WEBVTT - The Story of Ping 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tech stuff, a production from I heart radio. 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:14.520 He there, and welcome to tech stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.600 --> 0:00:18.160 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I heart radio, 0:00:18.320 --> 0:00:21.960 and how the Tech Are you? You know, there's a 0:00:21.960 --> 0:00:27.480 good chance you've heard the Term Ping before. If you're 0:00:27.520 --> 0:00:31.720 a golfer, you probably associated with equipment like clubs and bags, 0:00:31.760 --> 0:00:34.839 but that's not what I'm talking about today. If you're 0:00:34.880 --> 0:00:38.360 a submariner, well, your concept of paying is closer to 0:00:38.520 --> 0:00:43.560 what I'll be talking about in this episode, and specifically 0:00:43.560 --> 0:00:46.000 in this episode, I'm talking about Ping as a way 0:00:46.040 --> 0:00:51.680 to judge network speed between two different machines. Now, with 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:56.280 some stuff that you know we use in our technical world, 0:00:56.960 --> 0:00:59.800 the history can be a little muddled or hidden. Right. 0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:03.120 Might be one of those things where we have some 0:01:03.240 --> 0:01:06.640 common tool that we all use, but no one really 0:01:06.720 --> 0:01:09.840 documented where that tool came from or who first came 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:12.080 up with it, and so we have to use a 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:14.759 lot of qualifiers to talk about it. But in this 0:01:14.800 --> 0:01:18.520 case we can point to a specific person as the 0:01:18.600 --> 0:01:24.920 originator of the paying function, at least the first paying function, 0:01:25.400 --> 0:01:30.319 and that person was Mike Muss sadly, must passed away 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:34.840 in two thousand in a car accident. So uh, that 0:01:35.000 --> 0:01:40.120 is really a tragedy. must seemed like a really entertaining 0:01:40.319 --> 0:01:45.000 and innovative guy, based upon the stuff I've read that 0:01:45.040 --> 0:01:49.280 he wrote. Must had studied sonar and radar while he 0:01:49.320 --> 0:01:52.520 was in college. He had been modeling those systems and 0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:56.440 he worked for a while at the Ballistic Research Laboratory, 0:01:56.560 --> 0:01:59.160 or B R L, which we also have to talk 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:02.200 about in the past tense. The army established the army 0:02:02.280 --> 0:02:07.240 research laboratory in Nineteen two. That would absorb the old brl. 0:02:08.200 --> 0:02:10.640 So the B R L is no more. It is 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:15.200 part of the A R L. Anyway, while must was 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:18.560 working at the B R l, he noticed something hinky 0:02:18.840 --> 0:02:21.239 seemed to be going on with the I P network 0:02:21.760 --> 0:02:25.440 within that organization. Now, this was in nineteen eighty three 0:02:26.120 --> 0:02:28.799 and at that point, I think you're most folks had 0:02:28.880 --> 0:02:34.000 never even heard of internet protocol, or I p. that's 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:36.760 what I p means in this case, not intellectual property, 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:40.760 but Internet Protocol. I Doun't that most people had ever 0:02:40.800 --> 0:02:42.960 heard of that back in nineteen three. I know I 0:02:43.000 --> 0:02:46.560 had never heard it. The concept of the Internet was 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:50.360 a pretty foreign one to anyone not working in a 0:02:50.400 --> 0:02:54.800 military organization, a research institute or a number of universities 0:02:54.840 --> 0:02:59.399 that we're doing pioneering work in the field. Computer networking 0:02:59.400 --> 0:03:03.840 in general was something that was a pretty foreign concept 0:03:03.880 --> 0:03:08.280 to folks. This was early on when people could actually 0:03:08.320 --> 0:03:11.519 get access to a personal computer, let alone the thought 0:03:11.600 --> 0:03:14.239 of how do I connect this computer to that computer? 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:17.200 So it would take a decade before the rest of 0:03:17.280 --> 0:03:19.840 US would start to understand that you could actually connect 0:03:19.840 --> 0:03:23.240 computers together and make a network and then create networks 0:03:23.240 --> 0:03:26.160 together to create a massive interconnected system, a k a 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:32.119 the Internet. But must was really familiar with computer networks. 0:03:32.400 --> 0:03:35.840 He worked on the IP network at Brl all the time, 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:38.960 and so when he knows things weren't quite behaving the 0:03:39.000 --> 0:03:42.480 way they usually should, he decided to find out what 0:03:42.560 --> 0:03:44.600 was going on and to do that he needed a 0:03:44.640 --> 0:03:48.440 diagnostic tool. That didn't exist, so he had to create 0:03:48.440 --> 0:03:51.040 a program to do it. Now he had heard about 0:03:51.520 --> 0:03:55.880 other methods of testing things like network speed between machines 0:03:56.280 --> 0:04:00.760 that used other methodologies, but those weren't really applicable to 0:04:01.000 --> 0:04:03.839 his network. So he had to make the tool from 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:09.680 scratch and he programmed it on a UNIX system. This 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:14.040 is a family of operating systems that computer science scientists 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:16.840 at the Bell Labs Research Center of a t and 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:21.719 t created back in the nineteen sixties uh and then 0:04:21.960 --> 0:04:25.039 ended up releasing it for others to use in the 0:04:25.120 --> 0:04:29.560 nineteen seventies. So your average person would likely find vanilla 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:33.240 UNIX to be intimidating, because it is a system that 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:38.000 programmers made for other programmers for the purposes of being 0:04:38.000 --> 0:04:43.040 able to create programs within this framework and then used 0:04:43.120 --> 0:04:46.760 on those machines or similar machines. It is not a 0:04:46.800 --> 0:04:50.280 particularly user friendly operating system, at least not if you're 0:04:50.400 --> 0:04:54.520 someone who's unused to command prompts as opposed to graphical 0:04:54.640 --> 0:04:58.760 user interfaces or Gooey's Um. Back in the day, when 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:01.840 I first started using muters, command prompts were the way 0:05:01.880 --> 0:05:05.919 to go. In fact, I remember being incredibly reluctant to 0:05:06.040 --> 0:05:10.760 move from the DOSS system that was in use on 0:05:10.839 --> 0:05:15.000 IBM compatibles back in the day to migrating to Windows, 0:05:15.520 --> 0:05:19.600 because I thought windows was a huge waste of resources, 0:05:19.640 --> 0:05:21.919 that your computer had to use so many resources just 0:05:22.000 --> 0:05:25.840 to run the operating system that it completely hindered the 0:05:25.880 --> 0:05:28.120 sort of programs you could run on that sort of computer, 0:05:28.480 --> 0:05:30.760 and I did not like the idea of moving from 0:05:30.800 --> 0:05:33.440 doss to Windows. These days, if you put me in 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:38.719 front of a line prompt kind of of operating system, 0:05:38.760 --> 0:05:41.719 I'm sure I would be completely lost. UH, as I 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:45.200 get older, it gets harder to navigate those kinds of things. Anyway, 0:05:45.680 --> 0:05:50.000 what must wanted to do was create a small program 0:05:50.040 --> 0:05:54.760 that could measure the quote unquote, distance between two different machines. 0:05:55.240 --> 0:06:00.720 Except we're not really talking about physical distance here, although 0:06:00.760 --> 0:06:03.920 that can be a factor and we'll get to it. Instead, 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:06.839 what we're really talking about is the amount of time 0:06:06.880 --> 0:06:09.680 it takes for one machine to send a message to 0:06:09.839 --> 0:06:13.440 a second machine and then receive a message from that 0:06:13.520 --> 0:06:16.000 second machine. So how long does it take you to 0:06:16.040 --> 0:06:18.840 send a message out and get a reply back? In 0:06:18.880 --> 0:06:22.840 that way, it's a lot like an echo. So an 0:06:22.839 --> 0:06:26.160 echo is when you make or you hear a sound 0:06:26.560 --> 0:06:29.800 and then you hear that sound repeated. And it happens 0:06:29.839 --> 0:06:34.280 when sound waves bounce off of some hard, smooth surface, 0:06:34.320 --> 0:06:37.400 and the smoother and harder the surface, the better it 0:06:37.480 --> 0:06:40.280 is for creating echoes. So let's say that you are 0:06:40.440 --> 0:06:44.560 in a canyon, maybe it's a box canyon, and you 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:46.719 got a red base on one end and a blue 0:06:46.720 --> 0:06:49.920 Basse on the other, and no one can explain why. 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:53.159 So you're in this box canyon and you decide to 0:06:53.160 --> 0:06:56.960 shout text stuff, rules or you know something that you 0:06:56.960 --> 0:07:00.400 would actually shout. Well, the echoes you would hear are 0:07:00.400 --> 0:07:03.640 actually the sound waves that you generated that came from you. 0:07:04.120 --> 0:07:08.160 Those air fluctuations originated from you and then they bounced 0:07:08.200 --> 0:07:12.480 back to you after they hit the canyon walls. So 0:07:12.800 --> 0:07:15.200 if you're in a place where there are no hard, 0:07:15.400 --> 0:07:18.360 smooth surfaces, you're not going to get an echo. Doesn't 0:07:18.360 --> 0:07:21.960 matter how loudly you scream. There are no surfaces for 0:07:22.080 --> 0:07:24.560 the sound to bounce off of and come back to you. 0:07:24.640 --> 0:07:27.720 It's just gonna travel outward until it's essentially too weak 0:07:28.320 --> 0:07:32.440 for it to be heard by at least human ears. Now, 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:36.040 when we talk about stuff like sonar, we're talking about 0:07:36.120 --> 0:07:40.440 using sound to get an idea about how far away 0:07:40.560 --> 0:07:45.480 objects are from the sonar mechanism. And if we break 0:07:45.520 --> 0:07:50.720 down what sonar is from a technical standpoint, essentially what 0:07:50.800 --> 0:07:55.320 you have is a speaker that emits the sound and 0:07:55.360 --> 0:07:59.360 a microphone that picks up echoes of the sound and 0:07:59.400 --> 0:08:02.120 then some word of the system to calculate the amount 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:05.240 of time between making a sound and getting the echo. 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:08.320 These systems could be human powered or it could be 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:12.560 modern systems use computers, but in the old days it 0:08:12.560 --> 0:08:17.280 could actually be someone with a stopwatch and very quickly 0:08:17.320 --> 0:08:20.080 reacting in order to get an idea of how long 0:08:20.080 --> 0:08:22.160 it took to send a sound out and to get 0:08:22.240 --> 0:08:26.560 the echo back. This is really useful if, for example, 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:31.080 you're in a submarine that doesn't have windows. Those submarines 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:34.120 don't because windows are a point of failure and you 0:08:34.160 --> 0:08:36.840 don't want those when you're in a metal tube that 0:08:36.880 --> 0:08:40.360 goes under the water. So you use the sonar to 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:44.000 beam out a sound and you know how fast sound 0:08:44.000 --> 0:08:46.720 travels through water. It's a standard sort of thing. It 0:08:46.760 --> 0:08:50.800 actually travels faster through water than it does through air. 0:08:51.200 --> 0:08:54.080 We typically say that sound travels at about three forty 0:08:54.160 --> 0:08:57.840 three per second through the air, but in water it's 0:08:57.880 --> 0:09:02.400 one thousand four hundred eight meters per second. So if 0:09:02.440 --> 0:09:06.080 you send out a sound in a specific direction and 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:08.040 you time how long it takes for the sound to 0:09:08.080 --> 0:09:11.400 come back to you and then you essentially divided by two, 0:09:11.760 --> 0:09:14.520 you know how far away you are from, say, and 0:09:14.760 --> 0:09:18.679 underwater cliff face. It's pretty common to call the sonar 0:09:18.840 --> 0:09:22.960 sound a Ping, because that's what it sounds like. If 0:09:23.000 --> 0:09:25.800 you've seen the film adaptation of the hunt for Red October, 0:09:26.080 --> 0:09:28.360 you know there's a scene in which sean connery, who's 0:09:28.400 --> 0:09:33.680 playing a Soviet Submarine Commander, tells his Sonar Operator reverify 0:09:33.760 --> 0:09:37.800 our range to target one ping only. Now, in that 0:09:37.880 --> 0:09:42.000 case he's using the Ping to secretly communicate with the Americans, 0:09:42.040 --> 0:09:45.160 but he's selling his sonar operator the reason is just 0:09:45.280 --> 0:09:47.840 to make sure they know exactly how far the Americans 0:09:47.920 --> 0:09:51.719 are in case they need to fire upon them anyway. 0:09:51.960 --> 0:09:55.800 That's why must called his tool a ping. It was 0:09:55.880 --> 0:09:59.679 using a similar sort of approach. A message goes out 0:09:59.720 --> 0:10:02.960 from on computer to a different computer and the message 0:10:03.040 --> 0:10:05.480 essentially says hey, send us back to me, and the 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:09.120 target computer follows instructions and sends the message back. The 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:12.080 amount of time between sending the message and receiving the 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:15.440 reply can give you an idea about the network speed 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:20.000 between those two machines. If it's slower than expected, something's 0:10:20.040 --> 0:10:23.120 going wrong. Maybe there's too much traffic on the network, 0:10:23.360 --> 0:10:26.680 maybe there is an actual switch that's down somewhere on 0:10:26.720 --> 0:10:30.640 the network and it necessitates traffic to route around the issue. 0:10:31.040 --> 0:10:35.679 So it's really a diagnostic tool for measuring path latency. 0:10:36.080 --> 0:10:39.040 We'll talk more about latency in just a second, but 0:10:39.160 --> 0:10:52.040 first let's take a quick break. All right, let's talk 0:10:52.080 --> 0:10:55.120 about latency. You can think of latency as the delay 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:59.760 between the cause of something and it's effect. I always 0:10:59.840 --> 0:11:02.480 use video game examples for this, because anyone who has 0:11:02.480 --> 0:11:05.800 played enough video games has experienced this at one point 0:11:05.920 --> 0:11:08.839 or another. Um and it's, you know, one of the 0:11:09.640 --> 0:11:13.800 contexts in which we really talk about paying. Anyway, in 0:11:13.840 --> 0:11:17.280 most video games you really want the game to respond instantly, 0:11:17.559 --> 0:11:20.079 or at least appear to be instant according to our 0:11:20.520 --> 0:11:24.520 limitations of perception when you work the controls. So when 0:11:24.559 --> 0:11:27.760 you push that jump button, you want that lousy little 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:31.040 plumber to jump and squash that Gumba Gush. Darn it 0:11:31.800 --> 0:11:34.320 when there's a delay. So you push the jump button 0:11:34.480 --> 0:11:38.680 but the plumber waits a second before jumping. It makes 0:11:38.720 --> 0:11:42.200 the game way more difficult to play. Some Games do 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:45.480 the so on purpose. Sometimes it's up to the player 0:11:45.559 --> 0:11:48.559 to try and learn and adjust to the timing of 0:11:48.640 --> 0:11:50.720 the game, and it was all part of the design. 0:11:51.600 --> 0:11:54.520 Other Games didn't do it on purpose. They're just poorly made. 0:11:54.760 --> 0:11:58.640 Or they're running on inadequate machines, and so there's this 0:11:58.760 --> 0:12:01.880 latency introduced in to the experience and there's a lag 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:06.120 between input and output. Now must decide to create his 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:09.800 ping tool back in nine three on a whim. He 0:12:09.840 --> 0:12:12.360 didn't intend for it to be some sort of glorified 0:12:13.240 --> 0:12:16.400 feature that would be put to use countless times afterwards. 0:12:16.679 --> 0:12:20.160 He just thought it was an interesting exercise. He described 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:25.000 the Ping Program as a quote, thousand line hack end quote, 0:12:25.280 --> 0:12:27.960 and he wrote it in a single evening and he 0:12:28.000 --> 0:12:29.880 says that if he had known how much it was 0:12:29.920 --> 0:12:33.800 going to be used moving forward, he might have spent 0:12:33.840 --> 0:12:35.840 a little more time and effort in designing it. He 0:12:35.880 --> 0:12:42.679 also mentions that, of course, in Classic Uh fate, by 0:12:42.720 --> 0:12:46.160 the time he finished designing the tool, the original issue 0:12:46.400 --> 0:12:48.240 that made him think about it in the first place 0:12:48.240 --> 0:12:50.560 had already been fixed. Someone else had gone into the network, 0:12:50.600 --> 0:12:54.640 discovered it and fixed the problem. But the tools usefulness 0:12:54.679 --> 0:12:59.920 obviously went beyond the single use case that inspired must 0:13:00.000 --> 0:13:03.120 to create it. Must also joked about how people tried 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:06.439 to interpret Ping, the word paying, P I N G, 0:13:07.320 --> 0:13:10.680 as an acronym. There was a common assumption in the 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:15.959 network Admin field that Ping stood for packet Internet grouper, 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:20.320 but must dismiss that right away. It was pretty common 0:13:20.400 --> 0:13:23.880 to create wacky acronyms and government projects. In fact, that's 0:13:23.880 --> 0:13:26.600 still true to this day. If you look at any 0:13:26.720 --> 0:13:30.760 law or bill that has like a cool or cool 0:13:30.960 --> 0:13:34.640 ish name associated with it, there's a good chance that 0:13:34.760 --> 0:13:39.680 name is said to represent a tortured acronym, and I 0:13:39.720 --> 0:13:44.079 am positive that in the overall majority of cases lawmakers 0:13:44.120 --> 0:13:47.280 come up with a name for the legislation. First they 0:13:47.280 --> 0:13:50.360 come up with their cool name and then, retroactively they 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:53.480 try to justify the name by creating a phrase for 0:13:53.520 --> 0:13:56.880 which the name is supposedly an acronym, and it's almost 0:13:56.920 --> 0:14:01.280 always terrible anyway. must say that's what people were trying 0:14:01.280 --> 0:14:05.120 to do with paying, but he was adamant pain justed 0:14:05.200 --> 0:14:10.560 for paying, like with Sonar. Now, if you're an online Gamer, 0:14:10.600 --> 0:14:13.360 you're likely very aware of the importance of paying. With 0:14:13.480 --> 0:14:16.959 online multiplayer games, each player is connecting to a game 0:14:17.080 --> 0:14:22.280 server and to be clear, multiplayer games have lots of servers. Right. 0:14:22.560 --> 0:14:25.360 Each game has tons of servers, and it's just that 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:29.480 a player logs into a single server into which lots 0:14:29.520 --> 0:14:32.600 of other players are also logged, and once a server 0:14:32.680 --> 0:14:36.720 reaches capacity, players will have to connect to other servers. Well, 0:14:36.760 --> 0:14:39.720 it's pretty common practice to try and log into servers 0:14:39.760 --> 0:14:43.680 that are geographically close to the player, because that helps 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:47.560 cut back on latency. Now, it's not always true that 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:51.960 the closest server provides the fastest data speeds between the 0:14:52.040 --> 0:14:55.960 client machine, in other words the Gamer's rig, and the 0:14:56.080 --> 0:15:00.560 server itself, but it's usually the case. If you log 0:15:00.600 --> 0:15:03.000 into a server that's halfway across the world from you, 0:15:03.320 --> 0:15:06.120 that means the messages coming from your machine and going 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:09.480 to your machine have to travel halfway across the world 0:15:09.880 --> 0:15:13.520 and while data moves very, very fast, it's not instantaneous, 0:15:13.960 --> 0:15:17.920 so you start to encounter a bit of latency. That 0:15:18.160 --> 0:15:21.400 latency or lag means there is a delay between when 0:15:21.480 --> 0:15:24.800 a Gamer does something in their game on their machine 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:28.520 and when the server finds out about it, and sometimes 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:31.960 that lag is enough to cause problems in gameplay. In fact, 0:15:32.200 --> 0:15:35.040 the LAG does not have to be very long for 0:15:35.120 --> 0:15:38.840 issues to pop up. Well, less than a second in fact. 0:15:39.360 --> 0:15:41.800 I'll give you an example. So let's say you and 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:44.640 I are playing in a one on one first person 0:15:44.760 --> 0:15:47.840 shooter game. It's me versus you, and you've got me 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:50.960 in your sights. You're clear across the map. You've spotted me. 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:53.440 You've got a sniper rifle, so you take aim at 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:56.200 me and you shoot from your perspective. You've got a 0:15:56.200 --> 0:15:58.960 clear shot. There's no way you can miss. But then 0:15:59.520 --> 0:16:03.800 there's the latency. Let's say my connection is lagging just 0:16:03.920 --> 0:16:06.280 a bit, that I've got a very high ping rate 0:16:06.560 --> 0:16:10.360 to the game server and in fact, while you appear 0:16:10.760 --> 0:16:13.880 to be aiming straight at me, because from your side 0:16:14.000 --> 0:16:17.840 the game server thinks that is where I'm at, on 0:16:17.880 --> 0:16:21.000 my side I was doing the old Serpentinam and the 0:16:21.040 --> 0:16:24.760 server gets my input commands and the game essentially decides 0:16:24.800 --> 0:16:28.000 that your shots don't connect because it turns out I 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:31.320 wasn't really in the spot where you were aiming the 0:16:31.360 --> 0:16:34.680 whole time. There are some gamers who use this kind 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:38.120 of thing to cheat at Games. So back in the 0:16:38.160 --> 0:16:42.040 early days of Halo, to Multiplayer, there was a tactic 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:46.120 called stand by. A lot of modems had a standby 0:16:46.160 --> 0:16:50.240 feature that would let you temporarily pause a connection to 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:54.120 a server. So it's like disconnecting, but it was just 0:16:54.200 --> 0:16:58.320 doing it for a moment. so by using it strategically Halo, 0:16:58.400 --> 0:17:01.080 two players could appear to be in one place in 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:05.320 the game because the game server couldn't verify where the 0:17:05.359 --> 0:17:09.399 player was and so would just essentially keep the player 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:13.960 on the course that they were on before the connection severed, 0:17:14.119 --> 0:17:16.840 but it would hold off on dropping the player entirely 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:21.000 in case the connection repaired itself. And so that meant 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:23.520 that if other players were trying to do damage to 0:17:23.720 --> 0:17:28.480 that character, nothing would happen and once the connection reestablished, 0:17:28.480 --> 0:17:32.639 the game would reconcile the players actual position. So to 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:35.359 someone else it would look like your opponent had gone 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:39.000 invincible for a few seconds and then would suddenly teleport 0:17:39.080 --> 0:17:42.080 to a different location. And this got to be a 0:17:42.119 --> 0:17:44.320 real problem because people were using it to get an 0:17:44.400 --> 0:17:49.199 unfair advantage over others. But generally these days players do 0:17:49.240 --> 0:17:52.600 not want a High Ping rate. It makes playing the 0:17:52.640 --> 0:17:55.879 game very difficult and if you're a really competitive player, 0:17:56.200 --> 0:17:59.280 like you're in the elite echelons, you really want to 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:03.520 minimize all the external factors that could make a game harder. 0:18:03.920 --> 0:18:06.440 You want things to be a nice level playing field 0:18:06.440 --> 0:18:10.399 for everyone. So it really is skill versus skill, maybe 0:18:10.440 --> 0:18:13.920 some luck thrown in, but it's not some external factor 0:18:14.000 --> 0:18:17.200 that you have no control over. Giving one party and 0:18:17.280 --> 0:18:19.920 advantage over the other. So you really want that Ping 0:18:19.960 --> 0:18:23.919 to be low, and by low I'm talking about milliseconds. 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:28.560 Competitive gamers really want a super low ping, like if 0:18:28.600 --> 0:18:31.200 you managed to log into a server and you find 0:18:31.200 --> 0:18:34.280 out that Your Ping rate is fifteen milliseconds or less, 0:18:35.040 --> 0:18:38.640 that would be amazing. It would also mean you're probably 0:18:38.720 --> 0:18:41.919 living like a mile away from the game server and 0:18:41.960 --> 0:18:46.080 you're connecting straight to it. A Ping between fifteen and 0:18:46.119 --> 0:18:50.240 forty five milliseconds is really good and it's not ideal, 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:52.879 but it's not enough of a delay to measurably impact 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:57.080 the game. Between forty five and one hundred milliseconds, you 0:18:57.200 --> 0:19:01.200 start to get into an area where the lag can 0:19:01.200 --> 0:19:06.199 be noticeable. Not necessarily a game breaking mechanic, but you 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:10.439 can start to notice little issues. Between one hundred and 0:19:10.440 --> 0:19:13.159 two hundred fifty milliseconds, you've gotten experience that can make 0:19:13.200 --> 0:19:16.119 a game unplayable, and beyond two fifty you might as 0:19:16.160 --> 0:19:19.480 well just disconnect and try a different server. But it 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:21.800 also depends on what type of game you're playing. Right 0:19:21.880 --> 0:19:24.720 not all games are equal. If you're playing a turn 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:28.680 based game, that's not nearly as sensitive to paying issues, 0:19:28.760 --> 0:19:30.359 like if one player gets to go and then the 0:19:30.400 --> 0:19:34.080 other player gets to go and you're not simultaneously battling 0:19:34.680 --> 0:19:37.639 um at every moment, then a little delay is not 0:19:37.680 --> 0:19:39.440 going to be a big problem. It might make the 0:19:40.119 --> 0:19:43.600 game play a little irritating, but it's still totally playable. 0:19:43.880 --> 0:19:47.560 But if you're talking about a twitch based first person 0:19:47.640 --> 0:19:51.159 shooter style game, Players Need Really Low Ping for the 0:19:51.160 --> 0:19:54.600 game to run smoothly, particularly if you're talking about those 0:19:54.640 --> 0:19:58.199 elite levels of play. As an example of how this 0:19:58.280 --> 0:20:01.240 can give one player an edge over or another, imagine 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.040 a scenario in which two players are about to come 0:20:04.080 --> 0:20:07.280 into view of each other. Both of them are going 0:20:07.320 --> 0:20:09.520 to have line of sight to the other players, so 0:20:09.600 --> 0:20:13.760 like they're both cresting a hill or something. But let's 0:20:13.800 --> 0:20:18.800 say player one's Ping is much lower than player two's Ping. 0:20:19.000 --> 0:20:22.240 That means player one has much less path latency to 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:25.720 the game server. That could mean that player one will 0:20:25.760 --> 0:20:29.120 be able to see player to a moment earlier, which 0:20:29.160 --> 0:20:32.239 can give player one an advantage in the encounter. If 0:20:32.280 --> 0:20:35.720 you've got two players of similar skill, that could push 0:20:35.880 --> 0:20:40.880 a fair fight into unfair territory. All right, we're gonna 0:20:41.000 --> 0:20:43.960 take another quick break. When we come back we'll wrap 0:20:44.080 --> 0:20:56.600 up this discussion about paying. Okay, so now we understand 0:20:56.680 --> 0:21:00.520 that ping is a way to measure the latency between 0:21:00.560 --> 0:21:03.440 a client machine and a server machine. You could also 0:21:03.520 --> 0:21:06.000 do it between servers. You know, it's it's really between 0:21:06.040 --> 0:21:08.919 any two machines that are connected on a network. But 0:21:09.040 --> 0:21:14.160 what Affects Ping? What makes ping go from low to high? Well, 0:21:14.200 --> 0:21:18.399 as I mentioned earlier, physical distance between the client and 0:21:18.440 --> 0:21:22.760 the server is one thing that can certainly affect Ping. 0:21:22.880 --> 0:21:25.879 The further your information needs to travel to get to 0:21:25.920 --> 0:21:29.399 a server and then return to get to you, the 0:21:29.480 --> 0:21:32.200 more latency you're going to encounter. That just makes sense, right. 0:21:32.560 --> 0:21:35.200 So if you're in the United States then you're connecting 0:21:35.200 --> 0:21:38.760 to game servers that are located in Europe, chances are 0:21:39.119 --> 0:21:41.280 Your Ping is going to be on the higher side 0:21:41.600 --> 0:21:44.359 compared to Europeans who are connecting to that same server. 0:21:45.040 --> 0:21:48.400 The other big factor is the amount of traffic that's 0:21:48.400 --> 0:21:52.760 on your personal network. Just like with roadways, more traffic 0:21:53.040 --> 0:21:57.160 leads to congestion and it slows things down. So if 0:21:57.200 --> 0:22:00.280 you want to jump into war zone while you're house 0:22:00.320 --> 0:22:03.600 made is busy downloading a ton of four K films, 0:22:04.480 --> 0:22:06.600 chances are you're paying is going to suffer because your 0:22:06.640 --> 0:22:11.000 network bandwidth is finite. It's a limited resource. There's only 0:22:11.040 --> 0:22:13.640 so much of it and if the game is having 0:22:13.640 --> 0:22:16.560 to fight for some of that bandwidth compared to the 0:22:16.640 --> 0:22:20.520 downloading of these massive files, that means you're paying is 0:22:20.560 --> 0:22:23.639 probably going to go up as a result. For that reason, 0:22:23.640 --> 0:22:25.760 there are a lot of pro gamers out there who 0:22:25.920 --> 0:22:29.360 will have to dedicated network connections, one just for their 0:22:29.400 --> 0:22:33.520 gaming and the other for everything else, which to me 0:22:33.640 --> 0:22:36.359 is crazy. But everything about pro gaming is crazy to 0:22:36.400 --> 0:22:40.879 me because I'm a casual Gamer right I can't imagine 0:22:41.040 --> 0:22:46.359 dedicating eight hours or more per day to playing, streaming, 0:22:46.760 --> 0:22:51.359 you know, cutting together videos of my gameplay. That just is. 0:22:52.000 --> 0:22:55.960 It's daunting to me anyway. Other things that can affect 0:22:56.000 --> 0:22:59.600 paying can include the type of connection that you're using. 0:22:59.720 --> 0:23:03.360 If you've got a hardwired connection, they go straight from 0:23:03.400 --> 0:23:06.640 your computer to your router. That is going to Minimize 0:23:06.920 --> 0:23:10.120 Ping on your end, at least as far as connectivity 0:23:10.200 --> 0:23:14.159 between router and machine goes. Uh, if your housemaid is 0:23:14.160 --> 0:23:17.760 still downloading the complete works of the fairly brothers, you're 0:23:17.760 --> 0:23:21.160 still gonna have issues with paying. If if you're sharing 0:23:21.280 --> 0:23:26.480 a network connection, if you're relying on Wifi. Then things 0:23:26.520 --> 0:23:30.359 like your distance between your computer and the Wifi router 0:23:31.000 --> 0:23:33.600 or the fact that there may be walls or ceilings 0:23:33.680 --> 0:23:36.160 or floors between you and the router. All of that 0:23:36.560 --> 0:23:40.520 can have an effect on paying. So general rule is 0:23:40.560 --> 0:23:43.840 you want to be closer to the router rather than 0:23:43.880 --> 0:23:47.960 further away, and if you can have a hardwired connection 0:23:48.440 --> 0:23:52.440 it's better. Again, these really have more of an impact 0:23:52.800 --> 0:23:56.760 at the higher levels of Gameplay. If you're a casual player, 0:23:57.359 --> 0:24:00.879 it can still be something that might you might notice, 0:24:00.960 --> 0:24:04.320 but it's not likely to have as critical and impact 0:24:04.440 --> 0:24:08.080 on your level of play. It's also possible for there 0:24:08.119 --> 0:24:11.240 to be issues beyond your own network that you have 0:24:11.320 --> 0:24:16.360 no control over. So perhaps your Internet service providers network 0:24:16.520 --> 0:24:20.399 is having an issue, or a network that your I 0:24:20.640 --> 0:24:24.359 s P connects to Um that might have an issue 0:24:24.440 --> 0:24:26.600 and there's not much you can do about that other 0:24:26.720 --> 0:24:29.480 than maybe you can try and switch to a different 0:24:29.520 --> 0:24:33.440 server to see if the routing between you and that 0:24:33.520 --> 0:24:36.199 server is better. But if it's a problem with your 0:24:36.200 --> 0:24:39.399 I s P, if it's between like if it's in 0:24:39.440 --> 0:24:42.359 that last mile, there's really nothing you can do because 0:24:43.080 --> 0:24:47.600 everything is funneling through that last mile connection to your 0:24:47.920 --> 0:24:51.800 home and you can't step around that, at least not 0:24:51.880 --> 0:24:55.359