[vworld-tech] Ultimate MMO Platform

[Dave]

J C Lawrence wrote:

>Wouldn't the notions of quorum mechanics, such as the degenerate cases
>where both ends of a transaction cross-check/sanity_check the results of
>a computation or current game state directly contradict this?  They are
>'consensual systems' which yet offer (potentially) strong definition and
>correctness controls[1].
>  
>
Doesnt quorum mechanics rely on the fact that some nodes are more 
reliable than others? I'm not to familiar with the term so correct me if 
I'm wrong please. I dont consider a peer of higher authority to be a 
peer. The idea I had was make is you need to establish trust with the 
other nodes. I was thinking of a system similar to a web of trust like PGP.

Another point about using peer to peer is how you prevent users from 
extracting more information than they should about the area of the world 
that they are running?

>The difference of course is that in such quorum systems, instead of
>trusting network graph nodes (cf "people"), instead you trust state
>transitions.  An underlieing assumption is that nodes are inherently
>untrustworthy[2], if only for the fact that node identity is soft and
>unreliable, but that computation can be trusted as it can be side
>checked and relat4ed state changes sanity checked[1] thus providing a
>more reliable trust metric.
>  
>
Good point. It is difficult to maintain trust. Someone you once 
considered reliable may not be anymore, intentionally or not. This of 
course does cost in redundant operations but I suppose like everything 
it is a compromise of security vs performance.

>An interesting comparative thought model for the space is large NUMA
>machines and the migration of processes and data about such a cluster,
>aggregating in working-set groups, around physical resources, etc.
>
>  
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Another good point.

Its the phyiscal resources that you distribute. In the case of p2p its 
bandwidth and disk space. In highly parallel computers its memory and 
CPU. I may be making a different comparision, but, IIRC machines like 
the SGI Origin use hypercubes (is that right?) that would be an 
excellent way of organising p2p networks. Peers can be group on interest 
and optimal broadcasts and be carried out on this topology. MMOs need to 
take elements of each for simulating the world and distributing data.

>Frankly I'd start out by dropping "ultimate" and "should" from all
>discussions.  Neither term will help useful discussion or progress.
>
>  
>
Ok, ok, but it is in the title of the thread...

There obiviously is no ultimate. But you can engineer in flexibility to 
ensure that you can prioritise the compromises that you have to make. 
Hmm I suppose thats called over-engineering.