RESOLVED Dedicated Server Issues

[John - NEXFER 111]

Hi all,

I will update this post with known dedicated server issues, and cross them off once they have been confirmed as fixed.

The reason for this is that since the increase in people playing on servers, bugs may come to light and the forum may become messy for someone looking for information about them, searching within a ton of different posts.

So, I will update this post when I see your posts about dedicated server related bugs, and when the developers post confirmation of fixes etc.

Or just post in this thread with the information, up to you!

Importance Key:

* Critical

+ Important

- Trivial

 

Current Known Bugs:

[*] Dedicated server freezing - The server may seem like it's working, but players are unable to connect after a while (happens faster with more players logged in). Restarting can sometimes fix this, or you may have to create a new save game to host (rarer).

[*] Client stuck on "downloading game data" or "recalling buildings" - I think this happens when the server has frozen, as mentioned above.

[*] All timers stop working in kilns etc, and therefor no items can be crafted anywhere in the game- making it literally unplayable. The save file is affected even when booted.

[+] All online players become frozen for a second or two, whenever someone else logs in to the server.

[-] Running over a shark with a large boat, will make the shark stuck on deck of the boat.

[-] Having a horse on a large boat, will make your ship flip over when you try and set-sail, as if the horse weighs a lot more than the ship, because... physics.

[+] Dedicated servers have some lag (delayed animations, running on the spot, clicking an item and nothing happens for some time delayed, etc), that seems to be isolated to the game, other servers I host have no lag, and there are plenty of system resources spare.

[+] Trying to destroy placed blocks results in a "failed" message, though they can be picked up before the two minute timer ends.

[+] Server Monitor using more CPU % than the server itself (50% monitor, 25% server).

 

Fixed Known Bugs:

[*] Server list overlapping, no scrolling.

[*] Boats sinking underwater.

[*] Broken crafting menu, missing items.

[*] Character unable to act upon respawn.

 

[John - NEXFER 111]

@Aleš Ulm It seems that the multiplayer way of hosting, does not have the same issue as the dedicated server way of hosting (Freezing up, players unable to connect etc) - further, connecting to the server is much faster with the multiplayer method.

I've bought a second copy of Ylands and have set up a multiplayer server, which I have set to the lowest possible graphics settings and will leave online to see if this is a viable server option.

Worth noting from this then, that it seems the biggest dedicated server issue is purely isolated to the server monitor method of hosting, rather than the hosting itself, and thus could indeed be a bug with the server monitor application, rather than the Ylands.exe.

Any way to make it a simpler command prompt style server, rather than having a good looking UI for the dedicated server? The simplified version seems like a better option for server hosts, maybe possible for the future with Steam anyway.

Hope this info can speed up the hotfix for you guys!

*On a side note, the server (mutiplayer left online) seems to be eating up memory, it was on around 3-4GB used and has been steadily rising for the passed few hours, it is now on 5.5GB used, I think there could be an issue where memory is not being unloaded properly, might be worth looking in to as well.

Keep up the good work

Edited July 16, 2017 by Ylanders UK Dedicated

[Aleš Ulm 1725]

Hi guys,

here's an update about the current state of the dedicated server issues.

At first, we thought we would be able to release a hotfix, but right now it seems that for some fixes/improvements you will have to wait till the upcoming update (it is planned to be released around the end of this month).

Let me elaborate a bit...

The main problem is that the issues you're experiencing, that many times result in dedicated server becoming unstable, are very likely caused by several issues and unfortunately the logs you (or our QA for that matter) provide contain no hints we could use to identify them. Because of that we had just finished rewriting the better part of the server monitor which should now work better and provide us with more detailed info. We were able to fix some of the possible problems but we need some more testing to find those that remain.

Not only are the changes we had to make too large for this to be easily released as a simple hotfix, but we also don't feel like releasing something that could potentially fix only some of the issues. We'd like to do this properly, so please bear with us a bit longer - I assure you that it's our highest priority right now.

Thanks

 

[John - NEXFER 111]

29 minutes ago, Aleš Ulm said:

Hi guys,

here's an update about the current state of the dedicated server issues.

At first, we thought we would be able to release a hotfix, but right now it seems that for some fixes/improvements you will have to wait till the upcoming update (it is planned to be released around the end of this month).

Let me elaborate a bit...

The main problem is that the issues you're experiencing, that many times result in dedicated server becoming unstable, are very likely caused by several issues and unfortunately the logs you (or our QA for that matter) provide contain no hints we could use to identify them. Because of that we had just finished rewriting the better part of the server monitor which should now work better and provide us with more detailed info. We were able to fix some of the possible problems but we need some more testing to find those that remain.

Not only are the changes we had to make too large for this to be easily released as a simple hotfix, but we also don't feel like releasing something that could potentially fix only some of the issues. We'd like to do this properly, so please bear with us a bit longer - I assure you that it's our highest priority right now.

Thanks

 

Great to hear and completely understandable!

I think one of the most obvious methods I could think of, to help address these kind of unknown issues, would be to include in the server monitor, output display / logging, of all actions the server is taking, perhaps a second tab for this or whatever method to apply it in practice.

Then these problems become obvious, because server hosts will see exactly what task the server was performing, when things are going wrong etc.

These could be logged and correlated, and fairly soon consistent issues will be highly visible, as you mentioned the current logs do not provide such things.

One other thing I might suggest, is to include an "upload log" or "report error" button included within the game or server application, to allow detailed logs etc, to be sent directly to your team, this data could then be aggregated etc to find issues.

Keep up the great work - on a side note, the hosting a multiplayer server, on a second Ylands account, is working pretty darn well as a makeshift dedicated server substitute for the meantime! The server is very stable, and only a few of the smaller issues persist with this method (though it requires buying two copies of Ylands!). I've had it online for several days now and many players have logged in / explored - no server hanging at all, though there is a few seconds of freeze whenever a player connects / disconnects.

So if anyone is desperately wanting to host a server prior to the update, grab yourselves a second copy of the game, run it on the lowest possible graphics settings and keep it online on the host!

 

Edited July 17, 2017 by Ylanders UK Dedicated

[arnada 1]

On 2017-05-17 at 0:14 AM, John - Ylanders said:

[*] Client stuck on "downloading game data" or "recalling buildings" - I think this happens when the server has frozen, as mentioned above.

We also got this error and it didn't disappear on a server restart so we typed /kick playername in the server console. The command would return with an error since no players was connected but we could log in afterwards.

Don't know if anyone else can confirm this or if it was just  a coincidence.

[WijkagentAdrie 384]

For 0.5:

The already mentioned bug where standing on a boat will put you in a tripping state,

Quite a few crashes still. I have attached 3 logs and 1 other log for a game but that's 1GB in size. A 1GB size .txt file. Even wordpad can't open it, and for some reason, each crash it keeps growing and growing.

Furthermore, although they are not "issues", there are quite some gameplay changes needed to make it a worthwhile experience for now, but I will keep those to a different thread.

Adrie

output_log SERVER.txt

Adrie's Server 24-7, see forumtopic for password!_server_process_log.txt

output_log GAME.txt

[WijkagentAdrie 384]

Here's the massive logfile!

Adrie

Adrie's_Server_24-7,_Active_Admins,_See_forumtopic_server_process_log.txt