[MUD-Dev] Multi-threaded mud server.

[Jon A. Lambert]

On 17 May 99,, Chris Gray wrote:
> [Jon A. Lambert:]
> > Is there context switching going on here?  YES! Loads and loads of the 
> > "expensive" process-level context switching.  

[snipped rant]

My apologies to Ross and others.  I lost my mind and dumped core. :)

> In my case, its because of two things:
> 
>     - I grew up with processors that were about 1000 times slower than
> 	the one you mention, and that has built some habits that are
> 	hard to get rid of. (I had to think about it for a minute, but
> 	1000 *is* the right number!)

Sure, I understand this.  I started out an IBM 370 with a whopping 256K, 
screaming along at ~40mhz, fighting over memory, time and disk with 100 
or so hapless souls.  ;) 

>     - I have *BIG* dreams. I have a friend who works for one of the
> 	largest ISP's in Canada. I want to try putting my MUD server
> 	on a box in one of their network centers. That'll be a big,
> 	fast box (likely SMP) with a ton of memory and a great big
> 	pipe to connect it to the internet. I figure that the system
> 	networking overhead will tie up a CPU or two, and that'll leave
> 	one or two for my server process, and it'll need to handle
> 	1000 or more active clients to keep the pipe going. Remember
> 	that I said this was a dream!

The point I was trying to get across, was when you get right down to the 
nitty gritty, you are NOT going to control (from within your application) 
who is using what processor at what time for how long, unless your server 
IS the operating system.  Or, you have customized and/or configured the 
operating system to dedicate processors for your application.  
Still, I would not write a multi-threaded application ANY differently for 
a 1, 2, 4, 8, 16 or 32-processor machine.  


--
--*     Jon A. Lambert - TychoMUD Email:jlsysinc at ix.netcom.com             *--
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