[MatthTheGeek]

Diaspora is using latest trunk at time of release. Technically trunk is .13 until .14RC cycles ends, but actually it is months beyond .14 RC and latest .13 nightlies (last I checked .14RC was more than 1400 svn revisions late, not counting backports), and years beyond .12. It's the most stable and advanced build you can get right now without having to compile trunk yourself.

EDIT: ninja'd

3.6.13 is the dev branch for the eventual 3.6.14 release.

.13 is trunk until .14 comes out, or until 3.7 comes out if .14 is abandoned. Your post make it sound .13 is in preparation and hence before .14, which is not the case. .14 has its own dev branch, separated from trunk (hence separated from .13), where devs can fix and backport stuff.

Basically .13 is everything that happens in trunk after .12 and until the next stable release.

[General Battuta]

I would absolutely wait until the '3.6.7' release if that's what comes next.

[MatthTheGeek]

You mean 3.7

3.6.7 would be, like, 6-7 years ago ?

But then again if you're going to wait until 3.7 there is absolutely no telling when this happens. Especially if we get another... capricious RC cycle like .14. Could be in years from now. Better release with latest trunk.

[General Battuta]

Right, oops.

[karajorma]

As much as I hated the way kara said it (sorry, I percived it to be a bit arrogant - I guess it was unintentionally but notheless the tone didn't sit well with me), I've to admit that using the build supplied with Diaspora (for now) was a certain merit to it...

eh?

[jg18]

Just wondering, is FUBAR really unreachable? He seems to be on the forums fairly often (last online about 6 hours ago) and posted on the forums just yesterday (and also the day before that). So he seems to be around.

You know stalking someone that way is considered impolite ... (and you're not the only one who thought of that)

Stalking? Really? Don't you think that's a bit extreme of a description? I was just pointing to evidence that he's very clearly around, even when people were saying that he's unreachable. And others may very well have thought of it, but no one else suggested publicly that he might in fact not be unreachable.

Never mind, though; I shouldn't have interfered in TBP's business.

[jr2]

wtf, one team, one fight.  You sound like the Army, Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps.    Quit bickering, the Marines are best already I mean you're all on the same side. 

[Vidmaster]

Stalking? Really? Don't you think that's a bit extreme of a description?

Orph meant this as a joke.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

OK here is the run down as I see it.

Zathras will need to be updated for compatibility with anything beyond 3.6.12.  3.6.12 removed the -TBP command line flag and moved the info to the tables.  There was a bug in that removal that was fixed a few days after 3.6.12.  This led to the 3.6.12 compatible Zathras being intentionally shipped with tables that have commented out entries that are basically necessary bugs to work around that bug.  The tables in the test build posted 2 years ago contain the uncommented out lines necessary for 3.6.13 and beyond. 

There are also a bunch of other fixes as well as model optimizations (lods, debris, maps etc) in the beta. 

3.6.14 was supposed to be out so I discontinued work at that point so the beta could be tested.  As someone pointed out that was over 1400 revisions of 3.6.13 ago.

Fallout with Diaspora as well as no feedback on testing Zathras beta have pretty much left me burned out on anything FS2_Open related.

So basically that Zathras beta has been out there for about 2 years now with little testing.  Doing any kind of new installer would require that version.  Releasing it in an untested state is a bad idea. 

That leaves conetent.  What do we really have that warrants a new installer?  How much new/finished content?  How much is tested?  Do we even know if TBP will work with 3.6.14 or current trunk? 

[Col. Fishguts]

I'm using the latest Zathras with 3.6.14 build for quite some time, and it basically works. Of course debug builds complain about this and that, because let's be honest, the tables are a bit of a mess.
The way it is now with 3.4b and Zathras on top of it, there are too many tables/modular tables overriding each other. And there's a lot of table entries which were added originally to make BHX work, but now just clutter up everything.

If you want my opinion, in the long run there's no way around condensing everything into a clean base again (basically TBP 4.0), especially if we want to use all the fancy new features that require table and POF changes. Which also eventually means breaking backwards compatibility with existing campaigns.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

There should be no warnings or errors in debug.  If there are they need to be in mantis so they can be looked into.

As for the tables there are really only 3 sets.  The 3.4b release, latest Zathras release, and the Zathras beta if you are testing it.  Of course the beta ones get merged for release so still only 2 sets for release.     

While a 4.0 would be a good idea it's one hell of a lot of work and would require reworking and/or replacing a lot of assets to do it right.  Not going to happen anytime soon. 

[wesp5]

Not going to happen anytime soon.

Especially if it breaks compatibility with previous campaigns, this makes little sense. BTW, what is that about a Diaspora fallout?

[Slasher]

I was using 3.6.14 release candidate debug builds while testing the effects upgrades and I can't remember getting any messages using "vanilla" TBP 3.4b coupled with the last official non-beta Zathras patch. 

FUBAR, regarding the Zathras beta, the debris LODs all seem to work okay.  I have been using the beta mainly so stuff will explode and leave pieces behind instead of being completely and utterly consumed by great ballzofire. 

[Vidmaster]

Bad news: My mouse hand and subsequent arm are out of commission for some time. I can hardly type, yet alone program, play or write.
No playing FS2 or writing my thesis...  :-(

[Slasher]

Sorry to hear Vidmaster.  Get better soon, or alternatively, get a new arm!

[hip63]

hip, while we're waiting, have you played Diaspora yet?  If not, go get and play (latest patch is 1.0.3 don't forget), methinks you'll like.  Don't worry, only 6 missions.    At least 11,500 downloads 16 days after release.

Got it, just haven't had time to play it. Been busy with me rock-n-roll band!

hip63 

[Mongoose]

Sorry to hear Vidmaster.  Get better soon, or alternatively, get a new arm!

He didn't ask for this.