BUILD: When installed via "make dist-generic", theme folder isn't automatically found unless supported by backend

[mikrosk]

I have noticed this while testing ​https://downloads.scummvm.org/frs/demos/scumm/ft-dos-demo-en.zip.

Basically configure any backend with --datadir=data, make && make dist-generic, add game ft-demo and watch... a segmentation fault!

./scummvm 
WARNING: Couldn't initialize text to speech through speech-dispatcher!
User picked target 'ft-demo' (engine ID 'scumm', game ID 'ft')...
   Looking for a plugin supporting this target... SCUMM [v0-v6 games, v7 & v8 games]
WARNING: SearchSet::add: archive 'data' already present!
NutRenderer::loadFont() Can't open font file: icons.nut!
Segmentation fault (core dumped)

Apparently, scummvm realizes that "data" has been already added to the search set (the system one) and skips the "data" for given game, therefore leading to a crash because a font file has not been found.

I can imagine that if scummvm expands every relative path to an absolute one before adding to the search set (in runtime) would fix this kind of issues.

[lephilousophe]

--datadir is not intended to be a relative path. It's used by some platform to customize where in the system the data is installed.

[mikrosk]

Hmm, so how to interpret --datadir="data" (what I've seen quite often on various places) then? It's true that in the meantime I have discovered "make dist-generic" but that doesn't solve this problem either.

I can't test it right now but I see that "make dist-generic" even with basic ./configure (no further parameters) installs stuff into a relative (next to the scummmvm executable) "data" so are you sure that this problem wouldn't show up in such case anyway? (I can confirm this for you in the evening).

[mikrosk]

Phew, I was wrong. Plain ./configure && make && make dist-generic creates a relative "data" folder but doesn't lead to the crash anymore.

However: when *not* specifying --datadir="data", the theme is not loaded / found automatically in the "dist-generic" layout (I need to go to the Paths tab and set the absolute path manually). When I do specify it, it is loaded / found automatically.

I think this justifies reopening this ticket because it is directly related to the --datadir switch (although the fix would be in a different area, ScummVM should perhaps know that "data" is the default *relative* path for loading themes unless overriden with a *absolute* path via --datadir).

[lephilousophe]

./configure --data-dir= is used to specify the directory to use when scummvm is installed on the user computer.
This setup is done using make install, not make dist-generic.

make dist-generic is used to prepare a package for users and, as its name indicates, is generic and called by specific platforms: it is not intended to be used by end-user.

[mikrosk]

I'm not end-user, I'm a packager and I have packaged ScummVM using "make dist-generic". And found out that the themes are not loaded anymore. Using --datadir="data" worked for me until I found out about the FT Demo but I agree with you, it shouldn't be perhaps used like that.

Is this wrong medium to report bugs like this? (i.e. is this bug tracker indented for end-users only?)

I'm a new contributor so it's possible I have overlooked some obvious processes.