Perhaps these temporary measures may relax server quite a bit:
1. Disable streaming feature.
2. Allow one connection/opened page per IP. Currently it is possible to open 5 or so.
3. I doubt it is good idea to disable unregistered people to play, but it is as well possibility. You have mentioned somewhere that you have main problem with pairing system.
In general, disabling all unnecessary features which overload the server may allow and retain actual rate of games for even multiple times of users.
#1 Here we agree:
"In general, disabling all unnecessary features which overload the server may allow and retain actual rate of games for even multiple times of users."
@fastlearner50 What do you mean by disabling the streaming feature? As a streamer myself, I get 60% of my views from within Lichess. I do agree with the shared point by #2
@ChesswurmOTBThe most critical part for any server is a bandwidth and processing power. If one server use near 100% of it to support video streaming, then it is clear anything else will suffer. Currently it is clear that many reconecting issues happens, thus it is quite difficult even to play games. Until new server arrive, someting must to be temporarely disabled.
Other solution is to limit size of data stream per streamer/viewer, i.e. to limit resolution and quality of the video.
Of course, I have no access to internal server statistic, but it is more than evident that all unnecessary trafic and processing need to be limited or cut off in order to allow basic functionality.
Oh, now I see your cause for concern... however, just because the Streamers Arena failed doesn't mean that streaming video was the problem. Almost certainly the opposite since that's almost entirely handled by Twitch or YouTube.
#2 pointed at the most common denominator on which we can all agree. It is going into the details that may have people disappointed.
Then maybe consider what is lichess offering at its core. I have been taming my expectation of features on the understanding that lichess was a working playable platform, adding feature from a minimalist perspective (not to collapse upon itself). I think that in times of restrictions that should be considered the core. not?
The resolution compromise may be an intermediate step. that would keep #3 relatively happy, no?
However, I have no idea what it the most load bearing on the servers. Is streaming that demanding?
The fact is that streaming is made of blocking packets, and hence have priority over other non-blocking packets (tcp versus udp) if that is still a thing. so, maybe streaming is a bandwidth problem. It may not be a server processing load though.
#6 Yeah, in general Lichess is stable... we just didn't anticipate that demand would quadruple in a month, and we have a new back end server on the way.
I do understand. Not making any comment or complaining, just passing by and getting the news, and seeing some embryo of debate, wondering what I could contribute..... and what I care most about. thinking out loud? But I just read about a thread on the friends widget module, gave me some idea of the troubles (not read thoroughly, first page). So I am glad the platform is adaptive that way without overhaul, that modular code has allowed such possibilities. (no extensive ripples I would imagine).
Is bandwidth load separable from processing load as the current constraints on scale? Naive question (is high bandwidth usage implying server processing load of some kind).
I don't mind giving up the widget for some time, or ever (although I wonder if it is the widget itself and its interactivity or the tracking of followers both ways, and keeping the profile followed people onlineness updated at all times... did not read the thread). So if that helped taking care of the spike, great. No need for big scale relaxing moves, maybe?
Remove all variants and have separate websites like
liantichess.org lichess960.org liatomic.org and so on. :D (Or move all the variants to
pychess.org )
#9 It would be easier to remove standard chess.
