June 2003

• Damage and Stuff (Math and Code) Ben Chambers
• MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Derek Licciardi
• • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Mike Shaver
  • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Mike Shaver
  • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Daniel Anderson
  • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Matt Mihaly
    • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Luca Girardo
    • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of themarket. Ron Gabbard
  • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Chris Holko
  • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Matt Mihaly
    • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
  • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Justin Coleman
  • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of th e market. Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
  • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of th e market. Jeff Fuller
  • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Matt Mihaly
  • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Tess Snider
  • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Luca Girardo
  • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Tess Snider
    • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Matt Mihaly
    • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Jeff Fuller
    • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of themarket. Chris Holko
      • • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments ofthemarket. Scott Jennings
        • MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of the market. Jeff Fuller
• New Column by Dave Rickey "Engines of Creation" Now at Skotos Christopher Allen
• Announcing Shadow Door: an NPC Control Interface for Neverwinter Nights Robert Zubek
• ADMIN: So, what has been happening? J C Lawrence
• [Meta] Forward of moderated message J C Lawrence
• New Here MIKE MacMartin
• • New Here Mike
  • • New Here MIKE MacMartin
    • • New Here Miroslav Silovic
      • • New Here MIKE MacMartin
• Looking for a GUI Mud Development program Snicker Furfoot
• • Looking for a GUI Mud Development program Ben Greear
• ADMIN: List archives are now restored. J C Lawrence
• The Price of Being Male Rayzam
• • The Price of Being Male Sasha Hart
  • The Price of Being Male Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
  • • The Price of Being Male Rayzam
    • • The Price of Being Male Byron Ellacott
      • The Price of Being Male Dr. Cat
    • The Price of Being Male Castronova, Edward
    • • The Price of Being Male Boyle, Paul
      • The Price of Being Male Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes
      • • The Price of Being Male Rayzam
        • • The Price of Being Male Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes
          • • The Price of Being Male Rayzam
            • • The Price of Being Male Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes
        • The Price of Being Male Marian Griffith
        • • The Price of Being Male Paul Schwanz
          • • The Price of Being Male Rayzam
            • • The Price of Being Male Paul Schwanz
              • The Price of Being Male Vincent Archer
              • • The Price of Being Male Rayzam
        • The Price of Being Male Castronova, Edward
        • • The Price of Being Male Sasha Hart
          • The Price of Being Male Mark 'Kamikaze' Hughes
          • • The Price of Being Male Amanda Walker
          • The Price of Being Male Richard A. Bartle
          • • The Price of Being Male Castronova, Edward
            • • The Price of Being Male Richard A. Bartle
          • The Price of Being Male Tazzik
          • • The Price of Being Male Richard A. Bartle
            • • The Price of Being Male Tazzik
      • The Price of Being Male Richard A. Bartle
      • • The Price of Being Male Marian Griffith
        • • The Price of Being Male Sasha Hart
          • • The Price of Being Male Tom
            • The Price of Being Male Marian Griffith
            • • The Price of Being Male Sasha Hart
              • • The Price of Being Male Marian Griffith
                • • The Price of Being Male Sasha Hart
          • The Price of Being Male Richard A. Bartle
        • The Price of Being Male Castronova, Edward
        • • The Price of Being Male Richard A. Bartle
        • The Price of Being Male Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
      • The Price of Being Male Paul Schwanz
      • The Price of Being Male Daniel Anderson
      • • The Price of Being Male Travis Casey
        • • The Price of Being Male Paul Schwanz
          • • The Price of Being Male Travis Casey
          • The Price of Being Male Chris Holko
          • • The Price of Being Male Travis Casey
            • • The Price of Being Male Sanvean
              • • The Price of Being Male Sasha Hart
                • The Price of Being Male Tom
                • • The Price of Being Male Sanvean
                  • • The Price of Being Male Tom
  • The Price of Being Male Paul Schwanz
  • The Price of Being Male Amanda Walker
  • The Price of Being Male shop@isparkinson.co.uk
  • The Price of Being Male Boyle, Paul
  • The Price of Being Male Ola Fosheim Grøstad
  • • The Price of Being Male Sheela Caur'Lir
    • • The Price of Being Male Jeff Crane
• Are gold pieces taxable? Koster, Raph
• • Are gold pieces taxable? Boyle, Paul
  • • Are gold pieces taxable? Amanda Walker
  • Are gold pieces taxable? Thomas Leavitt
  • Are gold pieces taxable? Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
• Functors / Loki (was: New Here) Eli Stevens
• Architecture Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
• • Architecture Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
  • • Architecture ceo
    • • Architecture Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
• SW:G this is so unfair Marian Griffith
• • SW:G this is so unfair Marc Bowden
  • SW:G this is so unfair Martin Bassie
• Players policing themselves (was: MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of themarket.) Derek Licciardi
• • Players policing themselves (was: MMO Launch issues ruining potential segments of themarket.) Marian Griffith
• Q&A with Ken Troop, Lead Designer at Turbine Michael Tresca
• • Q&A with Ken Troop, Lead Designer at Turbine Threshold RPG
  • • Q&A with Ken Troop, Lead Designer at Turbine Mike Shaver
    • Q&A with Ken Troop, Lead Designer at Turbine Chris
• Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
• • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Zach Collins {Siege}
  • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
  • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
  • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
    • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Rossmann Peter
    • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) ceo
      • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
          "ceo" <ceo@grexengine.com> wrote:
          
          > That's a nice little design for a theoretical "game server". But
          > distributed-system design is not as simple as that. The easiest
          > analogy that comes to mind is the OSI 7-layered comms model. Yeah,
          > it's a great way of abstracting the functions, and it's a lovely
          > simple way to understand and reason about existing systems.
          
          > But it's not helpful if you're trying to build fast networking
          
          that's the matter om implementation. and payoff of modularity. if i
          would hand-code something in assembler, it would take me looong time
          to do, but with modular design, it's just the assemply of modules.
          and when we are talking about _large_ systems, then the time
          matters. even if you need more hardware to run it.
          
          and when talking about mmog systems, if you do one, there isn't many
          chances you'll sell it to 1000 customers. so, it's ok if it needs
          little more hardware, if you have saved half year of developement
          and avoided 1000 bugs. with scalable (good) design, you should be
          able to add a server to off-load the whole system. with bad design,
          even that would not help you.
          
          > In a clustered system, latency is still a problem (note: generic
          > systems rarely worry much about latency - this is one of the ways
          > in which games-systems are fundamentally different). You can
          > almost
          
          of course it is. even when inra-server latency is measured in tens
          of microseconds (be if numa/other san) or hundreds (be it ethernet),
          it will quickly add up based on how many intra-server communications
          are needed. the best would be to run it on shared memory system,
          where such latencies are minimal. but that would be expensive. (in
          telecom, we are doing that) so, you have to design well and when
          actually mapping the design to the HW, you should be carefull.
          
          > I'm not attempting to argue against the use of abstraction in
          > server-design - but the abstraction has to come from a much
          > lower-level than isolating systems (which is what your design
          > currently does). You want to be abstracting things that work
          
          depending on the design approach you take. top-down or bottom-up? i
          like to combine them, first do top-down, and then redesign it again
          all with bottom-up (if needed = if project realisation is probable)
          the bottom-up design takes more time/work, is better, and is not
          always needed. (if you can see even from top-down design that the
          project would be no good)
          
          > together in practical terms e.g. by looking at working-sets
          > (c.f. a google search for "working set" if you don't know the
          > term) and making sure each clump of related/non-independent data
          > is grouped
          
          WS is related to virtual memory of a process, isn't it? that's way
          too far for me yet.
          
          > together in the abstraction. ISTR JC spoke a couple of times about
          
          who is ISTR JC?
          
          > dependent working sets on the night before the MDC (in relation to
          > a dicussion on geographical partitioning).
          
          any links/memories of that speech? never heard that before.
          
          > Otherwise you have a design that is easy for a human to read on
          > paper, but practically impossible to implement.
          
          reading easines for human is only the visual/graphical
          configuration. if the design is right, then the partitioning will be
          right and the connections will be on proper places in regard to
          endpoints.
          
          The trouble with many architects is that they start to program too
          soon, in too detailed areas and the result is no good then. i belive
          Jessica M has described that in her mmog book. i just want to avoid
          that. :)
          
          Pietro
        • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) J C Lawrence
          • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
            • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) J C Lawrence
          • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Rossmann Peter
        • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Rossmann Peter
        • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) J C Lawrence
          • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Peter "Pietro" Rossmann
      • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
      • • Architecture (Cell Rebalancing) Peter "Pietro" Rossmann