[sldev] Can message_template.msg be changed, or will that break third party applications?

[Ryan Williams (Which)]

On 5/7/09 5:45 AM, Soft wrote:
> On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 7:06 AM, Carlo Wood<carlo at alinoe.com>  wrote:
>    
>> Is there a problem with changing app_settings/message_template.msg
>> as I suggest here:
>>
>> http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-13267
>>
>> that I'm overlooking?
>>      
>
> On the server, it reads it as a U8, but it's only using it to feed
> methods that want BOOLs. This really should have been a BOOL, as you
> point out. Since BOOL and U8 are the same size, it may be okay to
> change this over and to change the server code to unpack a BOOL to
> avoid introducing a warning there.
>
> I'm not sure how much havoc this change would wreak with the
> validation tools. Normally we're only to extend or add messages, not
> edit established protocol. Maybe a Linden closer to that code can
> comment.
>    
I commented, though I'm pretty far from that code these days.  I think 
as a practical matter of getting the code released it's better to just 
convert the viewer to cast the bool to a U8 and pack that.

The validation tools would be complaining for months both before and 
after this change, possibly years, and would increase the risk that a 
really-breaking change would sneak through amongst all the false positives.