Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

Locked
sfan5
Moderator
Posts: 4127
Joined: Wed Aug 24, 2011 09:44
GitHub: sfan5
IRC: sfan5
Location: Germany

Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by sfan5 » Post

This is a pre-release version of the upcoming Minetest 5.9.0. We'd be very grateful for help testing it.
If all goes well, Minetest 5.9.0 should be released the end of this week.

Highlights

You can read the the full changelog.

Known issues

  • The default /, + or - keybindings no longer work on certain keyboard layouts (#14545)
Please report any issues on GitHub or in this thread.

Downloads

Commit hash: 8ef2c42

User avatar
Athozus
New member
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Dec 15, 2020 13:26
GitHub: Athozus
IRC: Athozus
In-game: Athozus
Location: Toulouse, France
Contact:

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Athozus » Post

The failing keybinds are a major issue. At least on French keyboard (Azerty), a lot of default keys are not working. Notably the viewing range (+, -), but also the commands / and .,
-- Athozus

User avatar
rudzik8
Member
Posts: 246
Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2021 04:13
GitHub: rudzik8
In-game: db75c and rudzik8
Location: Siberia

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by rudzik8 » Post

I also had some problems. For example, since switching from WASD to IJKL, AUX1 is bound to semicolon (;). This key (and some other keys on the far right section of the keyboard) have been bound as "OEM X", where X is just a number.

However, after upgrading to 5.9.0-dev, I noticed that none of these "OEM" keys work, although they were still displayed in the controls. After rebinding them (the keys now show up as what they are and not "OEM X") the issue was gone (and the new config even worked with the release 5.8.0 build!), but it wasn't a nice experience.
Maintainer of Voxelgarden and VoxeLibre dev and modder || Codeberg

User avatar
celeron55
Administrator
Posts: 544
Joined: Tue Apr 19, 2011 10:10
GitHub: celeron55
IRC: celeron55

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by celeron55 » Post

For people wondering about the weird keybinding gotchas:

We've been in the situation that we have to get rid of Irrlicht's legacy windowing and input code at some point, and now is the time, with SDL2 being the up-to-date replacement. It's more future proof and more cross platform, with an obvious upgrade path to SDL3 in the future. SDL2 allows things like touchscreen input on desktop builds, and it allows us to add full gamepad support.

However, it causes changes to keyboard input handling. The keyboard input handling is in some ways more capable, but it breaks old keyboard layout specific keybinds - this is because it binds keys based on their position on the keyboard, instead of the symbol on the key.

We could have attempted to add workarounds to support all the old default keybinds for some common keyboard layouts, but such code would have started weighing us down in the long term and wouldn't have helped everyone, so we mostly opted not to, to get a fresh start.

User avatar
rudzik8
Member
Posts: 246
Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2021 04:13
GitHub: rudzik8
In-game: db75c and rudzik8
Location: Siberia

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by rudzik8 » Post

Not relevant.
Last edited by rudzik8 on Thu Aug 08, 2024 07:32, edited 1 time in total.
Maintainer of Voxelgarden and VoxeLibre dev and modder || Codeberg

Exo
Member
Posts: 13
Joined: Fri Jul 19, 2024 18:42
GitHub: ExonYT
In-game: ExonYT Exo ExoTheExotic
Location: US/Eastern
Contact:

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Exo » Post

Is this testable on Android? I have a win7 computer but it gives APPCRASH Error every time it loads >5.7.0 versions.

Astrobe
Member
Posts: 643
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2018 10:46

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Astrobe » Post

Hi, it's amazing keyboard management is still an issue; I was struggling with keycodes, scancodes and whatnot when I was assembly programming in MS-DOS far too long ago... I empathize with your struggles.

Anyway, yet another AZERTY keyboard user here. To add to the "/" issue, one thing is that it doesn't work out-of-the-box, but the other thing is: when you want to rebind it, the natural thing you do is to press either left-shift or right-shift and the key (because / is shift-: for us). When you do that you see "left shift" (or "right shift") in the GUI. But if you hold it down more than a couple of seconds, it becomes "left button". When you press quick enough the second key (":"), the GUI records ":" no matter what. But the binding actually works in game. Actually, users can redo that binding without shifting. IIRC, MT didn't actually distinguish between shifted and non-shifted keys before. But you clearly have an issue with the handling of shift key (and maybe with other modifiers).

As for the solution, I disagree that fixing it for 5.9 "wouldn't have helped anyone". It does help with maintaining the impression that MT randomly breaks things between releases (there's a whole website about that somewhere...). As a programmer I understand it is a PITA. As someone who wants to promote MT, those things are embarrassing; it makes me look like fool who recommends "broken" software (not to mention that you often have to deal with the comparison with a certain other voxel game which is superior for some things and inferior for other things). At the very least warn and inform the user about this.
My game? It's Minefall.

User avatar
celeron55
Administrator
Posts: 544
Joined: Tue Apr 19, 2011 10:10
GitHub: celeron55
IRC: celeron55

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by celeron55 » Post

Modifiers aren't supported in this version - those require further work. It's likely the end result will be more capable though, as we can do it so that the combined key doesn't need to have any symbol attached to it in the keyboard layout, like it has to in Irrlicht.

Even so, when that is implemented, it's probably near impossible to convert old symbol-based keybinds into modifier+scancode keybinds in any kind of universal way, so getting to that point in this release wouldn't have helped much - you'd still have to rebind, and the defaults couldn't be layout specific in any case.

It's not often we have to go through something like this but the only way not having to do this would have been to wait for SDL3, which likely allows binding keys based on both symbols and scancodes, but that's years and years away. It would be unwise to require people to maintain both SDL and Irrlicht backends for that long - it would take time away from more important things.

Astrobe
Member
Posts: 643
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2018 10:46

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Astrobe » Post

"Godrays" don't show up unless the game does the right thing. There should be a hint in the settings, just like with dynamic shadows.

(PS: the feature should actually be called "sun glare"; god rays aka crepuscular rays are a different thing)
My game? It's Minefall.

Astrobe
Member
Posts: 643
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2018 10:46

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Astrobe » Post

Is it my system or do the mapblocks loading is a lot slower? I'm used to see things popping in the distance, but now the distance is shorter and/or it takes a couple of seconds to load a single block.

Edit: never mind this, it was caused by some manually set option, to which the rendering seems to be more sensitive now. Can't tell which one because I've reset a bunch of them to their default value.
My game? It's Minefall.

User avatar
Blockhead
Moderator
Posts: 2238
Joined: Wed Jul 17, 2019 10:14
GitHub: Montandalar
IRC: Blockhead256
In-game: Blockhead Blockhead256
Location: Land Down Under
Contact:

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Blockhead » Post

Here's a crazy idea out of left field. If we're going to go all out on physical key positions instead of characters codes, why not add a UI that shows the current keybinds on a graphic of a keyboard like one off WikiMedia Commons?
/˳˳_˳˳]_[˳˳_˳˳]_[˳˳_˳˳\ Advtrains enthusiast | My map: Noah's Railyard | My Content on ContentDB ✝️♂

Astrobe
Member
Posts: 643
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2018 10:46

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Astrobe » Post

That's not really the issue. It's not the like the case when you install some bare-bones Linux distro that have you set your keyboard type in some config file while still on the wrong layout (thankfully that's rare nowadays). Issues are:

* user updates to 5.9 and then some keybindings don't work anymore. Even the default ones (slash on AZERTY). This needs a warning message at least.
* weird behavior like keeping the shift key turning into "left button" after a few seconds

Shift key and other modifier keys are a bit problematic from an ergonomic perspective because they are handled "per se" (as a normal key), but any key can act as a modifier in game (notably the "sneak" key, maybe "aux" too), and also some users could expect modifiers keys to be usable as actual modifiers (e.g. someone wants to bind chat to "t" and drop item to "T") (minor problem, users will easy figure out by trying that they can't do that).
My game? It's Minefall.

User avatar
celeron55
Administrator
Posts: 544
Joined: Tue Apr 19, 2011 10:10
GitHub: celeron55
IRC: celeron55

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by celeron55 » Post

We're considering postponing SDL2 to a later release so that there's a chance to iron out or work around some of the pain points.

Has anyone been able to try out touchscreen input on desktop?

aapolon2000
New member
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Aug 08, 2024 16:46

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by aapolon2000 » Post

After code compiation the Minetest 5.9 had NO SOUND on Linux Mint 21.3. Then I restarted the game and ran the game under ordinary user account (not under root) and game's audio/sound started working.

Astrobe
Member
Posts: 643
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2018 10:46

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Astrobe » Post

To revert SDL2, and then bring it back, sounds like a pain. OTOH you have no actual deadline, do you?
My game? It's Minefall.

User avatar
Desour
Member
Posts: 1527
Joined: Thu Jun 19, 2014 19:49
GitHub: Desour
IRC: Desour
In-game: DS
Location: I'm scared that if this is too exact, I will be unable to use my keyboard.

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Desour » Post

Astrobe wrote:
Fri Aug 09, 2024 08:32
To revert SDL2, and then bring it back, sounds like a pain.
No revert is needed here. It's just a matter of building with -DUSE_SDL2=TRUE or -DUSE_SDL2=FALSE.
he/him; Codeberg; GitHub; ContentDB; public personal TODO list; "DS" is preferred (but often too short)

User avatar
rubenwardy
Moderator
Posts: 7026
Joined: Tue Jun 12, 2012 18:11
GitHub: rubenwardy
IRC: rubenwardy
In-game: rubenwardy
Location: London, United Kingdom
Contact:

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by rubenwardy » Post

Renewed Tab (my browser add-on) | Donate | Mods | Minetest Modding Book

Hello profile reader

User avatar
Wuzzy
Member
Posts: 4930
Joined: Mon Sep 24, 2012 15:01
GitHub: Wuzzy2
IRC: Wuzzy
In-game: Wuzzy
Contact:

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Wuzzy » Post

It seems at least one string has been forgotten to be uploaded to Weblate: "Enable updates available indicator on content tab" (in the settings). And Weblate displays the "red exclamation mark" meaning it is out of sync with the Minetest repository.

Highlights:
* Mutlithread Lua mapgen (no idea how it works yet but wow!)
* Nodes can block pointing without being pointed at (this will help fix the annoying selectionbox when you spectate the builder in Quikbild in A.E.S.)
* Overridable pointing range for items (because why not?)
* Overridable fog color (surprised this wasn't already possible; apparently fog color was linked to sky/horizon color?)
* URL buttons: Click and the webbrowser opens
* Can force mods to load first or last in a game (will help massively to avoid some very hacky Lua code that depend on some load order)
* L-System trees as decorations (maybe we will soon get to see them more in actual worlds?)
* minetest.get_node_boxes to get de-facto nodeboxes of a node (GREAT simplification of horrible hacky code to emulate the logic)
* Translatable game name, mod name and game/mod description (it's only 2 strings, but I celebrate every improvement of the translation system)
* Custom wear bar color (I GLADLY removed this one from the List of hardcoded features)
* Physics overrides for walk speed and Fast Mode speed (I was partially involved) (player physics are very important for games to balance right, so any customization option is good)
* Wallmounted nodes on the floor or ceiling may now be rotated 90°. This now makes uses of the 2 previously unused values 6 and 7 of wallmounted nodes. Useful for e.g. floor signs. (feature by me)

I haven't tried these all yet but they sure sound useful.

Lowlights:
* Smooth scrolling (I HATE this and it can't be disabled :-( )
* For no apparent reason, hud_elem_type was renamed to type thus introducing a pointless deprecation (or is there an actual reason for this?)

User avatar
Linuxdirk
Member
Posts: 3250
Joined: Wed Sep 17, 2014 11:21
In-game: Linuxdirk
Location: Germany
Contact:

Re: Minetest 5.9.0 release candidate

by Linuxdirk » Post

Wuzzy wrote:
Fri Aug 09, 2024 20:37
Lowlights:
* Smooth scrolling
Yes, that’s always the first thing I turn off wherever possible because it always feels laggy and confusing. I hope this will be made customizable.

Locked