THE solution to the (big) textures and servers problem

[Redfish]

What if we just share the texture files, the zip files and all other celestia stuff with a program like Kazaa or Grokster.
I read on this forum that there are at least thousands of celestia users, so there should always be some people with broadband connections with them.
If we share the files on Grokster or Kazaa, and some ppl download the files, and share them immediately and keep on sharing them after download, we can get a great availability of the texture files, that is not limited by servers. When we got say 100 ppl who share the same files, you can easily get high transfer speeds.

And i know it's cross platform, but Linux Users can try and run wine with Kazaa, or other replacement programs.

[Troy]

I use WinMX, and I'm not on it all the time, but I would be willing to share Celestia AddOns over that network. Heck, I'll even give people downloading them priority in the queue.

We would need to make sure we followed a standard naming convention though, so we can easily search for Celestia related material.

[Redfish]

I'll share my files when i get to my cpu with Cable again.

I'll share them on grokster, so that makes them available for grokster and kazaa.
I think we should at least put the word celestia in the files, like:
celestia-earth16k.dds.zip.

[Troy]

I just did a search for 'celestia' and got over 300 hits. ( most of them for the word 'celestial' )

Perhaps something more unique, like celaddon? ( zero hits so far )

[chris]

Seems like a good idea to me . . . not as ideal as having a single site with all the textures and massive bandwidth, but still helpful. It's also a good demonstration of peer-to-peer file sharing for distributing something other than the usual W4R3Z, pr0n, and MP3s.

--Chris

[Redfish]

Okay Chris, You're right, but massive bandwidth for 1 site, i'm thinking about dozens of T3's. And I don't think the celestia textures will be hosted on anything like that soon. And I think that P2P is now a better alternative than the few sites that are now hosting the textures. Maybe eventually we'll get awesome download speeds for celestia add-ons.

And couldn't agree more on the last point :P

On Kazaa, i only got a single Hit for celestia(a picture). :( I see we have a long way to go...

[Sum0]

Hey, tell me if i'm crazy, but why use KaZaA, WinMX, etc. at all? Why not make a small file sharing program, include it with Celestia, and encourage users to use it to get higher res textures? You could get the program to look in the texture folders and get name and size info. Then you could just search for "moon" or something and get back a list of files matching moon, and also their sizes (1K, 8K, etc.). I don't know if this is possible without a dedicated team of coders working 24/7 but it's just a thought...

[Troy]

Ok, here's my proposal for our filenames:

celestia-tec-neptune-rings.zip

Prefix: celestia-

This can be used as the search term across the P2P network if you include the dash. Without it, you could bring up unrelated documents ( ie. celestial.mp3 )

Author: tec-

I think initials would be better than full names. A first name can get confusing with 2 or more 'Johns', and using the first and last names together makes for an overly long filename. Be sure to include a dash to seperate it from the suffix. Also, include your middle initial if you have one to provide us with a more unique identifier.

Suffix: neptune-rings

The suffix contains any further description required. 'earth-8k', 'comets', '2001-models', etc. Try to be as descriptive as possible in as small a space as possible. Use dashes to delimit words.

Packaging:

I recommend all AddOns be packaged within a zip file for several reasons. First, it provides decent compression. Second, most P2P networks support searching and sharing them. Third, every supported platform has easy access to decompression tools for them.

Packages should also contain a readme.txt file with a description, author information, installation instructions, and copyright notice. ( A seperate copyright notice ala GPL should be fine too. )

I do not recommend directly sharing texture or scc files for several reasons. First, some P2P networks do not support sharing file extensions that are not predefined. Second, they would not contain any copyright information. Third, no installation instructions for "newbies".

Pending acceptance of these guidelines, I'm ready to accept AddOn packages from the community. Feel free to PM me here for my email address, or to give me a one-shot URL for your resource. I'd also like to recommend that a line of communications be established between content developers and distributors where we ( the distributors ) can get URLs to the newest works, download them from the developer, and make them available without the general community's knowlage. This will help ensure that end users take advantave of this distribution network rather than downloading directly from the developer.

Let me know what you think.

[Troy]

Hey, tell me if i'm crazy, but why use KaZaA, WinMX, etc. at all? Why not make a small file sharing program, include it with Celestia, and encourage users to use it to get higher res textures? You could get the program to look in the texture folders and get name and size info. Then you could just search for "moon" or something and get back a list of files matching moon, and also their sizes (1K, 8K, etc.). I don't know if this is possible without a dedicated team of coders working 24/7 but it's just a thought...

I can't speak for Chris, but to me that would be a lot of extra work. Not only would a cross-platform filesharing program have to be developed, but he would have to administrate a server that keeps track of users who are online and gets them communicating with each other, which could defeat the purpose of using file sharing anyway ( ie. reduced bandwidth for Chris ). This could also be abused by people sharing illegal content, and could put the Celestia developers in legal trouble.

OTOH, the Celestia Peer2Peer Network does have a nice ring to it.

[Redfish]

Ok, here's my proposal for our filenames:

celestia-tec-neptune-rings.zip

Prefix: celestia-

This can be used as the search term across the P2P network if you include the dash. Without it, you could bring up unrelated documents ( ie. celestial.mp3 )

Couldn't agree more

Author: tec-

I think initials would be better than full names. A first name can get confusing with 2 or more 'Johns', and using the first and last names together makes for an overly long filename. Be sure to include a dash to seperate it from the suffix. Also, include your middle initial if you have one to provide us with a more unique identifier.

A little problem, what if i downloaded a texture, but don't know who made it???? The initials sound okay, but i'm wondering whether there are more John B's, than J. B's. I guess it's the latter. So i think there might even be more names starting with a J for the first name, and a B for the last name, than there are John B's. That is because all John B's are included into the large group of J B's. (Just to give an example)

Suffix: neptune-rings

The suffix contains any further description required. 'earth-8k', 'comets', '2001-models', etc. Try to be as descriptive as possible in as small a space as possible. Use dashes to delimit words.

Packaging:

I recommend all AddOns be packaged within a zip file for several reasons. First, it provides decent compression. Second, most P2P networks support searching and sharing them. Third, every supported platform has easy access to decompression tools for them.

Packages should also contain a readme.txt file with a description, author information, installation instructions, and copyright notice. ( A seperate copyright notice ala GPL should be fine too. )

I do not recommend directly sharing texture or scc files for several reasons. First, some P2P networks do not support sharing file extensions that are not predefined. Second, they would not contain any copyright information. Third, no installation instructions for "newbies".

Pending acceptance of these guidelines, I'm ready to accept AddOn packages from the community. Feel free to PM me here for my email address, or to give me a one-shot URL for your resource. I'd also like to recommend that a line of communications be established between content developers and distributors where we ( the distributors ) can get URLs to the newest works, download them from the developer, and make them available without the general community's knowlage. This will help ensure that end users take advantave of this distribution network rather than downloading directly from the developer.

Let me know what you think.

I agree about the file names contained in the zip. But i do think that we can distribute the celestia installer for windows in plain old exe format, and don't have to zip it :P

[Troy]

A little problem, what if i downloaded a texture, but don't know who made it???? The initials sound okay, but i'm wondering whether there are more John B's, than J. B's. I guess it's the latter. So i think there might even be more names starting with a J for the first name, and a B for the last name, than there are John B's. That is because all John B's are included into the large group of J B's. (Just to give an example)

That's a slippery slope. Naturally we want author identifiers to be unique, but if you're going to have johnb then you might as well go all the way with the full names. If no one minds this then it's no problem for me, but I thought it might be best to keep filenames below 32 characters. With expanded names it is possible to exceed that limit.

Perhaps if authors would select an 8 character or less nickname or handle? ( Checking to make sure it's unique, of course. )

I agree about the file names contained in the zip. But i do think that we can distribute the celestia installer for windows in plain old exe format, and don't have to zip it

I wasn't even thinking about the main executable, since Sourceforge is hosting that. But I'd be happy to mirror it too.

[Sum0]

Can I suggest we change standard format from .zip to .rar or .ace? Especially with a 56k modem, zip files are notoriously (at least in my experience) apt to suffer crc errors due to line noise. .rar files have a protection system which means it can repair crc errors, and I assume .ace files have a similar system.
I once downloaded a 180mb zip file with my 56k modem - took about 20 hours, and I got a lovely CRC error when I tried to open it... on the contrary, I recently download a 180Mb Ace file, and it worked perfectly. I've downloaded the earth16k texture (in zip format) twice now, and both times it's messed up. I'm sure i'm not the only person to get such errors. So, can you people with T3 lines remember us HPBs? The only problem is I have no idea whether there is a rar/ace uncompressor for Linux, which would be a problem for the 60% of Celestia users that use that OS...

[D.Edwards]

I don't seee that this will make any diference. I have a cable modem and I have downloaded plenty rar files to find then totaly useless because of crc errors. I think the biggest problem is what your using to download the files. Don't use Interner Explorer or its built in ftp engine. You will get crc errors everytime. I don't think Netscape would be any better. Use a download manager like Download Eccelerator or something else. I could never download from the Desmirnov server without crc errors until I went to a download manager. Besides if the server alows multiple downloads a manager can make serveral conections and speed things up for you some.
I do think we need to deside on a standard file compression format though. As a rule I think all files should be compressed to be self extracting so you don't have to go and download another decompresion utility. This would speed things up for beginers as well.

[malcolm]

Like D.Edwards I am also a bit surprised !
I have over the years downloaded .zip on allsorts from Win3.11wg on 14kmodem on up to this WinME/56k (in the UK like you so probably a similar prehistoric teleco !) and I have only ever had one zip failure,
something to do with the file being encoded with a modern (WinZip?) ziper and me trying to decode with an old Pkzip.
Line noise I would expect to cause negotiation problems reducing your connect from a notional 56k ( more usually 44 to 52 ish k !) down to 33k or even lower. I would expect FTP and/or HTTP protocols to take care of dropped/corrupt packets ?

just some random, OT? thoughts for comment/consideration

[Troy]

Can I suggest we change standard format from .zip to .rar or .ace? Especially with a 56k modem, zip files are notoriously (at least in my experience) apt to suffer crc errors due to line noise. .rar files have a protection system which means it can repair crc errors, and I assume .ace files have a similar system.

I'm afraid I have to agree with D.Edwards and malcom; I don't believe you recieved those errors strictly because it was in Zip format rather than Rar or Ace. When you're downloading over the net, both the TCP/IP stack and your download manager ( FTP client, browser, etc ) are supposed to make sure that the data it recieves is the data that was sent, and if not then it must be resent. The fact that you're recieving CRC errors shows that one of the two isn't doing it's job.

Having said that, Zip is much more ubiquitous and will be easier for newbies to handle ( In fact, IIRC doesn't XP have built in unzip tools? ) and we know it's supported on all three platforms.

As a rule I think all files should be compressed to be self extracting so you don't have to go and download another decompresion utility. This would speed things up for beginers as well.

This would be nice, but it can't be done ( that I know of ) in a cross-platform environment.

[Sum0]

Damn. I do use a download manager (Flashget) and I get errors with it... guess it's just my bad luck.

[Malcolm]

Sorry guys, I fouled up my quotes and attributions, in my previous post,
I'll try harder/better in future

Having said that, Zip is much more ubiquitous and will be easier for newbies to handle ( In fact, IIRC doesn't XP have built in unzip tools? )

Now how do I get it to say that Troy said that bit

There is Zip built in to WinME (but there are much better 3rd party ones, of course !) but I cannot say for XP.
" ubiquitous " ,such a nice word and describes the Windows zip situation perfectly, in fact some of us have been 'doing it' since DOS3.0 * It is so ubiquitous that I am surprised the LinuxLads are still tarballing and gzeding !
* But you can guess that some of us have not yet learned how to drive Forum Machines

D.Edwards said

As a rule I think all files should be compressed to be self extracting

I have a fear, call me paranoid if you will, but I hate running .exe recently downloaded from the internet, I usually wait for someone else to do it first and if they dont 'suffer' then I know it should be safe for me ! I'm a coward !

Malcolm,
In cloudy SW England and who did not see any Perseids

[Malcolm]

I do use a download manager

And I _never_ have used one ! could that be our (un)common difference I wonder ?
I dont ( well not often) need to "resume" a download so I have not tried any of those manager gizmos and when I have needed to then my FTP client (LeechFTP) has resumed. Most servers now support the resume I believe ??
The only one that does not that I have met recently is the Sun JavaSDK which has now grown so big (35Mb) that I cannot get it down during my (ISP)session limit of 2hrs Sorry, I stray a bit OT now.

[Sum0]

Why would we need self-extracting archives? Surely everyone on the web has some kind of unzipping program? XP has one built in, to answer your question....

Sum0 -
in cloudless, dark SE england, saw loads of Perseids and the Milky Way...

[Malcolm]

saw loads of Perseids

grrr,

I'm going to go and sulk over a cup of tea