Distinguish between more servers on network

cmarty

Hello. I have question how client should map and distinguish between more servers on the network.
Servers send PSN_INFO_PACKET. Is there any parameter in PSN_INFO_PACKET (for example “system_name”) that must be unique to help client recognize between more servers on network ? In other words - is it possible to have same “system_name” on more servers ? Is it the server IP address in incoming packet that should be unique ? Thanks for help.
Martin

gppaille

Hello Martin,

The pair (multicast_address, port) should be unique to all servers and used to distinguish between servers.

The “server_name” parameter is the “friendly name” that the client software can use for display purposes. It doesn’t have to be unique, but it is generally recommended. Since data packets do not contain the server name, we cannot rely on this to distinguish between servers.

Using the sender IP address to distinguish between servers is possible but we do not recommend it as it would make difficult the implementation backup servers. For example, if a server goes down and a backup server takes his place, the sender IP would have to be changed on all clients (manually or with cues), which creates coupling between different systems.

Regards,
Gilles-Philippe Paillé

cmarty

Thank you for an accurate and clear answer.