MapTool on Pi 4 (64 bit) success! But it's kinda slow

Progress reports and musings from the developers on the current gaming tools.

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TheDougMiester
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Joined: Wed Jul 22, 2020 3:32 pm

MapTool on Pi 4 (64 bit) success! But it's kinda slow

Post by TheDougMiester »

It runs! I used the 64 bit Raspian O/S still in beta, openjdk 10 by Bellsoft, and the standard jfx11 install (supplemented by the jars from the gluon version).

But... it's pokey. It'll load the 5e overlay (2.5 version), but after that, it's too laggy to be useful.

My goal is to run it as a headless server, but (especially since I've never used MapTool before -- this is a project to help my son and his friends play online in a COVID world).

I'm open to ideas on how to speed it up.

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jfrazierjr
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Re: MapTool on Pi 4 (64 bit) success! But it's kinda slow

Post by jfrazierjr »

TheDougMiester wrote:
Wed Jul 22, 2020 3:42 pm
I'm open to ideas on how to speed it up.
Use an actual PC? Not trying to be an butt here, but most PI's just don't have enough ram in them. Consider that these devices are intended for light weight applications and a MapTool server is anything but a lightweight application.

With that said, are you testing with a default map? If so, you are likely out of luck. If on the other hand you are using an existing map, does it have VBL and is that VBL performant? There are "some" ways to optimize VBL depending on what you are trying to use.

Also, exactly what are the hardware specs on your PI? I know there are a vast array of models and if you are using one with anywhere less than 4gb IMHO you should not even bother. Also, 1.8 just released and thus supports Java 14 which should have all of the included stuff baked in(unless the ARM compilers decided to go against the spec intel compilers are using) AND it has at least a few performance improvements(probably not enough to make a difference in your case, but who knows).
I save all my Campaign Files to DropBox. Not only can I access a campaign file from pretty much any OS that will run Maptool(Win,OSX, linux), but each file is versioned, so if something goes crazy wild, I can always roll back to a previous version of the same file.

Get your Dropbox 2GB via my referral link, and as a bonus, I get an extra 250 MB of space. Even if you don't don't use my link, I still enthusiastically recommend Dropbox..

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