Quote from _ak :

I'd like to have option to penalize drivers who cross white line when joining race from pits. Just like IRL, crossed line then get drive through

More info?

Updated: /repair_in_pit=full/minor/body/engine/no

Does this cover all options?

Added Global Blocking during Race/Qual. The Admin messaging was already in the list.

See PM. I might be able to help your cause. You seem keen enough.

Added: Logging of invalid packets (inSim or Client)

Added
Option to block AI players

Already listed
Finer control on vote types to allowed (/vote kick, restart, ban, qualify).

Last edited by Macfox, Fri, 14 Dec 2007 16:57.

Quote from mrodgers :

As far as I understand, you don't specifically disable the ability to add AI's, but the option to limit the number of cars per connection, per user, or something like that is there.

That doesn't allow someone to connect and add AI car instead of joining the track themselves, if I recall.

Yes you set the cars per host limit to 1, but even at 1, you can chosse between the player or an AI car. Pointless really.

Rob

Added.

Quote from Tumz(DK) :

I would like an option to sort out drift and citydriving servers as well as empty, full, private and public servers.

Added. But needs clarification/more detail. How would it be implemented given no such server classification exists ATM.

Quote from Lotesdelere :

An option to manage Restart votes.

Problem: after a chaotic start about 40% of the drivers have voted for a restart. Finally the race is going on but during the race some drivers retire. And suddenly the 40% of the drivers become 51% and the race is restarted in lap 8/10. Because the restart votes have never been cancelled. Annoying.

Suggestions:
Ability to set a duration after which all restart votes are automatically cancelled
Ability for admins to cancel all current restart votes
Ability to disallow the drivers who join mid race to vote for a restart if there are still x% of the drivers on track who have done the whole race from the start.

Added Vote time outs. Vote cancel/Clear.
The last one is really tricky. It might be better to weight restart votes based on laps. So someone who has completed 6 of 10 laps has twice the voting influence of a driver who has completed only 3 of 10 laps. Does that sound like a better way? This kind of thing would be perfect for an InSim addon.

Quote from hanzime :

Can not see the pace care suggestion in the list..WOULD LOVE to have one !!! This would really bring more action and more close racing at hand !

Trigger for pace car when car flips over or is idle for more then 15 seconds.

Probably because AI is all client side ATM and this thread is dedicated to server related ideas/feature requests. It's a common request in this forum, but it's one of those features that opens up a whole lot of additional issues. Such a feature would be very difficult to automate and get right 100% and could be abused easily. I've added it for completeness.

Quote from bluejudas :

/repair_in_pit=full/partial/no

Added. Nice.

Added.

Command to set vote threshold

Best ever loss IMHO... Not LFS.... Real.
You have to feel bad for the guy, but then you just burst out laughing...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zP5kU3JslgA

This would be so hard to implement, given the architecture of the comms in LFS. It isn't like a traditional central hub-spoke comms, it's more like a mesh, where each person connects to each other. The only exception is NAT proxy situations via the server, I believe.

No clients is guaranteed to see every packet, thus collisions are from the perspective of the players involved. It is probably why you get the weird collisions where a car will seemingly eject off the track for the slightest of touches, due one of the cars in the collision (missing position data) teleporting slightly inside another vehicle/object.

On top of this you have the challenge of deciding who is at fault. You would need to calculate your penalty based on position info leading up to the collision also, assuming you have all that data to begin with.

So given the above it would be very difficult to police collisions from any single point of view with 100% reliably and near impossible to program.

IMO if the race is that important (series/round) then there will be an official over looking the race.
And in the case where there isn't one, you can record the whole race on the host and review protest etc later, as in the real world.

All unpopular options, but I've kept them in cause they have valid uses on organised comp servers IMHO. A lot of people like a level playing field, as apposed to racing against setup kings.

+1

Quote from quackdougal :

i think you may have mis-understood me, i do not want stats for the AI (macfox may tho, i dunno). i would much prefer that lapper ignores the AI completely, because at the moment, if you add AI to the server, lapper goes crazy, like macfox said above

Yes... The problem is if AI is running on the server, LFS Lapper floods with messages. 20-30 a second. Not using AI isn't a real solution. Sure a lot of people don't like them, but they will eventually get improved and will be come more popular. It's only a small fix form looking at the code, but better for the devs to fix, than me hacking the code, as I did to get it to run as a service correctly.

Ditto. Added to the server options wish list.

Couple of separate problems. #2 likely a bug. Seeking advice or answers.

#1. Jump start=kick. Where in the default config do you change this behaviour? I'm trying to run a beginner server, but this kind of penalty isn't encouraging.

#2. AI vehicles. Doesn't seems to be handled correctly. LFSLapper gets confused between AI cars and you own. "0.0 seconds to 100Km/h repeated 100's of times." Particularly at end of race or when you pit or retire from race. Also fastest laps by the AI are attributed to your name.

Last edited by Macfox, Sat, 11 Aug 2007 18:08.

Are these the videos in question?

http://www.youtube.com/user/davescz

Looks great, but as you said, long way to go? It's only modelling at this stage I guess?

What about wheel base and physics etc.

I compiled LFSLapper as a windowed application in c# visual Studio, but it still didn't make a difference to the handling of the messages.

So I've dived into the code and made one small change in main.cs to ignore the Logoff event and it now works.


Just delete this line from the above code in main.cs to get the desired result.


Obviously this is just a quick hack to get it working as it should, but ideally and "-service" command line parameter would toggle the action on the CTRL_LOGOFF_EVENT message. (Suggestion?)

I've attached the exe to save others the hassle of installing the .NET IDE and recompiling etc.

Regards
Rob

Last edited by Macfox, Sat, 11 Aug 2007 04:31.

Quote from Punchy :

How did you set up lapper in firedaemon?

Simply installed Firedaemon, then set it to run LFSLapper.exe as a local process and interact with the desktop. No too sure what else to say. Detail is in the pic's below.

Unfortunately, Firedaemondidn't make a difference to the problem of it quitting upon logoff.

So I'm not using Firedaemon and going back to the MS reskit instsrv.exe and srvany.exe as they work just as good.

Using firedaemon made no difference.

I will try to recompile and advise the of outcome

Quote from Punchy :

I run 3 lappers as services in Firedaemon so it is possible, I have never tried the prog you are using so would have no idea how to set it up.

It the standard tool from MS to run almost any things as a service. Comes in the resource kits for NT/2000/XP/2003.

I've run many other programs using srvany, including LFS and other addons. This is the first program I've found a problem with.

I have heard of firedaemon, but never needed to use it in the past. Plus it's not free.

Has the new author of LFS Lapper got any comments?

Last edited by Macfox, Wed, 8 Aug 2007 05:45.

Has anyone managed to get LFS Lapper running as a service.

I'm using instsvr and srvany, but the application quits as soon as it sees a logoff message. WM_QUERYENDSESSION, WM_ENDSESSION, CTRL_LOGOFF_EVENT

I think we need a small patch so LFS Lapper ignores these messages and continues to run in the background.

http://www.devsource.com/article2/0,1895,1961577,00.asp

http://1014103.ru/dist/srvany.txt

Quote from Ratman :

Two suggestions:

1. Ability for server admins to allow "old" (pre-X) Car reset. So if a car lays on the roof the driver can turn it back on four wheels, but without repair. Maybe combined with some time delay and/or only when track is free. We can also think of some safe "respawn-points" on fixed positions beside the track.

2. Pit stop indicators. E.g a number behind every players name which shows the number of pitstops he/she has already done. In real racing you also get this info from your team, so why not here? Also some lights at the side of the cars would be fine, like in DTM.

Excuse my bad english

#1. At the moment if you're upside down you need to spectate, then rejoin mid race (if allowed), losing your pos. This is pretty much what happens in 99% of series/codes. Given LFS is a simulation, I doubt devs would support such a feature directly, but rather only through inSim(which is possible now).

#2 Is a good idea. Perhaps it could be added to the connection/names list.

Quote from kankkune :

//quest can select track yes/no
/selecttrack=x

//quest can select laps yes/no
/selectlaps=x

// midrace vote yes/no (i mean restart and race ending )
/midracevote=x

Added

Quote from KSheppard :

Took a look through the sticky list and didn't see it but how about an autoupdate feature (with maybe an alert notice)

Wouldn't be trivial as host vary in security setup and how the dedicated server is launched (Win32 Service/User space/WINE/ Linux). Added.

Quote from szaszi154 :

"How about a pro setting? So when every guest logs in, if his PB is better than some set time, he can join to race, otherwise he has to spectate. Of course, it would be up to the host to decide if he wanted his server pro or not. "

I support this idea! I just wanted to mention the same...

This can be acheived with inSim addons like LFSLapper today. Added.

A update will be out soon. They just wanted to wait for the inSim changes to stabilise before fixing.