Bug#848374: game-data-packager: ability to skip probing the file system

[Fabian Greffrath]

control: found -1 48

Simon McVittie wrote:
> game-data-packager GAME --no-search: only look in paths provided on the
> command line.

This is exactly what I was looking for. I knew it was there, but I just
coulnd't find it. The bad news is that it isn't documented anywhere,
neither in the output of g-d-p without any arguments nor in the manpage. I
reopen this bug to keep it open until this feature is properly documented.

> I'm curious: why? Is this just for development/testing (the original
> reason for that option), or is there a doom.wad that you consider to be
> better than other doom.wads?

There is a wide range of more or less exotic flavors of DOOM.WAD available
and I have installed many of them on my system. The version I want to
archive in a DEB package, though, should be the one from GOG since they
have already selected the "best" (i.e. most common, latest released, most
complete) for their installers. I was looking for a means to tell g-d-p to
use exactly *this* data and not anything else it happens to find on my
system.

> The list of alternatives for the full version's doom.wad are listed in
> a fairly arbitrary order, but if you have several versions, I think g-d-p
> picks the first one from the list. You know more about Doom than me:
> is our arbitrary order right?

I think I have already once reviewed this list together with Alexandre, so
it should be mostly fine.

In general, Doom WAD files follow a version schema and highest versions
should be ordered first. Then, there may be different releases for
different (more or less "common") platforms which carry the same version
number, e.g. 1.9 for PC and 1.9 for XBOX. And finally, there are different
actual relases that carry the same version number, e.g. Doom 1.9 and The
Ultimate Doom 1.9 or the Anniversary Edition of the Final Doom IWADs or
the BFG Edition of DOOM2.WAD.

So, in general, WADs should be ordered by (1) version number. If the
version number is the same, they should be ordered from (2) "common" to
"exotic" and if there is more than one "common" version, they should be
ordered by (3) more complete or bug-fixed first.

Sounds complicated? Yes, it is. ;)

 - Fabian