I'm leaving TTDPatch

[DaleStan]

As you can see, I was simply axed on TTDPatch until Beta 9 stayed too long.

You obviously haven't been following the TTDPatch nightlies. Try them someday.

[Skiper410]

Maybe I should try...but I heard that there are chashes and still some bugs....donno if it is still the case. I'd like to be shure my saved games are safe. Are the nightlies stable enough?

[Dropzone]

They're very unlikely to cause any harm to your saved games. They do have some minor bugs and might occasionally crash, but on the other hand, there are probably bugs and crashes in the beta which have been fixed in the nightlies. Overall, I doubt there's much difference between the beta and the nightlies in terms of stability (although you might want to avoid any very new nightly features, as they're the most likely to have bugs).

[Skiper410]

I'm going to update right now. I'll try and get have my opinion on this.

[krtaylor]

Can't resist a little thread-digging here because such excellent and intriguing posts were made...

I've been in the Patch community for quite some while, though certainly not as long as some others. I've definitely noticed the dropoff in Patchly activity over the past few years, though it seems in just the last few months it's picked back up again - with GRF development, anyway.

Honestly, I am very surprised that I have not switched over to OTTD. I always expected that, being in C and way easier to code, it would have no trouble catching up with Patch features. Not that each and every feature needs to be exactly identical - I understand the argument with different approaches to signalling systems - but it always seemed to me that, at minimum, OpenTTD needed to offer full support for the rather large number of GRFs that were developed at such enormous effort for the Patch. Those would be very difficult to recode and fully replicate, and to me they are a large part of what makes TTD fun. I have little time for gameplay these days, and the variety of trains is the biggest thing to attract me to play a game.

But as far as I can tell, there are still incompatibilities. I'm not quite sure why, as pointed out before the Patch development has slowed down a lot, so it should have been feasible to bridge the gap.

When that takes place, I'll almost certainly switch too. I love the idea of bigger maps; I definitely want new airports, and finished working trams, and the potential for passenger-destinations someday.

However, I do want to make one remark about ease-of-use and maintenance. There are quite a number of other people in my family who like to play the game but are not computer-sophisticates. I know a lot of you hate TTDXC; for my purposes, it is an absolute lifesaver. It provides a halfway sensible interface that a normal human being might have hope of understanding. It seems that OTTD has done a lot in the area of integrating the various features right into its GUI, which is even better; but, at least as far as I can tell, not an easy-auto way of keeping itself up-to-date as TTDXC does. I'm always seeing posts about "download this one, NOT that one", "Rebuild it", "Unzip this and copy that there..." Come on. No normal person wants to do this. Why not a simple "Most recent version" button like TTDXC has?

In my mind, we would all be better off if all our resources could be combined into one project, and because of the nature of the limitations of the code, that one would have to be OTTD - though I do respect those who feel themselves personally threatened by the theoretical legal problems involved. But it seems in some sense that OTTD is proud of being distinct and different than the Patch, which to me is sad. Obviously they shouldn't be identical forever. But if there were a day when the OTTD folks said, "As of right NOW, all your GRF files will also work in OTTD, and all your Patch features are available except for these couple which have the following more-or-less equivalents..." then we could all switch over, combine, and move forward together.

I hope this day eventually comes. Until then I guess I'll stick with what I am already familiar with, and my install-base.

[DaleStan]

Why not a simple "Most recent version" button like TTDXC has?

Because there are at least three different official definitions of "most recent", plus about fifteen "most recent"s for various user-provided builds. TTDPatch has a high barrier to new developers[0], which means we can afford to let anyone commit, provided they can keep their sanity (or what remains of it, anyway) when modifying the code. OpenTTD, without this barrier, needs to consider carefully who is allowed to add new features, lest someone add a buggy feature and then abandon it.

[0] Not just the language, but also the weirdest whack-job of a dynamic linker I've ever seen: "First off, we'll modify the memory pointers at over 3000 recorded locations to actually point to real memory, instead of pointing to nowheresville. Then we'll search for over 2000 different locations in TTD code and overwrite them with this code instead, but only if the appropriate switches are on. In the process, we'll modify some or all of another almost 600 nowheresville memory pointers." Yes. Seriously. And this is not counting all sorts of (de)compression magic that just happens, and that some devs might not even know exists, nor the magic that gets the dynamic linker to run.

"As of right NOW, all your GRF files will also work in OTTD, and all your Patch features are available except for these couple which have the following more-or-less equivalents..."

I seriously doubt that will ever happen. There are some Patch features the Open devs (AIUI) just don't want.

[eis_os]

[0] Not just the language, but also the weirdest whack-job of a dynamic linker I've ever seen: "First off, we'll modify the memory pointers at over 3000 recorded locations to actually point to real memory, instead of pointing to nowheresville. Then we'll search for over 2000 different locations in TTD code and overwrite them with this code instead, but only if the appropriate switches are on. In the process, we'll modify some or all of another almost 600 nowheresville memory pointers." Yes. Seriously. And this is not counting all sorts of (de)compression magic that just happens, and that some devs might not even know exists, nor the magic that gets the dynamic linker to run.

Well we support 2 code bases, with different languages, the problem with TTDPatch, it's over-configurable from the dev point of view, if I want to change say the vehicle list window I have to consider 4 or more other patch features (mostly written by someone else) that injects their code as well and by users will. A reason we have seen some full rewrite of core internals in TTDPatch from scratch. The linker quite involved over time, but you won't try to understand the gcc internals as example. The problem is simple, most easy beginner features are done already, the chances are high to break some other feature, so there is no quick/easy start... *

As Josef mentioned too, I don't think TTDPatch devs ever want to rewrite the same features again in c.

I do think that OTTD has much potential, but the core logic isn't much changed in OTTD either, it's simple very hard to write good stable features, you need creative people with a enough time and the willingness to push the features out. And to be honest OTTD hasn't enough of them to push OTTD in that direction. The OTTD devs have a different view how a good TTD should look... And the people who pop up from time to time who don't like OTTDs direction really never started a fork and to really maintain such a huge project is not an easy task...

* The time you work on a feature has been drastically raised since the beginning in March 2003! and people demand much more then simple clicking ctrl something to do something. I do think the people should be thankfully for the long time support that was given to TTDPatch by Josef and Marcin specially who worked already last century on it and Csaba who aren't official active anymore.

--
Btw. I don't think we will get a "stable" release in the near future...

[krtaylor]

Well, as I said, it's totally unrealistic to expect OTTD ever to look exactly the same as the Patch, and I don't. But specifically directed at GRF features, I'd be interested to know what features the Patch allows to be tweaked via GRF that the OTTD developers have considered and consciously rejected.

In fact, what Patch features of any kind, other than the PBS signalling system (which reasoning I understand) have been specifically and consciously rejected by OTTD?

Last, considering the "latest release" issue, I understand what you are saying about various branches that get worked on and then integrated back into the main trunk. But it seems like you have a fair amount of activity there, and regular updates to the trunk. What would happen if one single trunk under the control of the OTTD developers with commit authority was designated the single "official" trunk - which of course anybody could choose to use, or not use, as they prefer - and the putative auto-updater simply kept updated in relation to that? The people that always want to be on the experimental bleeding edge could still do so as they always have, and more normal people that just want to play the game would have a rocket-science-free way of easily doing so.

[eis_os]

By no means was my post explaining the OTTD situation, for OTTD questions you are a) in the wrong topic b) in the wrong forum part.

I only explained why the TTDPatch development has stalled, actually if we look in the past, all main goals are more or less archived.
- more graphic features
- better routing (PBS in more or less extend)
- new cargoes
- new stations
- new houses
- new industries
- higher bridges
- higher resolution
- sound system
- trams
- bug fixes
- more vehicles

Plus a ton of features people didn't even believe they will be ever in TTD.

Any questions about how OTTD Devs handle OTTD should be in the OTTD part...
OTTD has actually stable releases but as in TTDPatch they won't have the blending edge features but should work quite well.
(This means some grf may not work as intended)

[Draakon]

"As of right NOW, all your GRF files will also work in OTTD, and all your Patch features are available except for these couple which have the following more-or-less equivalents..."

All NewGRF work already in OpenTTD. And if you want feature x to be avabile, start writing a patch for it then.

[DaleStan]

No they don't. Right off the top of my head, jsignalsw.grf and jaquaduct1w.grf don't work.

[Draakon]

No they don't. Right off the top of my head, jsignalsw.grf and jaquaduct1w.grf don't work.

Maybe give me a link so i can test out?

[Maedhros]

Maybe give me a link so i can test out?

They don't work - trust us. Open has no support for either aqueducts or newsignals.

[krtaylor]

And if you want feature x to be avabile, start writing a patch for it then.

Well, if that is a typical OTTD attitude, then perhaps I begin to understand the bad blood between the two. I am simply discussing what sort of developments would induce myself (and, I imagine, a good many of the other current Patch users) to switch over. It would seem that OTTD, and the TTD community as a whole, would be improved by all pulling the same project in much the same direction. But if you think otherwise, fine, things will stay as they are, with two rather separate projects. Shame really.

[athanasios]

Let us not turn this into a new flamewar.
And Rubidium is doing his best to add missing features in OpenTTD.

[krtaylor]

Most definitely not. I have never had anything but good words and support for OTTD, and as I've said previously, I fully expect someday to switch over. Honestly, I'd prefer it to be sooner rather than later, as I'd love to play the big maps and whatnot. But there are some things, regarding both features and philosophy, that I'm looking for, and which the Patch generally supplies.

That actually might be an interesting discussion topic for a different thread - "Why have you NOT switched to OTTD?" Would the OTTD folks be interested in Patch people's responses to that question? Other than the aforementioned potential legal problem, for which I see no possibility of change or improvement.

[Raichase]

And if you want feature x to be avabile, start writing a patch for it then.

Well, if that is a typical OTTD attitude.[...] Shame really.

The thing I find the most amusing, is that all of the OTTD developers I have interacted with this far have a very positive, balanced outlook. Some of the OTTD (for want of a better term) "fanboys" seem to behave as above. Then again, TTDPatch has it's own fair share for "fanboys" too!

I agree with krtaylor though, I too hope one day to make the switch, as TTDP is physically running into limitations it cannot bypass without heaps of work. That doesn't mean I won't forget how many hundreds of hours of joy it has given me!

[WWTBAM]

I think ill stick with TTDP for a while now. I reckon one day quite a few of the limitations will be broken. I may even be able to start patching when I finish school as im doing a course on programming.

[Draakon]

Well, if that is a typical OTTD attitude.[...] Shame really.

What? It is the best way currently for a random user to get a feature he wants in the fastest way if developers won't do that currently.

[Wile E. Coyote]

Well, well, another flamewar about what is better is starting...

Both Patch and OTTD has its own advantages, so it's imposslible (at least for me) to say what is better. I usually play Patch because of more customizable options. When I want big maps (unfortunately, I'm not able for network playing yet), I play OTTD.