Feature request: multi-engine support

[Forboding Angel]

Is there any way to autokick players not using the correct spring version?

[bibim]

Is there any way to autokick players not using the correct spring version?

Afaik, there is no way to know the Spring version a player is using from the lobby (before he actually tries to connect to the game). The player shows unsynced, but that could be due to missing map or mod for example.

[Forboding Angel]

http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=29927

Is there some setting I'm supposed to change to broadcast which spring version the host is using? I would think it would do that automagically...

[bibim]

It could indeed do that automagically if there was an official way to do so, which isn't the case as you can check in the official lobby protocol description.

[danil_kalina]

Spring Protocol - Privately

[bibim]

Thank you, however I'm totally aware of these undocumented commands since the first day they got implemented (that's more than 1 year ago I guess now), but we can't start to add things described vaguely in some forum posts or meeting minutes. Imagine where we would be today if all the protocol description was scattered in hundred of forum posts, using different syntaxes etc.

[danil_kalina]

if I had access to this protocol I would add there not official commands

[bibim]

if I had access to this protocol I would add there not official commands

Yeah I guess, I'm not blaming you at all.
I don't remember exactly how it happened, but I think it's more a problem of how these commands have been decided/implemented without being documented/reviewed by most lobby devs.

[Forboding Angel]

So what shall I do?

Edit:
Not documentation, but at least some info: http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?p=537464

[bibim]

So what shall I do?

If you want to autohost non-standard engine games right now, you can use Springie (but you will have compatibility problems with SL and TASClient).

If you want the multi-engine lobby protocol extension to be adopted by more lobby clients/autohosts, the first step would be to document this extension as a patch of official lobby protocol description. However, ideally this should be done by those who specified these commands (aegis and Licho?), because I guess they know better than anyone else how they work (for example why 93.2 is considered as incompatible with 93.1 by lobby server etc.).

[Forboding Angel]

Well, here is the deal, every lobby that doesn't suck is using it, documented or not.

As a result, they all report my spads hosts as being 93.2

Considering that they are very much 91.0 you can probably imagine that that is causing quite an issue. So I am very much in between a rock and a hard place.

Is there anything I can do about it?

[bibim]

Well, here is the deal, every lobby that doesn't suck is using it, documented or not.

That's your point of view as end-user, which is totally understandable. However my point of view as lobby developer is entirely different: the lobby clients which implement unofficial extensions are the ones which could lead to situations where all our lobby protocol is scattered in hundred forum posts, and becomes impossible to implement for new lobby devs without relying on reading current lobby server source code.

Is there anything I can do about it?

I don't see how to answer this question without repeating exactly my previous post.

People who extend lobby protocol must patch accordingly the official protocol description. That's what I did it when I specified the lobby compat flags to allow lobby protocol extensions, the accounts IDs to track renames, and the JOINBATTLEREQUEST commands to allow true battle bans. There hasn't been any problem with these extensions.

[Forboding Angel]

In the meantime, autohost maintainers get screwed because lobby devs can't agree on anything.

That's just peachy.

Edit:
Allow me to paraphrase for anyone who isn't getting the full picture.

Basically Licho went off and did his own thing, because nothing around here ever gets done if you don't just go ahead and do it, protocol be damned.

Bibim as a proper developer, dislikes this behavior and as a result chooses not to capitulate to improper development, consequences be damned.

In the meantime, all the lobbies implement it because it is a SORELY needed feature, regardless of it's implementation and the politics surrounding it, and we all know that getting aegis off of his ass to do anything with the server software is a non-starter.

That about right?

[bibim]

That about right?

Not really:

Basically Licho went off and did his own thing, because nothing around here ever gets done if you don't just go ahead and do it, protocol be damned.

Wrong. As I explained in my previous post, I added myself multiple extensions to lobby protocol, the only difference is that I documented them so other devs could review it and the protocol description was always up to date. Also, afaik, Licho didn't implement the lobby server part, aegis did.

Bibim as a proper developer, dislikes this behavior and as a result chooses not to capitulate to improper development, consequences be damned.

I only dislike what is clearly bad for future lobby development, even if right now you only see the benefit of having multi-engine support in one autohost...

In the meantime, all the lobbies implement it because it is a SORELY needed feature

You know, if all lobbies had refused to implement this unofficial protocol extension before it got documented, maybe now it would be documented and we would have official multi-engine support...

we all know that getting aegis off of his ass to do anything with the server software is a non-starter.

Wrong, he did a small patch recently to add REMOVESCRIPTTAGS command to uberserver. However, if I remember correctly he was against the official protocol description document format, so I doubt he would indeed document the multi-engine protocol extension himself.

[Forboding Angel]

So basically all this is because someone didn't write a paragraph explaining how to use a call?

[bibim]

So basically all this is because someone didn't write a paragraph explaining how to use a call?

As I explained multiple times already, the problem is that the protocol extension for multi-engine support isn't included in official lobby protocol description. I understand as a non-lobby-dev you could think of it as "a paragraph explaining how to use a call", but that doesn't mean it's true. Please use this thread for following posts about this subject as it's getting off-topic here.