It's happened.... hitching problems found and fixed (mostly still WIP)

SamusDroidSamusDroid Colorado Join Date: 2013-05-13 Member: 185219Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, Subnautica Playtester, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
edited November 2013 in NS2 General Discussion
Disclaimer: Don't be eating, drinking, or standing when you click this spoiler. I've solved it, I finally found he cause, and a fix.
Results to far: No hitches, 10 second load times on a fresh start, people's minds blown, no more getting murdered when switching builds.


All because of DDS files, and a few extra models taking up load time. If you can, please test this, and report findings here, based on questions on mod page. Basically when load times was giving everyone times, it was giving them the times it took to load the actual material file which is not preached, NOT the DDS texture files that are loaded when the material loads. So yeah, you notice a hitch, it only said something like 0.01 seconds and you are like WTF!?!? When really it loaded a material file which loads 4-5 more high res texture dds files. So, what if you were to precache all these dds ffiles on load?! This is the result. Somehow when it should be taking longer to load more files, it's actually reducing loadtimes by like 1/3.


To test this mod, subscribe to the mod, enable it in game and then restart the game. Load a listen server and type load times into console (`). Notice first encounters and load times for each side, report findings to here when out finish.

Things to report:
Was load times faster?
Did you have any hitches? If so list them here or upload a lis of the console with the long load time.
If you had any load time =15 report it here as well. Or ANYTHING that made you hitch.
Any other comments or things you noticed

Reported 1/3 default lload times.
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Comments

  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    edited November 2013
    Here's video from the thread I made, by doing a map ns2_summit like in the video normally, I take 1:30 to load and hitch all over first engagement shit (like shell casings, blood etc).

    EDIT: Also I don't have an SSD.



    Mod delete other thread?

    EDIT 2: HUGE DEVELOPMENT, READ THIS POST:
    forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/comment/2167703/#Comment_2167703
  • tallhotblondetallhotblonde Join Date: 2012-12-11 Member: 174770Members, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Shadow
    Can UWE please give this man my shadow donation kthnx
  • NarfwakNarfwak Join Date: 2002-11-02 Member: 5258Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS1 Playtester, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Gold, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica PT Lead, NS2 Community Developer
    IronHorse wrote: »
    *All hail Samus! All hail Samus!*

  • SamusDroidSamusDroid Colorado Join Date: 2013-05-13 Member: 185219Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, Subnautica Playtester, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
    This will eventually have a option to load for all those 32 bit people out there with memory issues. This will expand a lot, it's only just begun...
  • SamusDroidSamusDroid Colorado Join Date: 2013-05-13 Member: 185219Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, Subnautica Playtester, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
    Temporarily disabled by cosistency I guess, will make it client sided tomorrow so you can load it when game starts. For now you can test by removing consistency checking in AppData/Roaming/Natural Selection 2/ConsistencyConfig.Jason.
  • casan0vaxcasan0vax Cloverfield, USA Join Date: 2012-11-04 Member: 166663Members, WC 2013 - Shadow
    I concede to your greatness, SamusDroid. Bravo!
  • HeatSurgeHeatSurge Some Guy Join Date: 2012-09-15 Member: 159438Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    edited November 2013
    UWE should hire you for ongoing support for NS2 while they work on their new game :-) .
  • CCTEECCTEE Join Date: 2013-06-20 Member: 185634Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    Can some1 explain what Hitching problems are?
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    CCTEE wrote: »
    Can some1 explain what Hitching problems are?



    See near end of video when I fire the rifle.
  • kalakujakalakuja Join Date: 2012-09-11 Member: 159045Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter
    oO one does not simply fix ns2!
  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    This is hitching - over half a second of my screen freezing, generally in very crucial moment:
    33uWGWu.jpg
  • CrushaKCrushaK Join Date: 2012-11-05 Member: 167195Members, NS2 Playtester
    HeatSurge wrote: »
    UWE should hire you for ongoing support for NS2 while they work on their new game :-) .



    ≖_≖
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Not included, gotta wait til 261 :(
  • Al_BoboAl_Bobo Join Date: 2013-03-14 Member: 183957Members
    Thank you very much.
  • RoobubbaRoobubba Who you gonna call? Join Date: 2003-01-06 Member: 11930Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    Great work, @Samusdroid, now if we can have this avoid consistency checking, that'd be fantastic :)
  • AsranielAsraniel Join Date: 2002-06-03 Member: 724Members, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Retired Community Developer
    as soon as a single lua file is allowed, its trivial to write aimbots and wallhacks.

    That said, his fix passes consistency checking
  • sotanahtsotanaht Join Date: 2013-01-12 Member: 179215Members
    edited November 2013
    Seems to have absolutely no effect for me. Load times seem to be roughly the same, hitching is about the same (was minimal to start with). I am getting the "precacheing everything ever" lines in my console so I'm pretty sure the mod is running.

    Edit: While I do get the "Precacheing" spam which seems to appear simultaneously so I don't actually get a scroll effect, I do NOT see the scrolling "loading" spam that Ghosthree3's first video shows. Maybe the mod isn't quite running properly?
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Asraniel wrote: »
    as soon as a single lua file is allowed, its trivial to write aimbots and wallhacks.

    That said, his fix passes consistency checking

    No, no it doesn't. It will error you saying lua\Loading.lua failed consistency check. Watch the console while you join a server. Also notice how you DON'T load in 10s.

    @sotanaht see above.



    THE ONLY WAY TO TEST THIS is to remove consistency checking from yout %appdata%\natural selection 2\consitencyconfig.json file and then start a listen server. It DOES work then though, see my video up top.
  • NeokenNeoken Bruges, Belgium Join Date: 2004-03-20 Member: 27447Members, NS2 Playtester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Silver, Subnautica Playtester
  • sotanahtsotanaht Join Date: 2013-01-12 Member: 179215Members
    edited November 2013
    Ghosthree3 wrote: »
    Asraniel wrote: »
    as soon as a single lua file is allowed, its trivial to write aimbots and wallhacks.

    That said, his fix passes consistency checking

    No, no it doesn't. It will error you saying lua\Loading.lua failed consistency check. Watch the console while you join a server. Also notice how you DON'T load in 10s.

    @sotanaht see above.



    THE ONLY WAY TO TEST THIS is to remove consistency checking from yout %appdata%\natural selection 2\consitencyconfig.json file and then start a listen server. It DOES work then though, see my video up top.

    Ok I'm not ENTIRELY sure how to do that but I have played with the file to the best of my limited knowledge. I know the mod is loading at least partly because it comes up on the list of server modifications when I start the map (which I am now doing with the console command you used), it does not say "...will be disabled", and it provides the precacheing spam which does not happen when I join a public server (that blocks the mod).

    Regardless, so far the mod has had no effect, and the message log in my console does not quite match that of your first vid so I'm fairly sure something is broken on my end.
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    edited November 2013
    sotanaht wrote: »
    Ghosthree3 wrote: »
    Asraniel wrote: »
    as soon as a single lua file is allowed, its trivial to write aimbots and wallhacks.

    That said, his fix passes consistency checking

    No, no it doesn't. It will error you saying lua\Loading.lua failed consistency check. Watch the console while you join a server. Also notice how you DON'T load in 10s.

    @sotanaht see above.



    THE ONLY WAY TO TEST THIS is to remove consistency checking from yout %appdata%\natural selection 2\consitencyconfig.json file and then start a listen server. It DOES work then though, see my video up top.

    Ok I'm not ENTIRELY sure how to do that but I have played with the file to the best of my limited knowledge. I know the mod is loading at least partly because it comes up on the list of server modifications when I start the map (which I am now doing with the console command you used), it does not say "...will be disabled", and it provides the precacheing spam which does not happen when I join a public server (that blocks the mod).

    Regardless, so far the mod has had no effect, and the message log in my console does not quite match that of your first vid so I'm fairly sure something is broken on my end.

    Just download this file, https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/176653127/ConsistencyConfig.json
    Place it in the %appdata%\natural selection 2\ folder. It should ask to overwrite, if it doesn't, wrong folder. You COULD open the file in notepad and get rid of everything between the brackets ( [ and ] ) that follow the "check" code but I've blanked the whole file for you.

    EDIT: Again, only works if you load a local server. Type map ns2_summit in console or go to the start server tab in play and load it in on summit.

    EDIT2: Very important
    Ok, I have done several tests. IF you enable this on your client and restart the game, you will see the console spam of it precaching stuff, that's cool, except I believe it gets unloaded on map start. IF you start a server with "map ns2_summit" it will respam it and load in VERY quickly. However, even if you join a server that has the mod, and you have the mod enabled, it will NOT spam it. This tells me that it's actually being loaded as part of the server loading routine, NOT client loading (also when it DOES spam it on the map command, it spams it well before "real" precaching). So, the theory is sound, but execution needs a tiny bit of modification so it loads at the correct time, ie. when you're loading a map/during real precaching, not at game start or server start.

    EDIT3: @sotanaht What you probably saw was the spam from when you load the menu, NOT actually during while loading. Try the method I've listed above in this post, and in my first video, for a proper "test" of it.
  • MephillesMephilles Germany Join Date: 2013-08-07 Member: 186634Members, NS2 Map Tester, NS2 Community Developer
    kalakuja wrote: »
    oO one does not simply fix ns2!

    except your name is SamusDroid

  • current1ycurrent1y Join Date: 2003-12-08 Member: 24150Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester
    IronHorse wrote: »
    This is hitching - over half a second of my screen freezing, generally in very crucial moment:
    33uWGWu.jpg

    I see you got no excuses now when I spit you to death..
  • soccerguy243soccerguy243 Join Date: 2012-12-22 Member: 175920Members, WC 2013 - Supporter
    seriously... can my reinforcement money go to Samus?

    but seriously.
  • Dictator93Dictator93 Join Date: 2008-12-21 Member: 65833Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    Wow. ALL we need to do is get rid of Visportal / culling hitching on maps and this game has perfectly fluid performance.

    Amazing work!
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    edited November 2013
    seriously... can my reinforcement money go to Samus?

    but seriously.

    Yeah if this fix actually ends up going through and working properly (we're not done yet, samus only worked on it for like 30 minutes lol) then he's done much more for this game than any other single person has in a looooong time.

    EDIT: Not to say no one else is doing work...but this takes the cake.
  • AsranielAsraniel Join Date: 2002-06-03 Member: 724Members, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Retired Community Developer
    Ghosthree3 wrote: »
    seriously... can my reinforcement money go to Samus?

    but seriously.

    Yeah if this fix actually ends up going through and working properly (we're not done yet, samus only worked on it for like 30 minutes lol) then he's done much more for this game than any other single person has in a looooong time.

    EDIT: Not to say no one else is doing work...but this takes the cake.

    I think you have no idea what the developers at UWE do for the game. Not saying its not great what samus does, but i would feel offended as a uwe developer reading your comment, because its simply not true.
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Asraniel wrote: »
    Ghosthree3 wrote: »
    seriously... can my reinforcement money go to Samus?

    but seriously.

    Yeah if this fix actually ends up going through and working properly (we're not done yet, samus only worked on it for like 30 minutes lol) then he's done much more for this game than any other single person has in a looooong time.

    EDIT: Not to say no one else is doing work...but this takes the cake.

    I think you have no idea what the developers at UWE do for the game. Not saying its not great what samus does, but i would feel offended as a uwe developer reading your comment, because its simply not true.

    I did say that I know they do work. But as a player, I've been waiting for better load times and the removal of hitches for over 30 builds. It has been my number one frustration with the game. Yes I hate the current balance (which is now Sewlek's job and he isn't who I'd truly call UWE even if they did employ him recently), and more maps would be kind of cool but I'm not desperate for them. Performance has been my number one issue for quite some time, so I don't retract my statement, this is the biggest improvement (for me anyway) that has (well hopefully will...) happen in a long time. Let's just hope it's actually as promising as it looks.
  • MigeMige Join Date: 2005-03-19 Member: 45796Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Can you add .material files? Most famous would be "materials/infestation/infestation_decal.material" :)
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