[Linux] Big loading time compared to the Windows version

rkfg

I noticed that Windows version of NS2 loads times faster than the Linux one. First off, I have an SSD and Steam is on it. I also moved and symlinked ~/.config/Natural Selection 2 to SSD since it contains the shaders cache. No matter what when I get into the ready room there's already 15 out of 20 players there and I'm sure all of them use WIndows. I also saw the loading process on some youtube stream and it was a blast! Literally 20 seconds from pressing the join button to enter the RR. For me it takes 1 minute and 17 seconds (!!!), almost 4 times longer. Imagine what happens with HDD (hint: about 3 minutes of waiting). But let's stick to SSD for now. I doubt Windows filesystem is performing this better than ext4. I also doubt that SSD is 4 times faster than mine (OCZ Vertex 4). But I suspect it has something to do with case sensitivity because I see lots of this

WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/Dropship/dropship1_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/Dropship/dropship1_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/Dropship/dropship1_normal.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/Dropship/dropship1_normal.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/Dropship/dropship1.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/Dropship/dropship1.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/tunnel/Mouth_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/tunnel/Mouth_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/tunnel/Mouth_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/tunnel/Mouth_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/lerk/Lerk_shadow_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/lerk/Lerk_shadow_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/lerk/Lerk_shadow_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/alien/lerk/Lerk_shadow_spec.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/female/Female_view_v3.dds'
WARNING: Corrected case of '/opt/SteamLinux/SteamApps/common/Natural Selection 2/ns2/models/marine/female/Female_view_v3.dds'

on each load. It's not a secret that Windows FS are case insensitve while Linux FSes are all case sensitive. I guess a hack was used to overcome this while porting the game, probably not very efficient when working with many files. Maybe it's unrelated at all but it bothers me performance-wise. Since CDT now has Linux developers on board and recently the performance improvements were made, could you please profile the loading process on Linux (using SSD to take out of equation the seek times) and see what exactly bottlenecks it? I have a couple of friends who really hate the long loading time on Linux and don't play NS2 exactly because of this. Which is sad.

rkfg

Any attention, please?..

Darakian

Have you tried changing the case of any of the files?

Obraxis

We're aware of the issues with the Linux build, and have brought on 3 linux programmers to help with this for future builds. We can't promise WHEN the issues are fixed, but they are known and being looked into.

rkfg

Darakian wrote: »

Have you tried changing the case of any of the files?

To what exact case? There's no indication what the game expects and what it gets.

Obraxis wrote: »

We're aware of the issues with the Linux build, and have brought on 3 linux programmers to help with this for future builds. We can't promise WHEN the issues are fixed, but they are known and being looked into.

Thanks, just wanted to be sure that this particular issue is recognized. I suppose it's much easier to fix than random crashes, because it's 100% reproducible and profileable.

ArthurDent

Yeah. I have the same issue on my linux machine. It really slows down the loading time period.

rkfg

I'm not claiming that the case sensitivity slows down the loading process but it may be one of the factors. It could have been written off to mods but I joined to the same server that I saw on that stream with the same set of mods, and the difference in loading times was huge.

minteh

Obraxis wrote: »

We're aware of the issues with the Linux build, and have brought on 3 linux programmers to help with this for future builds. We can't promise WHEN the issues are fixed, but they are known and being looked into.

^ Love this.

The new update (267) killed NS2 on my Linux machine, it failed to compile shaders and would just close. I managed to combine my current shaders folder with murray's and its worked my past two games. Although REALLY slow to get into game, when in my FPS are a lot better with this build. I'm on 14.6 Betas.

ceribik

Can't say I've noticed this. I'm running NS2 on a HDD and I always "beat" 80%+ of the server on map change.

ArthurDent

The problem is that it takes seconds for every script, for about a hundred scripts every time you load a map.