Taking the load off CM Mods - a hypothetical

[Soddball]

Originally posted by Redwolf:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Soddball:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Redwolf:

There is absolutely no reason to go for a single-vendor protocol, especially if it is single-vendor, single-platform, closed-source, small-company implementation aka a toy, when there is a standard protocol with multiple implementations available.

The life expectancy of this is much less than cmmods.com.

And of course the minor point that CMMods relies exclusively on the good will and sound finances of a single person seems to have leapt past your attention. </font>

[Redwolf]

Well, Soddball.

You know the sad thing is that you had the right idea, actually an almost perfect idea, to keep the CM mod community alife.

Yet it is more important to you to ruin the whole thing in flamebait than to carry it forward.

cmmod.com will eventually go down before we are ready, and you just did your share. Congratulations.

[Soddball]

If you wanted to help, you could have downloaded the software, tested it out, joined the group, and tried sharing mods. Instead, you were much more interested in telling me how much better you could do it.

If you want to be useful, then try the damn program and stop telling me how much cleverer you are than everyone.

Don't try to slap a guilt trip onto me. I am going ahead with setting this up. You turn if you want to - the Soddball's not for turning.

[Bonxa]

Hey, I know both of you for good chaps. Don't ruin this by getting angry at each other, you're more like to scare away people from this little project than persuading them to get along if you continue like this.

Redwolf, how do you propose one get hold of the torrents? Don't we need a common place to go to anyway to get them?

Soddball, as Redwolf has pointed out there is a multitude of software for sharing files and Grouper may not be the best or most long lived. Still I think it good that you have gotten something started. What means for sharing we end up with in the end is of lesser importance.

[Redwolf]

Bonxa, you need somebody central to host the information about the files that are dowloadable by the torrent. cmmod.com could do that or anybody else with a fixed server address. However, a pure webserver host will not do, you need a server where you can start whatever you want.

Then that person creates the torrent files (which is scriptable and easier than creating the web pages cmmod has now).

Then you need to bootstrap with one machine (doesn't have to be the same that is hosting the description files) who has everything. Of course more initial machines work better.

Things will be heavy for the initial hosts having everything but will rapidly improve as people download hosts and leave their bittorrent clients open in the directory where their already downloaded files are in. Also, even for the initial host it will be lighter load than just serving the same thing by HTTP.

Here's the guide how to set up the central repository:

http://www.bittorrent.com/guide.html

Soddball's solution pretty much does the same thing but in a tiny isolated package that he'll never be able to convince enough people to download, install, and keep open 24/7, assuming that company stays in business for long enough to matter.

[Bonxa]

Yes, that was how I suspected a bittorrent setup would work. We could essentially reduce the bandwidth requirements of the central server (cmmods right now) but not eliminate the need for it. Given that we have a few people with many mods, their machines on and their bittorrent client open we could achieve good speeds as well.

This can also go into testing. I don't mind having both Grouper and a bittorrent client open at the same time. The catch is we need that central server. Who's up for that?

[ColumbusOHGamer]

I hate to be the one to point this out, but P2P is not going to work, no matter what software you use.

You are all assuming that those who d/l the mods will also be sharing them. You would be lucky to get 1-2% sharing files more than 12 hrs/day and probably less than 10 that will CONSISTANTLY host files 24/7. And of course, everyone has at least 256k d/l pipes to handle the traffic.

Why not start a usenet group, or just highjack an existing one? With usenet, you can use tools that can break up the .zip files into multiple parts so even the 56k users can d/l it. And EVERYONE should have usenet access. Even the worst Euro ISPs carry them. It'll also allow for some history as they will be stored by the ISP usenet sever for at least a few days. It's not the best solution, but it's universal, easy and fast.

That's just my .02 on the topic.

Oh, BTW, bickering amongst each other will certainly not sound inviting to the 1,000's of people reading this thread.

And let me say that for now, and the near future, cmmods.com is NOT GOING ANYWHERE. The month absense was because I had to move away to another city to be with my wife. That's not going to happen unless she becomes extremely ill. Even then, I've already taken steps to make sure cmmods.com stays up.

But, please continue to discuss this. If a reliable solution can be found, I'd gladly hand the responsibility over to another CM fanatic.

[Soddball]

I was seeking a simple, easy-to-work solution for non-technical people (which is what most of us are).

I am assuming that mod downloaders will also share them, yes. A bit of a big assumption.

I know that the system works and that it's fast enough to be worth doing. I also know that it's a potential backup solution.

I shall continue to run the program on my machine with all the CM:AK mods from CMMods on it and available for whoever wants them. I certainly can't run it 24/7 but it'll be on when I'm around.

Edited to add: It's not typical peer-to-peer such as EMule/Limewire.

[ July 12, 2005, 05:35 AM: Message edited by: Soddball ]