Umapinfo or mapinfo?

[DoomGappy]

I'm helping pack together Doom 2 in Song Only, and I wanted to know what exactly is the difference between these two formats, and what I should use and when. I have Jading Tsunami's Umapinfo Designer, but I want to understand how all of this works. 

Edited November 5, 2023 by DoomGappy

[Xaser]

UMAPINFO is the one you want for that particular project -- it works across many different source ports, including dsda-doom, gzdoom, eternity, woof, etc. Basically, if you've got an MBF21 (or Boom) project, that's the one to reach for... at least at the time of writing (see below).

 

"Regular" MAPINFO (a.k.a. ZMAPINFO) is traditionally for ZDoom-based ports (GZDoom, Zandronum, etc.) -- it's originally a Hexen feature that got extended and upgraded a with a new syntax, but historically it's only worked in the Z ports. I say "Historically" though because dsda-doom's latest release just added support for MAPINFO -- it offers a bunch of features that UMAPINFO doesn't, though most of them are really only applicable if you're making a UDMF map (again, at time of writing; this could maybe change in the future). May still be worth taking a look to see if there's anything there that's useful, but UMAPINFO probably covers everything you'd need for a Boom/MBF21 mapset and has wider cross-port coverage, so stick with that for now (if you're able).

[DoomGappy]

10 minutes ago, Xaser said:

UMAPINFO is the one you want for that particular project -- it works across many different source ports, including dsda-doom, gzdoom, eternity, woof, etc. Basically, if you've got an MBF21 (or Boom) project, that's the one to reach for... at least at the time of writing (see below).

 

"Regular" MAPINFO (a.k.a. ZMAPINFO) is traditionally for ZDoom-based ports (GZDoom, Zandronum, etc.) -- it's originally a Hexen feature that got extended and upgraded a with a new syntax, but historically it's only worked in the Z ports. I say "Historically" though because dsda-doom's latest release just added support for MAPINFO -- it offers a bunch of features that UMAPINFO doesn't, though most of them are really only applicable if you're making a UDMF map (again, at time of writing; this could maybe change in the future). May still be worth taking a look to see if there's anything there that's useful, but UMAPINFO probably covers everything you'd need for a Boom/MBF21 mapset and has wider cross-port coverage, so stick with that for now (if you're able).

For some reason UDMF and DSDA are two things I was not expecting to be tied together somehow. I always associate UDMF with the Zdoom based ports and their advanced features. Thanks, Xaser, I'll stick to UMAPINFO for now. 

Edited November 5, 2023 by DoomGappy

[DoomGappy]

24 minutes ago, Xaser said:

UMAPINFO is the one you want for that particular project -- it works across many different source ports, including dsda-doom, gzdoom, eternity, woof, etc. Basically, if you've got an MBF21 (or Boom) project, that's the one to reach for... at least at the time of writing (see below).

 

"Regular" MAPINFO (a.k.a. ZMAPINFO) is traditionally for ZDoom-based ports (GZDoom, Zandronum, etc.) -- it's originally a Hexen feature that got extended and upgraded a with a new syntax, but historically it's only worked in the Z ports. I say "Historically" though because dsda-doom's latest release just added support for MAPINFO -- it offers a bunch of features that UMAPINFO doesn't, though most of them are really only applicable if you're making a UDMF map (again, at time of writing; this could maybe change in the future). May still be worth taking a look to see if there's anything there that's useful, but UMAPINFO probably covers everything you'd need for a Boom/MBF21 mapset and has wider cross-port coverage, so stick with that for now (if you're able).

Also, I've released a version in the thread. I've added these into the lump, but they didn't appear correctly in GZDoom. When I play a map I don't get "mapper: map name", but instead "Mapxx: Map name". Am I doing anything wrong here?

 

 

Edited November 5, 2023 by DoomGappy

[Devalaous]

GZDoom does not support the 'label' feature. It will appear in DSDA/Woof and probably dev builds of Eternity however.

[DoomGappy]

9 minutes ago, Devalaous said:

GZDoom does not support the 'label' feature. It will appear in DSDA/Woof and probably dev builds of Eternity however.

  

Indeed, DSDA shows it. Why doesn't GZDoom support it? Weird.

 

[SpaceCat_2001]

3 hours ago, Devalaous said:

GZDoom does not support the 'label' feature. It will appear in DSDA/Woof and probably dev builds of Eternity however.

Dont tell Graf Zahl about it. @DoomGappy But in a all seriousness UMAPINFO would be better to use due to being supported by larger scope of ports

 

Edited November 5, 2023 by SpaceCat_2001

[Gregor]

For a compromise you could combine the author and map name - "levelname = Silverminder: The Healer Stalks" - and use "label = clear" to disable the label entirely. That way it looks correct in DSDA/Woof/Eternity etc. but you still get the author being displayed in GZDoom as well (along with map label).

[Bauul]

I believe ZMapinfo does supper an "Author" tag though, which achieves a similar thing. So if you write a ZMapinfo as well (depending on how much you care about using the built-in author variable) you'll be able to get it to show up in ZDoom family ports.

[Devalaous]

1 hour ago, Bauul said:

I believe ZMapinfo does supper an "Author" tag though, which achieves a similar thing. So if you write a ZMapinfo as well (depending on how much you care about using the built-in author variable) you'll be able to get it to show up in ZDoom family ports.

 

The author field prints out the designated text underneath the CWILV graphic on the intermission screen, I use it often in my patches. It should only be used if the CWILV graphics dont already have the author as part of the graphic, otherwise you get it doubled. UMAPINFO also now has the tag, but according to the documentation, it only is used if theres no CWILV graphic at all.

 

Basically this is a situation where multiple lumps will be needed as nothing fits every port here, its fine though, as xINFO usually dont interfere with each other (Unless its Doomsday, but thats pretty much out of use now)

[SynarchyBattleDoge]

 

16 hours ago, Xaser said:

UMAPINFO is the one you want for that particular project -- it works across many different source ports, including dsda-doom, gzdoom, eternity, woof, etc. Basically, if you've got an MBF21 (or Boom) project, that's the one to reach for... at least at the time of writing (see below).

 

"Regular" MAPINFO (a.k.a. ZMAPINFO) is traditionally for ZDoom-based ports (GZDoom, Zandronum, etc.) -- it's originally a Hexen feature that got extended and upgraded a with a new syntax, but historically it's only worked in the Z ports. I say "Historically" though because dsda-doom's latest release just added support for MAPINFO -- it offers a bunch of features that UMAPINFO doesn't, though most of them are really only applicable if you're making a UDMF map (again, at time of writing; this could maybe change in the future). May still be worth taking a look to see if there's anything there that's useful, but UMAPINFO probably covers everything you'd need for a Boom/MBF21 mapset and has wider cross-port coverage, so stick with that for now (if you're able).

 

Is there any issue if I use ZMAPINFO and UMAPINFO? I mean, I'm focusing on DSDA-Doom, but what if I later consider to add Zdoom features, such as GL stuff and something like that?

[DoomGappy]

20 hours ago, Bauul said:

I believe ZMapinfo does supper an "Author" tag though, which achieves a similar thing. So if you write a ZMapinfo as well (depending on how much you care about using the built-in author variable) you'll be able to get it to show up in ZDoom family ports.

Hey, bauul. Great fan of your four site. Was going to replay it again and post the video on the old thread. I'm going to take a look into ZMapinfo, it would be nice if things were uniform. 

[Xaser]

UMAPINFO also supports the "author" field -- same concept.

 

11 minutes ago, SynarchyBattleDoge said:

Is there any issue if I use ZMAPINFO and UMAPINFO? I mean, I'm focusing on DSDA-Doom, but what if I later consider to add Zdoom features, such as GL stuff and something like that?

 

Nope, no issue -- in the pre-mapinfo days it was common to ship projects with multiple types of MAPINFO lumps for basically this reason, and if you want to do some zdoom-specific stuff, adding a ZMAPINFO is the way to go. Though if your target ports are DSDA-Doom and GZDoom, maybe take a look at DSDA's MAPINFO support and go that route. Some fun new things in the works there.