No, I don't believe there is anything so easy for games with custom TCP and UDP protocols. There are solutions that you can pay for but also you must integrate your game into such systems. You can't just send your money across the internet and suddenly you are immune to DDoS.

I think any such complex solutions involving large amounts of development would be a bad idea while there are two separate branches of LFS. Also the 'old' version (that everyone uses) is built in such an old compiler that it is impossible to incorporate modern software into it. So one part of the solution could be to just stop spending 100% of my time working on server issues, and get back to finishing the version we are all waiting for. But that's not really a great idea if for a few more days work the current system can be made more robust.

Just to answer a couple of points.

1) DDoS was common before we did the hosting, so developing a new solution for self-hosting would not miraculously solve DDoS issues.

2) It's not just about developers earning a bit less money due to piracy. I don't think you understand the severity, when an illegal master server was able to replicate our services (allegedly 'free' although that wasn't quite true) we didn't earn enough money to live on. This isn't about asking for sympathy, it's a simple statement of fact that if you can't earn enough to pay the bills, you have to get another job.

There are still more things to try, of course I don't know if they'll do much good. The trouble with DDoS these days, for everyone, not just LFS developers, is that every time you increase your defences, the attackers just come back with a bigger attack.

We're on the same side here, I'm working long days on this.

Quote from d_cury :

I know there have been problems, but our SV TAM®INDYCAR is not working...

Quote from manolixsvouros :

Mine has a similar issue, can't restart the server at all...

The Brazilian host controller stopped working for some reason, possibly a rare bug. I'll see if I can find a fix.

I have restarted the controller so hopefully you can start your hosts now.

We are under attack again so various things will not work.

Apparently someone's hobby is to destroy the online activity of LFS.

I don't know why that is. The only insight I can give is there are various types of DDoS attack.

Last edited by Scawen, Sun 16 Jun 2024, 17:02.

UDP is better, faster, definitely preferable unless you have a problem.

Sometimes TCP packets get through when an ISP or router fails to pass UDP packets correctly.

It's possible that problem is at your end, you may need to select TCP instead of UDP for position packets.

Dear Hosters,

For security reasons we have closed all hosts that are not 0.7E13 version.

Please select version E13 and restart your host when convenient.

Sorry for the disruption.

EDIT: Now E14 is the only supported version.

Last edited by Scawen, Tue 18 Jun 2024, 16:59.

Thanks for the suggestion but:

1) If we release the host code in any way, the well-known pirates will soon get their hands on it, start their own master server and our sales will drop back near zero, and we will have to seek alternative employment and LFS development will stop.

2) It is no use to all use the Netherlands servers because:
a) Bad ping all around the world.
b) Today the NL servers have been attacked successfully too.

I have some ideas that may reduce the effect of these attacks. LFS development is paused again while I work on the updates.

Thanks for the information.

I would like to correct your terminology. This is not a 'crash'.
It looks to me like:
1) Something (maybe an attack, maybe an internet issue) caused Lapper to disconnect.
2) After that it was unable to connect.

As a programmer, the word "crash" means something quite specific, and this is not it. So let's just say "lost connection" or "failed to connect" then it will be easier to communicate.

I have no information about last night. I don't see any evidence of an attack. Maybe there were internet troubles, at the data centre or something, I don't know. Although the Turkish server is running a lot better, it may still be possible to improve it and we are asking our provider about that.

About today, there were attacks. This is something completely different. Someone wants to stop Turkish people playing LFS, or maybe it's just your server, I don't know. Vandalism and attacks are not something I can understand or explain as I am not that type of person.

This time, I will answer you, but in future I will ignore any posts that have my name in it. I am not the server guy and I have work to do, that I can never do this year, because the whole year I am dealing with website and server troubles, that were never my job.


Information:

There was a DDoS attack this morning, between around 10:10 and 10:20 UTC. It was ongoing while you wrote your post above.

I can see no problems with the server last night, from looking at our graphs.

Adam, there is a problem with your post. It is no information to me, to say that connection problems started and there was a crash.

You need to describe, step by step, what symptoms you experienced. Don't try to theorise what the problem is. There are attacks and there have been server problems. Just describe what happens and let one of us try to figure out what is actually going wrong.

If you can describe what symptoms you experienced, and what UTC time that occurred then we can try to relate your experience with what we see on our activity graphs.

Last edited by Scawen, Fri 14 Jun 2024, 10:42.

You don't need this "@scawen".

1) I am not the 'server guy'
2) There is no notification by @name system on tthis forum.

All you achieve by writing @scawen is to annoy me, and make me less willing to help you.

Please, in future, let us know the problem and one of us will have a look to see if we can help. Do not try to suggest which one of us should stop our development to come and help you.

The Turkish server has been restarted by our provider after they made some adjustments.

We hope the connection will be improved but we will see about that.

EDIT: Hosts that were running before the restart have been restarted.

I recommend host version E12.

Last edited by Scawen, Tue 11 Jun 2024, 13:19.

I don't know much about the relay service but I could see it was running (not crashed or stopped).

I've tried restarting it, in case that may help.

EDIT: Do please let me know if it works, and if not, when was the last time you know of that it did work? So I can try to find out if any changes were made around the time it stopped working.

Last edited by Scawen, Fri 7 Jun 2024, 11:52.

I had to restart the server again this afternoon for some tests.

To those who were online at the time, sorry for the disruption.

I hope the provider will make some sense out of the test results.

I've restarted the hosts that were stopped. In my test server I didn't notice any difference when the other hosts were stopped.

My ping number (in 'N' list of connections) sits stable for a while then goes red and up to 2, 3, 4, 5, seconds before recovering. This seems to happen every minute, it's not a rare event.

After looking for quite some time, I can't see any explanation for this so we will ask the providers if they have any ideas.

Hello Turkish Hosters.

I am running tests to try to work out reasons for connectivity issues with the Turkish server.

I am talking about a problem that has nothing to do with DDoS attacks. It is about jerky, intermittent connections when there is no apparent DDoS attack going on.

As a test, I have temporarily closed the hosts that had no players on them. I closed 11 hosts. You are free to restart them if you want, but if you don't need your host for now, you may wish to leave it OFF and I will restart it later.

The idea is to see if the number of hosts is causing any problems, although it should not, as the CPU, memory and bandwidth of an empty host is very small. But I am trying to eliminate issues before we ask the server providers.

So, if your host disappears and reappears, it's not a bug, it's me testing. Sorry for the disruption but I am trying to help.

EDIT: This is not helped by the fact that DDoS attacks on the Turkish server are ongoing today at various times. If the attacker would kindly stop that would be much appreciated. I am trying to help Turkish people and it would be fantastic if you would stop attacking, so we can try to make a good fun game for everyone to play. It's best to try and have a good time in life, and help others to do that whem possible.

Last edited by Scawen, Wed 5 Jun 2024, 13:48.

I know you have experienced problems with the Turkish server.

Please can you be clear. Your comment "I wish it were so" suggests that it is still not smooth.

If that is the case, can you tell me clearly? I have a lot to do, so would prefer not to be confused.

We already know what you wish. What we need to know is, what actually is the case?

Hello hosters,

We updated some settings recently and restarted the hosting servers in these locations today:

Australia / Turkey / Brazil / Hong Kong

I hope the restart didn't cause too much disruption. I know some people were online although I tried to choose an off-peak time.

It's possible the servers may run more smoothly after the restart.

I recommend you restart hosts in E12 now that it is well tested and E12 client is on the auto updater.

I definitely recommend E12 now that it is well tested, especially as E12 client is now on the auto updater for everyone with version E.

Dear LFS racers,

As we are nearing the end of the current series of test patches, and because some hosters have moved to the E12 version which you cannot join with 0.7E, I have put the E12 version on the auto updater.

This is a different way of doing things. Normally we wait until the final, official, version and I am sure we will do that in future, when things need testing before going public.

It's different this time as it would be good to get hosts onto E12. The patch is very well tested.

How to update:

Method 1: AUTO install: Start LFS and click List of Hosts and select a download mirror
Method 2: MANUAL install: Visit the test patch thread to read the changelog and manually install

How to update your game host:

Stop host
Select E12
Start host (you are forced to wait for 1 minute after stopping)

I've rebuilt the E12 patch as an installer instead of a self-extracting archive.

Also, as a well tested patch, and now that some hosts are using the improved E12 hosting version, I have put this update on the auto updater system for everyone.

This is experimental, it's a different way of doing things. I'm sure it cannot be done for all test patches but it seems OK right now as this one is well tested.

The test patch forum was opened and the thread moved there at the same time that the E12 server became available.

The test patch thread was originally in the mods section because the earlier test patches were primarily about changes related to mods. This is fairly obvious if you look at the change log. https://www.lfs.net/forum/thread/106967

So then we didn't really need a whole forum section dedicated to a test patch that was all about mods.

Just recently some updates on the host side have required an updated client version. That point I delayed as much as possible, but now we are near the end of the life cycle of this test patch, so things need to be tested.

It does raise the question about making E12 'official' in the sense that it could be automatically downloaded by E clients using the auto updater. Some people might say that is a no-brainer, in the sense that it would be a good idea to provide more frequent updates like that. Maybe they are right, I'm not sure. We haven't done that before. Official updates have always come with an announcement and a new full version. This method has worked for us for many years. Roughly 20 years, I guess.

Either way, it probably would make more sense to use a better installer instead of the self-extracting archive that has served us quite well up to now. But I understand we are moving into an era where many people own a PC and play games but are confused about simply moving a file into a known location on their computer. This can seem hilarious to those of us who have used PCs since the days of MS-DOS. But I do understand the convenience of the proper installer and I am looking into that a bit.

The trouble is, although it's understandable to want to make such a small change for the fun of it, the time of such tweak mods has really passed. Of course you are free to play around with them on your local computer but it is unlikely to make it to publishing on the public system.

Over the last few years, the mods system has gone through many stages, ups and downs and now mods are not published unless they get community support. There are so many good mods now, the community won't really support mods that don't bring something new and interesting.

Tutorial videos: https://www.lfs.net/forum/thread/95664

I understand that it is not obvious, but it is in the "Test Patch Forum" that is visible from the main page of the forum.

https://www.lfs.net/forum/66-Patch-TEST-Forum

Sometimes when we get near to an official release, hosts move onto an incompatible version for various reasons and people must use the test patch in order to visit those hosts.

E12 is quite a bit better than E and I would like to release an official version soon, there are just a few more things on the list to sort out.