Developer Notes - 2021-02 Ruleset Updates

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Originally Posted by deer_buster

You didn't understand the concept then. The author of the extension would certify that they have checked the code against a specific major version, and when the client loads the extension, it would compare that ruleset's version against the certified version of the extension, and provide an error or warning depending upon whether it is a major or minor version violation. If it is an error, provide the option to skip loading that extension into memory at that point. At no point should any expectation be that FG, or any other program, would look at the code itself and try to validate it. As you said, too much variability.

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Apologies, I now see what you meant - my bad. But asking me to update some flag every time an update pops up is likely not going to happen as they update one or thrice a week. And while I tend to be proactive on making sure my extensions are running - I know others are not. Having a bunch of false warnings come up is not something I'd look forward to. Extension problems usually get identified by users, because they are too complex and interwoven to be validated against a build unless a very simple extension with low impact on the code architecture.

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Originally Posted by SilentRuin

Apologies, I now see what you meant - my bad. But asking me to update some flag every time an update pops up is likely not going to happen as they update one or thrice a week. And while I tend to be proactive on making sure my extensions are running - I know others are not. Having a bunch of false warnings come up is not something I'd look forward to. Extension problems usually get identified by users, because they are too complex and interwoven to be validated against a build unless a very simple extension with low impact on the code architecture.

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Only time this would be "required" would be when a major version of the ruleset is released. Minor versions and patches would not require re-certification (see https://semver.org/ for what would qualify as a major, minor, and patch change...assuming every ruleset uses semantic versioning, which I would highly recommend changing to if it isn't).

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Originally Posted by deer_buster

Only time this would be "required" would be when a major version of the ruleset is released. Minor versions and patches would not require re-certification (see https://semver.org/ for what would qualify as a major, minor, and patch change...assuming every ruleset uses semantic versioning, which I would highly recommend changing to if it isn't).

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The only version I have is for my extension. And SW does not like anything more than Major.Minor - just FYI.

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Originally Posted by SilentRuin

The only version I have is for my extension. And SW does not like anything more than Major.Minor - just FYI.

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Hmm, looking at SFRPG ruleset version is 2.1.18 (major.minor.patch)...so it's being used at least in one or more rulesets. SEMVER is very clear and useful at showing any technical user who looks at it about the level of change, and if it isn't being used, it should be.

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Originally Posted by deer_buster

Hmm, looking at SFRPG ruleset version is 2.1.18 (major.minor.patch)...so it's being used at least in one or more rulesets. SEMVER is very clear and useful at showing any technical user who looks at it about the level of change, and if it isn't being used, it should be.

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Didn't say people didn't use the triple numbers - I did at first - until someone informed me that it was not looked at or caused an issue. Think it was Mad Nomad but not sure. Then I removed them all to 2 digit only in my extension.xml files.

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Originally Posted by SilentRuin

Didn't say people didn't use the triple numbers - I did at first - until someone informed me that it was not looked at or caused an issue. Think it was Mad Nomad but not sure. Then I removed them all to 2 digit only in my extension.xml files.

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To be fair, you said

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Originally Posted by SilentRuin

And SW does not like anything more than Major.Minor - just FYI.

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Looking at the FGU version....4.0.10 (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forum...elease-v4-0-10) so I'm not sure that is a true statement.

Regardless, certification of an extension whenever a major ruleset release happens should be done by the extension author...my suggestion was merely for the client to provide some kind of notification and/or exclusionary feature for extensions that haven't been certified. If there isn't the mechanism in place to even allow that, then it seems to me, imho, that it should be there, especially since extensions being out of date cause many problems.

OK guys, you've derailed this important information thread enough. Please take this discussion to another thread so that people wanting to know about the upcoming ruleset changes can get info quickly without having to wade through a lot of unrelated posts. Thanks.

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Originally Posted by Moon Wizard

In order to support ruleset developers, I have made a number of notes regarding changes that should be made to bring rulesets in-line with the changes to the others.

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Are the changes likely to affect backward compatibility with FG Classic?

Is there a simple way to go back to icon sidebars?

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Originally Posted by Valarian

Are the changes likely to affect backward compatibility with FG Classic?

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I'm pretty sure what I'm seeing in TEST will ABSOLUTELY prevent my stuff from working in Classic as it will likely not have these changes. Moon Wizard would have to address it specifically though. As I've told everyone who could listen in all my literature on my extensions that I only support them in FGU, it has not stopped people from claiming some do work in Classic. I've told them I will never say that as I never plan to support it, and that they better always save their working versions someplace safe as I can't guarantee they will continue to work there.

Barring Moon Wizard saying differently, I'm pretty sure the changes I've had to make in TEST server to prevent them from going BOOM with the ActorManager2 changes I described in my "Issues" thread related to this will make it incompatible with any previous version of FGU and for sure FGC. IMHO.

[This would mean if you wanted to support one extension for FGU and FGC you would have to add in specific IF logic to handle each case separately - as I only support unity I won't be doing this ]