Hello,
sefo wrote:
edit: BigDoug's post from which I quoted a few sentences below has been deleted for some reason.
I actually deleted my own message about 10 minutes after I posted it. I said some condescending things in that post which I regretted almost immediately after submitting it. I therefore deleted it, but you read it beforehand. Please accept my apologies for being condescending -- it was rude and I regret it.
I therefore had an idea. Based on my understanding of your comments, I'd like to explain some of the issues which can cause lag. I'm obviously not saying that these issues are the cause of lag each time. However, I'd like to explain why saying that KGS always causes lag is an over-simplification. Note that I'm going to be as high-level as I can, so each item may be technically incorrect in some areas. I'm choosing simplicity over technical completeness.
If you're using a wireless connection, each wireless transmitter sends out a signal on a given channel. If there are nearby transmitters sending out signals on similar channels, then the connections for people using those channels can be weakened or interrupted. For example, if wireless modems for two neighbours who are playing on KGS are transmitting on similar channels, each neighbour can experience lag depending on which signal is stronger at that moment. Some of the cheaper wireless modems have limited number of channels on which to transmit, which poses a problem if you live in flats with thin walls and/or floors.
If you're using software which uploads or downloads at the same time as you're using KGS, then the performance will be affected. For example, if you're playing on KGS and your computer starts to download a security update, you'll experience lag, because the programs are competing for access.
A firewall can introduce lag because it's making decisions on whether to allow or not allow incoming or outgoing traffic. This is actually quite common. Note that firewalls can exist both on your computer and on your ISP's routers and switches.
The modem which transmits to the ISP depends on various equipment (e.g., the physical line which carries the signal to the switch, how many of the ISP's customers are using the switch at that very moment). My aunt's internet performs poorly when it rains, so she would experience lag at that time if she played on KGS. In our house, we experience lag when there is a major event nearby, because our ISP diverts bandwidth to cope with the increased traffic from their customers at the event. If your using shared physical lines and your neighbour starts to download a large file (e.g., a movie), then your performance is going to be affected. (I can't remember if this is true for both cable and ADSL.)
If you don't live the US, then the signal from your computer must be transmitted to the US. Any problems with the routers en-route or with the transmission lines will impact the quality of the signal, thereby causing degraded performance (seen as lag on KGS). For example, here in Australia, they use undersea cables which are occasionally damaged by submarines and fishing nets. Network performance is degraded until the cable is replaced or repaired. Note that there are similar routing issues within the US (e.g., the recent storms in the US degraded network performance and even cause complete shut-down in some cases).
These are just some of the many issues which can cause lag. If your computer was directly plugged into the KGS server, then it would be much easier to diagnose lag. However, because of the many pieces which make up the internet's infrastructure, poor performance of any of them impacts the network performance. When I worked for the vendor, we used very expensive diagnostic equipment and engineers to diagnose networking issues and they were rarely easily solved.
From your perspective, you experience lag on your personal computer. From a KGS admin perspective, we regularly receive queries from people about poor performance and our personal connection is working just fine. It's not unusual for someone to complain about 10,000 ms response time (using server stats) at the same time that I'm experiencing 150 ms response time. In this instance, something is causing that poor response time, but it's unlikely that KGS is the cause, because I'm not experiencing the lag and I'm not receiving complaints from other people.
For these reasons, when someone complains about lag, the response of KGS admins is to try to identify the cause of the problem. Sometimes we can help and sometimes we can't. However, we generally start with questions about firewalls and what applications you're running, since it's not possible for us to diagnose issues with firewalls, routers or undersea cables.