UB bug still present in v16, [split by Baronius] Options

[Baronius]

The bug was known for v15 already. Wouldn't it be easier to fix it in UB itself?

[This topic was split from this]

[Baronius]

@plainab:

This is exactly why I gave up any attempts of cooperation with those who you seem to agree with. You're convinced of your own viewpoint so amazingly strongly that you simply completely ignore the arguments of the other side. You don't want to hear (acknowledge) what the other says. You state things such as that the other one is making judgement based on personal preference ("You don't like the G3 Fixpack"), and not based on actual technical arguments. Furthermore, despite the fact I repeatedly emphasized that I've been describing a general phenomenon (which best example is indeed the G3 BG2 Fixpack), you seem to strongly believe that I'm going off-topic, going far from the actual specific subject. You seem to believe (or pretend) that the G3 BG2 Fixpack case is a different issue.

You're so much convinced about the superiority of your viewpoint, that you automatically consider any counter-arguments (especially from Baronius) as void.

When I was reading your words, I had the impression I'm reading CamDawg's words, or SimDing0's words. Completely the same things, repeated again and again.

After the recent discussions with some people (including DavidW), I started to believe that perhaps it's me who wasn't detailed enough or patient enough in the past when I've shared my arguments with you. Now I see that my hope was baseless, and I have never been wrong: no matter how accurately I list my arguments and how strongly I emphasize that it's a general technical and not a personal/subjective issue for me, you simply ignore my arguments or pretend that they don't exist.

I was open in the past when hlidskialfTeamBG taught me some basic WeiDU skills. I was open in the past when I finally decided support the possibility of compatibility with BGTutu as well (partly based on CamDawg's arguments) in my released BG1 mods. I was open to the advice of others several other times. Even if I disagreed in more cases, I've never immediately buried others' arguments by believing that my viewpoint is superior, no matter what the others say. On the other hand, you've never been not open. You are 100% convinced about the superiority of your own viewpoint, and the superiority of your own knowledge in it -- instead of giving a 1% chance to the other's arguments before finding an easy and simple reason to refuse them all. In my country, we call this "considering the other one to be an idiot".

I don't think any more that there will be a miracle and my above words will ever get disproved, so I suppose I'm soon completely finished with you; but as a last attempt of hope, let me repeat some of the arguments I had in a different form, as an answer to a restricted selection of your statements.

As to the rest of the post, I take it you have a problem with G3's BG2 Fixpack?

What I find appalling is that a simple posted solution to an issue between ToD, UB, SCSII, my NPC mod, and maybe others none of which was the G3 BG2 Fixpack brought on an entire bash (I use the word loosely) of the BG2 Fixpack. It's one thing to mention them as an example, once or twice. But to mention only them for all the issues you have, you seriously need to get some new material.

As I've emphasized, the G3's BG2 Fixpack is a (very extreme, definite) example of a general phenomenon I've introduced. One of the most importants points was that mod developers should make a careful examination before overriding/overwriting original, non-faulty conditions provided by the original game. This is particularly true to mods which are supposed to be standard parts of each game installation (hence the G3 BG2 Fixpack the best example, again).

"The code is good. It solves the problem, but it doesn't solve the problem before it starts. Because the problem didn't know it was a problem until the problem become a problem. [..]"

[..]and there is no way to know what the problems will be until they arise.

If this was true, your operating system and installed software wouldn't run for 5 minutes before producing a bug or malfunctioning. If the approach you described was used in software technology, we would still be in the ancient ages, i.e. where we was before the software engineering conference of NATO in 1968.

One of the magic words is planning, preparing. Justifying the presence of all problems by saying "we can't the predict the future problems" isn't correct. Sure, many problems cannot be predicted, but many others can be. Many issues can be avoided before they would appear.

Your thinking seems to be excessively focused around the concept of code. As far as I can see, you're saying that you presented a solution to a problem, and somehow my answer was generalized, and it brought up G3's BG2 fixpack. Have you ever considered why (apart from your obvious and unified viewpoint "Baronius doesn't like the Fixpack")? Have you ever considered that after approving your code, I wanted to express that it's the solution of a specific problem, and it doesn't help on general problems (and I used G3 BG2 Fixpack as an example to introduce the general problem)?

But nobody could have foreseen the problem until it came up. (except for maybe the first modder to use the ar0004.bcs instead of changing it to ar0021.bcs).

I'm sorry to repeat it again, but this again proves that you're 100% convinced in your viewpoint, and base all of your other claims on this fact. The first modder to use ar0004 instead of changing it to ar0021?! How can you be so sure that everyone thinks in the same way as you and automatically changes the script to ar0021? Have you ever considered that other modders might consider the game's conditions as a base and wouldn't try to "change" everything to more "reasonable"? Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that your arguing (consistent naming) has no good points -- I'm just saying that you automatically assume everyone thinks about in the same way as you.

For example, even jcompton (who you can really can't say to be BWL's biased member) believed that we may have a point in what we say about the UB issue (bold and italics added by me):

In my slightly mangled build I don't see that either AR0021.BCS or AR0004.BCS even exist in the core game to begin with--which is presumably why you felt safe in the first place renaming it, but on the other hand is doubtless why later modders felt perfectly safe using the confusing-but-not-otherwise-invalid AR0004.BCS .

Again, I don't say he necessarily agrees with us, but he found our suggestion reasonable, and used the word 'doubtless'. Just see the bold and italic parts: he doesn't seem to be think that it's obvious everyone finds it so natural to replace the script name just because it's more reasonable. He might feel his viewpoint closer to your solution (consistent naming all the time) and not to ours (I don't know what he thinks), but he did consider our arguments from a technical point of view, unlike what you guys (practically at G3) do all the time: "our solution is superior, you just don't like our mod/work/method etc.".

Why do you assume that everyone interprets the rules or possibilities (e.g. of the IE game, or of mod development) in the same way as you? Because there were 9 or 10 people supporting your viewpoint on a forum, or because a few hundred players downloaded your mod and provided positive feedback? Or because you have seen it working correctly and seamlessly for yourself, so you assume than anything that works differently is bad? It is like assuming that since you know "X" to be 'true' (= you see it working correctly etc.), all other possibly unknown solutions are automatically 'false' (~ "closed world" concept, DavidW could probably tell much about it). In this case, perhaps not 'false', but 'worse', 'inferior'.

To me, your approach and arguing often seems to be based on influence and the power of majority, and not on technical facts and discussions. You only consider those technical discussions as valid which interest you and aren't opposed to your strong belief about the superiority of your solutions. Others discussions are simply ignored by you. This "the majority rules" is confirmed by this statement too (bold added by me):

We must learn to accept the G3 BG2 Fixpack for what it is, an attempt to fix bugs (granted some perceived bugs) within the game.

And again, another sequence of assumptions:

You (or someone on your behalf) said that as a new modder someone might have looked at the area script reference and said, "Odd naming convention, but what the hey, I'll use it." First off, if someone is able to look at the file and see what the area script is, they've probably looked at several other areas and saw that the file names matched. But since WeiDu might not have been up to the task yet, they didn't want to overwrite an area file that just needed a script block, the existing one was used. WeiDu comes along and we update.

How can you be so sure that all or most modders looked at it (and look at it) like that? Many mod developers even don't care about how reasonable a naming convention is, they just build a mod based on the game, and then e.g. use WeiDU to build a package that is compatible with the mods it can be compatible with.

Again, I don't state that your assumptions there are wrong. I just emphasize that you can't generalize, and shouldn't base all your statements and decision on the assumption that since "it looks obvious to me, others certainly think about in the same way", and "I've seen it working perfectly in my environment, so other solutions can't be better or seamless" (on a side note, this seems to be a typical American and Western European mentality as well, as far as I've noticed; it isn't surprising, but let this remain a side note).

To cut a long story short, I think you guys (as far as I've noticed, you too plainab, and most of the others too who pretend not to see my technical points) base your arguments on the belief of superiority in your own solutions, in the influence and power of majority, the majority's confirmation -- instead of considering others' arguments even to a minimal degree (like, for example, Jason Compton, Luan, Ymarsakar, lroumen did), and instead of considering even a little bit what others say (Wounded Lion, Blucher, Wounded Lion (again) ).

I don't ask you to agree different viewpoints, just at least acknowledge and consider them a little bit. To stop pretending that each issue is completely specific and isolated from others. For example, you plainab say that my generalization and G3 Fixpack example is irrelevant, because it was only about a problem your code specifically fixes; similarly, Blucher posted something very general in the "Keys Being Used By Doors" topic (link above), and that issue was also treated as "specific issue"; the fact G3 Fixpack's alignment changes can break Improved Anvil's scripts is also considered by you guys as a "specific" issue and Improved Anvil should enforce its necessary creature alignments on its own etc. etc. etc.

Unfortunately, you guys don't give the least credit or even respect to viewpoints other than yours, no matter how technically estabilished they are. Instead, you are content with the fact that hundreds of players and the majority of the active, loud modders follows what you dictate. You've never considered that perhaps there could be a compromise which would be accepted by practically all modders and all players, and perhaps there would be less bugs and problems if you listened to what others say, because those others aren't idiots either. But it would require effort and work, and would somewhat risk the current situation and level of reputation you're satisfied with, so it's much easier to just pretend that what others say is baseless, or based on personal preferences and taste.