threaded servers (was Re: [MUD-Dev] request for comments

[Mike Sellers]

At 05:03 PM 1/6/98 PST8PDT, JC Lawrence wrote:
>To describe my system loosely, and briefly:
>
>  The server is heavily multi-threaded (I think the idle-state is over
>50 threads currently).
>
>  All events are processed aynchoinously and in parallel.  
>
>  The server is lockless.
>
>  I don't guarantee order of execution of two unrelated events.

So... without recapitulating the flamage on this that occurs regularly in
r.g.m.*, how do you handle things like the "Dragon's Dinner" scenario,
where the player thinks she has closed the door behind her, but then is
surprised when she is fried by the dragon anyway (who, in this race
condition, saw the door as "open" and went through)?  In a truly lockless
system, aren't race conditions inevitable?  


--

Mike Sellers   Chief Alchemist -- Online Alchemy   mike at online-alchemy.com

"One of the most difficult tasks men can perform, however much others 
may despise it, is the invention of good games.  And it cannot be done 
by men out of touch with their instinctive values."  - Carl Jung