Threading and Concurrency
In the last post of The IOs of Game Netcode, I talked about a few general rules of thumb I usually follow when starting a new netcode framework. Over the next few posts I’m going to go a little deeper into the technical options available to us as netcode developers and what routes I take based on different scenarios. The first topic I’m going to start with is threading, and the resulting issue – concurrency.
Synchronisation and Locks
We’ve already established you need to run your netcode framework on a different thread to your main game’s update/render loop, something which all netcode developers will agree is a requirement for writing good netcode. This means you’re already in danger of the threading and concurrency issues mentioned in the last post. So how do you ensure that you don’t run into these issues? Well, you have a few weapons in your arsenal to tackle the problem.