Openra: Map can be downloaded from the server hoster, not only the OpenRA Resource Center

[cookgreen]

Hi

When I join a game which the map don't exist in the OpenRA Resource Center, so I can't start the game
I think we can make map can be downloaded from the Server hoster if the OpenRA Resource Center don't exist the map

[PurityLake]

I'll take up this task

[ghost]

The peer-to-peer map download conflicts IMO with the concept of the resource center and its features. These are my considerations which make me believe that this is a step backwards:

• By allowing P2P download, we eliminate the motivation to upload maps to the RC

• Maps that are not uploaded to the RC (or some other hosting service) are not available for the public and not protected against local data loss

• We have no possibility to track download counts etc.

• No linting of maps and protection against corrupted / incompatible maps,

• Security implications due to P2P download inside of an application from untrusted sources

The only improvements which I can see are to

• share maps offline
• satisfy people who are to lazy to create an RC account / upload their maps but still want an automated distribution system.

The first case can be handled by sharing the map on your local network and have people add it to their map folder. For the second case, I don't see how lazyness can justify a change that effectively demotivates EVERYONE to use the RC services, which help both the community and map makers.

Instead, we should improve the possibilities to explore the RC ingame, integrate it with player profiles etc. This can not be handled by the few people that develop the engine, but it would be a mistake to decrease the motivation for new people to work on integration of web services.

[pchote]

The bigger issues here are technical - player-created maps with custom assets can be several tens of MB, so can't be sent over the normal order stream in one go. They must be split into sufficiently small chunks to avoid degrading performance and reassembled at the other end. It may be possible to negotiate a side channel to transfer the map over a different socket, but this will need to work around the usual set of NAT and firewall issues.