On Sat, 27 Jul 1996, Roy wrote:
They use the ping times to figure out which server would be closest. All the servers are not located in the same place. The idea is that european users may receive better service from a european server.
This brings to mind a question: are ping times a more appropriate vector than hopcount or topological locality? Ping times reflect a lot of important (but ephemeral) aspects of performance which more direct measurements do not. E.g., the latency of trans-pond links nicely reflects their cost in a matter not easily captured in simple topology maps. Ditto for congested links which might be closer to the viewer. Of course cacheing solves all of these problems (J <- hook next to bait), but in this imperfect of worlds, what reasons, if any, make ping time less attractive than other metrics? I used to think them simple-minded and sloppy, but now I am not so sure. _____________________________________________________________________ Todd Graham Lewis Linux! Core Engineering Mindspring Enterprises tlewis@mindspring.com (800) 719 4664, x2804