Help tracking lag spikes

jasonrohrer · 2018-07-20 04:59:47

Scorp, it's not "decay" in the sense of items wearing out, but the general-purpose timer system that makes mikweed ripen and fires go out and crops grow. I called that system "decay timers" back when I designed it.

One object (say, squash sprout) "decays" into another object (squash plant) in so many seconds.

This is tracked when people load new sections of the map, but it's also tracked live in RAM for the sections of the map that are already loaded. But if stuff hasn't been looked at in a while, it's flushed from RAM (so if someone walks away, we don't keep the milkweed running through it's cycle forever, or eventually we'd have a nearly-unbounded number of things to track---it only cycles again when someone walks back into the area).

Every five seconds, a player "looks at" the stuff right around them, to keep it loaded in RAM for live timer tracking. This keeps the milkweed around them cycling (for example), even though nothing is being reloaded from the map.

A funny side-effect of this:

If you light a fire and walk far away for 20 minutes, and no one else is around, when you come back, there will be hot coals there, and not ashes.

In other words: A tree falling in the woods does not make any sound unless there is someone there to hear it.

But anyway, the "lookAt" code portion of this was very inefficient and touched the database when it didn't need to.

sc0rp · 2018-07-20 12:37:29

jasonrohrer wrote:

Every five seconds, a player "looks at" the stuff right around them, to keep it loaded in RAM for live timer tracking. This keeps the milkweed around them cycling (for example), even though nothing is being reloaded from the map.

So decaying items in containers is handled somewhere else?

jasonrohrer wrote:

A funny side-effect of this:
If you light a fire and walk far away for 20 minutes, and no one else is around, when you come back, there will be hot coals there, and not ashes.
In other words: A tree falling in the woods does not make any sound unless there is someone there to hear it.

Blind Vestal Virgins tending the fire: "don't look or He will get enraged!". I feel like new religion will be born in OHOL in 3, 2, 1...

Anshin · 2018-07-20 12:46:40

jasonrohrer wrote:

Every five seconds, a player "looks at" the stuff right around them, to keep it loaded in RAM for live timer tracking. This keeps the milkweed around them cycling (for example), even though nothing is being reloaded from the map.
A funny side-effect of this:
If you light a fire and walk far away for 20 minutes, and no one else is around, when you come back, there will be hot coals there, and not ashes.

So that's why rabbits don't get caught in snares if I run off to get some food while hunting.

Only watched pots boil.

FeignedSanity · 2018-07-20 13:43:51

Anshin wrote:

jasonrohrer wrote:
...
So that's why rabbits don't get caught in snares if I run off to get some food while hunting.
Only watched pots boil.

As long as you wait for the process to start, then you're good. Make sure they pop their head out before you go, and they'll be snared when you get back.

FeignedSanity · 2018-07-20 13:48:45

sc0rp wrote:

That's the final proofs we needed to come to conclusion that introducing decay was really bad idea. Could you reverse it? That would make your life simpler and all players pre-apocalypse level happy

I suppose that depends on who you ask, I think the decay update was a great idea (aside from baskets). And there were a lot of players that weren't happy during the "pre-apocalypse level happy" phase. Sure, the minecraft kids loved it and inevitably threw a fit when it was implemented, but quite a few enjoyed the game more after the apocalypse.

Last edited by FeignedSanity (2018-07-20 13:49:08)

sc0rp · 2018-07-20 14:09:33

FeignedSanity wrote:

I suppose that depends on who you ask, I think the decay update was a great idea (aside from baskets). And there were a lot of players that weren't happy during the "pre-apocalypse level happy" phase. Sure, the minecraft kids loved it and inevitably threw a fit when it was implemented, but quite a few enjoyed the game more after the apocalypse.

I watched pre-apocalypse play-throughs. Then bought the game after apocalypse and at the beginning of massive nerfs, decay, map wipes. So you could imagine the dissapointment. All nice towns dissapeared and they have not rebounded since.

I want to see warfare, trade, penguin hockey arenas, prisons, etc. But they ain't gonna happen without sustainable towns. And they are not possible now, with decay combined with map wipes and low server caps:
https://onehouronelife.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=2881

Hopefully with perfomance fixes we can get closer to it. Next thing is to get rid of map wipes (or extend them A LOT), so we can build those damn roads.

FeignedSanity · 2018-07-20 19:45:08

sc0rp wrote:

I watched pre-apocalypse play-throughs. Then bought the game after apocalypse and at the beginning of massive nerfs, decay, map wipes. So you could imagine the dissapointment. All nice towns dissapeared and they have not rebounded since.
I want to see warfare, trade, penguin hockey arenas, prisons, etc. But they ain't gonna happen without sustainable towns. And they are not possible now, with decay combined with map wipes and low server caps:
https://onehouronelife.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=2881
Hopefully with perfomance fixes we can get closer to it. Next thing is to get rid of map wipes (or extend them A LOT), so we can build those damn roads.

I sympathize, I've had the game make changes I don't approve of as well, but that's the beauty of it. It's not your game or my game, we're just along for the ride. But I can't sympathize with your desires, all those things are stuff you do when you have nothing better to do. You've taken care of survival and are just sitting on your bear skin rug in your mansion. What now? Guess I'll fight a war or watch some sports.

If I wanted warfare, I'd play a war game. If I wanted sports, I'd play a sports game. If I wanted prisons, I'd play prison architect or something. If I wanted to build a civilization I have full control over, I'd play a civilization builder. I like the challenge and struggle to grow and advance, and I hope the game never gets to a point where the only enjoyment left is role playing something else. That is pre-apocalypse OHOL, which (as someone who played a lot of pre-apocalypse OHOL) I'm grateful is gone...for the most part anyway. I also hope stuff like map wipes are never gotten rid of. I'd honestly like to see it cranked up, like if your city dies, it's gone forever. But different folks and all that.

I would also recommend you take a look at 2HOL, seems like it'd be up your alley.

Last edited by FeignedSanity (2018-07-20 19:47:58)

Alf · 2018-07-20 21:28:28

FeignedSanity wrote:

sc0rp wrote:
I watched pre-apocalypse play-throughs. Then bought the game after apocalypse and at the beginning of massive nerfs, decay, map wipes. So you could imagine the dissapointment. All nice towns dissapeared and they have not rebounded since.
Hopefully with perfomance fixes we can get closer to it. Next thing is to get rid of map wipes (or extend them A LOT), so we can build those damn roads.
I sympathize, I've had the game make changes I don't approve of as well, but that's the beauty of it. It's not your game or my game, we're just along for the ride. But I can't sympathize with your desires, all those things are stuff you do when you have nothing better to do. You've taken care of survival and are just sitting on your bear skin rug in your mansion. What now? Guess I'll fight a war or watch some sports.
If I wanted warfare, I'd play a war game. If I wanted sports, I'd play a sports game. If I wanted prisons, I'd play prison architect or something. If I wanted to build a civilization I have full control over, I'd play a civilization builder. I like the challenge and struggle to grow and advance, and I hope the game never gets to a point where the only enjoyment left is role playing something else. That is pre-apocalypse OHOL, which (as someone who played a lot of pre-apocalypse OHOL) I'm grateful is gone...for the most part anyway. I also hope stuff like map wipes are never gotten rid of. I'd honestly like to see it cranked up, like if your city dies, it's gone forever. But different folks and all that.
I would also recommend you take a look at 2HOL, seems like it'd be up your alley.

Prisons would still be a possibility though. I tried to lock up children in sheep pen with food but they always escape.

FeignedSanity · 2018-07-20 23:10:33

Alf wrote:

FeignedSanity wrote:
If I wanted warfare, I'd play a war game. If I wanted sports, I'd play a sports game. If I wanted prisons, I'd play prison architect or something. If I wanted to build a civilization I have full control over, I'd play a civilization builder. I like the challenge and struggle to grow and advance, and I hope the game never gets to a point where the only enjoyment left is role playing something else.
Prisons would still be a possibility though. I tried to lock up children in sheep pen with food but they always escape.

Maybe it's bad etiquette, but I don't think it's necessary to quote the entire thing if you're only going to respond to one part. But in response to your comment, I'd agree with you that it'd be possible. A lot of things are possible. You can start a kingdom, prison, football field, whatever you like; it's just not a part of the core experience. You can do stuff like play sports in non sports games (the soccer field in fortnite springs to mind) but you're not really supposed to. In fact, most of the time, you're just being a detriment either to yourself or others.

I've spent several runs just making a blue outfit and an arsenal of weapons just to run around pretending to be a soldier for an imaginary faction, but that's not helping my civilization. I'm not helping my "team win the game" (so to speak), in any way. I'm effectively just a waste of food, but I can do it.

jasonrohrer · 2018-07-21 00:05:43

Stuff in containers that decays is tracked in the same way, and "looked at" by players in the area to keep it tracked in RAM.

sc0rp · 2018-07-21 00:07:33

FeignedSanity wrote:

I sympathize, I've had the game make changes I don't approve of as well, but that's the beauty of it. It's not your game or my game, we're just along for the ride.

Actually I think that it's more true about other games than OHOL. Here we DO have a significant impact on where the game is going. We obviously don't have control, but still we are part of development cycle, with all the discussions, etc. That's pretty unique.

FeignedSanity wrote:

But I can't sympathize with your desires, all those things are stuff you do when you have nothing better to do. You've taken care of survival and are just sitting on your bear skin rug in your mansion. What now? Guess I'll fight a war or watch some sports.

Oh, you misunderstood me. I don't intend for those things to be done, because we're bored. At least not all of them. Warfare and/or trade with other towns should be mandatory at some development level. You simply should not be able to progress without having trade routes or conquering other towns. And the choice shouldn't be obvious, there should be tradeoffs. It's still survival, but with bigger, better problems to solve. We already desperately need money and a way to track ownership at low level to manage towns better.

And games... We have games IRL and they serve no practical purpose. Well, really? People are having fun. And people involved are making money out of it. OHOL is a civ simulation, so we may see it emerge here too. Sometimes I play OHOL as min/max game and I'm annoyed AF at all people roleplaying. And sometimes I'm roleplaying myself and I'm annoyed AF by all people min/maxing and scolding me for roleplaying. So maybe games have plece here after all. We can get well earning gladiators this way, that can later fund great projects.

FeignedSanity wrote:

I would also recommend you take a look at 2HOL, seems like it'd be up your alley.

Thanks, but how many player are there at the peak? I don't want to play another Minecraft.

sc0rp · 2018-07-21 00:10:14

jasonrohrer wrote:

Stuff in containers that decays is tracked in the same way, and "looked at" by players in the area to keep it tracked in RAM.

I supposed it to be so, but you wrote in your optimization notes:
"Turns out that lookAtMapRegion was pulling contained items from the DB for every cell in the player's view area (to update their decay timers). BUT, it only needs to know how many contained items there are."

FeignedSanity · 2018-07-21 01:02:08

sc0rp wrote:

FeignedSanity wrote:
I sympathize, I've had the game make changes I don't approve of as well, but that's the beauty of it. It's not your game or my game, we're just along for the ride.
Actually I think that it's more true about other games than OHOL. Here we DO have a significant impact on where the game is going. We obviously don't have control, but still we are part of development cycle, with all the discussions, etc. That's pretty unique.

Huh, I've never really seen this. I mean don't get me wrong, he's A LOT more in touch with the community than most developers; but he seems like he's definitely making the game he wants to make, rather than the game others want him to make. Which there's nothing inherently wrong with.

sc0rp wrote:

FeignedSanity wrote:
But I can't sympathize with your desires, all those things are stuff you do when you have nothing better to do. You've taken care of survival and are just sitting on your bear skin rug in your mansion. What now? Guess I'll fight a war or watch some sports.
Oh, you misunderstood me. I don't intend for those things to be done, because we're bored. At least not all of them. Warfare and/or trade with other towns should be mandatory at some development level. You simply should not be able to progress without having trade routes or conquering other towns. And the choice shouldn't be obvious, there should be tradeoffs. It's still survival, but with bigger, better problems to solve. We already desperately need money and a way to track ownership at low level to manage towns better.
And games... We have games IRL and they serve no practical purpose. Well, really? People are having fun. And people involved are making money out of it. OHOL is a civ simulation, so we may see it emerge here too. Sometimes I play OHOL as min/max game and I'm annoyed AF at all people roleplaying. And sometimes I'm roleplaying myself and I'm annoyed AF by all people min/maxing and scolding me for roleplaying. So maybe games have plece here after all. We can get well earning gladiators this way, that can later fund great projects.

Well I'd still have to disagree. I don't believe warfare or trade SHOULD be mandatory. I really disagree with the notion that these should be critical to your civilization's advancement. In fact, I believe that they are little more than distractions. Besides, I don't think trade would ever really be viable. You don't really live long enough to establish stuff like trade. I can't imagine a trade deal lasting very long were the people grow old and die mid negotiations. Compound that with the fact that communication is ass unless you're 40-50 years old. I just don't think the mechanics support something as needless as trade.

Now war over resources, that's something I see a lot more viability in. I think that the distance between cities would be a big hurdle. You would have to be close enough to even start a war, because most of you would die of old age mid journey. And If you're close enough to start a war with, you probably don't have anything that we don't already have; unless we're fighting over shared resources. In which case, why has the war not been settled forever ago? And how did you even get set up with the ability to oppose us? But as long as survival is the main element, I'm not really opposed to anything.

And are we really going to talk about playing a game within a game? I don't really want this to get philosophical, but real life is not the same as a game. The point of games are to have fun and offer you a distraction from real life. To me, that feels like going to a restaurant to eat and having the chefs cook a meal that your cook is going to eat before that cook makes your food. I mean sure, you still get food, but why go through the extra trouble? Just cut out the middle man. I feel like all of this is just distractions from the main premise of the game. Man, I just want to join a random group of people I don't know, do my part to help us all survive in a cruel and unforgiving world, building relationships, and seeing how far we can get; then dying to join a new group of people I don't know and building new relationships, before dying again. Maybe I should just play real life but have the re-spawn button on XD

sc0rp wrote:

FeignedSanity wrote:
I would also recommend you take a look at 2HOL, seems like it'd be up your alley.
Thanks, but how many player are there at the peak? I don't want to play another Minecraft.

I honestly don't know. It's not really my kind of game, so I don't really know much about it's player base. But I do know that they're all about that stuff. Also, I don't play minecraft, so I'm not sure what you're referring to or if you'll find those similarities in 2HOL. I just wasn't sure if you'd heard about it, and it seemed like something you might be interested in.

Wow, sorry for novel, but that's kind of what I do. Anyway, this took a fair amount of brain power after a long day of work, so that's enough of the forums tonight. Enjoyed the discussion.

sc0rp · 2018-07-21 01:03:04

Just short question to Jason:
With all the optimization work, do you also profile wall clock time, or only CPU time? Worth checking with cold cache to ensure that I/O wait times won't be a significant issue.

yin69yang · 2018-08-15 14:40:17

16:22
timezone +1

I've been experiencing disconnection for about two hours.
During the tutorial I got disconnected a few times, unable to login for 1-4 minutes after death. Everytime when trying to interact with things.
During the following multi player stage I got disconnected first when accidentally left clicking a berry bush with a basket, and this last time (16:22) when trying to fill a bowl with water (it was the second time I tried to refill it).

This game seems awesome. I wish you luck with the debugging. <3

(disconnected again 16:42 while being carried as a newborn)

Last edited by yin69yang (2018-08-15 14:43:00)

AltyBagU · 2018-08-15 18:21:50

I'm running window's and lag spikes are really rare. At least for me so you know.

One Hour One Life Forums

#26 2018-07-20 04:59:47

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#27 2018-07-20 12:37:29

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#28 2018-07-20 12:46:40

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#29 2018-07-20 13:43:51

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#30 2018-07-20 13:48:45

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#31 2018-07-20 14:09:33

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#32 2018-07-20 19:45:08

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#33 2018-07-20 21:28:28

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#34 2018-07-20 23:10:33

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#35 2018-07-21 00:05:43

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#36 2018-07-21 00:07:33

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#37 2018-07-21 00:10:14

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#38 2018-07-21 01:02:08

Re: Help tracking lag spikes

#39 2018-07-21 01:03:04

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#40 2018-08-15 14:40:17

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