ModMeta API

For plugin authors, the most important things to know about the ModMeta API are the request types and version matching.

Request Types

Key (by_key)

This is the “default” request used by Vortex, and the only request supported by Nexus Mods. It's also the simplest and requests metadata using a single key: the MD5 hash of the mod archive file. This is super useful for mod sources that store a hash as it's fast, unique and simple.

Logical File Name (by_name)

This is the next-best request, not as specific as file key, but not as vague or intensive as expressions. Technically speaking, the logical file name is just a string, but it's usually a string that's semantically important to the mod, such as a unique name for a specific variant of a file.

Logical file name lookups also use version matching

File Expression (by_expression)

File expressions are, essentially, glob patterns. That makes them very flexible and able to work with practically any file/mod format, but also fragile and intensive to look up, so they are considered a last-ditch option for when the other two are not possible.

File expression lookups also use version matching

Version Matching

Lookups using logical file name or file expression also use a version string to match specific versions of a file. Version matches are not (necessarily) an exact match and are best specified as a version range.

If you've used Node/npm and it's version semantics before, that's how modmeta-db does its version matching. ModMeta Relay tries to match that as closely as possible, but for those curious, existing plugins are using semver.net (Semantic Versioning for .NET) for version matching.

The actual implementation of matching version strings with mod package/file versions is up to plugins, but should always be as specific as practical since returning too many results for a mod can result in conflicting metadata.