Re: [simspark-devel] discussion about timer

[Yuan X. <xuy...@gm...>]

Hi all,

About the timer again,
Joschka supposed to implement a mechanism just like 2D server,
discard the whole SPADES,
but in my my opinion, we should create a new commserver with timer(not
try tracking
agents, but timing), the commserver should not send the overtime
command to the server.

What do you think about it?
Any comment is welcome ;-)

our discussion is here:

/////////////////////////BEGIN///////////////////////////////////////
>> No, I think it wouldn't need that. To my understanding, the commserver
>> had the purpose of tracking the instruction cycles used by an agent and
>> doing the communication with the server. I think the agents should be
>> able to connect to the server directly (like in the simspark right now).
>
> OK, if there is no "commserver", the simulator is much more like the
> 2D simulator, I think the technology is mature.

I agree. It's simple, but easy to implement, and with the right network
setting, definitely suited for a competition environment.

> As we know the SPADES tries to tracking the instruction cycles, but it
> is hard too do, and the agent thinking is not only the CPU consumption
> but also any other operation of the agent.
> We should implement a new timer to replace it, but another function of
> commserver is applicable, communication by commserser keeps the
> influence of net away.
> Here I means we do NOT set the net "correctly", i.e. in the lab with a
> public switch, or anything doesn't match the competition settings. And
> the competition settings are changed between games, so we can not
> prove this is not a affection of team's performance.

I like the idea of having independence from network activity in the
simulation. On the other hand, this means a lot more "book keeping"
between the server and the commservers, which is harder to implement and
can slow down the simulation speed (to some extent).

> And I think we should try to make the simulator
> Hardware-Platform-Independent, although it nearly impossible.
> ;-D

You say it, it would be great, but it's almost impossible.

> And there is disadvantage of discarding the whole "commserver":
> If discard the "commserver", all the teams will be forced to implement
> a new communication module, and may need multithreading and complex
> synchronous mechanism.
> But all these technologies are not the focus of AI and RoboCup.

Yes that's true. I guess the new server (possibly with Humanoid robots)
will force teams to implement quite a lot of new code anyways, but we
should try to minimize the work.

> In my opinion, we should a new commserver with timer(not try tracking
> agents, but timing), the commserver should not send the overtime
> command to the server.

I think it sounds good. I will bring your proposal to the technical
committee discussion and I hope that we will have a decision soon.

///////////////////////////END///////////////////////////////////////





-- 
Best wishes!

Xu Yuan
Institute of Automation
Southeast University, Nanjing, China

mail:   xuy...@gm...
          xy...@ya...
web:   http://xuyuan.cn.googlepages.com
--------------------------------------------------