Server Restart Schedule

Author	Message
ImTyeDye	Date sent: 2018/12/04 21:42:42 Recently, the server has been a really laggy place to go, and I've seen complaints in chat due to server lag, and telling staff to please restart the server. I'm here to request a schedule for restarting the server. I recommend daily restarts, at the most inactive hour which is probably 5:30ish AM EST. If this is not possible, at least weekly restarts should be a thing, as players do not want to deal with the server being extremely laggy. This would help clear the RAM which reduces the lag, and increases the player's experience (most likely) on the server.
ImTyeDye	Date sent: 2018/12/04 21:43:23 my internet took a crap too
Xhizorss	Date sent: 2018/12/04 21:53:10 Never thought I would support anything from you.. but.. +1
ziggyzip	Date sent: 2018/12/04 22:59:31 this
Shindori	Date sent: 2018/12/04 23:42:18 To keep the mush tradition in honor, I have to -1 this great suggestion.
luigiofthebakery Moderator	Date sent: 2018/12/05 05:10:43 Restarting the server is not a solution to lag. If there are no memory leaks or problems with the server, then it doesn't do anything like "clear the RAM". The only reason why restarting gives the illusion of less lag is because all the players are kicked and all chunks unloaded, which to the few players who join right after a restart, will make a noticeable impact. However the reason for this is because on average 1/3 of players online before a restart don't rejoin the server. Before long, after about half an hour, if the server is active and all the chunks and entities are reloaded, lag may return and we're back where we started.
Presinus	Date sent: 2018/12/05 12:58:21 +1 to restart the server every 30 minutes
spacebois	Date sent: 2018/12/05 13:12:44 this has already been suggested before by ACe http://webbcraft.co.uk/forum/read_topic.php?id=7275
spacebois	Date sent: 2018/12/05 13:14:36 -1
ImTyeDye	Date sent: 2018/12/09 20:11:28 I've taken a couple of days to do some research, and have concluded that there are many benefits to restarting the server daily, or at least weekly. First off, it clears the RAM, unused chunks on the server and can drastically boost performance. Secondly, when restarting, there is as much time as you want to give you the ability to add, remove, update and edit plugins, which can create a better, more smooth player experience and makes it more fun with all the different choices you could make and more things to do. A big disadvantage which Luigi listed was that 1/3 of the players would return, but not the other 2/3. Although this seems like something bad, I think it's a great thing. Of course you should set up a message for 15 minutes, that every 5 minutes it broadcasts that the server is about to restart, and to be ready to be kicked, which will brace players to be ready to rejoin after the restart. The upside I see to only 1/3 of the players rejoining is firstly, the active players will rejoin. With kicking the mainly other 2/3 of AFK players, it makes the server seem more alive and everyone is more active, before the current population of the server grows and goes back to being AFK. Also, it encourages activity on the server by kicking the "overnight players" who just keep the server open while they sleep trying to reach #1 on the activity board. With the sources I've listed below, you can see other server owner's and player's experiences with this. Although they do admit that the server restarts and comes back with a smaller playerbase, they say they feel a drastic change with performance and it's way faster than it could be without the restart. They also list their personal server's times of restarts based on player count, the size of their RAM, and many other things. If you even wanted to, you could do more research than me and look at more forums, videos and things like that to get an even larger majority opinion favored FOR restarting the server! Sources: https://shockbyte.com/billing/knowledgebase.php?action=displayarticle&id=5 (even the Managing Director of Shockbyte [server hosting company] recommends restarting your server everyday!) https://cubedhost.com/help/minecraft/java-edition-pc/how-often-should-i-restart-my-minecraft-server https://www.spigotmc.org/threads/how-often-do-you-restart-your-server.7522/ Plugins that can automate this process: https://www.spigotmc.org/resources/autorestart.2538/ (not sure if it works for 1.13) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnWwQ16PD4A (video to show how to make the file yourself)
ImTyeDye	Date sent: 2018/12/09 20:59:02 Also @spacebois, it doesn't matter if something has already been suggested. For example, did you know the Veteran rank was suggested twice? First it was posted by Spuntysaurus (http://webbcraft.co.uk/forum/read_topic.php?id=2591) in 2015, asking for pretty much an og rank that people who played for 2 - 3+ years obtain just for playing. It was then re-suggested by fatmanjumprope in 2017, and was then accepted! Ideas can be recycled, reused or any other re's that you want. Great ideas aren't made by originality, they're made by effort and practicality.
Miss_Sassy34	Date sent: 2018/12/10 07:28:43 When will the server be restarted again
ImTyeDye	Date sent: 2018/12/10 12:54:24 Not a map restart, but simply turning the server off and back on at the least busy time.
spacebois	Date sent: 2018/12/10 16:53:22 some do a tl;dr for me on Tye's comment
ImTyeDye	Date sent: 2018/12/11 01:24:35 i list some bomb ass reasons why we should make it a thing, and i list my sources
luigiofthebakery Moderator	Date sent: 2018/12/17 00:50:03 Tye if you look on that spigot forums thread you posted, there is evidence of players running servers for multiple weeks without a restart that have experienced no lag. Furthermore, if you look at the bukkit implementation of chunk and entity unloading, there is no need to clear "unused chunks and entities" because the server already does this. In the bukkit.yml (https://bukkit.gamepedia.com/Bukkit.yml) there is even a flag for chunk-gc to catch chunks that didn't unload for some reason. For plugin changing and editing, we have a plugin called PluginManager that can dynamically load and unload plugins without having to restart the server. The fact that this exists proves that restarting the server is merely a fix for lazy software developers who don't bother to release resources after they are finished being used. Sure hosts are going to recommend scheduled restarts to clueless clients complaining about lag while using buggy software. It's easier than the alternative which is to fix that software. However, any large successful server will never do scheduled restarts, because if they did they would quickly go out of business. In a world where users expect services to be always online, mere seconds of downtime can be extremely costly. According to Gartner, the average cost of downtime is $5,600 per minute (https://blogs.gartner.com/andrew-lerner/2014/07/16/the-cost-of-downtime/). Regarding afk players, on server lists it does not show that they are afk. When new players are looking for servers, they choose the one with more players, because that's what multiplayer is all about. Servers with more players are often even ranked higher and achieve a higher rating in search engines, to attract more players. That's why afk players are good for the server.
Presinus	Date sent: 2018/12/18 04:45:07 Point: I loaded some chunks, cut down some trees, unloaded the chunks, returned 9 days later, reloaded the chunks, and all the saplings, apples, and discarded items were still there. Point: if AFK players are so good, why don't you invest in alts or bots? Point: On several occasions restarting this server has fixed lag (though sometimes temporarily)
luigiofthebakery Moderator	Date sent: 2018/12/19 00:06:41 Pressinus wrote: "I loaded some chunks, cut down some trees, unloaded the chunks, returned 9 days later, reloaded the chunks, and all the saplings, apples, and discarded items were still there." Exactly, you just proved my point because while chunks are unloaded they are not being ticked so don't create lag. If they were then the items would have despawned and the saplings grown. Alts are a bad investment, there are cheaper and easier ways to change the player count without alts or bots but that would not be legit because there are no real people behind those players. Afk players are still legit players but are not currently active - that doesn't mean they will never be active like an artificially inflated player count. It's essentially the same as being able to see users who are away or offline in discord, they don't get kicked from the server after a length of time.

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