no password = downloads mod. Password = mod download failed

As title.

For the first time in months I have passworded my servers and one of the issues that made me leave them open appears to be there.

When they are open, everything downloads fine. When I apply a password, the rfmod download, more often than not, fails. This is on both of my servers.

Any ideas?

 

Do you run both servers side by side on one machine? If yes then stop both servers and start just one of them with a password and see if you can join.

i had this issue some time ago and it turned out the mod download fails on a passworded server as soon as I start a second one.

 

Yes. Both are in the same dedicated server. Right enough one seems to work pretty OK, the 2nd very temprimental.

 

Hey Rich,

I've been struggling with this issue for a long time. I found a solution that works for us.


In the task manager right click on the Dedicated.exe and set your CPU affinity to 1 CPU.
If you have multi servers: set each Dedicated.exe to a different CPU. (4 CPU cores = 4 servers) (Server1 to CPU 0, Server2 to CPU 1, etc...)
and set the CPU priority to high.


This solved the leave-lag issues (user left 1000times) in previous builds for us + the "Get Mod" with a password + less disconnections when going to next session.

I'm curious if this solves the issue for you too.

 

I will do this, thanks a lot. I'll give feedback when I have it.

 

Rich, are you using profiles or separate installs?

 

Separate installs these days mate.

 

One other thingy:

If you change the server from no password to a passworded server.
You'll need to exit the dedicated server and restart it with a password.

And each time you restart the dedicated server, you'll need to set the CPU affinity and the priority again.

 

Oh bugger. My servers are now set to automatically restart with a password for league events I can't always be at my server to start the sessions (Like this evening)

 

That is fine. You only need to restart a server if you change it in the GUI. If you are using that script I wrote to change the password then you are fine because it closes the server, changes the password it in the json and then starts it back up.

I just did a bunch of testing with two servers and it is working perfect every time. I have both servers sharing the same core and datapath and have a separate profile for each server. One is UserData\Server 1\Server 1.json and the other is UserData\Server 2\Server 2.json. The ports are unique for each server and the ports are open in both my router and windows firewall. Both servers also have different passwords.

I am using a command line like this to start the servers:

Code:

<Core>\Bin64\rFactor2 Dedicated.exe +profile="Server 1" +oneclick"
<Core>\Bin64\rFactor2 Dedicated.exe +profile="Server 2" +oneclick"

The working directories need to be one level up. So <Core>\ and not <Core>\Bin64. Otherwise it gives you that message about not having any mods installed.

To test I would join server 1 and type the password... It joins fine. Then I would close rF2 and run a little batch file that looks like this:

Code:

@echo off
del C:\Users\ermax\Documents\rFactor2\VEC\Installed\rFm\VEC_*.mas /q
del C:\Users\ermax\Documents\rFactor2\VEC\Manifests\VEC_*.mft /q
del C:\Users\ermax\Documents\rFactor2\VEC\Packages\VEC_*.rfmod /q

That is just a quick way to uninstall the mod and delete the rfmod file from the packages folder. Then I would start rF2 back up and join Server 2. No problems. I repeated this for both servers about 10 times each. Not a single time did it fail to join either of them. I assume you are using build 910 right? I know there was a bug in older builds.

 

You might want to look at this plugin:

http://isiforums.net/f/showthread.p...rol-(race-session-every-x-hours-like-iRacing)

It just restarts weekend at a certain hour. Might be useful if you only want to do that. It doesn't change password or reverse grids or something.
Don't know if Dennis has plans to develop it further and automate more stuff.

 

I am running the same vmod on both servers though. Let me do a different vmod on each and see if that causes problems.

 

Okay.. even with different vmods with different components is working perfect for me. Again, uninstalling and delete the vmod and restarting rF2 between each test so I am forcing it to download the vmod each time.

 

So you're using the same install with different profiles, Noel?

I'm using 2 totally different installs. Only reason for this is to allow the live timing to be used. When I put it on my server B1ker said I needed separate installs for it to work.

 

Correct.. I am using profiles. Let me do a new test using separate installs and see if I have any problems.

 

would be great for feedback mate. Again, they run totally faultlessly unless I add a password. I use a shortcut to the dedi exe.

 

I just tested with a unique Core and DataPath for each server and also used the script I made yesterday for starting them up and I tested over and over on both servers without a problem. You are randomly able to join both servers or totally unable to join one of them? Also, if you preinstall the vmod does that have any impact? Or is the server grayed out in the matchmaker?

Right now I only see one server from you online and without a password which is here:
http://109.236.88.26:2025/SessionInfo/

HTTP port at 2025 and Sim port as 1025.

 

Good job you said that, one of my servers had crashed!

The BTCC server seems joinable most of the time. Sometimes requiring a 2nd attempt. The Clio server the mod download failed every time.

They're not passworded currently, only set to password when the league session starts thanks to your script.

Neither are greyed out. Have not tried preinstalling the vmod.

 

What would be really cool is create a watchdog script that knows when the server is down and automatically restart it. The problem is sometimes the dedi only partially crashes so it would be hard to detect that with a script. You could repeatedly query the SessionInfo page but sometimes that will respond even when the server is hung up. You could monitor the task list to be sure the task is still running but sometimes the server isn't responsive but the task is still there. I will have to think about this a little.

 

Your vmods are monster sized for some reason. It takes forever to download the vmod. To compare, your Clio vmod is 7.5MB and our vmod at VEC is only 38kb. I just looked at your Clio vmod and it has a mas file inside a mas file inside a mas file. Each one has icons. You may want to take a look at that. Your DDS icons are also much larger than ours. Our icons are 170kb each and yours are 1MB each. Also make sure you use max MAS compression on this file.