NewGRF Online Content Ingame

[wilir]

I think there could be very useful and pretty simple upgrades in this part of the game. Maybe add a "Upload Date" Collumn? A ingame rating system for NewGRFs? Amount of downloads would be useful as well! I'm sure there might be limitations with how the things are being handled in that regard, but yeah, I just think there is probably a way to organize things better, adding more data.

[odisseus]

I'm afraid a unified rating would make no sense whatsoever, because the add-ons are too diverse. To put an example, how would you rate Road Hog against Eyecandy Road Vehicles, or Swedish Houses against British Town Names?

The upload date is not very meaningful either, as old add-ons aren't necessarily inferior to newer ones. However, if that bit of information interests you, it is available at the Bananas site.

The number of downloads might be a useful metric of the worth or popularity, but it would be skewed in favour of older add-ons. For example, ECS has been around for more than 15 years, and even though it never was particularly popular, it surely has scored a fair number of downloads over these years.

[kamnet]

Several devs, along with myself and other players, have been contemplating ways to enhanced and make the in-game content download system more useful and with meaningful information.

The upload date for a file isn't useful data at all for anything other than when it was added to the system. That particular file may have been available for months or years before the author decided to add it to the system. And since it is exceedingly rare that a old file no longer works with a newer version of OpenTTD, it's not a reliable metric for whether or not somebody should download it. So just having it to show how long it's been on the system is info that just clutters the limited space on the screen.

Number of downloads is also meaningless as any type of metric except perhaps to the author who uploaded it. Again, that particular file may have been available from other places for years, or even privately traded among players. It doesn't genuinely demonstrate popularity.

Everybody likes the idea of ratings, but nobody can agree on just what a numerical or star rating would mean. And does it apply to just one particular version of a file, or collectively to all the released versions? Should it be weighted by the number of downloads? Is it weighted for just the last week/month/year or does it last a lifetime? How do you rate older versions of the file which you may privately have but is no longer publicly available except through savegame file requests? Is there a way to weight it by how often users play with it, and how do we collect that data in a manner that complies with local, regional and national data compilation and privacy standards? Who is responsible for sanitizing that data? How do you counteract somebody trying to manipulate ratings by egregiously upvoting or downvoting in a targeted campaign? All of this is quite murky, and none of us have found a comfortable and universally agreed-upon answer.

[LaChupacabra]

I think there could be very useful and pretty simple upgrades in this part of the game. Maybe add a "Upload Date" Collumn? A ingame rating system for NewGRFs? Amount of downloads would be useful as well! I'm sure there might be limitations with how the things are being handled in that regard, but yeah, I just think there is probably a way to organize things better, adding more data.

You're not the first person to suggest this. Not too long ago, someone else started a similar topic. Two years ago, I also posted some suggestions here.

The upload date for a file isn't useful data at all
(...)Number of downloads is also meaningless as any type of metric

Sometimes it's useful, and moreover it can be just as interesting.

So just having it to show how long it's been on the system is info that just clutters the limited space on the screen.

It is not a problem. It is only a matter of choosing the right layout and solutions. For example, the publication date could appear in the main list when a player chooses to sort by date. Including this data in the description part shouldn't be a problem at all.

nobody can agree on just what a numerical or star rating would mean. And does it apply to just one particular version of a file, or collectively to all the released versions? Should it be weighted by the number of downloads? Is it weighted for just the last week/month/year or does it last a lifetime? How do you rate older versions of the file which you may privately have but is no longer publicly available except through savegame file requests? Is there a way to weight it by how often users play with it

Everyone knows what the stars mean and everyone knows what the numbers in the rating mean. This is so common knowledge that I don't understand what the problem is.
The number of downloads or how often users play with these add-ons should not have any impact on the rating. This would unnecessarily complicate the rating system and simply the number of downloads could be related to the popularity of the server or scenario where a given add-on is only an unimportant background, but it will not be related to how it is rated.
The rating may apply to each version separately but an overall rating may also be added.
I believe that securing the credibility of the ratings may be the only real problem, but perhaps it doesn't have to be very complicated.

By the way... My latest vision (rather cosmetic changes)

NewGRF - new downloading window v1.4k.png (95.4 KiB) Viewed 928 times

NewGRF - new downloading window v2.2.png (304.87 KiB) Viewed 928 times

[Skarfester]

What I missed recently was the ability to see which packages were going to be upgraded when clicking "Select upgrades" button, instead of manually review the whole list. A simple filter like "show selected packages" in the filter field could do the trick.
Not exactly what you were discussing but it fits the topic.

[skc]

What I missed recently was the ability to see which packages were going to be upgraded when clicking "Select upgrades" button, instead of manually review the whole list. A simple filter like "show selected packages" in the filter field could do the trick.
Not exactly what you were discussing but it fits the topic.

After you click 'Select Upgrade', if you click on the column header for the left-most column, twice, it will sort the column by status. That will group all installed NewGRF's together at the top, then all NewGRFs selected for downloading together in the middle and then all non-installed and non-selected NewGRF's at the bottom. Scroll down, if necessary, to see what's being updated/installed.

[Eddi]

probably a better order would be <selected>, <installed>, <unselected>... with only one click of the button

[Redirect Left]

I'm not sure if this is worth a new thread or not so I'll put it here.
I'd also suggest that if you press select upgrades, it also tells you what you're upgrading, maybe ctrl-click to strip all the other entries in the list and only show upgrades? There's now so many GRFs its just irritating to scroll through everything. I tried to type 'update' or 'upgrade' into the tags to see if that'd filter it, it did not. So i guess that's maybe also an option, just make a tag that shows upgrades?

[Skarfester]

After you click 'Select Upgrade', if you click on the column header for the left-most column, twice, it will sort the column by status. That will group all installed NewGRF's together at the top, then all NewGRFs selected for downloading together in the middle and then all non-installed and non-selected NewGRF's at the bottom. Scroll down, if necessary, to see what's being updated/installed.

Problem solved! Thank you!