Re: [Alephmodular-devel] Re: XCode 2.1

[Br'fin <br...@ma...>]

On Jun 7, 2005, at 1:28 PM, Alexander Strange wrote:
> On Jun 7, 2005, at 1:19 PM, Br'fin wrote:
>> Note to ourselves. Now is probably a good time to serialize saved  
>> files since I didn't already do that. (My bad for thinking that  
>> transferring saved files tween Mac and anything else wouldn't be  
>> supported and now having it cause future problems transferring  
>> tween Macs)
>>
>> Given the lack of foresight, and with the note that existing M2  
>> saved games were never supported, just M2 films. When I code new  
>> serialized saved games, do I...
>>     1. ...avoid all support for existing 0.3 saved games
>>     2. ...acknowledge and don't run existing 0.3 saved games
>>     3. ...acknowledge and support older 0.3 saved games as well as  
>> the new ones?
>>
>> I admit the spread of AM is potentially low enough that we could  
>> get away with 1.
> Is there something extremely convenient (like a version field) in  
> the file format? If there is, 3 would be the best way; otherwise, I  
> don't think it would be easy enough to justify not going with 1.

There is a data_version field in the WAD headers. But right now  
that's advertising that the basic format of the saved game is that of  
a Marathon 2 version map. There doesn't seem to be a great spot for a  
minor version note. In the future, things get interesting though for  
now I'll just take route 1.

No guarantees on not crashing AM when you try to open older saves.  
And as files go, there the worst kind for andling gracefully, since  
for the most part they are legitimate. It's only once you hit the  
dynamic data that things may get undefined. Heck... if the alignment  
and voodoo is right with no empty spots in the data structures, they  
may continue to work fine post serialization in a similar way that  
Terminals were never original serialized on reading in or writing out.

-Jeremy Parsons
http://alephmodular.sourceforge.net/