[I/JG27_Waggel]

The AAA community had problems to pay the download traffic in the last few months. Big patches whould strengthen this financing problem much more.


TEXTURES
If every new plane has textures (cockpit) with a size of round about 150MB, the size of the new patches for the Unified installer rises dramatically. You whould have a 2Gig patch or much more. A 150MB texture pack is not nessesary. You will get nearly the same quality with a 50MB pack. it is good for the performance of your computer and the download traffic of AAA is reduced.

Same with the textures for objects. Normally you reduce the textures to 8 bit colors (like the plane skins). But meanwhile you can see lots of objects with unconverted textures. An unconverted texture is four times bigger than an 8 bit colors texture.

DOWNLOAD
The unified installer causes a lot of download traffic. Perhaps we can put it into an external download service.

EXAMPLE:

The patch UI1.X has a size of 2 gigs. We can split this patch into 20 x 100mb rar files. This 20 x 100mb rar files will be uploaded on rapidshare or another filehoster (So you have different mirrors).

now we take a download manager like cryptload. This program is a specialist for one click hosters. As an uploader you can create a container file. This means the download manager knows every download page for the 20 x 100mb rar files. You do not have to click manually every download link. The download manager makes this automatically and he also downloads all 20 x 100mb rar files to your hard disk.

You can make a password for this splitted .rar archive like "allaircraftsimulations.com". This PW will be used for all AAS downloads.


The AAA server only whould share the .CFF file. The size of this file is 5KB (VERY SMALL :-) ).


With this system we whould reduce the download traffic dramatically. It is also very save. No one can use a single splitted file. You need all files.

[Forager]

Is it feasable to request modders provide the smaller texture packages for inclusion into the UI?

They could offer the large files as single options outside the pack.

There are extremely well done cockpits available but, as you mentioned, they are huge files.

AAA cannot package every mod and many mod users pick and choose anyway.

Addons outside the self installing new planes and object packs and things needed to keep online play standard, should be left to the individual to get or not get.

AAA should not be expected to provide massive download packages when most of what they contain can be added seperately by users if they read the instructions.

Whether AAA provides a large pack or users have to select what they want, there will still be many "I cannot make it work", "It crashes at whatever %" and all the other problems that crop up due to language differences, impatience, lack of ability to use the search button, etc.

AAA can well serve its intended function, make quality mods available, without the massive packages offered in the past.

It may be time to put more responsibility on the users to mod their game

[Guest]

+1

[VonBarb.]

Another good way to achieve better speeds while browsing the forums, saving money and making things generally cleaner and easier to read would be to enforce regulations on signature images size and resolution. What do you think Bender ?

We could also just not allow them, to save even more bandwidth. Avatars are quite good enough IMO.

Cheers

Nico

[Radoye]

Also, putting up a torrent download could be a good idea. Basically, if everyone who downloads it keeps it seeded for at least a day or two pretty soon it wouldn't use AAA bandwidth at all yet still be available.

Rapidshare and such as another mirror is a good idea also, but you should not rely solely on them.

[SamIAm]

Should we consider cleaning out the attic?

[Vpmedia]

Also, putting up a torrent download could be a good idea. Basically, if everyone who downloads it keeps it seeded for at least a day or two pretty soon it wouldn't use AAA bandwidth at all yet still be available.

Rapidshare and such as another mirror is a good idea also, but you should not rely solely on them.

imho with 35.000 AAA members a torrent would have been the oblivious choice since the beginning, its not wise to spend any money on bandwidth if you can easily manage otherwise, filefront also has a free ftp file hosting service for developers http://www.filefront.com/developers_hosting.php which could be used

[kapteeni]

I'm all with torrents. I use it a lot with lage files!

[PA_Willy]

Also, putting up a torrent download could be a good idea. Basically, if everyone who downloads it keeps it seeded for at least a day or two pretty soon it wouldn't use AAA bandwidth at all yet still be available.

Rapidshare and such as another mirror is a good idea also, but you should not rely solely on them.

imho with 35.000 AAA members a torrent would have been the oblivious choice since the beginning, its not wise to spend any money on bandwidth if you can easily manage otherwise, filefront also has a free ftp file hosting service for developers http://www.filefront.com/developers_hosting.php which could be used

+1. I told the same when the 1.1 release. Torrent is the way. Easy and free.

Regards.

[Forager]

PorcoRosso, good one.
The sigs and avatars here caused me go get another browser just so I could block all that nonsense.

I know, lots of people love all that extra stuff but at the end of the day this place is about mods and the most efficient way to get them out into the world, not who has the coolest and/or biggest pictures associated with their posts..

No idea how torrents work but they seemed to get immediate negative response from the last administration.

[Spinnetti]

+1 torrents
+1 NO sig images (Avatar only)

[ojcar]

Maybe eMule too?

[BH_Blue]

I doubt, they will go for torrents, but maybe with the change of leadership that will change.

[fly_zo]

+1 torrents
+1 NO sig images (Avatar only)

forum without sigs ? you must have been joking here , right ?


restricted sig picture size is more likely to be expected ...

as for torrents goes ... i wouldn't hold my breath ( at the time being )

reg
Z

[Spartan10590]

I have to agree with others who are saying a torrent would be an excellent download option.

The only issue is to start this torrent you would need several people to initial seeders, which means they need the files ahead of time. Then, once people begin to complete their own downloads, we would need them to continue to seed for a little while (doesnt have to be too long, but the more you seed the more you help everyone else) to ensure everyone can get the files. The last issue is once the initial rush of donloads subsides, you need to have a way to ensure the files continue to be seeded, or else the torrent will no longer be able to distribute the files.

At the very least though, a torrent should be utilized along side a dedicated download. Or, better yet, make a torrent the only way to get the files for say the first week or so. After this period of time, make the download available, whether that be through AAA host or an outside host.

As far as limiting sig sizes, go for it. Common size limitations I've seen are 450W x 100H to 500W x 150H.