i fight for the user1!!

it turned out to be the case that the poor performence of Q3 was only my
operating system performing poorly in generally. the fix was a new installation,
which is to say that there was no fix. i spent hours working through the
manuals for pidstat(1) sysstat(5) sadc(8) and running what were entirely
fruitless commands.

these utilities and their usage comprise a good chunk of the LPIC-2 course
materials, and i would say that a main idea of that certification is analyzing
system performance and performing diagnostics and investigations. i was happy
to get the reps in with these tools, but i must say, although i am not
a certified LPIC-2 administrator, this stuff is just worthless. the actual fix
was a fresh installation.

who could be bothered to have to reconfigure in this manner every year or two?
for me it only indicates that i'll be giving up on some things sooner rather
than later and that i had better be comfortable with that. i would
like to show 5 games on userland.lol. with the overhead being what it is, i'm
guessing that two games or three might be what ends up as reasonable.

this of course suggests that 0 games is reasonable. i'll try to enjoy it while
it lasts :D

I am alive, and have opted to try and reduce pulseaudio latency when i stand up
my stream via a script:
- https://git.ultrono.com/user472393/userland-stream/-/blob/master/bin/pulse-latency

I'm probably not able to emit a high quality quake stream given my hardware.
When I capture output on a separate PC, the progressive signal shreds the
screen into strips; ripping and tearing the image. I can't effect the necessary
configuration with nvidia to prevent this.

When i record on the gaming pc itself, i'm liable to repeatedly time out from
the server. I'm not sure what's up with that. At a glance my system looks
performant. It's a game from the last millenium. what's up with that not running
alongside obs?

~~~
inxi -GSaz
System:
Kernel: 6.1.0-31-amd64 arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 12.2.0
parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-6.1.0-31-amd64
Desktop: i3 v: 4.22 info: i3bar vt: 7 dm: SLiM v: 1.4.0 Distro: Devuan
GNU/Linux 5 (daedalus)
Graphics:
Device-1: Intel HD Graphics 630 vendor: Gigabyte driver: i915 v: kernel
arch: Gen-9.5 process: Intel 14nm built: 2016-20 ports: active: none
empty: DP-1, HDMI-A-1, HDMI-A-2, HDMI-A-3 bus-ID: 00:02.0
chip-ID: 8086:5912 class-ID: 0380
Device-2: NVIDIA GM107 [GeForce GTX 750 Ti] vendor: Gigabyte
driver: nvidia v: 535.216.01 non-free: 530.xx+
status: current (as of 2023-03) arch: Maxwell code: GMxxx
process: TSMC 28nm built: 2014-19 pcie: gen: 1 speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 16
link-max: gen: 3 speed: 8 GT/s bus-ID: 01:00.0 chip-ID: 10de:1380
class-ID: 0300
Device-3: Nanjing Magewell vendor: SafeNet driver: Pro Capture v: N/A
alternate: ProCapture pcie: gen: 2 speed: 5 GT/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 06:00.0
chip-ID: 1cd7:0004 class-ID: 0400
Device-4: Logitech HD Pro Webcam C920 type: USB
driver: snd-usb-audio,uvcvideo bus-ID: 1-1:2 chip-ID: 046d:082d
class-ID: 0102 serial: <filter>
Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 1.21.1.7 driver: X: loaded: nvidia
gpu: i915,nvidia,Pro Capture display-ID: :0.0 screens: 1
Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1600x1200 s-dpi: 203 s-size: 200x150mm (7.87x5.91")
s-diag: 250mm (9.84")
Monitor-1: DVI-I-0 pos: primary
res: 640x480 hz: 150 dpi: 46
size: 350x260mm (13.78x10.24")
diag: 436mm (17.17") modes: N/A
Monitor-1: DVI-I-0 pos: primary res: 1600x1200 hz: 75 dpi: 115
size: 352x264mm (13.86x10.39") diag: 440mm (17.32") modes: N/A
Monitor-2: HDMI-1 size-res: N/A modes: N/A
API: OpenGL v: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 535.216.01 renderer: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 750
Ti/PCIe/SSE2 direct-render: Yes
~~~

usb soundcard and pulseaudio are not naively great for gaming
here are some notes on how to improve things

we are starting with a latency of around 36ms
~~~
$ pactl list sinks | grep -i latency
Latency: 36460 usec, configured 24988 usec
Flags: HARDWARE DECIBEL_VOLUME LATENCY SET_FORMATS
~~~

and here is the module in question
~~~
$ pactl list modules
...
Module #52
Name: module-alsa-card
Argument: device_id="4" name="usb-E-MU_Systems__Inc._E-MU_0404___USB_E-MU-AE-3F04-07D70A01-01D2B-STATION_02-00" card_name="alsa_card.usb-E-MU_Systems__Inc._E-MU_0404___USB_E-MU-AE-3F04-07D70A01-01D2B-STATION_02-00" namereg_fail=false tsched=yes fixed_latency_range=no ignore_dB=no deferred_volume=yes use_ucm=yes avoid_resampling=no card_properties="module-udev-detect.discovered=1"
Usage counter: 6
Properties:
module.author = "Lennart Poettering"
module.description = "ALSA Card"
module.version = "16.1"
~~~

these commands have been taken from juho's blogpost
https://juho.tykkala.fi/Pulseaudio-and-latency#positive-effect-on-latency

lets keep following the steps outlined there and run some more commands
~~~
$ pactl unload-module 52
$ pactl load-module module-alsa-card \
device_id="4" \
name="usb-E-MU_Systems__Inc._E-MU_0404___USB_E-MU-AE-3F04-07D70A01-01D2B-STATION_02-00" \
card_name="alsa_card.usb-E-MU_Systems__Inc._E-MU_0404___USB_E-MU-AE-3F04-07D70A01-01D2B-STATION_02-00" \
namereg_fail=false \
tsched=no \
fixed_latency_range=yes \
ignore_dB=no \
deferred_volume=yes \
use_ucm=yes \
avoid_resampling=yes \
card_properties="module-udev-detect.discovered=1" \
fragments=1 \
fragment_size=15
~~~

and we end up with a latency of about 2ms. nice!
~~~
$ pactl list sinks | grep Latency
Latency: 2267 usec, configured 1043 usec
~~~

now how can this be made to persist? how about for a different pulse setup? we'll have to see

i played about 10 tgm games, and in that time 2 sections were okay
where okay means not too unskillful

there were some surprising failure in ta death
why or how i would be surprised about something that happens all the time i do
not know

i played a game of broodwar where i was defeated for want of vision of the
terran natural

all of the games were really too much opponent not enough user

i was lucky to be able to get a couple of games in after work this day.
at my present skill it is sufficiently difficult to control workers in the
opening minutes such that i am unable to reliably implement plans of any detail.
this is on display in the first game of the night, where it's just too hard to get an overlord at 9 supply.
i was glad to not have thrown my army away, but stopped expanding after 20 minutes.

the second game of the night i probed with lurkers and that was sufficient
agression to win sufficed to win. however, i have lost several games recently by
probing in exactly that same way and losing my only defense. i have some notion
of rebuilding defense at that point, but only dimly. it's a common failure in my
play that i have absolutely no defense, and i want to avoid that.

thanks to those players for those games!