FreeCiv windows or linux

[ngunjaca]

I am just wondering if there is anyone here that tried playing freeciv on windows and linux so he can share his experience; is there any difference in the performance? I played only on windows and the gtk2 gui can sometimes be laggy even on a good pc and the loading of larger games is little too long. Also the end turns are quite long in larger games.
I have a i2400 with 16GB of ram and somehow i expect that this procesor power should be enough for smooth and speedy gaming.
I am not critisizing the coding I can live with the situation as it is (my first computer was an amiga 500 and i still remember how gaming then was slow and laggy) I am just curious whether freeciv is faster on linux.

[cazfi]

While freeciv itself runs practically identical code on both, I think gtk+ that providesus identical interface to both windowing systems works more naturally in linux than in windows - meaning that it needs to do more work on windows to convert things between underlying OS and itself. At least my experience indicates that it's much slower on Windows than in Linux of machine of similar hardware. The thing with end turns usually is not gui though, but processing of AI players on server side. That can take significant time if there's a lot of ai players/cities/units and/or large map.

[ngunjaca]

Never installed linux before but always thought I should try it one day. I will give Ubuntu today a chance to amaze me. I am kind of tired of windows so today is Linux-day.

[ngunjaca]

Installed Ubuntu yesterday, and tried running FreeCiv. The difference between the windows version is huge. It is much more user friendlier and a lot faster (GUI is faster and loading times are also faster) and the GUI looks better. Now I just need to get comfortable with the OS and learn how linux is different from windows in terms of usage.

[sveinung]

Now I just need to get comfortable with the OS and learn how linux is different from windows in terms of usage.

Maybe a list can be helpful? Here are three differences I really miss each time I use a Windows computer.

The first is copy and past. The first clipboard work like on Windows. You must copy and past by hand. The second is automatic. If you mark some text it is added to a second clip board. To past press the center mouse button (often you scroll wheel).

The second is package management. My advice is to install everything using your distro's package manager. This way it will be kept updated. If you wish to install a program that isn't there see if it exist in a package well you can add. (For Ubuntu just look for a ppa on http://launchpad.net)
Hint: Just like Freeciv has many clients Ubuntu's package manager has many front ends. If people try to give you instructions on using one in text ask for instructions for a command line based package manager like apt-get. "sudo apt-get install freeciv-server" is easier to understand than "Start GUI package manager. Type freeciv-server in the search box. Press enter. In the area below a search result called freeciv-server should now appear. Click on it. Select it for install. Press the global install button and..."

The third is auto complete on the command line. Start typing in the name of a command or one of its arguments. Then press tab. It will now write it for you. If more than one alternative exist it will write everything up to the point where a single letter separates the alternatives. Type that letter and press tab again. It will now auto complete the rest (or everything up to the next point where a single letter separates the alternatives).

[cazfi]

a lot faster (GUI is faster and loading times are also faster)

Sounds like something we can put down to performance of the OS itself. Even if there's no difference in freeciv, with the same hardware Windows itself eats more resources, leaving less for freeciv. Also, I wonder if that explains all the reports about freeciv being really slow when I have not seen slowness to be acute problem myself (on linux).

[Arbogast]

That iz ze all problem Cazfi! Seems like Unix runs a quicker turnover than Windows. There are a lot of Posts about the slowness in Windows.
Maybe you could help us on how to run Linux on a Windows machine? Maybe what memory is the minimum?
What about running Freeciv in a Dos window?...

[ngunjaca]

Thanks sveinung for the tips, they did come handy.

The first is copy and past. The first clipboard work like on Windows. You must copy and past by hand. The second is automatic. If you mark some text it is added to a second clip board. To past press the center mouse button (often you scroll wheel).

This one is really cool. I really like it.

The second is package management

Yep the app installations in linux is something you have to get used to. It is quite different than windows. So far I am getting slowly into the "game"

The third is auto complete on the command line. Start typing in the name of a command or one of its arguments. Then press tab. It will now write it for you. If more than one alternative exist it will write everything up to the point where a single letter separates the alternatives. Type that letter and press tab again. It will now auto complete the rest (or everything up to the next point where a single letter separates the alternatives).

This one is also nice.
The terminal/command line is a call to MSDOS days I enjoyed. It really is somehow nice to type the commands again and take control of the system in that way.

What i found interesting about linux/ubuntu is that it forces me to investigate/research how stuff works; not everything is doable by one click, instead you have to read a couple of web pages to learn new commands and how to use them. For instance i wanted to remap my mouse buttons and it took me a while to find the right command (xinput) and then learn what mouse button is what number and do the remapping (xev); and finally write a script for startup (etc/rc.local).
And then the permissions issues ... freeciv would not load a file i copied from an NTFS portable hard disk to an ext partition. It constantly reported being unable to load the file and I was like: i can see it there!! why don't you load it?! And then i found out NTFS doesn't use permissions as ext file systems and all i have to do is give root read access to the file.

but so far i like ubuntu a lot.
One more thing: i will repeat it FreeCiv runs much faster on ubuntu than on windows 7. Here are some numbers i measured:
Loading of FreeCiv to Main Menu:
Win7 - 3 seconds
Ubuntu - 2 seconds
Start new game - until the Game options menu:
Win7 - 4 seconds
Ubuntu - 2 seconds
Loading of a really big save game (30 megs unpacked size, 30 AIs, 44,000 tiles) / measured until i could move my unit not until map was shown:
Win7 - 106 seconds
Ubuntu - 71 seconds
Ending turn of the mentioned big save game / measured until i could move my unit:
Win7 - 335 seconds
Ubuntu - 228 seconds
We can see that ubuntu is faster by approx 30% which is a lot in my opinion.

[Arbogast]

OK you guys!
I'm going for Linux and just because Freeciv...
But there are so many variations to it that I can't make a proper choice.
Here is my idea:
I run XP and I would like a double boot with Linux, just for Freeciv (again).
So here is a desperate call to you all:
Which Linux? Remember: it's just to run Freeciv quicker.

Merci for your tips...

[cazfi]

Most of the freeciv development happens on Debian and Ubuntu, so that "family" might be safer choice than RedHat or Suse derivatives. Ubuntu is the more end-user oriented derivative of Debian.

I wonder if it would make sense to make Ubuntu live-CD with freeciv in it - one that you can use even without installing Linux to your harddisk. Though you would want some media which you can save stuff, savegames at least.