ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

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RallOfFoam
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Joined: 16 Jan 2015, 12:38

ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by RallOfFoam »

Zero-K has split its lobby server from the main spring lobby server.
http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/11417

Both sides of the disagreement that caused this are understandable and everyone is very greatful for the incredible effort the devs put into all projects. But this is a disaster for the Spring community, including for both ZK and other games. The communities are small and the ability to move easily between different games, not to mention the shared development resources, is a major user and marketing advantage of Spring that is being lost here. Couldn't more of an effort be made to cater for the Zero-K code requirements and try to keep the community together?
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PicassoCT
Journeywar Developer & Mapper
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Joined: 24 Jan 2006, 21:12

Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by PicassoCT »

im sorry, honey, mum and daddy are going through a difficult time. We both luv you very very much, but your dead is a drunkard
-WHO CAN NOT STAY MARRIED ANY LONGER TO A HARLET
- which wasted her best years on a asshole
-WHO AT LEAST HAS THE DECENCY TO FACE LIVES DIFFICULITES AND MAKE DECISIONS
-thats it. we are so out of here. im moving in with Licho. He is so much greener then you.
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Anarchid
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Anarchid »

I don't see this as a split of the dev community. I don't understand why people think that.
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1v0ry_k1ng
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by 1v0ry_k1ng »

Image
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smoth
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Joined: 13 Jan 2005, 00:46

Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by smoth »

Zk Devs are not all the content devs here, you are acting as if there is the engine and ZK only. Besides all that we are buddies there is still a possibility wounds can heal etc. Maybe it is just what licho needs to do to prove his server concept. OS is funny like that.
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Forboding Angel
Evolution RTS Developer
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Forboding Angel »

Sigh.

Licho is insane. Performance in 96 is fantastic. Try fixing your damn game.
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Licho
Zero-K Developer
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Licho »

Image

Entire ZK dev team is "insane" as is the player community... It might well be game/engine interaction but it's consistent across ZK versions and happens since 92.0 .. thats the reason we didnt ugprade *back then* !
raaar
Metal Factions Developer
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by raaar »

I'm not sure if disaster is the right word. But i think it is bad for the spring community as a whole.

I've recently started to play zk, and despite cursing the game at times it's still pretty fun... and has an active player base with games running all the time. Now on the official server there isn't a single ZK room left.

As it was i could be playing ZK games then i could join the XTA peoples on some games then work on my game and ocasionally chat. All on the same hub.

It can be good for ZK community though, as new players are less likely to be confused and/or hop into other games in the future, especially if it goes into steam.

If i remember correctly there was some confusion when EVO went steam because of different games, lobbies etc coexisting on the same server.
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Forboding Angel
Evolution RTS Developer
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Forboding Angel »

raaar wrote: If i remember correctly there was some confusion when EVO went steam because of different games, lobbies etc coexisting on the same server.
No, the confusion was on the side of the spring players, because I dumped all those people in newbies and main. As a result, regular springers thought they were using a vanilla lobby with no presets.

That caused some problems but not because of steam users or anything on that side. Their game list was already filtered to evo.

The reasoning for putting them in main and newbies was that I figured that ideally someone would think to clickt he big red x of the game filter and see all the other games they could play and main and newbies might help the transition.

Unfortunately it didn't pan out that way.

The lobby confusion was also on the side of existing springers, because weblobby had such a small userbase, we had springers trying to have people do things that can only be done in zklobby or springlobby and shit like that and none of them with weblobby experience.

Once again it wouldn't have been a problem if I had been more strict on channel autojoins, but I was trying to appease some of the idiots on these forums and it came back to bite me.
msafwan
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Joined: 16 Dec 2010, 14:44

Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by msafwan »

I've heard the goal is for the 2 lobby server to connect thru a bridge.

I also heard that there's disagreement on the idea; because Spring server (abma) wanted always-On encryption but ZK server (licho) want only secure Login.

I imagine if the bridge is a success, we could have isolated servers to join with Spring and create a "federation of servers"!

If we resist this idea, its like putting everything into 1 basket. If Spring server goes down, every single Mod dies. If Spring server did not go down, other servers will still be alone.
gajop
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by gajop »

msafwan wrote:I've heard the goal is for the 2 lobby server to connect thru a bridge.

I also heard that there's disagreement on the idea; because Spring server (abma) wanted always-On encryption but ZK server (licho) want only secure Login.

I imagine if the bridge is a success, we could have isolated servers to join with Spring and create a "federation of servers"!

If we resist this idea, its like putting everything into 1 basket. If Spring server goes down, every single Mod dies. If Spring server did not go down, other servers will still be alone.
The disagreement is on more than just the encryption. Licho has also removed/changed other features present in uber and specified under the lobby protocol. The two implementations are bound to diverge until they become fully protocol incompatible to the point you can't use the same lobby client on both.
There is little interest here of doing federation of incompatible protocols. The way I see it, it's just Licho's attempt to portray this as something other than a community split. It doesn't seriously consider the abundant issues such as user/battle/channel naming collisions or the protocol issues I mentioned previously.

As to "putting eggs in one basket". Well, that's just wrong. There wouldn't be any issues with this if it was an attempt of clustering the server, or even doing a different implementation while respecting the protocol, but it would still require a lot of design so it doesn't turn out like a crappy hack. Also, so what if the server goes down? You just restart it or redeploy it and the system would continue working right away.
msafwan
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by msafwan »

gajop wrote: The disagreement is on more than just the encryption. Licho has also removed/changed other features present in uber and specified under the lobby protocol. The two implementations are bound to diverge until they become fully protocol incompatible to the point you can't use the same lobby client on both.
Currently, despite Licho changed the code, a same lobby client could still use both server. In point of view of user, this didn't show the protocol is incompatible.
gajop wrote:There is little interest here of doing federation of incompatible protocols. The way I see it, it's just Licho's attempt to portray this as something other than a community split.
Why you are toward community split? Licho reserve legacy protocol for compatibility if needed, but if someone want a real split (like purposely make it difficult for compatibility) this will cause real split.
gajop wrote:It doesn't seriously consider the abundant issues such as user/battle/channel naming collisions or the protocol issues I mentioned previously.
Why not just work out the appropriate user naming or battle naming or channel naming? I'm guessing the change was just to add some kind of prefix to name. How is that become much issue?
gajop wrote:As to "putting eggs in one basket". Well, that's just wrong. There wouldn't be any issues with this if it was an attempt of clustering the server, or even doing a different implementation while respecting the protocol, but it would still require a lot of design so it doesn't turn out like a crappy hack.
I saw hack already in current protocol, like why CPU is used for Lobby type? that work just fine, people play thousand of successful game already.
gajop wrote:Also, so what if the server goes down? You just restart it or redeploy it and the system would continue working right away.
But players want interconnected server, please :(
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Silentwings
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Silentwings »

I saw hack already in current protocol, like why CPU is used for Lobby type? that work just fine, people play thousand of successful game already.
It has no effect on playing games, the information is discarded by autohosts and human hosts alike. The lobby type was never part of the lobby protocol and the "CPU" field (which was part of the protocol but was never reliable) is deprecated.
gajop
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by gajop »

msafwan wrote: In point of view of user, this didn't show the protocol is incompatible.
User point of view is irrelevant, it's either compatible or not. This is a fact, not something you vote on.
msafwan wrote: Why you are toward community split? Licho reserve legacy protocol for compatibility if needed, but if someone want a real split (like purposely make it difficult for compatibility) this will cause real split.
WTH? Community is already split, and it's not something we did! Also as I said, Licho already broke compatibility.
msafwan wrote: Why not just work out the appropriate user naming or battle naming or channel naming? I'm guessing the change was just to add some kind of prefix to name. How is that become much issue?
It wasn't even considered but there are a lot of issues. Names and ids will no longer be unique identifiers across the server. This will cause a bunch of issues and confusion. I'm sure you can think of one at least, but here it goes: (if a channel exists on both servers, will it use a prefix? if so, to be in the same channel, people would have to use a different name to join it depending on their server -> confusion; if not, would we suddenly have people barging in a passworded #mysecretchannel? -> issue). AND there's a compatibility issue
msafwan wrote: I saw hack already in current protocol, like why CPU is used for Lobby type? that work just fine, people play thousand of successful game already.
CPU used to identify the lobby type is a minor thing. This is not, so don't attempt to equate the two.
msafwan wrote: But players want interconnected server, please :(
So go complain at Licho, maybe he would be more willing to listen to these *arguments*.

I find it quite annoying how you are ignoring the most important issue: lobby protocol incompatibility. Looking at the ZK Infra repo it's easy to see all the changes that have made it partially incompatible. Why do you keep denying this?
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1v0ry_k1ng
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by 1v0ry_k1ng »

I don't see why you see the split as a problem. That a game made with the spring engine that is not BA has sufficient player base to have an independent lobby is fantastic. There is nothing preventing players from having ZK lobby installed to play ZK, and Springlobby installed to play other games.

Quake III and Jedi Knight II have the same Q3 engine, but I don't open up Q3 expecting to be able to play JKII. Any game that wants to build a polished experience between double clicking the game icon and making it in-game needs to fork to some degree.
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Licho
Zero-K Developer
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Licho »

Gajop, nothing important is "broken" in the protocol. Removed commands were admin commands and rename .. .
All ordinary stuff is intact. If you consider removal of bunch of admin commands, which would not be a part of relay anyway "breaking protocol", then I must say that you probably suffer from the same orthodox/idealist view of things which sadly often does more harm than help and harms the progress..
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CarRepairer
Cursed Zero-K Developer
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by CarRepairer »

1v0ry_k1ng wrote:There is nothing preventing players from having ZK lobby installed to play ZK, and Springlobby installed to play other games.
Or better yet, having Weblobby installed to play ZK, and then having Weblobby installed to play other games.
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Forboding Angel
Evolution RTS Developer
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Forboding Angel »

^^ I had to explain that to someone last night.

The issue is that ZKL does things it the most backwards manner possible. Namely, the way it stores assets is freaking mental, so a direct migration is more difficult (although very doable if you know where to move your stuff from ZKL).
gajop
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by gajop »

Licho wrote:Removed commands were admin commands and rename
https://github.com/ZeroK-RTS/Zero-K-Inf ... 4889b9c147
https://github.com/ZeroK-RTS/Zero-K-Inf ... 6012c77db0
So, not really?
I'm just not interested in working with someone who's going to remove other people's work as he pleases and then say: "we should work together!".
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Jazcash
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Re: ZK lobby server split is a disaster?

Post by Jazcash »

1v0ry_k1ng wrote:I don't see why you see the split as a problem. That a game made with the spring engine that is not BA has sufficient player base to have an independent lobby is fantastic. There is nothing preventing players from having ZK lobby installed to play ZK, and Springlobby installed to play other games.

Quake III and Jedi Knight II have the same Q3 engine, but I don't open up Q3 expecting to be able to play JKII. Any game that wants to build a polished experience between double clicking the game icon and making it in-game needs to fork to some degree.
My thoughts exactly. The whole 'Spring' as a community type thing is getting a bit old-hat now, no? The name 'Spring' itself should start being used specifically as a reference to the engine and not a collection of games that use the Spring engine, or the community on this forum, or the lobby server.

I agree completely that in a small community, a situation like this isn't ideal, but I think ZK now has a playerbase large enough to survive living on its own and this is simply it flying the nest. That said, I think the main server remaining available for use by anybody is vital for all the other projects that typically have fewer players, or less resource-equipped developers.

To use the nest metaphor once more, games should be born and bred on the main server and nurtured there until they are successful or profitable enough to move on to their own systems. If they never become these things, then they are no great cost to the main server's resources so it's no big deal. However, if they do become these things, then it's arguable they will burden the server with a mass influx of players. Certainly not an unlikely scenario in the event of something like Steam front page coverage.

If anything, it should be the lobby client's job to allow connecting to multiple servers at once, like most advanced IRC clients.
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