Subj : Multinode Question 컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴 I've got more of a tech question for you Authors out there who have programmed multi-node games. What's the best/Quickest way to repeatedly read and write to a single file from many different nodes? I'm looking at File Locking, but from what I've seen of it, it looks like it would take too long. I need something that is EXTREMELY fast because in my game players can walk around and talk to each other while online. They can even (hopefully parties of 5-10 and converse/fight together/ etc. Is this even going to be possible? If so, are there any good shareware programs (Pascal/assembler)? ****Not with current dos technology. SFC has perhaps the fastest multi-player realtime game where up to 4 people can fight/converse at once (Star Force Commander SFC100) and it slows down to 1-2 reads per/sec in most cases. It really slows down when some other nodes are playing Lord or TWs that use a very disk intensive locking method. ****lock files *REAL* quick? The main data file is going to be almost a Don't try this with a network.... You'll kill yourself! ****MEG and if all goes as planned, there will be at l or 3 reads/writes per second. Thanks for your help! ****File size doesn't matter if you are accessing the record properly. You might get 3-5 reads/writes a second for files overall, but most people don't put all their info in a single file. So you may only be able to access a particular file 1-2 per second. (I don't think you want to mix your chat file with your dungeon map file do ya?) ****One other thing to think about is that for each player the program running in EACH node may have to read the data of the OTHER players to know where they are and what they are doing. (attacking you..giving you money.. etc.) So the number of reads really starts to increase geometrically as you add additional players. To get around this you can use common 'pool' files where all actions are recorded. (Some games call this their Onliners.dat file). Each node goes there to read and find out what is going on and where everyone is. ****Locking files is half the question. If you open and close the files just before locking and after unlocking it solves a lot of sharing problems but your speed goes way downhill. I keep my most accessed files open the entire program . However since DV and some other taskers only allow about 20 files to be open in a window at a time you must open and close some of your lesser used files. ****What is faster than file locking is OS/2 piping, or using Win95 api calls that do all the locking/access/storage in common memory. Makes it behave like a Major BBS door. Don't ask me how, I don't now yet.. �