This has been an ongiong issue for our league this year and I'm sure for any league which has upgraded to V2.
At 8MB, the league file is just way too big. Because it was costing me a lot of extra money for the bandwidth on our server for the first month after the switch from V1, I bought cheaper storage space elsewhere just to host this one file, but now GMs complain to me that the file takes too long to download some days (~20 mins sometimes).
The new features in V2 are awesome, but this is one thing that is a "huge" downgrade from V1 (pun intended ).
There *has* to be some way. There just cannot be 8mb worth of new information that the GMs need to get after every day of games... To put that in perspective, the classic computer game "Tie Fighter", which was a pretty massive game in it's day with great graphics, music, tons of missions... was under 6.5mb on the install disks (!!!).
Maybe at the start of the season GMs need to get a huge file to set things up on the client side, but then small updates after that?
I just really think that reducing this daily client file size to a manageable 100-500kb should be a priority. Just do the math. I have 26 teams in my league. I think it's a pretty conservative estimate to say I'd get 50 downloads of the league file each week. Even that conservative estimate would be over 200 per month... or over 1.6 GIGABYTES! Every league is going to be paying for that kind of additional bandwidth... and for a hobby that we're all just putting time in "for fun", I think this issue could actually shut leagues down. Or at the very least, push them back to using STHS V1.
Anyway, I'm coping with it as best I can. I just wanted to "suggest" this change as strongly as I can.
SICHLCommish wrote:There *has* to be some way. There just cannot be 8mb worth of new information that the GMs need to get after every day of games... To put that in perspective, the classic computer game "Tie Fighter", which was a pretty massive game in it's day with great graphics, music, tons of missions... was under 6.5mb on the install disks (!!!).
Maybe at the start of the season GMs need to get a huge file to set things up on the client side, but then small updates after that?
I just really think that reducing this daily client file size to a manageable 100-500kb should be a priority. Just do the math. I have 26 teams in my league. I think it's a pretty conservative estimate to say I'd get 50 downloads of the league file each week. Even that conservative estimate would be over 200 per month... or over 1.6 GIGABYTES! Every league is going to be paying for that kind of additional bandwidth... and for a hobby that we're all just putting time in "for fun", I think this issue could actually shut leagues down. Or at the very least, push them back to using STHS V1.
Anyway, I'm coping with it as best I can. I just wanted to "suggest" this change as strongly as I can.
Take Care,
Mark MacRae
SICHL Commissioner
26 teams... 8mb. Yet, my 12 team test league also produces a 8mb file. It really does make you wonder whats in this file.
I don't wonder. If you look at the size of the actual league file (the one you load in the actual simulator), it's only slightly bigger. So basically the entire simulator league file is being downloaded by the GMs on a daily basis.
I really hope I don't come across sounding like a whiny bitch in my posts. I am not trying to be a dick about this - I'm just stating (what I think is) the most obvious flaw in STHS2. A program built for the sole purpose of running an ONLINE fastasy hockey league should be designed with ONLINE considerations in mind. This isn't new thinking; All kinds of programs (e.g. Photoshop) have options to "Save for Web". And what does that do? It makes the file really really small.
That Simon flat out refuses to explore ways to improve this situation for his users seems very strange to me, but he's totally within his rights to or not do what he wants. Until there is a better option out there (and it's doubtful that that will ever be the case considering how little money can be made from hockey simulators), we're all going to continue using and enjoying STHS.
Hey why send the whole file when you just need the team updates? You ask simmons inventer , who does not want to address this issue? Lets look at an online changer , problem solved ?????? ONLINE changer solves all your problems , GM user friendly , time friendly and league friendly