Doc: Map Population on website and download list

[RogerCooper]

@LaFayette Is https://github.com/triplea-game/triplea/blob/main/triplea_maps.yaml now deprecated?

What happens if map.yml is duplicated? Some people have work in progress on Github.

I don't much like triplea_maps.yaml but there needs to be some control over the mods.

[LaFayette]

@RogerCooper If the map_name is duplicated, then we see the example we had with ww2v5 variants being downloaded instead of the correct map.

Note the table has an "ID" and "repo_url", those are both unique. The map-name does not have to be unique though. It should though..

The non-uniqueness of map-name is a design flaw baked in since TripleA was first written. The code treated the name of the map as its unique identity. Ideally the code would use the map IDs wholesale.

Prior to 2.6, the code would look for a map by name, searching for the a map folder with that name, then for an XML with a map_name attribute on it that also had to match. That's updated where the new code ignores the name of the map folder entirely, just looks at "map.yml" to do the matching of the map name. The "map.yml" then indicates where the game XML files are located. Thereby the code is able to load the XML files by using [map_name, game_name] by reading just the 'map.yml' file. Non-uniqueness of map names across all map.yml files is a design flaw.

[LaFayette]

@RogerCooper Another aspect to duplication of 'map.yaml' - when we fork the repo into 'triplea-maps', (we being the map admins), the map admins should check that 'map.yml' has been updated.

[RogerCooper]

@LaFayette An error message should go out if there is a non-unique map name in any map.yml

[LaFayette]

@RogerCooper How, when and where to flag that error message are all open questions. My thoughts on how to solve that - It's on my roadmap to create a HTML status page so we can see the status of map indexing. If a new duplicate map_name is introduced then that status page would reflect the error. I'm not sure if we have to disable the duplicate entirely.

Similarly it's on the roadmap to use IDs as well instead of map names. In which case the map name would appear duplicated in download maps, but the description would be unique and the download would download the right thing.

I'd even like for each map to be stored under its commit-ID on disk as well, then TripleA could finally have a concept of different map versions. Another flaw in TripleA's map handling design is TripleA assumes not only that the map name uniquely identifies a map, but that there is actually just one and only one version of that map.

If TripleA used Map-ID + Commit, TripleA could have multiple versions of a map installed, could use the right one, and could precisely and always download the correct version as needed.

With all that said, the status page is pretty high priority compared to everything, the indexing is an opaque process right now.

[RogerCooper]

@LaFayette said:
It's on my roadmap to create a HTML status page so we can see the status of map indexing. If a new duplicate map_name is introduced then that status page would reflect the error. I'm not sure if we have to disable the duplicate entirely.

That sounds like a good solution.

If we are changing things, I would like to go back to the old system of having a distinct "mapName". That way, if a mod uses an existing map, there would be no need to copy all the map files over.

[LaFayette]

@RogerCooper said:

I would like to go back to the old system of having a distinct "mapName".

FWIW, the old system didn't enforce a unique map name. Windows has a case insensitive file system, and because the old system tied the map name to the folder name, you couldn't install two maps with the same name without overwriting. Except, there still was no guarantee that globally across all maps, that the names were unique. Mac and Linux have case sensitive file names, so in the old system you could still have a duplicate name installed so long as the casing was different. Using 'mapName' overall is essentially the design flaw.

[RogerCooper]

@LaFayette Can I definitely stop updating triplea_map.yaml?

[TheDog]

@LaFayette
Please list the urls for the error reports, as;

Some of the maps from GitHub map repositories are not making it to the
Map Server map listing page

I would like to see the reason why and try to fix them
1888A Steam and Steel for one.

[Panther]

@LaFayette said:

You'll notice the table contains essentially all of the the same data fields that the previous 'triplea_maps.yaml' contained.

Is the triplea_maps.yaml still needed - for which purpose?
Or can it be removed?

[beelee]

@Panther

I think the yaml has already been removed.

Edit
https://github.com/triplea-game/triplea/pull/14567

[Panther]

@beelee said:

@Panther

I think the yaml has already been removed.

Edit
https://github.com/triplea-game/triplea/pull/14567

It's not used any longer, but still there (Screenshot from seconds ago):

[beelee]

@Panther

Oh well .. yea I stand erected