[hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
Alfred or other Valve representative, There are many, many plugin and mod developers displeased at the moment because of your recent decision to change CSS menuing behavior so drastically. I'm not precisely sure why the decision was made to suddenly push such a big change (now rolled-back temporarily) on everyone in the world, but this has wounded our confidence in the support Valve provides to their SDK community. Last night, plugin developers were inundated with yells for help as plugin menuing systems were obliterated in one fell swoop. Those same developers spent frantic hours trying to reverse engineer what caused the problem, all the while trying to communicate the issues to their own users. As far as I can tell, there was absolutely no forewarning. Nothing to indicate to the developer community what could be changed to fix the problem. In turn, there was no warning developers could provide to their users or even early code changes they could make to limit the impact. With some sort of notice, it would have been possible to do a great deal to help the situation. It really comes down to the fact that it's Valve's community of game players that suffer when this happens. If 30% of the servers out there run popular admin mods and those mods suddenly cease to function painfully, people get a much worse impression of "steam updates". They, as you know, even come whining to you about why you broke their favorite 3rd party plugin. Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning before things changed in sensitive areas-- especially when things are deprecated. Without a heads-up from Valve, the developer community relationship is simply going to crumble into name-calling and constant bickering. None of us want to go that route, but we're going to need better support from Valve in order to avoid it. So, I'm asking nicely for the Valve teams to provide us additional forewarning before making large changes. Deprecating *anything* should be announced well beforehand so that plugin and mod developers can act accordingly. The unannounced update we saw last night simply cannot continue if you care anything about the developer community. Even if you feel something is a "hack", you should at least work with us a little more rather than letting us fall onto our own swords. While I appreciate what you guys have done for the developer community, I still think there's more needed or we're all going to suffer. Please give us warning before you change things like this. Thanks for your time. Respectfully yours, -Mattie ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using that. - Alfred Original Message From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mattie Casper Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 9:42 AM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning > Alfred or other Valve representative, > > There are many, many plugin and mod developers displeased at the > moment because of your recent decision to change CSS menuing behavior > so drastically. > > I'm not precisely sure why the decision was made to suddenly push > such a big change (now rolled-back temporarily) on everyone in the > world, but this has wounded our confidence in the support Valve > provides to their SDK community. > Last night, plugin developers were inundated with yells for help as > plugin menuing systems were obliterated in one fell swoop. Those same > developers spent frantic hours trying to reverse engineer what caused > the problem, all the while trying to communicate the issues to their > own users. > > As far as I can tell, there was absolutely no forewarning. Nothing to > indicate to the developer community what could be changed to fix the > problem. In turn, there was no warning developers could provide to > their users or even early code changes they could make to limit the > impact. With some sort of notice, it would have been possible to do a > great deal to help the situation. > > It really comes down to the fact that it's Valve's community of game > players that suffer when this happens. If 30% of the servers out > there run popular admin mods and those mods suddenly cease to > function painfully, people get a much worse impression of "steam > updates". They, as you know, even come whining to you about why you > broke their favorite 3rd party plugin. > > Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every > little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning > before things changed in sensitive areas-- especially when things are > deprecated. Without a heads-up from Valve, the developer community > relationship is simply going to crumble into name-calling and > constant bickering. None of us want to go that route, but we're going > to need better support from Valve in order to avoid it. > > So, I'm asking nicely for the Valve teams to provide us additional > forewarning before making large changes. Deprecating *anything* > should be announced well beforehand so that plugin and mod developers > can act accordingly. The unannounced update we saw last night simply > cannot continue if you care anything about the developer community. > Even if you feel something is a "hack", you should at least work with > us a little more rather than letting us fall onto our own swords. > > While I appreciate what you guys have done for the developer > community, I still think there's more needed or we're all going to > suffer. Please give us warning before you change things like this. > > Thanks for your time. > > Respectfully yours, > -Mattie > > > ___ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list > archives, please visit: > http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
Alfred Reynolds wrote: 3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using that. PWNED! :) -- Jeffrey "botman" Broome ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
A "hack" is a funny thing to call a user message nicely documented in cl_dll/menu.cpp. ~dvander Alfred Reynolds wrote: 3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using that. - Alfred Original Message From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mattie Casper Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 9:42 AM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning Alfred or other Valve representative, There are many, many plugin and mod developers displeased at the moment because of your recent decision to change CSS menuing behavior so drastically. I'm not precisely sure why the decision was made to suddenly push such a big change (now rolled-back temporarily) on everyone in the world, but this has wounded our confidence in the support Valve provides to their SDK community. Last night, plugin developers were inundated with yells for help as plugin menuing systems were obliterated in one fell swoop. Those same developers spent frantic hours trying to reverse engineer what caused the problem, all the while trying to communicate the issues to their own users. As far as I can tell, there was absolutely no forewarning. Nothing to indicate to the developer community what could be changed to fix the problem. In turn, there was no warning developers could provide to their users or even early code changes they could make to limit the impact. With some sort of notice, it would have been possible to do a great deal to help the situation. It really comes down to the fact that it's Valve's community of game players that suffer when this happens. If 30% of the servers out there run popular admin mods and those mods suddenly cease to function painfully, people get a much worse impression of "steam updates". They, as you know, even come whining to you about why you broke their favorite 3rd party plugin. Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning before things changed in sensitive areas-- especially when things are deprecated. Without a heads-up from Valve, the developer community relationship is simply going to crumble into name-calling and constant bickering. None of us want to go that route, but we're going to need better support from Valve in order to avoid it. So, I'm asking nicely for the Valve teams to provide us additional forewarning before making large changes. Deprecating *anything* should be announced well beforehand so that plugin and mod developers can act accordingly. The unannounced update we saw last night simply cannot continue if you care anything about the developer community. Even if you feel something is a "hack", you should at least work with us a little more rather than letting us fall onto our own swords. While I appreciate what you guys have done for the developer community, I still think there's more needed or we're all going to suffer. Please give us warning before you change things like this. Thanks for your time. Respectfully yours, -Mattie ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
> PWNED! :) Hardly. If you manage an API and you make a breaking change that affects a significant fraction of the users of your API, you have screwed up. That's why managing an API is such a difficult job. Frankly I'm impressed at how few problems like this we've seen. In general Valve and Alfred have done a surprisingly good job of maintaining their API. But the original poster was absolutely correct. If Valve is going to make breaking changes to their API, even if it is to a portion of the API that Valve considers a hack, then have an obligation either to communicate those changes to the developer community in advance or to take responsiblility for breaking a large number of servers. -Don -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jeffrey "botman" Broome Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 11:07 AM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning Alfred Reynolds wrote: > 3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of > game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier > version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using > that. PWNED! :) -- Jeffrey "botman" Broome ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
That is part of the leaf code of the mod, not an exported API. Assuming that CS:S uses the same code that we ship in the SDK is wrong (because they won't match). Injecting network messages and assuming the same implementation in a binary you don't control is not going to work. We have provided a stable, consistent (across all mods) API for plugins to message users. We have already added new functionality to this interface at the request of plugin authors, a quick email discussion with us and I am sure we can find a middle ground. Also note that plugins already use the exported API for HL2MP (and other 3rd party mods I suspect). We are not going to be held hostage to 3rd party programmers using triggering out of date and unused game code that isn't part of a published API (i.e part of an exported interface function). - Alfred Original Message From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of David Anderson Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 11:19 AM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning > A "hack" is a funny thing to call a user message nicely documented in > cl_dll/menu.cpp. > >~dvander > > Alfred Reynolds wrote: > > 3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of > > game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier > > version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using > > that. > > > > - Alfred > > > > Original Message > > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mattie > > Casper Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 9:42 AM To: > > hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: [hlcoders] To Valve: > > Developer Forewarning > > > > > > > Alfred or other Valve representative, > > > > > > There are many, many plugin and mod developers displeased at the > > > moment because of your recent decision to change CSS menuing > > > behavior so drastically. > > > > > > I'm not precisely sure why the decision was made to suddenly push > > > such a big change (now rolled-back temporarily) on everyone in > > > the world, but this has wounded our confidence in the support > > > Valve provides to their SDK community. Last night, plugin > > > developers were inundated with yells for help as plugin menuing > > > systems were obliterated in one fell swoop. Those same developers > > > spent frantic hours trying to reverse engineer what caused the > > > problem, all the while trying to communicate the issues to their > > > own users. > > > > > > As far as I can tell, there was absolutely no forewarning. > > > Nothing to indicate to the developer community what could be > > > changed to fix the problem. In turn, there was no warning > > > developers could provide to their users or even early code > > > changes they could make to limit the impact. With some sort of > > > notice, it would have been possible to do a great deal to help > > > the situation. > > > > > > It really comes down to the fact that it's Valve's community of > > > game players that suffer when this happens. If 30% of the servers > > > out there run popular admin mods and those mods suddenly cease to > > > function painfully, people get a much worse impression of "steam > > > updates". They, as you know, even come whining to you about why > > > you broke their favorite 3rd party plugin. > > > > > > Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every > > > little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning > > > before things changed in sensitive areas-- especially when things > > > are deprecated. Without a heads-up from Valve, the developer > > > community relationship is simply going to crumble into > > > name-calling and constant bickering. None of us want to go that > > > route, but we're going to need better support from Valve in order > > > to avoid it. > > > > > > So, I'm asking nicely for the Valve teams to provide us additional > > > forewarning before making large changes. Deprecating *anything* > > > should be announced well beforehand so that plugin and mod > > > developers can act accordingly. The unannounced update we saw > > > last night simply cannot continue if you care anything about the > > > developer community. > > > Even if you feel something is a "hack", you should at least work > > > with us a little more rather than letting us fall onto our own &
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
Sounds like a nice scenario for a quick mod of cs_office cs_valve - rescue the VALVe development Team from the nasty plug-in haxor terrorists! Happy Friday! Alfred Reynolds wrote: We are not going to be held hostage to 3rd party programmers using triggering out of date and unused game code that isn't part of a published API (i.e part of an exported interface function). - Alfred ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
That will almost make me want to play CS:S again. -Original Message- From: Steve Tilson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 2:33 PM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning Sounds like a nice scenario for a quick mod of cs_office cs_valve - rescue the VALVe development Team from the nasty plug-in haxor terrorists! Happy Friday! Alfred Reynolds wrote: > >We are not going to be held hostage to 3rd party programmers using >triggering out of date and unused game code that isn't part of a >published API (i.e part of an exported interface function). > >- Alfred > > > > > ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
The provided menu feature is a whole different kind of unfriendly though. While the radio dialog may prevent a player from switching weapons, sending a radio command, or navigating a buy menu, having them completely pause their game is a lot worse. I think it'd be better if you made it a combination of the two. Have a normally unused key that triggers dialogs and have those dialogs appear in-game and have them easily answered with or without a mouse. Alfred Reynolds wrote: 3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using that. - Alfred ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
> cs_valve - rescue the VALVe development Team from the nasty plug-in > haxor terrorists! That made me laugh out loud ;) > I think it'd be better if you made it a combination of the two I agree, if Valve could make the built-in more customizeable, it would be an acceptable replacement. The whole "escape" thing needs to go, and the menu needs to feel more smooth in game (like the ShowMenu ones did). ~dvander Spencer 'voogru' MacDonald wrote: That will almost make me want to play CS:S again. -Original Message- From: Steve Tilson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 2:33 PM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning Sounds like a nice scenario for a quick mod of cs_office Happy Friday! Alfred Reynolds wrote: We are not going to be held hostage to 3rd party programmers using triggering out of date and unused game code that isn't part of a published API (i.e part of an exported interface function). - Alfred ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
We are not going to be held hostage to 3rd party programmers using triggering out of date and unused game code that isn't part of a published API (i.e part of an exported interface function). Alfred, we're not asking for hostages. We're just humbly asking for, at a minimum, warnings. Ideally, we'd like discussion about the implications, but a warning is our minimum requirement. Please see the relevant section of my initial email, I quote here: > Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every > little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning > before things change in sensitive areas-- especially when things > are deprecated. Keep in mind that we're all very grateful for the work you guys do on the SDK. It's been invaluable. It's just that in order for the community to remain healthy we're going to have to work together. Thanks for your time and assistance, -Mattie - Original Message - From: "Alfred Reynolds" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 2:29 PM Subject: RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning That is part of the leaf code of the mod, not an exported API. Assuming that CS:S uses the same code that we ship in the SDK is wrong (because they won't match). Injecting network messages and assuming the same implementation in a binary you don't control is not going to work. We have provided a stable, consistent (across all mods) API for plugins to message users. We have already added new functionality to this interface at the request of plugin authors, a quick email discussion with us and I am sure we can find a middle ground. Also note that plugins already use the exported API for HL2MP (and other 3rd party mods I suspect). We are not going to be held hostage to 3rd party programmers using triggering out of date and unused game code that isn't part of a published API (i.e part of an exported interface function). - Alfred Original Message From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of David Anderson Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 11:19 AM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning A "hack" is a funny thing to call a user message nicely documented in cl_dll/menu.cpp. ~dvander Alfred Reynolds wrote: > 3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of > game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier > version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using > that. > > - Alfred > > Original Message > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mattie > Casper Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 9:42 AM To: > hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: [hlcoders] To Valve: > Developer Forewarning > > > > Alfred or other Valve representative, > > > > There are many, many plugin and mod developers displeased at the > > moment because of your recent decision to change CSS menuing > > behavior so drastically. > > > > I'm not precisely sure why the decision was made to suddenly push > > such a big change (now rolled-back temporarily) on everyone in > > the world, but this has wounded our confidence in the support > > Valve provides to their SDK community. Last night, plugin > > developers were inundated with yells for help as plugin menuing > > systems were obliterated in one fell swoop. Those same developers > > spent frantic hours trying to reverse engineer what caused the > > problem, all the while trying to communicate the issues to their > > own users. > > > > As far as I can tell, there was absolutely no forewarning. > > Nothing to indicate to the developer community what could be > > changed to fix the problem. In turn, there was no warning > > developers could provide to their users or even early code > > changes they could make to limit the impact. With some sort of > > notice, it would have been possible to do a great deal to help > > the situation. > > > > It really comes down to the fact that it's Valve's community of > > game players that suffer when this happens. If 30% of the servers > > out there run popular admin mods and those mods suddenly cease to > > function painfully, people get a much worse impression of "steam > > updates". They, as you know, even come whining to you about why > > you broke their favorite 3rd party plugin. > > > > Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every > > little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning > > before things changed in sensitive areas-- especially when things > > are deprecated. Without a heads-up from Valve, the developer &g
RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
I think his warning, from day one of the SDK, was do not use interfaces other than those of the plugin api. How much more of a warning do you need? The whole, "Why didn't you tell me.. wh." Thing is a dead dog. You might want to focus on the possibility of getting easier to use menus. Save the "Why didn't you tell us stuff" for when (if) they change the documented API without notification. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mattie Casper Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 4:01 PM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning Alfred, we're not asking for hostages. We're just humbly asking for, at a minimum, warnings. Ideally, we'd like discussion about the implications, but a warning is our minimum requirement. Please see the relevant section of my initial email, I quote here: ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
Those menus are horrendous... you have to first hit escape..then you have to use the mouse to click.. They are very nice to look at..and horrible to use.. At 01:53 PM 05/20/2005, you wrote: 3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using that. - Alfred Original Message From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mattie Casper Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 9:42 AM To: hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning > Alfred or other Valve representative, > > There are many, many plugin and mod developers displeased at the > moment because of your recent decision to change CSS menuing behavior > so drastically. > > I'm not precisely sure why the decision was made to suddenly push > such a big change (now rolled-back temporarily) on everyone in the > world, but this has wounded our confidence in the support Valve > provides to their SDK community. > Last night, plugin developers were inundated with yells for help as > plugin menuing systems were obliterated in one fell swoop. Those same > developers spent frantic hours trying to reverse engineer what caused > the problem, all the while trying to communicate the issues to their > own users. > > As far as I can tell, there was absolutely no forewarning. Nothing to > indicate to the developer community what could be changed to fix the > problem. In turn, there was no warning developers could provide to > their users or even early code changes they could make to limit the > impact. With some sort of notice, it would have been possible to do a > great deal to help the situation. > > It really comes down to the fact that it's Valve's community of game > players that suffer when this happens. If 30% of the servers out > there run popular admin mods and those mods suddenly cease to > function painfully, people get a much worse impression of "steam > updates". They, as you know, even come whining to you about why you > broke their favorite 3rd party plugin. > > Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every > little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning > before things changed in sensitive areas-- especially when things are > deprecated. Without a heads-up from Valve, the developer community > relationship is simply going to crumble into name-calling and > constant bickering. None of us want to go that route, but we're going > to need better support from Valve in order to avoid it. > > So, I'm asking nicely for the Valve teams to provide us additional > forewarning before making large changes. Deprecating *anything* > should be announced well beforehand so that plugin and mod developers > can act accordingly. The unannounced update we saw last night simply > cannot continue if you care anything about the developer community. > Even if you feel something is a "hack", you should at least work with > us a little more rather than letting us fall onto our own swords. > > While I appreciate what you guys have done for the developer > community, I still think there's more needed or we're all going to > suffer. Please give us warning before you change things like this. > > Thanks for your time. > > Respectfully yours, > -Mattie > > > ___ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list > archives, please visit: > http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
Also very awkward. Obviously the "hack" menus worked fine, and instead of deprecating the code, why didn't Valve just leave it in there or even elaborate it? There was nothing wrong with that, and I doubt it'd have been any extra work leaving the code in there while rewriting the radio code for the client side. How does Valve or Alfred expect us to create server plugins without using hacks when we aren't provided enough to do so. - Original Message - From: "Ray" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 3:46 PM Subject: RE: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning > Those menus are horrendous... > you have to first hit escape..then you have to use the mouse to click.. > > They are very nice to look at..and horrible to use.. > > > > At 01:53 PM 05/20/2005, you wrote: > >3rd party plugins have been using a hack to trigger an unused bit of > >game code. We provide them with another, maintained, user friendlier > >version of menus that work across all mods, they need to start using > >that. > > > >- Alfred > > > >Original Message > >From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mattie > >Casper Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 9:42 AM To: > >hlcoders@list.valvesoftware.com Subject: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer > >Forewarning > > > > > Alfred or other Valve representative, > > > > > > There are many, many plugin and mod developers displeased at the > > > moment because of your recent decision to change CSS menuing behavior > > > so drastically. > > > > > > I'm not precisely sure why the decision was made to suddenly push > > > such a big change (now rolled-back temporarily) on everyone in the > > > world, but this has wounded our confidence in the support Valve > > > provides to their SDK community. > > > Last night, plugin developers were inundated with yells for help as > > > plugin menuing systems were obliterated in one fell swoop. Those same > > > developers spent frantic hours trying to reverse engineer what caused > > > the problem, all the while trying to communicate the issues to their > > > own users. > > > > > > As far as I can tell, there was absolutely no forewarning. Nothing to > > > indicate to the developer community what could be changed to fix the > > > problem. In turn, there was no warning developers could provide to > > > their users or even early code changes they could make to limit the > > > impact. With some sort of notice, it would have been possible to do a > > > great deal to help the situation. > > > > > > It really comes down to the fact that it's Valve's community of game > > > players that suffer when this happens. If 30% of the servers out > > > there run popular admin mods and those mods suddenly cease to > > > function painfully, people get a much worse impression of "steam > > > updates". They, as you know, even come whining to you about why you > > > broke their favorite 3rd party plugin. > > > > > > Now, we certainly aren't asking you to indefinitely support every > > > little feature we use, but we absolutely *must* have forewarning > > > before things changed in sensitive areas-- especially when things are > > > deprecated. Without a heads-up from Valve, the developer community > > > relationship is simply going to crumble into name-calling and > > > constant bickering. None of us want to go that route, but we're going > > > to need better support from Valve in order to avoid it. > > > > > > So, I'm asking nicely for the Valve teams to provide us additional > > > forewarning before making large changes. Deprecating *anything* > > > should be announced well beforehand so that plugin and mod developers > > > can act accordingly. The unannounced update we saw last night simply > > > cannot continue if you care anything about the developer community. > > > Even if you feel something is a "hack", you should at least work with > > > us a little more rather than letting us fall onto our own swords. > > > > > > While I appreciate what you guys have done for the developer > > > community, I still think there's more needed or we're all going to > > > suffer. Please give us warning before you change things like this. > > > > > > Thanks for your time. > > > > > > Respectfully yours, > > > -Mattie > > > > > > > > > ___
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
Daniel Jennings wrote: Also very awkward. Obviously the "hack" menus worked fine, and instead of deprecating the code, why didn't Valve just leave it in there or even elaborate it? There was nothing wrong with that, and I doubt it'd have been any extra work leaving the code in there while rewriting the radio code for the client side. How does Valve or Alfred expect us to create server plugins without using hacks when we aren't provided enough to do so. I don't think server plugins were ever meant to be used in the way that they are currently being used. You are trying to make a Swiss Army Knife out of a potato peeler. If all you are doing is trying to peel potatoes, then the server plugin system does what it is supposed to do. If you are trying to fillet a fish, saw down a tree, open a bottle of wine, and cut out some paper snowflakes, you are going beyond the designer's vision of what the tool was supposed to do. -- Jeffrey "botman" Broome ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
What are server plugins supposed to do then? I haven't found many practical uses for server plugins that use no hacks. When Valve created the interface for the server plugins, what were they expecting us to do with it? They had seen the millions of HL and CS plugins and essentially CS modifications (such as Warcraft) and decided to offer a built-in interface. If they knew what the server plugins were going to be for, what reason would they have for restricting the functionality of the server plugins so much. I'm not trying to make a Swiss Army Knife out of a potato peeler. - Original Message - From: "Jeffrey "botman" Broome" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Sent: Friday, May 20, 2005 4:13 PM Subject: Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning > Daniel Jennings wrote: > > Also very awkward. Obviously the "hack" menus worked fine, and instead of > > deprecating the code, why didn't Valve just leave it in there or even > > elaborate it? There was nothing wrong with that, and I doubt it'd have been > > any extra work leaving the code in there while rewriting the radio code for > > the client side. How does Valve or Alfred expect us to create server plugins > > without using hacks when we aren't provided enough to do so. > > I don't think server plugins were ever meant to be used in the way that > they are currently being used. > > You are trying to make a Swiss Army Knife out of a potato peeler. > > If all you are doing is trying to peel potatoes, then the server plugin > system does what it is supposed to do. If you are trying to fillet a > fish, saw down a tree, open a bottle of wine, and cut out some paper > snowflakes, you are going beyond the designer's vision of what the tool > was supposed to do. > > -- > Jeffrey "botman" Broome > > ___ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: > http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders > > > ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
Ray, Danny: I think it's absolutely wonderful that you're coming down on VALVe 'not supporting developers' on a list hosted by VALVe with the expressed purpose of aiding third parties... Everyone Else: When you come down off the irony of that, Developer Forewarning is one of the big issues many people had (and have) with steam. While I doubt that any major legacy-breaking patches would be released without any notice, it is concievable that certain games could be broken by pushing updates down the line. In these cases, you have to ask yourself: "Why did they break this?". The answer is never "Because they hate you and your mod", it's almost always stability or bloat pruning or whathaveyou. I would not be against valve prepublishing patches to developers (as they used to do with the sdks before new versions of half-life), but I don't think there is the appropriate methods to do so in Steam at the moment. -Kuja Digital Paintball ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
Re: [hlcoders] To Valve: Developer Forewarning
-- [ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ] "At 11:47 PM 5/21/2005, Dagok wrote: >So many people spreading misinformation. > >a) Plugin authors were given NO warning, ever, none whatsoever. Not to use network messaging protocol hacks for a mod they don't have the source code for ? The Source SDK codebase is *NOT THE CODEBASE FOR CS:SOURCE* >b) It is documented in cl_dll/menu.cpp and this has been stated multiple >times now. Nowhere in the Source SDK codebases for either Single Player, Multiplayer or HL2DM does it say "CS:Source uses identical code to this." Only a newb coder or a complete moron would make such an assumption." >From another topic. Sums it up perfectly. On 5/22/05, Kuja <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Ray, Danny: > > I think it's absolutely wonderful that you're coming down on VALVe 'not > supporting developers' on a list hosted by VALVe with the expressed > purpose of aiding third parties... > > Everyone Else: > When you come down off the irony of that, Developer Forewarning is > one of the big issues many people had (and have) with steam. While I > doubt that any major legacy-breaking patches would be released without > any notice, it is concievable that certain games could be broken by > pushing updates down the line. > In these cases, you have to ask yourself: "Why did they break > this?". The answer is never "Because they hate you and your mod", it's > almost always stability or bloat pruning or whathaveyou. I would not be > against valve prepublishing patches to developers (as they used to do > with the sdks before new versions of half-life), but I don't think there > is the appropriate methods to do so in Steam at the moment. > > -Kuja > Digital Paintball > > ___ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, > please visit: > http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders > > -- - Ben Davison - http://www.shadow-phoenix.com -- ___ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlcoders
