Warnings when loading a mod incompatible with this version of minetest

[louisroyer]

Problem

On contentdb help, there is a page (see also the bottom of this page) about min_minetest_version and max_minetest_version tags. These tags are currently not used at all by the engine. They are already used by some mods (mostly min_minetest_version since max_minetest_version should typically be used in mods that are no longer maintained).

Solutions

• Document these tags in the API (section mod.conf).
• Raise a warning if the assertion min_minetest_version <= current minetest version <= max_minetest_version is false.

[SmallJoker]

That would not be fork-friendly. If mods require a certain Minetest version, they can check against the API features using minetest.features or the existence of a particular function.

[MoNTE48]

@SmallJoker, who cares about forks here?)
I think that API Level could be an alternative, for example. Fork has version 1.1.1, and Minetest API Level 3, which corresponds to Minetest 5.4.

[louisroyer]

Maybe not something as strong as raising a warning, but at least printing to the user in the mod selection panel, that this mod will probably be broken (it is more an information than a constraint). I agree that mods should check against the existence of functions, it's just that some mods are almost guaranteed to be broken when using an older minetest version (since the modder indicated it in mod.conf) and it is not even worth for the user to enable them. Forks could just disable this display via a compilation option…

[HybridDog]

Mods could have an on_enable.lua file which is executed in the main menu when somebody enables the mod there. Modders can then use this script to show a warning if some new feature is missing for this mod. This script should be lightweight, so it should not install or download something for the mod.

[rubenwardy]

ContentDB supports min_minetest_version and max_minetest_version in mod.conf for this purpose. The patch is ignored, only the MAJOR.MINOR is used.

To support forks, ContentDB also uses the protocol_version to find the matching Minetest version - but this is in the package API, and not in the mod.conf