Smart Fox Server vs Flash Media Server

  Hey did any one take a look at the Smart Fox Server?
 
 Saw a link on http://www.shocksites.com . We purchased it and man O man!
 
 It is awesome. The full version for free, with 20
connections. So we purchased the 100 connections license. It
is much easier then the shockwave multi-user server was (and
more stable).
 
 We are going to port the http://www.chamberofchat
.com from MUS to SmartFoxServer over the next few
weeks.
    We installed it with little issues. It has build in
features that we have to manually build in our chat world.
    It has built in items like auto service creation(for
hosting), curse filter, room grouping, banning members,
native database connectivity, security, logs, max members,
and even the ability to create your own extensions for it!
    Sweeeeeet! 
    The interface is sooo slick. And it all works well.
    “Smart Fox Server” is much better then that expensive
“Flash Media Server”!
    It does not do video streaming but it does multi
user!!!! All day long!
http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin01.j
pg
http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin02.j
pg
http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin03.j
pg





 
---------------------------------
Finding fabulous fares is fun.
Let Yahoo! FareChase search your favorite travel sites to
find flight and hotel bargains.
_______________________________________________
dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l

It looks great for a chat, but if you want to build a real
client->server 
model it falls short in comparison with Nebulae.
It doesnt look as easy to extend and 100 connections really
isn't that 
much...

Elia

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Hipolito Troy" <troyhipolitoyahoo.com>
To: "Director - Shockwave - and Flash Game
Production" 
<dirgames-lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, January 31, 2007 6:27 AM
Subject: [dirGames-L] Smart Fox Server vs Flash Media
Server


>  Hey did any one take a look at the Smart Fox Server?
>
> Saw a link on http://www.shocksites.com . We purchased it and man O man!
>
> It is awesome. The full version for free, with 20
connections. So we 
> purchased the 100 connections license. It is much
easier then the 
> shockwave multi-user server was (and more stable).
>
> We are going to port the http://www.chamberofchat
.com from MUS to 
> SmartFoxServer over the next few weeks.
>    We installed it with little issues. It has build in
features that we 
> have to manually build in our chat world.
>    It has built in items like auto service creation(for
hosting), curse 
> filter, room grouping, banning members, native database
connectivity, 
> security, logs, max members, and even the ability to
create your own 
> extensions for it!
>    Sweeeeeet!
>    The interface is sooo slick. And it all works well.
>    "Smart Fox Server" is much better then
that expensive "Flash Media 
> Server"!
>    It does not do video streaming but it does multi
user!!!! All day long!
> http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin01.j
pg
> http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin02.j
pg
> http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin03.j
pg
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Finding fabulous fares is fun.
> Let Yahoo! FareChase search your favorite travel sites
to find flight and 
> hotel bargains.
> _______________________________________________
> dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
> http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l 

_______________________________________________
dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l

> It looks great for a chat, but if you want to build a
real client->server 
> model it falls short in comparison with Nebulae.
> It doesnt look as easy to extend and 100 connections
really isn't that 
> much...
>
> Elia
>

After looking at the pricing page, here's the actual
breakdown:

20 connections - Free
100 connections - $647
500 connections - $1,295
Unlimited connections - $2,590

So the Smart Fox server does support unlimited connections
but the 
equivalent license cost 5 times as much as the Nebuale
Server ($500). Smart 
Fox does look more user friendly and it seems to be utilized
in quite a few 
commercial applications, which is good. But the unlimited
connections 
license is not too far off from the cost of the Flash Comm
server (which is 
expensive). If I needed to have 2-3 servers to run the game
I'd have to 
spend almost $8,000 in license fees. If you're doing more
than a avatar 
chat, the Smart Fox server gets really expensive.

Still, it's nice to see another viable option for MUS.
Thanks for sharing.

- Chris



_______________________________________________
dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l

Does it use the same protocol as SMUS? If I've coded a
multiplayer Shockwave 
game for MUS how difficult would it be getting it to work
with Smart Fox?

I'm developing a multiplayer game and I was thinking about
going with 
Nebulae, but now I'll have to consider Smart Fox Server.
Steve


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Hipolito Troy" <troyhipolitoyahoo.com>
To: "Director - Shockwave - and Flash Game
Production" 
<dirgames-lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, January 30, 2007 9:27 PM
Subject: [dirGames-L] Smart Fox Server vs Flash Media
Server


>  Hey did any one take a look at the Smart Fox Server?
>
> Saw a link on http://www.shocksites.com . We purchased it and man O man!
>
> It is awesome. The full version for free, with 20
connections. So we 
> purchased the 100 connections license. It is much
easier then the 
> shockwave multi-user server was (and more stable).
>
> We are going to port the http://www.chamberofchat
.com from MUS to 
> SmartFoxServer over the next few weeks.
>    We installed it with little issues. It has build in
features that we 
> have to manually build in our chat world.
>    It has built in items like auto service creation(for
hosting), curse 
> filter, room grouping, banning members, native database
connectivity, 
> security, logs, max members, and even the ability to
create your own 
> extensions for it!
>    Sweeeeeet!
>    The interface is sooo slick. And it all works well.
>    "Smart Fox Server" is much better then
that expensive "Flash Media 
> Server"!
>    It does not do video streaming but it does multi
user!!!! All day long!
> http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin01.j
pg
> http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin02.j
pg
> http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin03.j
pg
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Finding fabulous fares is fun.
> Let Yahoo! FareChase search your favorite travel sites
to find flight and 
> hotel bargains.
> _______________________________________________
> dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
> http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l
> 

_______________________________________________
dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l

After reading through the docs and I must agree with Troy,
it looks slick! 
The admin page shows server load, data traffic, memory
usage, dropped 
messages, among other things. But I'm most impressed with
the extensions. 
You can choose between ActionScript, Python, or Java for
server-side 
scripting. That gives good flexibility. For a relatively
simple server 
operation you could code it quickly in ActionScript. Then
for more complex 
operations you can use Java to boost/optimize performance.

According to the docs, you can add/start/stop extensions
without restarting 
the server. This is a definite advantage over Nebulae.

Switching to Smart Fox would require code rewrites though.
Smart Fox uses 
the Flash Server protocol, not MUS, and they're not
compatible. I'll admit 
I'm not eager to do this. However, realistically MUS is even
more dead than 
SW3D. It's pretty solid all things considered, but it's not
going to get any 
improvements. Even Nebulae mostly gets bug fixes these days,
not new 
features.

So who knows maybe it's a good idea to switch now to Flash
servers since 
that's where everything is these days and it will continue
to get new 
features. Macromedia stopped supporting MUS, what 4-5 years
ago? I need to 
stop using dead platforms...

- Chris

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Hipolito Troy" <troyhipolitoyahoo.com>
To: "Director - Shockwave - and Flash Game
Production" 
<dirgames-lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, January 30, 2007 9:27 PM
Subject: [dirGames-L] Smart Fox Server vs Flash Media
Server


  Hey did any one take a look at the Smart Fox Server?

 Saw a link on http://www.shocksites.com . We purchased it and man O man!

 It is awesome. The full version for free, with 20
connections. So we 
purchased the 100 connections license. It is much easier
then the shockwave 
multi-user server was (and more stable).

 We are going to port the http://www.chamberofchat
.com from MUS to 
SmartFoxServer over the next few weeks.
    We installed it with little issues. It has build in
features that we 
have to manually build in our chat world.
    It has built in items like auto service creation(for
hosting), curse 
filter, room grouping, banning members, native database
connectivity, 
security, logs, max members, and even the ability to create
your own 
extensions for it!
    Sweeeeeet!
    The interface is sooo slick. And it all works well.
    "Smart Fox Server" is much better then that
expensive "Flash Media 
Server"!
    It does not do video streaming but it does multi
user!!!! All day long!
http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin01.j
pg
http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin02.j
pg
http://www.smartfoxserver.com/products/images/admin03.j
pg






---------------------------------
Finding fabulous fares is fun.
Let Yahoo! FareChase search your favorite travel sites to
find flight and 
hotel bargains.
_______________________________________________
dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l 

_______________________________________________
dirGames-L mailing list  -  dirGames-Lnuttybar.drama.uga.edu
http://nuttybar.drama.uga.edu/mailman/listinfo/dirgames
-l