Author Topic: Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.  (Read 1968 times)

Legacy_KlatchainCoffee

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 372
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #75 on: February 18, 2013, 05:29:25 pm »


               

henesua wrote...


In any case, by working together we could probably get over this hurdle. People with contacts of old community members would be a great help to work with. And someone that would do the leg work to contact artists and get approval for inclusion of stuff in a compilation HAK would be very useful. This would be someone that would take inventory of all the content they can't live without, and start contacting the artists to get approval to use it. I can do all of this, but have a lot on my plate and without help I need to keep the scope of my work small.



This would be quite a big task, as people (of those who can actually be reached) would have diffent reactions - even to the best possible 'pitch' on our side: some will say 'no problem, glad you'd be using my stuff' but others will just give a flat 'no, don;t you dare infringe my copyright!!'. People are very different, I've seen people do increadible work and be very happy to share with total strangers, while others would feel cagy about useful bits of code with people who actually spent time and effort helping them on their projects.

Anyway, considering I'm not so hot on the coding side, this would be something (my free time allowing) that I could undertake, although if I am perfectly honest - this might have a greater chance of success if done by one of the older 'known names'. Perhaps a clear 'presentation' of what is being done and the idea that it is a good thing and in some sense kudos shown to their work would be helpful.
               
               

               
            

Legacy_henesua

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6519
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #76 on: February 19, 2013, 02:50:01 am »


               Well lets take the discussion about specific action to the Foundation thread, KlatchainCoffee.

Or are you talking about CEP 3?
               
               

               
            

Legacy_Shadooow

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 7698
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #77 on: February 19, 2013, 12:58:13 pm »


               AD. CEP3

While there is definitely a lot what can be improved on CEP2, due to the decisions taken by CEP2 team in past, its really easier to start over.

The modularity could be added to the CEP of course, but that would mean there would be the same problem with CEP2 as in past with CEP1 - it would become useless and playeer would had to have both CEP2 on their disk and CEP3 because name of hak would differ. Although there would be the same content! Absolutely ridiculous since CEP2 has now over 5gb filesize.

Removing anything from CEP2, even if poor quality might result in crashes as someone might used that content in their module already. Changing character parts, item icons would result in the change on already existing characters as well.

The only thing what probably could be done with CEP2 is to fix duplicate resources. I know that Mavrixio did that for Sinfar and he saved almost 500mb lol.

But fact is that as bad is to create a new package, CEP2 team leave us no other choice. As much I would like improve CEP2, now I realise it is no longer possible due to the backwards compatibility reasons.
               
               

               


                     Modifié par ShaDoOoW, 19 février 2013 - 01:05 .
                     
                  


            

Legacy_KlatchainCoffee

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 372
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #78 on: February 19, 2013, 02:02:35 pm »


               

henesua wrote...

Well lets take the discussion about specific action to the Foundation thread, KlatchainCoffee.

Or are you talking about CEP 3?


I'm surprised it sounded like this to you. Other than Foundation, I don't see anyone saying 'let's actually do something about organising the best of the content - old and new -  in a way that's best functional and helpful to everyone and encourages the creators to continue contributing".


In an ideal world, the CEP team would be right there with us to make this happen in the post - Masterserver/Gamespy era, but the fact that they are staying away even from the discussion either out of principle or sheer lack of time/motivation is very telling in itself.
               
               

               
            

Legacy_henesua

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6519
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #79 on: February 19, 2013, 04:13:46 pm »


               ShaDoOoW:

I wonder if a module updater could be created to update a module from CEP 2 to the next version. It seems feasible to me, but I am not sure off the top of my head how to do it.

If it was possible you could create a transition hak full of 2das, and add this to a module. Then the updater could crawl through the module resources and adjust - for example - creature appearances to the updated appearances. Then you remove CEP 2 HAKs from the module, and add CEP 3 HAKs.

It would be challenging, and force CEP 3 to use very higher indexes in a number of 2DAs, but could be interesting.

That said much of the content in CEP 2 also needs to be left behind. There is no reason to Microsoft our selves to death by maximizing backwards compatibility.
               
               

               


                     Modifié par henesua, 19 février 2013 - 04:14 .
                     
                  


            

Legacy_Shadooow

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 7698
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #80 on: February 19, 2013, 04:19:50 pm »


               

henesua wrote...

ShaDoOoW:

I wonder if a module updater could be created to update a module from CEP 2 to the next version. It seems feasible to me, but I am not sure off the top of my head how to do it.

If it was possible you could create a transition hak full of 2das, and add this to a module. Then the updater could crawl through the module resources and adjust - for example - creature appearances to the updated appearances. Then you remove CEP 2 HAKs from the module, and add CEP 3 HAKs. 

That is not a solution, merely and easier instalation to avoid redownloading. But the main problem stands, player will still need the old CEP2 haks (cos not all PWs update to use new CEP3) and a CEP3 haks which would share the same content. 2x6gb is really lot.
               
               

               
            

Legacy_henesua

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6519
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #81 on: February 19, 2013, 04:43:05 pm »


               

ShaDoOoW wrote...

henesua wrote...

ShaDoOoW:

I wonder if a module updater could be created to update a module from CEP 2 to the next version. It seems feasible to me, but I am not sure off the top of my head how to do it.

If it was possible you could create a transition hak full of 2das, and add this to a module. Then the updater could crawl through the module resources and adjust - for example - creature appearances to the updated appearances. Then you remove CEP 2 HAKs from the module, and add CEP 3 HAKs. 

That is not a solution, merely and easier instalation to avoid redownloading. But the main problem stands, player will still need the old CEP2 haks (cos not all PWs update to use new CEP3) and a CEP3 haks which would share the same content. 2x6gb is really lot.


I see. I misunderstood your concern. Yes, a player would need both for awhile just as happened when CEP 1 transitioned to CEP 2. There is nothing we cna do about that.

However I see little to no value, to simply contain everything the community has ever produced as CEP does. A CEP 3 should look forward rather than obsess about being all inclusive.
               
               

               
            

Legacy_painofdungeoneternal

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 313
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #82 on: February 19, 2013, 04:48:11 pm »


               

henesua wrote...

The problem isn't only 2da files. Any resource which is part based or otherwise has numbering will collide with a similarly named part. Integrating Reforged Weapons with Project Q for example requires a bit of work - none of which involves 2da edits. Q's shields are another example, and anyone that has compiled a HAK of heads and clothing knows the renumbering game. And there is also the TGA - DDS thing which can lead to work. Phenotypes are a hybrid case: do you edit the 2da or do you edit the model names? Both?

Regardless I do catch your drift, _six. But I do not think you are too late with this idea. I wonder if a conversation between Pain and yourself could be fruitful in this regard.


2da's are the crux of the issue, that is what my work is aimed at for NWN2, the rest is just window dressing and trying to make a complete system so it's actually easy ( ie none of the actors know about all this, but by doing what they want to do, it implements all this ) ( oh and I also address custom.tlk as well in my system, and there can be tools to dynamically assemble 2da's and models for tilesets for example. )

This is mainly for NWN2 features, but I think could apply here as well.
A. Don't put 2da files in content haks, let each PW do them custom and provide preworked ones for PW's who can't.
B. Each PW has a 2da hak, which includes all their 2da's. These are dynamically created based on their chosen content, and they can add code to further tailor it, move rows, etc.
C. Each PW has a blocking 2da hak, which includes vanilla 2da's ( this assumes bics use 2da's in hak, which i think is an issue unless you use NWNCX, but it also removes the effects of all 2da files accidentally left in other haks. ) ( this assumes honest players using my system, if we could force this many exploits would be a lot harder )
D. Diff out the rows of each content, ( using the UPD format i developed or like elven did it, my system does this on the fly right now for NWN2 ), work out numbering to avoid conflicts - still this is manual. I have yet to do a blueprint/module tool to migrate 2da rows seamlessly, but there are perl solutions for this in NWN2 ( kivinen ). NWNlib probably can do this as well( by elven ). ( i need 2da and dialog files for each version of NWN1, 1.00 to 1.69, prolly have 1.68 and 1.69 now in my installed version and previous version, also need ones for each language if possible so this can be multilingual. )
E. Create a API service which indexes all content, and manifests to said content.
F. PW's or SP module authors subscribe to content, it makes a development setup just like we did on our old PW, teams can just subscribe to the same system, and can update the manifests, thus updating the team, or compilation, or send out bug fixes to PW's and SP end users.
G. Content is backed up from the vault, or dynamically pulled from it. Manifests provide instructions, options, and are followed to assemble a 2da hak, and all other needed haks. ( planning on editing the module to attach these dynamically as well ) SHA1 checksums monitor content.
H. Once completed on my end, source for the API, how I do things should be shared, so others can develop their own tools which are compatible ( ie NWNx plugins, NWNCX plugins for clients, websites listing content, tools to upload things to the vault and nexus, etc. ) - most of the core features will actually be running on the Vault Preservation Project server.

Note this is not just NWN1 I am doing this for, this is actually a larger project across NWN1 and NWN2, and thus should have far more talent aimed at helping it and debugging it, assuming I can get critical mass.
               
               

               


                     Modifié par painofdungeoneternal, 19 février 2013 - 04:57 .
                     
                  


            

Legacy_NWN_baba yaga

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1944
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #83 on: February 19, 2013, 08:26:22 pm »


               I like your foundation project alot and it´s promising but a restart of a CEP uhm! I really think that the oportunity was missed long ago and to rescue something where a half of us see no reason and some would just rip it apart is not worth the work imo and the time is better spend on the foundation.

If i can be of any help you let me know:)
               
               

               


                     Modifié par NWN_baba yaga, 19 février 2013 - 08:28 .
                     
                  


            

Legacy_Sadira of Tyr

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 299
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #84 on: February 19, 2013, 11:41:43 pm »


               I would have to agree with Baba. Making a whole new cep would mean a lot of work removing the old cep. Even if it was changed automatically. I'm pretty sure that the new stuff would not fit well within the module. I remember switching from cep 2.0 to 2.2, and it left a lot of problems. There were floating trees all over, and treasure chests buried in rocks. It would probably be easier to start a new module. With our player base getting smaller, making a new module is not really a good option either.

I read a bit of that foundation thread, and it sounds impressive. I would offer to help, but I'm not sure there is anything that I could do. I have enough trouble getting my scripts to do what I want them to do, lol.
               
               

               
            

Legacy_Shadooow

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 7698
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #85 on: February 20, 2013, 12:20:30 am »


               

NWN_baba yaga wrote...

I like your foundation project alot and it´s promising but a restart of a CEP uhm! I really think that the oportunity was missed long ago and to rescue something where a half of us see no reason and some would just rip it apart is not worth the work imo and the time is better spend on the foundation.

If i can be of any help you let me know:)

Fact is that Foundation as well thought it is, will cause another diversion. Some PWs will not want to switch it to avoid further work and fixing incompatibilities. We can hardly expect that PWs such as Higher Grounds will use anything else than next CEP update/generation.I dont think we can do anything about this. CEP2 as bad it is, is already essential for these PWs and they will not use Foundation just because its better designed, better structured and has more quality content (but less).

What I want to say is, that for these PWs an another update of CEP2 would be still appreciated and needed.
               
               

               
            

Legacy_KlatchainCoffee

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 372
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #86 on: February 20, 2013, 12:39:00 am »


               ShaDooow, I hear what you are saying - the now (rather large) mod my team and I had already built uses CEP 2.3 and rebuilding is not really feasible. However, from what I have understood, Foundation would be more than just about content management, but in some respects about taking NWN to a new level. I think that if it is done well + presented well + gives new features and good proportion of existent CC (including that which never made into CEP) all in one place - it would succeed and gradually become one of the must-haves. If parts of it could be made compatible with CEP-using worlds, all the better.
               
               

               
            

Legacy_Shadooow

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 7698
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #87 on: February 20, 2013, 12:41:55 am »


               Hmm right. I forgot that the Foundation might be on some level compatible with CEP. That would be probably the best way to satisfy everyone!
               
               

               
            

Legacy_Lazarus Magni

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1837
  • Karma: +0/-0
Difference between CEP 2.3 and 2.4? And a frank discussion on CEP in general.
« Reply #88 on: February 21, 2013, 07:57:52 am »


               I feel I need to say this, to clear up any misconception on my personal views of CEP. Despite my dis-satisfaction with the current state of CEP’s evolution (or more precisely, lack there of), I have to say there is a reason why it has been widely accepted by many, many mods (ours included) as the standard. It has some outstanding content, and the fact that it is widely accepted has made it easy for PWs to implement with out cutting themselves off. I can definitively say our world is much better off because of it, and I am happy for that. Of course I want more, but make no mistake, I am grateful for what we have.