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Cloud File CDN Questions
I am a total newb when it comes to CDNs and have some questions. Specifically I am wondering if it is possible to do what I describe below and if so which CDN to use.
I host game servers in several locations. The game server configuration lets you put in an http location for those connecting to the server to download maps. So if use http://example.com/mapfiles/ it will look for map files in that directory.
Is it possible for any CDN to work in this way, so that if a request comes for http://example.com/mapfiles/name.map it will serve the file from the nearest server? All the map files have to be in the same directory so the server can find them. It is a small community so players from all over the world play on the same servers. It would be nice if they could at least download maps fast by getting them from nearby servers.
I looked at Amazon CloudFront and Rackpace Cloud Files, but was hoping someone could provide some quick feedback here rather than me try to sign up for various CDNs and see if they work the way I need them to. Thanks.
Comments
They should yes, but depending on the CDN it may not cache your files on a local node till they are requested, some also have limits on the filesizes they may cache.
The largest map file is around 3.85 MB, average size around 1.2 MB. However I would also like to put up a game installer for a different, open source game which is somewhat large at closer to 120MB if it won't end up being too expensive. Looking at the CDN's designed for hosting files, not those intended specifically for speeding up websites. The game installer is not absolutely necessary but would be great to have it as well.
And again the main concern is that I can keep them all in one folder and request them directly by the original file name. Also If there is some self hosted CDN software I can put on my own servers and their bandwidth that would be great too. Really don't need too many locations, 3-5 servers spread out on different continents would be enough.
I honestly wouldn't recommend a CDN for files larger than 150 KB. It's going to cost you a lot of money depending on where your players are coming from. Just get a good VPS that has decent connectivity and bandwidth allocations.
Based on Amazon CloudFront and Rackspace Cloud Files pricing I don't think it would cost much at all. Both of the games are older with small communities. Most players already have all the map files. The only downloads would be for new maps or the occasional new player. The map download bandwidth would be really small. I doubt the larger installer would result in more than 15GB of traffic per month.
Why do you need a CDN? You aren't looking for millisecond improvements. You want fast downloads, but your users don't expect instant downloads. A CDN is for when you need physical closeness to your audience and centisecond response times.
Why not just use Amazon's S3. That's what Minecraft does with all of their game files and updates.
Using a S3 bucket near most of your users is a good solution.
To answer your question, yes you can use Cloudfront. You may want to set it up so it's a custom origin pull from your game server. Also check your server for caching headers.