Stuart Cheshire, IP guru and author of Bolo, investigated these issues very thoroughly 4 years ago, and wrote it up as It's the Latency, Stupid , which you shoudl read. He also wrote a second paper Latency and the Quest for Interactivity, which is also well worth reading, but I'll quote the conclusion for those too lazy to click a link (remember this was written in 1996):
To improve the quality of computer network interaction, we need to do two things: 1. We need to aggressively eliminate all causes of unnecessary latency in our computer hardware and software. 2. For interactions with the other side of the planet, we can never beat the speed of light, so we need to develop latency-hiding techniques that give us the illusion of interactivity when true interactivity is not possible. As long as customers think that what they want is more throughput, and they don't care about latency, modem makers will continue to make design decisions that trade off worse latency for better throughput. Modems are not the only problem here. In the near future we can expect to see a big growth in areas such as ISDN, Cable TV modems, ADSL modems and even Wireless 'modems', all offering increases in bandwidth. If we don't also concentrate on improved latency, we're not going to get it. One first step in this process would be for the industry to adopt a modem latency rating scheme. TEN, MPath, Catapult, Sandcastle and the other network gaming companies could collaborate to set this up. Modems that can achieve a round-trip delay below say, 100ms, could be authorized to place a sticker on the box saying "Gameplay approved" and the gaming companies could encourage their customers to buy only modems that are "Gameplay approved". If we don't start caring about latency, we're going to find ourselves in a marketplace offering nothing but appallingly useless hardware.
William Thompson (later raised to the peerage as Lord Kelvin) did huge amounts of theoretical and experimental work on Thermodynamics, Electromagnetism, as well as inventing the reflecting Galvanometer that made undersea cables practical (he made pots of money from this too...) He was a definitive geek - on his honeymoon in Switzerland he measured the temperature at the top and bottom of the highest waterfall he could find to confirm the conversion of potental energy into kinetic energy.
Tycho Brahe spent his life making extremely accurate measuements of the positions of stars and planets, before the invention of the telescope. Without these data, Kepler would not have had the information to formulate the theory of elliptical orbits, which Newton later explained. He had an artifical nose made of gold because he lost his due to congenital syphilis.
Finally, if I can extend back a few more millennia, I'd like to put a word in for Epeus (sometimes spelt Epeius), who was the greek engineer who designed and built the original Trojan Horse.
Whenever education is mentioned, there is a knee-jerk response - more money. This approach was tested to destruction in the UK, where failing schools got given more money by Local Education Authorities, and pupils were forced to attend them. Then the policy was changed. Schools were funded on the basis of number of pupils, and allowed to choose how to spend the money themselves; the pupils were free to attend the school of their (parents') choice, the shcools got to select the pupils if oversubscribed. A lot of bad schools closed and good schools grew. Overall school results improved enormously - the schools competed for pupils. Sadly, the current UK govt is reversing this policy, and giving power back to the Local Education Authorities instead of the schools, despite the evidence.
One day Sir Alec was accosted in the street by a woman and her 12-year old boy. "He's seen Star Wars over 100 times" she said proudly. "Can you give him some of your wise advice?" Guinness walked over to the boy, bent down and looked him in the eye and slowly said "Never - watch - it - again"
I still think is best films are 'Kind Hearts and Coronets', 'The Lavender Hill Mob' and 'The Man in the White Suit' - a nerd parable if ever there was one.
Have you looked into using Akamai to host your images? They disperse them over their servers around the world so that they are very near your users. They do charge though...
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Stuart Cheshire, IP guru and author of Bolo, investigated these issues very thoroughly 4 years ago, and wrote it up as It's the Latency, Stupid , which you shoudl read. He also wrote a second paper Latency and the Quest for Interactivity , which is also well worth reading, but I'll quote the conclusion for those too lazy to click a link (remember this was written in 1996):
To improve the quality of computer network interaction, we need to do two things:
1. We need to aggressively eliminate all causes of unnecessary latency in our computer hardware and software.
2. For interactions with the other side of the planet, we can never beat the speed of light, so we need to develop latency-hiding techniques that give us the illusion of interactivity when true interactivity is not possible.
As long as customers think that what they want is more throughput, and they don't care about latency, modem makers will continue to make design decisions that trade off worse latency for better throughput.
Modems are not the only problem here. In the near future we can expect to see a big growth in areas such as ISDN, Cable TV modems, ADSL modems and even Wireless 'modems', all offering increases in bandwidth. If we don't also concentrate on improved latency, we're not going to get it.
One first step in this process would be for the industry to adopt a modem latency rating scheme. TEN, MPath, Catapult, Sandcastle and the other network gaming companies could collaborate to set this up. Modems that can achieve a round-trip delay below say, 100ms, could be authorized to place a sticker on the box saying "Gameplay approved" and the gaming companies could encourage their customers to buy only modems that are "Gameplay approved".
If we don't start caring about latency, we're going to find ourselves in a marketplace offering nothing but appallingly useless hardware.
William Thompson (later raised to the peerage as Lord Kelvin) did huge amounts of theoretical and experimental work on Thermodynamics, Electromagnetism, as well as inventing the reflecting Galvanometer that made undersea cables practical (he made pots of money from this too...)
He was a definitive geek - on his honeymoon in Switzerland he measured the temperature at the top and bottom of the highest waterfall he could find to confirm the conversion of potental energy into kinetic energy.
Tycho Brahe spent his life making extremely accurate measuements of the positions of stars and planets, before the invention of the telescope. Without these data, Kepler would not have had the information to formulate the theory of elliptical orbits, which Newton later explained. He had an artifical nose made of gold because he lost his due to congenital syphilis.
Finally, if I can extend back a few more millennia, I'd like to put a word in for Epeus (sometimes spelt Epeius), who was the greek engineer who designed and built the original Trojan Horse.
Whenever education is mentioned, there is a knee-jerk response - more money. This approach was tested to destruction in the UK, where failing schools got given more money by Local Education Authorities, and pupils were forced to attend them.
Then the policy was changed. Schools were funded on the basis of number of pupils, and allowed to choose how to spend the money themselves; the pupils were free to attend the school of their (parents') choice, the shcools got to select the pupils if oversubscribed. A lot of bad schools closed and good schools grew. Overall school results improved enormously - the schools competed for pupils.
Sadly, the current UK govt is reversing this policy, and giving power back to the Local Education Authorities instead of the schools, despite the evidence.
I think this is just heightened news sensitivity.
This site tells me there were 1183 earthquakes in California this week.
The LadyKillers- how could I miss that one out!
Mind you Guinness's performance, strong as it is, isn't the centre of the film as it is in the other three, as it is more of an ensemble piece.
I wonder if the Ealing comedies are out on DVD yet?
One day Sir Alec was accosted in the street by a woman and her 12-year old boy.
"He's seen Star Wars over 100 times" she said proudly. "Can you give him some of your wise advice?"
Guinness walked over to the boy, bent down and looked him in the eye and slowly said "Never - watch - it - again"
I still think is best films are 'Kind Hearts and Coronets', 'The Lavender Hill Mob' and 'The Man in the White Suit' - a nerd parable if ever there was one.
Have you looked into using Akamai to host your images? They disperse them over their servers around the world so that they are very near your users. They do charge though...