Linux versions of some G3 mods

[the bigg]

My inclination would actually be to release 'em as tarballs. I don't anticipate we'll get too much demand so I'm not terribly worried about getting some super-efficient compression.

 

/me waits for dial-up penguins to protest...

Zip files have the advantage of being decompressable on Windows, meaning that smarter modders can download them, compare them to the Mac version, and release Linux versions of their mods too.

[CamDawg]

My inclination would actually be to release 'em as tarballs. I don't anticipate we'll get too much demand so I'm not terribly worried about getting some super-efficient compression.

 

/me waits for dial-up penguins to protest...

Zip files have the advantage of being decompressable on Windows, meaning that smarter modders can download them, compare them to the Mac version, and release Linux versions of their mods too.

Player convenience trumps modder convenience. WinRAR handles tarballs just fine.

[the bigg]

I'm pretty sure that {un,}zip is provided with all decent Linux distributions (in fact, the compression algorithm used in zip files is the same as the one used in gz ones). Besides, try teaching a normal Windows user to cd to their game directory and run 'tar czf mymod.tar.gz mymod setup-mymod.tp2'.

 

Can you change that retarded spam ban from \.[bB][zZ] \.[bB][zZ][^2]? DOTtarDOTbz2 has much better compression rates than DOTtarDOTgz.

 

EDIT: also, to install mods on Linux you currently need to rely on the CLI (`weinstall mymod'), and decompressing the archive takes less keystrokes with ZIP than with TAR (`tar xzf mymod.tar.gz' vs. `unzip mymod.zip').

[CamDawg]

I'm pretty sure that {un,}zip is provided with all decent Linux distributions (in fact, the compression algorithm used in zip files is the same as the one used in gz ones). Besides, try teaching a normal Windows user to cd to their game directory and run 'tar czf mymod.tar.gz mymod setup-mymod.tp2'.

This isn't Linux. Tarballs can be handled by WinRAR the exact same way as any other compressed archive, i.e. you can extract them with a double- or right-click.

 

Can you change that retarded spam ban from \.[bB][zZ] \.[bB][zZ][^2]? DOTtarDOTbz2 has much better compression rates than DOTtarDOTgz.

Gone.

 

DIT: also, to install mods on Linux you currently need to rely on the CLI (`weinstall mymod'), and decompressing the archive takes less keystrokes with ZIP than with TAR (`tar xzf mymod.tar.gz' vs. `unzip mymod.zip').

I suspect that knocking off 30 megs from Amber's download size might be more appreciated than those extra keystrokes. If you can knock down the zip file to a comparable size to the tarball, we'll go with zips.

[the bigg]

This isn't Linux. Tarballs can be handled by WinRAR the exact same way as any other compressed archive, i.e. you can extract them with a double- or right-click.

WinRAR can decompress tarballs, it cannot compress them.

 

I suspect that knocking off 30 megs from Amber's download size might be more appreciated than those extra keystrokes. If you can knock down the zip file to a comparable size to the tarball, we'll go with zips.

Amber was larger because all amber/sounds/*.ogg files were duplicates from the ones in amber/sounds/*/*.ogg.

After fixing that, here are the results (zip -9, 'best compression + solid archives' in Winrar):

30M amber.7z

30M amber.rar

32M amber.tar.bz2

33M amber.tar.gz

34M amber.zip

[Miloch]

It usually boils down to:

- take the Mac version.

- Lowercase all file names in the filesystem.

- Edit .sh files: point at system executables rather than ones shipped; lowercase the file; move from sox to oggdec.

- Remove all executables in the package (save snd2acm.exe, if needed).

More stuff here: http://forums.gibberlings3.net/index.php?showtopic=7573.

Or, just download Amber and compare the Linux version with both Mac and Windows versions, since it contains all tasks that require thought, namely oggdec, tisunpack and snd2acm.

The readme blurb is likely missing - it's available from the tb#tweaks readme over at SHS.

Someone may want to update the G3 Mod Package Creation page with this info.

[Miloch]

Or, just download Amber and compare the Linux version with both Mac and Windows versions, since it contains all tasks that require thought, namely oggdec, tisunpack and snd2acm.

None of the links above is available anymore. Nor have Linux versions of the mods been uploaded to G3 as far as I can tell. I'd like to check one of these out, not because I want to play a Linux mod but because I'm trying to include Linux compatibility in a mod I'm working on. Basically, I'm wondering whether you deliver a sound decoder like sox or just rely on the version that is likely already present on the user's system (and for that matter, I'm wondering why we don't do the same for OS X, since from my shallow understanding, it is essentially a Unix subsystem).

[Fyorl]

Sox and oggdec will already be present on most Linux distros, there's no need to send them along with the mod.

[Miloch]

Sox and oggdec will already be present on most Linux distros, there's no need to send them along with the mod.

Sox and oggdec? I have sox on my Debian box (though I don't remember specifically installing it, so I'll assume it's kind of a standard thing) but I don't even see an option to install oggdec. There is an oggconvert Gnome utility available but not installed. No worries though, since oggdec and sox do basically the same thing and we can just rely on sox it seems.

[Fyorl]

Hmm, I seem to have both oggdec and oggenc but when I think about it they may have come from the Linux WeiDU install. But yes, you're right, it shouldn't matter as sox will do both.

[Guest erik]

oggdec is a part of the vorbis-tools package, which is commonly installed.

 

sox decodes ogg just fine these days.

 

Anyway, in ubuntu feisty, oggdec/vorbis-tools is part of the core distribution, while sox is a "universe" package (ie. only community support). Check in the script which is available and use whichever you find ... would be good. Or yell clearly that the one you want to use is missing.

[Miloch]

Ok, yeah, I have vorbis-tools (and therefore oggdec) on Debian too (and again, I don't recall specifically installing that either). So what erik suggests about checking for one or the other makes sense. Offhand, I don't know how to do that in a shell script but it'd probably be easy. And I guess it begs the question - which should be the default tool we check first? In other words, which is the better tool, or do they produce the same quality?

 

And as long we're on about it, can we do the same thing for OS X?

[Guest erik]

They use the same decoding library on my system. So the end result should be identical and take the same amount of time... (And, well, only the encoding is supposed to be lossy. Decoding is supposed to give the same result however you do it, modulo bugs.)

 

I know too little about OS X.

[Miloch]

After fixing that, here are the results (zip -9, 'best compression + solid archives' in Winrar):

30M amber.7z

30M amber.rar

32M amber.tar.bz2

33M amber.tar.gz

34M amber.zip

Given these compression rates, .rar should be an acceptable format for all platforms. Another consideration is that you should be able to find a free .rar extracter regardless of your platform, if you don't like trialware:

UnRAR for Windows

UnRarX for Mac OS X

Unrar-free for Debian/Ubuntu Linux

Unrar-rpm for Red Hat Fedora Linux

UnRAR for Other Linux

We might just put this information in the installation sections of readmes for those who aren't intimately familiar with this already. Also using one format avoids awkward "which tool to I use to package my mod on which platform?" sort of questions.