[MUD-Dev] 3D graphics (Was: The impact of the web on muds)

[coder at ibm.net]

On 14/02/98 at 12:18 PM, cg at ami-cg.GraySage.Edmonton.AB.CA (Chris Gray)
said:

>Re: the earlier comment about us all running 1GHz Alphas in 1999: I've
>been having a hard time settling on what my next computer (when $ allows)
>should be - a Pentium running Linux or an Alpha running Linux. I'd like
>to chose the one with the best performance, but also with a decent
>expected lifetime. 

What sort of lifetime?

>I just wish we knew what Compaq intended. I saw info
>on comp.arch indicating that they had *given* the designs, etc. for the
>21264 and 21364 to Samsung, and that Samsung wanted to push hard to get
>the 21364 out at the time the merced became viable. But, of course,
>nothing official from anyone. Sigh.

Samsung appears to be following up on this with early models of their MB's
and the like being leaked.  

I'll be buying a machine some time this year.  My current candidates are a
SPARC Ultra-5, 600MHz Alpha, or a two-way P-II.  

I suspect I'll end up going with the PC just for binary compatability with
the majority of the Linux market.  I'm not interested in fighting to get
things to build under Linux/Alpha purely because the original authors
thought the entire world was 32bit, and little-endian.  I'd go with the
Alpha purely because I *really* like 64bit architectures, some of my DB
code is now 64bit, and I already have one.  I have little doubt that
Alphas have been permanently borderlined -- but they're still the fastest
thing out.  I'd go with the SPARC simply because I can get them at a
significant discount.

>To swing this a little bit back towards MUDs, and special clients: what
>kind of byte-ordering does anyone use in custom binary protocols? 

I use network ordering for everything.  Its simple, the calls are always
available, its portable (noops where its not needed), and it leaves me
just not having to think about it any more.

>What endian does Linux run Alphas in? 

Big.

>Do a few byte-
>flips make any difference? 

Not that I've noticed.

>Any gut feelings for whether or not endianness
>affects how well a given architecture can be an internet server?

Nope.

--
J C Lawrence                               Internet: claw at null.net
----------(*)                              Internet: coder at ibm.net
...Honourary Member of Clan McFud -- Teamer's Avenging Monolith...