

Hmm, you could just make "Compatible with 1.xx.x" table and just add OXP's to the list

[mcarans]

That is effectively what the main table would become, but these OXPs (which we must remember are not incompatible, just unchecked for compatibility for a long period of time) are still kept easily accessible in the page linked from the main OXP list. So if someone does want to test them and say they're compatible, they can be moved back.

[maik]

I don't think we would do the OXPs with unconfirmed compatibility justice by moving them to a separate page when 1.75 comes around. My gut feeling is that most of them work today and will work with 1.75 as well.

Moving them to a separate page will probably not result in more updates to the "C" column than we get today.

Instead, I would suggest to have a joint "OXP compatibility triage day" with a a bunch of volunteers to fill in the blanks. And when 1.75 comes around, we can have another one to confirm they actually do work with 1.75. Incidentally, is there an #oolite IRC channel already that could be hijacked for the triage day to coordinate?

[CheeseRedux]

That is effectively what the main table would become, but these OXPs (which we must remember are not incompatible, just unchecked for compatibility for a long period of time) are still kept easily accessible in the page linked from the main OXP list. So if someone does want to test them and say they're compatible, they can be moved back.

Just to be sure I haven't completely misunderstood the concept of "compatible" here:
Is the definition of compatible (with regards to the OXP list) that Oolite doesn't give a compatibility warning when starting?
Or is there some deeper test it has to pass, ensuring it actually works as intended?

If the first is the case, I can quickly test a vast majority of OXPs, if the second, not so much...

[Cody]

There’s an IRC link on the Links page of the main Oolite page.

[maik]

That is effectively what the main table would become, but these OXPs (which we must remember are not incompatible, just unchecked for compatibility for a long period of time) are still kept easily accessible in the page linked from the main OXP list. So if someone does want to test them and say they're compatible, they can be moved back.

Just to be sure I haven't completely misunderstood the concept of "compatible" here:
Is the definition of compatible (with regards to the OXP list) that Oolite doesn't give a compatibility warning when starting?
Or is there some deeper test it has to pass, ensuring it actually works as intended?

If the first is the case, I can quickly test a vast majority of OXPs, if the second, not so much...

Working as presumably intended. So if you are using OXPs from the list that have a blank cell in the "C" column and you think that they actually do work then please let us know. Same if you don't agree with a "Y" or "N" in that column.

[CheeseRedux]

Well, I can tell you that Total Patrol gives incompatibility warning when installed. Same with Scoop Positions. Other than that I have a bunch of things installed that appear to be working fine, but that's really just on a level of haven't-noticed-anything-amiss, not tested at all.

[maik]

There’s an IRC link on the Links page of the main Oolite page.

Mmh, didn't find what you were referring to but it's late . Anyways, found it in the FAQ Thanks!

[Eric Walch]

Well, I can tell you that Total Patrol gives incompatibility warning when installed. Same with Scoop Positions. Other than that I have a bunch of things installed that appear to be working fine, but that's really just on a level of haven't-noticed-anything-amiss, not tested at all.

Problem with incompatibility is that it could be in a single command that is rarely used. I remember a bug in one of the rarely used ship-adding commands. Military Fiasco used it to add the final ship. At that moment Oolite crashed. In this case it was an Oolite bug, but some problems don't show immediately but only when playing a specific part of the oxp.

For Total Patrol its easier. The author added a requires.plist to prevent it loading with future Oolite versions. Just as precaution in case it would become incompatible. As it shows now, it would work with 1.74 so one could just raise the maximum version a bit.

For Scoop Positions it is different. It does things that are already implemented in 1.74 itself. Therefor it has 1.73.99 as max version. That is an incompatibility for a reason. Same for the old external views oxp. All that code is now also part of Oolite itself.

[Commander McLane]

The incompatibility warning given at the start of Oolite is pretty much useless as an indicator. It is triggered only if an OXP tells Oolite explicitely to trigger it, so there are no tests whatsoever.

Telling Oolite to trigger it is done by setting a max_version in the OXPs requires.plist. The vast majority of OXPs (98%?) don't use that command, and in most cases the reason is that their authors simply weren't aware of the command. So its presence or non-presence simply says nothing at all about the OXPs compatibility to a certain version.

Total Patrol was released in a time when I was very cautious about the ever-evolving scripting engine of Oolite, and thought it best to put a max_version in, so that really nothing could go wrong. The side effect is that you can't use it in 1.74, although I think it works just perfectly, because nothing has changed with the parts of the scripting engine it uses.

More recent OXPs of mine were released without any max_version determined. They don't lose usability with newer Oolite versions and may throw out warnings or errors in the log, which is actually much more sensible and helpful then simply refusing to work at all.

So the warning in Oolite itself has absolutely nothing to do with the actual compatibility of an OXP.

[mcarans]

One could argue that the OXPs that have already had the blank changed to Y are probably the OXPs that the majority of people are using.

Ones that have remained blank for all this time are likely ones that few people are using and not to the extent that they feel it's worth the effort to update the wiki or mention that they have it working.

The purpose of the OXP List is to provide a list of OXPs that people would want to install in my view not necessarily to be a history of every OXP ever created, hence it wouldn't be a bad thing IMHO for these rarely used OXPs to end up on another linked page (they won't be lost and can easily be moved back if someone really wants to install and test them for compatibility).

[maik]

One could argue that the OXPs that have already had the blank changed to Y are probably the OXPs that the majority of people are using.

Ones that have remained blank for all this time are likely ones that few people are using and not to the extent that they feel it's worth the effort to update the wiki or mention that they have it working.

The purpose of the OXP List is to provide a list of OXPs that people would want to install in my view not necessarily to be a history of every OXP ever created, hence it wouldn't be a bad thing IMHO for these rarely used OXPs to end up on another linked page (they won't be lost and can easily be moved back if someone really wants to install and test them for compatibility).

They are not rarely used. Since I put all the oosat1 and oosat2 in my box.net account I get an overview of what people are downloading--most download almost everything, regardless of what is in the "C" column.

Since we launched the table we didn't have more than a couple of changes to the "C" column, so I'd rather argue that a) the content of the column doesn't matter much to the average downloader, and b) he consequently doesn't provide feedback to update it.

[mcarans]

Strange that users are not worried about compatibility when downloading OXPs - maybe there is confusion in this area probably not helped by the message on the Oolite download page about Oolite versions. Maybe users are just assuming that anything in the table must be compatible.

Anyway given this info, best to leave the table as is.

[skodarap]

From a perspective of new player that done the same mistake (downloaded couple of oxp's that weren't compatible with 1.74.2) - I only noticed that C column after I read posts in this thread.

I didn't click on the oxp links from that table (well, I only used that table to find some specific oxp few times after noticing the talk about them on forum), but went trough categories and then picked them by description (or some other criteria - unimportant at this time).

Anyway, as far as compatibility goes, things are pretty unclear (or hidden) - that column is not really that obvious to the new person, and in the oxp page you can usually see only versions that are supported; for example "Total Patrol" - on wiki page it says: "Total_patrol oxp v 1.2 runs on Oolite 1.73." but it doesn't say it's not compatible with 1.74.2.

Well I only wanted to point this out.

Cheers

[maik]

From a perspective of new player that done the same mistake (downloaded couple of oxp's that weren't compatible with 1.74.2) - I only noticed that C column after I read posts in this thread.

When you say "weren't compatible with 1.74.2", does that mean that they indeed did not work or only that they were not clearly marked as compatible with 1.74.2?

Anyway, as far as compatibility goes, things are pretty unclear (or hidden) - that column is not really that obvious to the new person, and in the oxp page you can usually see only versions that are supported; for example "Total Patrol" - on wiki page it says: "Total_patrol oxp v 1.2 runs on Oolite 1.73." but it doesn't say it's not compatible with 1.74.2.

I agree it is confusing. How is a new player to know that OXPs which work with 1.73 are most likely going to work with 1.74 as well? Eventually, the "C" column in the OXP List should give the definite answer, but as long as the majority of entries remain blank we continue to confuse people.

That said, if you are using an OXP without problems (e.g. you added some ships and they actually appear in the game) and see that its entry in the "C" column is blank, let us know and we can update the Wiki.