Are people really surprised that putting all lvl 60s on the server, (and the vast majority of players logged on), crashes it? I simply don't think MMoRPG servers are designed to handle load that way. On the other hand, I think it would be smart to create a type of failover set of computers to pick up the load of any computers on any server that were reaching fatal limits. A type of SWAT computer group to help back up the day-to-day servers.
My guess though is that more people won't mean more power in the long term. I'd suspect that as the world grows, the real measure of strength will be something of a exploitable natural resources per person measure. I don't know what china's sitting on but it better be big.
People are social creatures. But the outgoing aspect of it applies more to singles or couples without children. Couples with children have no time to go be social. They instead desire the benefits of a small town, (knowing your neighbor, letting your kids go out and play and not worrying, etc). Small towns a really the way outsourcing should be done. Put people who are raising families in smaller towns with less to do but a more friendly, (and inexpensive), environment.
I think that the angle for small towns is not small businesses working for big businesses, but big businesses setting up departments in small towns. A programming group set up in a small town should have better cohesion and while the big company can win the work on its big public image, the close-knit aspect of the small town center where the work is actually done can make the good product.
It seems to be fairly hard to remove javascript from input where other tags are allowed. By removing things you introduce other things. And web browser parsing becomes even more complex.
Is there an easier way to check for injections on rendering of the data rather than on saving of the data?
I have the business package so have a good 70-90KB up. =). I don't really want to let people tunnel all the way into my home network. I would rather something like winamp except that it worked as a client/server over a secured link. Preferably they'd be able to drag songs they liked over to their computer also. I though tunneling x might work, (I could easily write a quick script that started up everything including the tunnel for them), until I figured out xtunneling doesn't work with sound. Maybe xmms2 will do what I need.
I went the same way. Having had more drives die than I can count, its not worth keeping data anywhere but a central, LARGE, array. About January last year I got a rack 48u tall. I had 2 custom machines put together by a local shop, (I wanted someone to run to when they break.) I have a 4u case w/ room for 8 hard drives plus 2 DVD drives. I have an 8-way sata raid card w/ hardware xor. I have 4 drives in the array right now, (at 300GB/drive I get about 850GB storage in raid 5). It runs debian linux, (very easy install). I have gigabit installed and share files using smb and ssh. (I guess I could use nfs if there was somewhere to share them too. I can add drives to the array dynamically so when I want to expand I can.
However I did make the mistake of not using LVM to set up the drives so adding drives is going to be complicated. (I also did a poor job of partitioning which isn't helping my cause.)
Since I built this there are now multiple cheaper solutions w/ at least a TB of storage. Little appliances you just plug into your network. I think they are the cheapest, quickest, and easiest way to do what you want. The second easiest given your low storage needs is to use the on-board raid chip on most new mobos and set up a raid 1 array with 2 400GB or 500GB drives.
But if you do go the full system approach, (which certainly lets you be flexible with how you share the data), Think about how you will expand the array when you need to, (both physically and partition wise). Think about the partitioning, (I basically have 1 for the OS and 1 HUGE partition with home media and temp, (basically everything I download), partitions that are that are bind mounted to where I want them. This means one partition won't fill up while the other has space. Think about how you will replace drives, (seagate drives have a 5 year warranty. Not a bad idea when you are making a system w/ 7 or 8 of them.) Think about power consumption of large numbers of drives. (I have mine on battery backup because the box is also my server. The poor APC XS 800 (800VA, 540Watts) can bearly handle the server and the cable modem.
And think about how you want to make the data available. I personally like being able to get to my data anywhere, (includes my email which is on the server). I make smb available inside the network and ssh inside and out. I tunnel X over ssh and run evolution. I however haven't found a good way for my friends/family to access my photos/music to play/download. I also use webmin to interact with it for the most part.
Also if you go the computer route, it has to be one of those computers you don't fiddle with. Install debian, set it to install security updates, and forget about it. The more you mess with it, the more likely you are to fubar it and the array.
Anyway, thats my experience. I have to say that I am VERY happy storing everything that isn't an OS or a program on a storage computer. I don't have to worry about my data dieing w/ the drives. I don't have to worry about it being inaccessable when I'm on the road. I don't have to worry about trying to find something in the "pictures" directory on 6 different computers, (some a "pictures" directory on multiple hard drives within them). And I don't have to worry about about 100 different physical drives running out of space!
I would dearly love a mac. And w/ the Intel ones coming out, the powerpc macs are heavily discounted. But I don't want a mac if the software for it is going to disappear within the next 3 years. Anyone have a feeling on what the lifespan of powerpc macs is now? Even a brand new G5?
I agree that it is about time to leave the pentium name. At some point it just gets old. And I have to admit that when I hear 'pentium', I still think of the original pentium. Or when I hear about the new pentium I think "how many pentiums have there been again?" The 'pentium' was meant to be the processor that followed the 486. Its just plain old.
On the other hand, they really should come up w/ a new name. Call it the powerblock or the razorbeak or flubber. Whatever they want. But give it a new, identifiable name to help carry on the brand identification. A D840 means so little to me I'll likely never pick one on my own. I have no clue what any number there represents as far as architecture version, speed, etc. At least most AMD chips are identifiable by their core name.
I have made some... bad recording choises... over the last couple of years which has resulted in a music collection in mp3, ogg, and aac. Also I have lots of video, mp4, wmv, mov, and *shudder* rm. Those really become inaccessable from this device though my modded xbox is always capable of using the non-HD stuff. But I would really need both HD and TV recording/timeshifting, (in an open format though it looks like this does do that), before I got something. I would prefer that they provided something I could put in my back room, (to avoid the HDD/fan noise), and interface w/ a thin client at the TV.
I think with the prepackaged software in linux and windows media center, media center computers are finally starting to show polish out of the box. Unfortunately I think linux media centers have somewhat missed a devisive turn.
Microsoft is starting to lean to a "put the media wherever and use it at your TV" approach. Probably based on the fact that most people already have computers. W/ the xbox 360 and the Windows Media Extenders you can have your media in your computer room and play it anywhere.
I think this is the right approach. I have my media on a computer in a rack in my back room. Should I get cable I'd build a computer w/ a tv tuner to put in the rack. I don't want a large computer that has to crunch LOTS of data, (particularly to transcode HDTV), sitting making all sorts of noise and heat in my entertainment center. Additionally I don't want one like the one chosen for this article that looks more like my game cube than like my receiver. I want something that no-one even considers is a computer.
What we need is better linux support for things like uPNP-AV appliances, basically thin clients. The last time I looked at it it was pretty weak. But linux would make a great back end on a computer capable of managing my media in an open framework so I did not have to worry about accessing it. I just need a package I can install on some computer w/ a few TV tuners in it and then plug in some media extender that looks nice in my entertainment center and has no fans which can then control the media capabilities of the TV card and manage HD playback.
Until this support is available I will probably forego TV recording and HDTV playback. For everything else, (music playing, non-HD video playing, emulators, image viewing), I'll just use my modded xbox and xbox media center. (For those who have never thought about it, modding a used xbox --which takes about an hour-- and installing xbox media center is the best, easiest, and cheapest way to get about everything except TV recording/timeshifting and HD playback.
I was all for liquid cooling right up until the point where I had the liquid freeze in the tubes while I was transporting the computer. It worked afterwards but weakened the system and it broke a few months later. Reguardless, I don't think it's worth the hastle yet. Also, I went to rack mounted systems so they'd all be together and out of the way.
I think Sony and Toshiba are going to spend so much time fighting the battles that they will lose the war. People will refuse to move away from DVD to a multi-hundred dollar player while the battle rages. But they WILL be willing to download a piece of software that lets them buy movies online. I think Sony and Toshiba will postpone the next disk winner for so long that people will go strait to direct download, (which I see as being the eventual next step).
Another thing to remember is the female component. What I know of the females that play is they crave the social interaction afforded them by games. Considering the article I saw here, (or another news agregator, I forget which), the other day that females outnumber males online, I think there is high insentive to facilitate and reward robust social networks. (How many girls do you know that use slashdot compared to the number that use myspace.)
I think the revolution will not need the network as much. It is designed more for casual gamers to get away and relax or social gamers to play with friends physically present. I don't think that a lack of online focus will hurt it the same way it doesn't really detract from the gamecube.
The PS3 though will likely live or die based on 2 things, it's online capability and it's game catalog. If they get a huge game catalog heavy on RPGs not available on other systems, they can survive w/o the online in some fasion. But in the US and Europe at least, I see online game play and media capabilities defining what console people buy within the next 4 or 5 years. If the PS3 doesn't have online capability, in the US and Europe it'll be a console people will only buy to play a specific game or 2. And that won't be enough to make it profitable.
I really don't think that real people add tactical depth unless forced to. Over the holiday I talked with a friend who plays BF2, (I play AA:Ops). Basically he indicated that BF2 was more people running around shooting eachother rather than working toward any common goal. AA:Ops gives very little progress for kills and large amounts for goals. It rewards people who accomplish goals and those who work together.
Anyone who played Everquest knows the complexity of some of the fights. They all became easy as people became experienced in the encounter, but many of them required specific people doing specific things at specific times. And the experience in EQ of walking through Qeynos and it's Aquaducts to the first time you came to Kelethin to sneaking around the plane of Hate made the player truely feel that they were in another world to a depth otherwise impossible. And as MMoRPGs grow with encounters such as those in World of Warcraft, the depth of strategy improves.
The problem of course is that the encounters, however complex, don't change. I think to get out of the 'do' loop of developing new encounters, new content, and new rewards at the high end, MMoRPG designers are going to have to program their encounters to 'learn' from the strategies used against them and develop counter strategies so that all encounters are continuiously changing.
They're really throwing out pennies here. It's just a way to throw some money at small companies for the greater good. But likely it won't amount to much. 1 out of 100 they do may be useful.
This year I gave to Childs Play from Penny Arcade, Through my parish, and to a charity dance (I think toys for tots distributed the gifts). Basically I give through organizations that represent me; as a gamer, as religious, and as a social dancer =).
I wonder how this ties back to the chinese hacking article that was up a day or 2 ago. Does the lack of uptake of SP2 in other countries, particularly ones like china who are known for their piracy, soften them to US cyber retaliation?
I agree completely. Our current limitations are more so in the computers HMI input than in the output. When we can input in 3D space effectively then a 3D display may become relevant.
I think gestures are the next step in interface design. The fingerworks touchpads are a great example of this. After that I think we will move into volumetric interfaces where you can not just see something in 3D but reach into it and interact with it. Really what we need are better direct HMIs as in Ghost in the Shell. Until then we will be signifigantly limited in our ability to interact with our electronics.
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Are people really surprised that putting all lvl 60s on the server, (and the vast majority of players logged on), crashes it? I simply don't think MMoRPG servers are designed to handle load that way. On the other hand, I think it would be smart to create a type of failover set of computers to pick up the load of any computers on any server that were reaching fatal limits. A type of SWAT computer group to help back up the day-to-day servers.
My guess though is that more people won't mean more power in the long term. I'd suspect that as the world grows, the real measure of strength will be something of a exploitable natural resources per person measure. I don't know what china's sitting on but it better be big.
This is very dependant on the location of the small town. Western Kansas has much less to do than say mid-Colorado =).
I think that the angle for small towns is not small businesses working for big businesses, but big businesses setting up departments in small towns. A programming group set up in a small town should have better cohesion and while the big company can win the work on its big public image, the close-knit aspect of the small town center where the work is actually done can make the good product.
Is there an easier way to check for injections on rendering of the data rather than on saving of the data?
I have the business package so have a good 70-90KB up. =). I don't really want to let people tunnel all the way into my home network. I would rather something like winamp except that it worked as a client/server over a secured link. Preferably they'd be able to drag songs they liked over to their computer also. I though tunneling x might work, (I could easily write a quick script that started up everything including the tunnel for them), until I figured out xtunneling doesn't work with sound. Maybe xmms2 will do what I need.
However I did make the mistake of not using LVM to set up the drives so adding drives is going to be complicated. (I also did a poor job of partitioning which isn't helping my cause.)
Since I built this there are now multiple cheaper solutions w/ at least a TB of storage. Little appliances you just plug into your network. I think they are the cheapest, quickest, and easiest way to do what you want. The second easiest given your low storage needs is to use the on-board raid chip on most new mobos and set up a raid 1 array with 2 400GB or 500GB drives.
But if you do go the full system approach, (which certainly lets you be flexible with how you share the data), Think about how you will expand the array when you need to, (both physically and partition wise). Think about the partitioning, (I basically have 1 for the OS and 1 HUGE partition with home media and temp, (basically everything I download), partitions that are that are bind mounted to where I want them. This means one partition won't fill up while the other has space. Think about how you will replace drives, (seagate drives have a 5 year warranty. Not a bad idea when you are making a system w/ 7 or 8 of them.) Think about power consumption of large numbers of drives. (I have mine on battery backup because the box is also my server. The poor APC XS 800 (800VA, 540Watts) can bearly handle the server and the cable modem.
And think about how you want to make the data available. I personally like being able to get to my data anywhere, (includes my email which is on the server). I make smb available inside the network and ssh inside and out. I tunnel X over ssh and run evolution. I however haven't found a good way for my friends/family to access my photos/music to play/download. I also use webmin to interact with it for the most part.
Also if you go the computer route, it has to be one of those computers you don't fiddle with. Install debian, set it to install security updates, and forget about it. The more you mess with it, the more likely you are to fubar it and the array.
Anyway, thats my experience. I have to say that I am VERY happy storing everything that isn't an OS or a program on a storage computer. I don't have to worry about my data dieing w/ the drives. I don't have to worry about it being inaccessable when I'm on the road. I don't have to worry about trying to find something in the "pictures" directory on 6 different computers, (some a "pictures" directory on multiple hard drives within them). And I don't have to worry about about 100 different physical drives running out of space!
I would dearly love a mac. And w/ the Intel ones coming out, the powerpc macs are heavily discounted. But I don't want a mac if the software for it is going to disappear within the next 3 years. Anyone have a feeling on what the lifespan of powerpc macs is now? Even a brand new G5?
On the other hand, they really should come up w/ a new name. Call it the powerblock or the razorbeak or flubber. Whatever they want. But give it a new, identifiable name to help carry on the brand identification. A D840 means so little to me I'll likely never pick one on my own. I have no clue what any number there represents as far as architecture version, speed, etc. At least most AMD chips are identifiable by their core name.
I have made some... bad recording choises ... over the last couple of years which has resulted in a music collection in mp3, ogg, and aac. Also I have lots of video, mp4, wmv, mov, and *shudder* rm. Those really become inaccessable from this device though my modded xbox is always capable of using the non-HD stuff. But I would really need both HD and TV recording/timeshifting, (in an open format though it looks like this does do that), before I got something. I would prefer that they provided something I could put in my back room, (to avoid the HDD/fan noise), and interface w/ a thin client at the TV.
The network media one or only the time based ones? Also it seems like they are limited in the formats they can play.
Can the KISS products record live tv and do timeshifting or control a computer that does?
Microsoft is starting to lean to a "put the media wherever and use it at your TV" approach. Probably based on the fact that most people already have computers. W/ the xbox 360 and the Windows Media Extenders you can have your media in your computer room and play it anywhere.
I think this is the right approach. I have my media on a computer in a rack in my back room. Should I get cable I'd build a computer w/ a tv tuner to put in the rack. I don't want a large computer that has to crunch LOTS of data, (particularly to transcode HDTV), sitting making all sorts of noise and heat in my entertainment center. Additionally I don't want one like the one chosen for this article that looks more like my game cube than like my receiver. I want something that no-one even considers is a computer.
What we need is better linux support for things like uPNP-AV appliances, basically thin clients. The last time I looked at it it was pretty weak. But linux would make a great back end on a computer capable of managing my media in an open framework so I did not have to worry about accessing it. I just need a package I can install on some computer w/ a few TV tuners in it and then plug in some media extender that looks nice in my entertainment center and has no fans which can then control the media capabilities of the TV card and manage HD playback.
Until this support is available I will probably forego TV recording and HDTV playback. For everything else, (music playing, non-HD video playing, emulators, image viewing), I'll just use my modded xbox and xbox media center. (For those who have never thought about it, modding a used xbox --which takes about an hour-- and installing xbox media center is the best, easiest, and cheapest way to get about everything except TV recording/timeshifting and HD playback.
I was all for liquid cooling right up until the point where I had the liquid freeze in the tubes while I was transporting the computer. It worked afterwards but weakened the system and it broke a few months later. Reguardless, I don't think it's worth the hastle yet. Also, I went to rack mounted systems so they'd all be together and out of the way.
I think Sony and Toshiba are going to spend so much time fighting the battles that they will lose the war. People will refuse to move away from DVD to a multi-hundred dollar player while the battle rages. But they WILL be willing to download a piece of software that lets them buy movies online. I think Sony and Toshiba will postpone the next disk winner for so long that people will go strait to direct download, (which I see as being the eventual next step).
There's already a movie on this.
Another thing to remember is the female component. What I know of the females that play is they crave the social interaction afforded them by games. Considering the article I saw here, (or another news agregator, I forget which), the other day that females outnumber males online, I think there is high insentive to facilitate and reward robust social networks. (How many girls do you know that use slashdot compared to the number that use myspace.)
The PS3 though will likely live or die based on 2 things, it's online capability and it's game catalog. If they get a huge game catalog heavy on RPGs not available on other systems, they can survive w/o the online in some fasion. But in the US and Europe at least, I see online game play and media capabilities defining what console people buy within the next 4 or 5 years. If the PS3 doesn't have online capability, in the US and Europe it'll be a console people will only buy to play a specific game or 2. And that won't be enough to make it profitable.
Anyone who played Everquest knows the complexity of some of the fights. They all became easy as people became experienced in the encounter, but many of them required specific people doing specific things at specific times. And the experience in EQ of walking through Qeynos and it's Aquaducts to the first time you came to Kelethin to sneaking around the plane of Hate made the player truely feel that they were in another world to a depth otherwise impossible. And as MMoRPGs grow with encounters such as those in World of Warcraft, the depth of strategy improves.
The problem of course is that the encounters, however complex, don't change. I think to get out of the 'do' loop of developing new encounters, new content, and new rewards at the high end, MMoRPG designers are going to have to program their encounters to 'learn' from the strategies used against them and develop counter strategies so that all encounters are continuiously changing.
Now we know what the impetus to switch to internet 2 will be.
They're really throwing out pennies here. It's just a way to throw some money at small companies for the greater good. But likely it won't amount to much. 1 out of 100 they do may be useful.
This year I gave to Childs Play from Penny Arcade, Through my parish, and to a charity dance (I think toys for tots distributed the gifts). Basically I give through organizations that represent me; as a gamer, as religious, and as a social dancer =).
I wonder how this ties back to the chinese hacking article that was up a day or 2 ago. Does the lack of uptake of SP2 in other countries, particularly ones like china who are known for their piracy, soften them to US cyber retaliation?
I think gestures are the next step in interface design. The fingerworks touchpads are a great example of this. After that I think we will move into volumetric interfaces where you can not just see something in 3D but reach into it and interact with it. Really what we need are better direct HMIs as in Ghost in the Shell. Until then we will be signifigantly limited in our ability to interact with our electronics.
The whole time I was there I felt like I was moving inside a dome. It was honestly like the realization of the fog of war in a Warcraft game.