[1.3.59] "Ghost" Connections can not be booted

[Paradox]

This started out as a question about functionality, but has been converted to a bug report.

When a player is dropped from the server, MapTools does not always recognize that, preventing the player from logging back on until MapTools does recognize them as being disconnected.

Boot should allow the GM to manually disconnect the "ghost" connection, so the actual player can log back in immediately.

However, Azhrei, Full Bleed, and Palmer indicate that is not what happens. The Boot function doesn't seem to diconnect the "ghosts". It will, however, disconnect a legitimate player connection.

(Disclaimer: I haven't seen this myself yet, but I was looking for a means to disconnect "ghosts" and was told that there as one, but it doesn't actually work as intended.)

To reproduce:
1.) Start a server, get people to log in
2.) Wait till one of them is dropped, but not recognized as being disconnected.
3.) Attempt to manually disconnect them with the Boot command

[trevor]

I've done two things to address this:

Reap link dead client connections more regularly
Make Boot a server side action

These should technically fix the dead client issue, but since it's hard to reproduce accurately, we'll know for sure when it happens in the wild and we see the result.

These changes are in 1.3b60

[Azhrei]

I can test this easily: start a server, connect with a client, bring down the loopback interface (via ifconfig lo down)

I'll test it when I get a chance...

[trevor]

I can test this easily: start a server, connect with a client, bring down the loopback interface (via ifconfig lo down)

I'll test it when I get a chance...

ooooooo good call. (Now if only my linux file server hadn't gone belly up recently)