[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Development Strategies [Was Documentation,Usability and Development]

[Reinier Post <rp@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sun, Dec 09, 2001 at 02:40:40PM -0800, Kevin Brown wrote:

> My question is: with respect to limiting what the scripting language
> that would be used on the server can do, why do we care?

You don't want anyone to be able to change the rules of the game without
anyone else knowing.  A scripting language that enables the user to
set his money to 10000 is too powerful.

> I mean, this is the *server* we're talking about here.  If someone
> decides to run a server that includes units that favor one player over
> another (as an example), that server will become unpopular very
> quickly.  Problem solved.

No, it won't.  What about a script that makes all units of player Foo
50% harder to beat 50% of the time?  You don't want to allow rules like
that (not in a ruleset, either).
 
> What I'm getting at is that it DOESN'T MATTER if people egregiously
> hack on the unit code, because they can't submit it remotely to the
> server anyway -- they have to actually be in control of the server,
> and if that's already the case then no amount of protection in the
> scripting language is going to help.

True, you need to trust the server owner.  I think we were discussing
scripts or ruleset changes set in the server, but specified at the
client end.

-- 
Reinier