Spring without rendering

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 08 Nov 2006, 00:05

- Is it possible to disable rendering completely? I would like to get dedicated host functionality, and I don't really need rendering.

- And are there any plans to implement some sort of interprocess communication (spring relaying chat to other process on demand, causing spring to force start, kick someone or to exit game and such). I'm currently using "hacks" to get that functionality for springie autohost (sending WM keypresses to spring window to cause it to force or type chat).

AF · Post by AF » 08 Nov 2006, 00:17

Spring doesnt render if you minimize it, which can be done via command line parameters.

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 08 Nov 2006, 02:38

Can you please tell me what parameter it is?

Why it still eats 100% cpu if I minimize it manually?

Argh · Post by **Argh** » 08 Nov 2006, 02:47

Because Spring is using a lot of CPU, whether or not your GPU is getting used. Minimizing it just removes the load from the GPU.

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 08 Nov 2006, 03:00

I thought that max CPU usage is because it's processing frames - as quickly as possible, for rendering. I cannot think of any other reason why should it always take 100%

Argh · Post by **Argh** » 08 Nov 2006, 03:02

Most of the CPU use of Spring is pathfinding and Simulation time, not graphics processing. That said, it may be hogging processor time more than most dedicated servers would, because it needs to maintain sync. I'm sure that Tobi could give a far better explanation than I can, however.

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 08 Nov 2006, 03:43

Ahh .. sems I confused it with previous versions. Now minimised spring eats ~ 0 CPU :)

What is the commandline param to start minimised?

yuritch · Post by **yuritch** » 08 Nov 2006, 07:50

In Windows:

Code: Select all

start /MIN spring.exe

Typing start /? in command line will give you a list of other start options. There are some interesting commands, including setting process priority at start.
I'm not sure, maybe Spring itself has an option to start minimized, but start command can be used with everything.

Tobi · Post by **Tobi** » 08 Nov 2006, 10:46

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spring.exe /minimise

Ought to work. It will minimise itself just after the window is created.

While minimised, the drawing routine is replaced by a short sleep, so it's almost impossible for spring to reach 100% CPU while minimised.

EDIT:

Ideally someone (me?) would split up server (which is basically a simple multicast deamon with some validity checks) and client code, so the dedicated server wouldn't need to be spec (and run the entire simulation).

Once this is implemented a dedicated server will take very few system resources.

(Not sure about windows, but on linux I can see two spring processes while running spring, one taking over 60% CPU usually, and one taking only 1% every now and then. The last one is the server thread, which is technically the only thing needed for a dedicated server. Unfortunately spring always assumes player 0 is server and the server is player 0, so this needs to be decoupled first...)

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 08 Nov 2006, 11:52

Could you also add parameter to hide window completely? I don't mean not creating, but creating invisible ...
Window is a nice thing (I can send commands to it) but I'm going to hide spring window anyway for autohost.

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 08 Nov 2006, 11:54

Regarding /minimise switch ..

It starts minimised, but still takes 100% cpu .. I have to maximize it and then minimize manually and then it's ok and eats 0%

Tobi · Post by **Tobi** » 08 Nov 2006, 12:11

Ah, that was a bug in 0.73b1, it's fixed in SVN already.

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 10 Nov 2006, 11:49

There is indeed some sort of bug if you minimize spring too soon after starting it, countdown continues to negative numbers and game never starts :)
To fix it you only need to restart and minimize window again.

Brabby · Post by **Brabby** » 04 Jan 2007, 10:52

Hello, I follow the development of Springie already for a while, great project Licho, at the moment i try to let run a dedicated server in a VMware (Debian ROOT-Server).
However, I fail in missing direct3d support of the VMware.
Error Message: Update Drivers
'Needed extension GL_ARB_texture_env_combine not found!'

Is it possible to disable rendering completely and checking for this Extension?
Would be it to be inserted possibly a start option like /minimise rendering completely switches off and also does not check the direct3d support?

Greeting

AF · Post by AF » 05 Jan 2007, 14:31

there is a command line parameter that starts spring minized, whats exactly I've forgotten but tobi told me ages ago on msn.

Tobi · Post by **Tobi** » 05 Jan 2007, 15:09

AF, please read threads before you post. 4 posts above yours is the switch you mention........

grumpy_Bastard · Post by **grumpy_Bastard** » 06 Jan 2007, 08:21

Brabby wrote:Hello, I follow the development of Springie already for a while, great project Licho, at the moment i try to let run a dedicated server in a VMware (Debian ROOT-Server).
However, I fail in missing direct3d support of the VMware.
Error Message: Update Drivers
'Needed extension GL_ARB_texture_env_combine not found!'

Is it possible to disable rendering completely and checking for this Extension?
Would be it to be inserted possibly a start option like /minimise rendering completely switches off and also does not check the direct3d support?

Greeting

Ive been having this problem as well. I was looking forward to running spring under Vmware, its not an option to run it on the main operating system (if one thing crashes, everything goes down, in vmware if one VM crashes... no big deal).

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 06 Jan 2007, 16:27

In decent OS if one thing crashes, system stays .. unless you have DOS or Windows 95/98 server

Peet · Post by **Peet** » 06 Jan 2007, 21:00

It is not terribly uncommon that spring causes total system instability.

Licho · Post by **Licho** » 06 Jan 2007, 23:45

How would it do? Only harm it can do is to monopolize CPU if you run it at high priority...

But otherwise unless you have faulty drivers or HW you are safe..

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