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View Full Version : [Request] An Auto-Updater?



Emrak
February 5th, 2013, 17:34
What would be really awesome is if there were an auto-updater for user-created mods and rulesets. It would work thus:

1) Creator makes a mod. Mod has *two elements within: VERSION and NAME.
2) Creator uploads mod to FG.COM master mod/ruleset page.
3) In FG2, user downloads this mod (perhaps FG2 could have a mod/ruleset searching functionality built in that lists all content in the master mod/ruleset page).
4) Creator updates the mod several weeks later and uploads the latest edition.
5) Next time user starts FG2, it automatically checks all his mod versions against the master list to insure user has the latest one and downloads it accordingly.

The more I think on this, the more I think it's not just a good idea, but probably a necessity. I think we're getting to the point where all the varying user-generated content (mods, rulesets, extensions, etc.) are beginning to eclipse the app in terms of size. Smiteworks may wish to begin to consider how to "institutionalize" this stuff and make it a core functionality of the app itself. I do not mean including all these files in the download, but including an in-app method of searching, downloading, and updating them, so a user doesn't have to dig through forums and try to keep mods updated manually.

PLUS user-generated content is really the core of what separates FG2 from other rising stars in the VTT world (such as https://roll20.net/ ). The more we can accommodate (and encourage!) a robust, user-generated community, the better off FG2 will be. :)



* it should also probably have a 3rd element as well. something like "FG VERSION". Basically so that FG2 could prompt a little pop-up that says "Hey, this ruleset you're running has not yet been tested on the current version of FG2. Do you still want to use?" Reason behind this is because many users (at least in my group) do not distinguish between an "FG2" problem and a "user-created ruleset" problem. When there's a bug, the finger pointing always goes against FG2.

Trenloe
February 5th, 2013, 17:53
That's a really good idea...

The main issue I see being that as soon as Smiteworks start to provide updates from the community then people begin to expect Smiteworks to check the content and provide support if they break something else.

What happens if 2 updates clash with each other and break something in a GMs campaign - who's fault is it? The author of update 1 or the author of update 2 or Smiteworks?

Also, a "problem" with auto updates is that people just don't read the "readme" and go ahead with the update blindly and so can miss a bunch of stuff they need to know about the update. At least if the update is in a forum thread there is a "chance" of the user reading about the update and any gotchas...

It's still a great idea... :)

Moon Wizard
February 13th, 2013, 07:28
Doug and I actually talked about this a couple weeks ago.

We really want to have a better solution for updating all content for FG. We will probably focus on the supported products first, but want to make community updates better as well.

We're thinking that the updater would be modified to provide a list of updated links, and let the user decide. It would be great to have an option to roll back the last update as well, to deal with some of the issues that Trenloe mentioned.

It's sort of on the backburner as I work through some overhauls of the main client.

Regards,
JPG