I know why they do it David. Its too prevent most of those managers from opening multiple instances and flooding the server with multiple download connections, in order to do segmentation. And, I 100% agree with them on that, but I also know there are other ways to handle that, not the least being that you can track the IP accessing the site, and break "all" connections from it, if they try to download more than one thing at a time from the server (or multiple of the same file). The problem is, most FTP servers are really dumb about this issue, lack support to identify the IP, or at least, lack the means to check if the same person is requesting two sections of the same file, at the same time. Instead of fixing the damn servers, so they catch and prevent such access, they opted to invent complicated ways to make it harder to start the download in the first place.
Note, ***most*** of them **all** provide resumable interfaces though, so that a temporary server lag, or other issue, doesn't frell the persons download. Even the ones that use session management, like The Underdogs, which checks for more than one download from the same IP, and those that use complex methods to track the user, or feed the files, via browers redirects, and other stuff (which is what the, "?fud=foobar", uses, **still** support resumable servers. Here is the thing.
Sony, which I used as an example, has *no* redirection, so you can get the files from a direct link, no X-number of files per user, and *no* restriction on how many segments are being downloaded at one time. All their downloads are either patches, which you need to own the game for, or demos, so there is no reason they couldn't either a) allow resuming, or b) supply a torrent link instead. No, they opt to let you download the dang 3GB worth of files any way you want, in as many segments as you want, using any download agent you want, then cut your legs out from under you, by making the server a "does not support resuming". Sorry, but I just don't buy the excuse that they are doing it to prevent flooding from morons using segmentation. Most of the servers are, in my experience, either suing something that "tries" to stop that, but which only breaks browsers and irritates people, without really solving the problem, or have just been configured in such a way that they flat out simply don't fracking work correctly. At least one sight I downloaded from once in a while was so badly configured that even *if* the files was a) not segmented, b) downloaded in *any* browser, instead of a manager, c) only a few megs in size and d) you had a valid cookie, about 50% of the time it would fail, for no apparent reason at all, at not let you even attempt to download the same file again, until you went through the whole mess of authentication, cookie acquisition, etc., and then, it might still fail to start, no matter how many times you tried it.
There are better ways to handle this. And **neither** database based redirects, nor non-resumable servers do "anything" to prevent the managers from working, unless you also add in session cookies, and IP checking, so all they *usually* end up doing is making life difficult for the legitimate users. BTW, I gave up on Sony and downloaded the ****fully paid for**** copy of Everquest I via someone's bittorrent backup of it. At the time I didn't know you could download the patcher, then have it "update" everything to the current version, nor did their website say anything at all about doing that.
Put simply. I don't think that a) some people doing this know how badly it can break things, b) intend to use them for the reasons such systems are usually used, c) configure servers properly in cases where they don't intend to create these barriers, or d) really think about how **best** to prevent what they are trying to stop in the first place. I mean, seriously, how hard is it really to simply have a server that goes, "Oh, 66.55.44.33 is asking for file abc.zip at segment 50, is that address *already* downloading part of the file?", then reject the new connection if it is? Wouldn't that have been about 500 times simpler, less complicated and more effective than inventing a dozen layers of cookies, sessions, etc, etc, etc, and doing stuff, like breaking download resuming in the process? |
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