I agree your ideas have merit Dan and are well intentioned, if the ultimate scenario is everyone having "averaged" connection performance. I admit with being UK based I have absolutely no knowledge of server and client connections in the states but in the UK and Europe this sort of automated system would be frowned upon, heavily, for a few reasons.
Servers I manage operate on 1 or 2 x 100mbit full duplex connections per box, which run from 3-6 clan ports or publics, say 30-120 slots. Based on this server side bandwidth is never an issue, bearing in mind the maxrates of these servers is 50000 kbits. In fact our clients in general don't even consider the bandwidth they use as we impose no limitation. So auto-rates serve no purpose here. Client side connections to our game servers are primarily from broadband clients using ADSL or cable (512kbps/256kbps being the average), very few ISDN users (64kbps) and hardly any analogue modemers. Clients connections although contended do not suffer the severe bandwidth losses you have highlighted (love the examples btw :D), the majority seeing solid sustained average rates at all times. So again auto-rates serve no purpose here. I can see however that should we provide a volume of community servers, free of charge to the public, in a region where clients did suffer such a varying level of bandwidth, your ideas would be welcomed. However, we primarily provide performance (high tick/fps) private match servers to clans on a rental basis. Our emphasis is on the performance of the server and to that end clans are looking for the maximum bang (tick/fps/good bullet reg) for their buck with as much control over the configuration as allowable. As you can see this differs massively from the criteria desired of a community public. I suppose it's a matter of circumstance as to which camp people fall in. I'd always assumed the majority of CS and CSS servers were rented to clans as private or public servers, not given away as community resources, I could equally be wrong though :) The same goes for my assumptions of server and client connections/bandwidth. All of the above not withstanding I feel there is a much bigger issue responsible for not using an auto-rate system, server side overheads. CS and CSS servers already consume considerable resources using a fixed rate system, I can only see an auto-rate system increasing this resource usage, nevermind the recoding of whatever server and client side to add this feature. To instigate an auto system to outright replace the existing options would however be a total disaster in the UK and Europe. In our region the mass of servers running are clan ports, either private or public and are therefore purchased by clans based on there performance for their players and region. Levelling the playing field to such a degree doesn't just reduce versatility for server admins, clans and players it literally removes all possibility of it. Server performance and rate "tweaking" is something clans almost require, reports of rate abuse are ever increasing and other than using plugins/addons (baggage attached) to control client rates (specifically cl_cmdrate) we are powerless to prevent it. At least we've ascertained that one system alone is unlikely to suit all, as with most things in life :) Maybe an auto-rate option could be added to the current min/max system (say setting all netrate options to 0), allowing server admins to select auto or fixed min/max. This and the addition of sv_mincmdrate and sv_maxcmdrate to the fixed options would provide very comprehensive control indeed. This is certainly something Valve should be looking into though. Adding server cmdrate min/max would solve a major issue and hand off responsibility for "rates" in general to server admins, which I feel most would welcome. Forcing an auto system would obviously be more involved. That combined with Valve becoming responsible for everyones netrates (baggage attached) whether they like it or not, hmm, somehow I don't think they are willing to take such a risk. Common sense would say that should any auto-rate system be added it would be possible to disable it anyway, so hopefully it would be considered on merit. As usual just my 1p (2 cents approx) :) _______________________________________________ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlds_linux
