[crossfire] Metaserver reporting and accuracy

[Mark Wedel]

Tchize wrote:
> Andrew Fuchs wrote:
>> Would be easier to manage (on both sides) by having a "permanent" flag
>> sent to the metaserver, that has to be explicitly set in the server
>> config.
> Just a though:
> metaserver entries of 'permanent' server should, at least partially, be 
> stored in a config file of metaserver.
> 
> For example, if I create a server named "Lands of  magic", i don't want 
> someone to configure his own personal server with the same name and fool 
> the players. Permanent servers should have reserved names in metaserver.
> Also, metaserver should have a way to ensure the given connection ip is 
> the one from which the metaserver entries are sent (currently it's only 
> a matter of sending an udp packet and so metaserver could be overflowed 
> by fake entries with random ips)

  I'd almost say that this is more a 'trusted server' list, which is probably a 
good idea, but is a little different.

  I don't really think a permanent flag is needed - if a server hasn't provided 
an update in X amount of time, it probably isn't around (even if it is a trusted 
server), and shouldn't be shown.  Not sure current setting, but initially the 
timeout on the metaserver to remove systems that haven't provided updates was 
very long (a leftover from initial testing).

  But before we start looking at doing too much here, this sort of goes back to 
the discussion several months back about a new/better metaserver design (more 
than one metaserver, etc).  That discussion basically went away after the 
metaserver came back online.