Oriented said:
Not as difficult as it sounds in concept. A field checksum could also keep a record of the version from which the data was saved. If restoring the settings and other data to a later version of Pleco, the warning message could state that "the data was saved for version x.y.z and a restore is only compatible with that version".
Version compatibility isn't even the issue - we have plenty of code to deal with that for upgraders and such; it's more the hidden settings keeping track of various bits of user state that we're worried might get inconsistent if edited. But you're correct that we could work around this with checksums.
The scattered nature of Pleco settings that I alluded to in my last post is also an issue, though - there are a bunch of things related to startup behavior / finding files on Android that are stored in various Android preference strings / temporary files rather than in Pleco's regular preferences store (which is loaded at the same time as the cross-platform engine).
Oriented said:
Whilst any changes between z figures (minor releases) shouldn't as a matter of practice affect the data, the Pleco product for Android is still largely in development (such as the Flashcard issues), so probably better to make only compatible for the Pleco version that it was saved under.
Which flashcard issues are you referring to?