TCP

TCP stands for Transmission Control Protocol. It is sometimes refered to as TCP/IP. TCP is like a messenger, but it delivers messages through the internet. The World Wide Web itself and many E-mail programs use TCP. We will be using a TCP connection to send information between our client and the server.

TCP connections make sure that the data gets to were it needs to go. A UDP(User Datagram Protocol) connection is faster but you will not be sure that the data went through. TCP is designed to always get to the destination but not always so fast.

TCP exchanges pieces of data over the internet called 'packets'. Packets are just the information you are sending.

blaXun

BlaXun of the GMC has updated his online engine.

I have a lot of respect for him as a game maker. I highly recommend his engines. You can find quite a few along with some theory here.

IP

In order to continue I need to define some terms, so this is a little mini series before I keep going

I.P. Address

An IP is basically like an address for your computer. Everyone has a different one. It can be paralleled to a street address. It is your own personal space. It is for your computer and your computer only.

IPs are always written in the format xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (where ‘x’ is a positive number)

One special IP that can be used for your own computer is 127.000.000.001 (which can be written in short as 127.0.0.1) This is like saying ‘home’ instead of 123 maple st. Whenever you use the IP 127.0.0.1 you mean your own computer.

To find out your own IP I recommend http://www.ip-adress.com/it is very simple. You simply visit the page and it tells you your current IP.

dllinit()

dllinit()

It basically starts the 39dll.
It has 3 arguments

Argument 0:
The first is the dll file name. Usually it will be called 39dll.dll but you can rename it if you want I guess. If you just want to use the 39dll.dll you can either write that or just put a '0' and it will still work.

Argument1:
For loading socket functions. Set to true to load socket functions and false to forget about them. Trust me you need them.

Argument2:
Set to true to load utilities. The best I can tell is it loads the last few scripts. They are mostly helpful little functions but not vital. They include:
fileopen()
fileclose()
filewrite()
fileread()
rilepos()
filesetpos()
filesize()
md5string()
md5buffer()
adler32()
bufferencrypt()
iptouint()
uintoip()
netconnected()

dllfree()

dllfree()

It frees the dll. I don't really know why I should do this. I looked it up on wikipedia.com and some other sites. It seems like it just frees it so your computer does not have it loaded anymore. Perhaps it affects performance? Anyway you do not need to understand everything there is to know about freeing a dll to understand what it does and use it effectivly. It closes the dll. Call it at the end of your game.

Note: This dll has no arguments

39dll dicitonary

To help me learn the 39dll and anyone else who comes by here. I will be writing a dictionary on every function. I'll start at the top and continue downward. If I don't know something then I'll find out.

Wish me luck.

As we go and learn the functions we need I'll start making a client/server example