CR 2.1 Release
September 1, 2003

ConferenceRoom 2.1 is the biggest upgrade to ConferenceRoom since 1.7. The entire internal architecture has been majorly overhauled to improve performance, reduce resource consumption and, of course, add a few features.

The UNIX I/O layer has been almost completely rewritten. The new I/O layer breaks connections into logical groups to boost concurrency. This also allows the I/O layer to have low-latency sockets (for things like IPC and DNS) as well as high-throughput sockets (for things like IRC and HTTP) without having to compromise.

The new UNIX I/O layer also features speculative write code to reduce latency and boost performance when an idle connection needs to be spun up for transmission. This makes a huge difference when a message to a channel causes a hundred formerly-idle connections to be spun up at once. I/O concurrency in this case is much better now, even on uniprocessor machines.

Data detection latency has been greatly reduced on UNIX as well. This makes a major difference for web server throughput.

Another new feature of the UNIX I/O layer is called smart buffering. This permits buffers to be dynamically assigned and re-assigned to connections as needed rather than permanently associating I/O buffers with a connection. This provides several benefits. First, memory consumption is reduced because there are fewer wasted buffers. Second, system CPU usage is reduced because the buffers can be larger. Third, cache efficiency is improved because the same buffers are rapidly re-used rather than pushing new buffers into and out of the cache.

The memory management code has been significantly upgraded. Previouly, ConferenceRoom largely relied upon the system library to provide memory management services. Some platforms provided memory managers that worked well with ConferenceRoom, but some did not.

The new code performs well on all platforms. It includes a lookaside table to speed up memory allocations when the allocator is busy (either because another thread is using it or because it's performing maintenance). In addition, the memory manager provides information to and receives information from the higher-level server code, allowing the memory manager and the server code to tune to each other.

For the Solaris platform, several new primitives have been hand-coded in assembly language. This allowed us to work around a small number of extremely expensive operations that testing revealed were consuming a disproportionate amount of CPU time.

For all x86 platforms, low-level code is now hyper-threading aware. Performance on processors with hyper-threading is now much smoother. In addition, several critical primitives (atomic operations, bit manipulations) have been re-written in hand-coded assembly language for improved performance.

Another new cluster of core code features are aimed at resisting denial-of-service attacks. Among other techniques, the low-level code now has the ability to monitor the connection rate to a port and throttle if the rate of new connections exceeds a configurable threshold. This protects the server's ability to serve existing clients and its ability to accept new client connections on other ports.

The web server has received some changes to improve its support for caching. This should result in less bandwidth consumption and significantly reduced page load times for pages with many embedded images. Support for persistent connections and conditional requests has also been improved.

2.1 is also the first release of ConferenceRoom to include the streaming media server. The stream server supports audio, video, and other media types and seamlessly integrates with ConferenceRoom (through custom business logic if desired). Watch for more information about the stream server in the coming months or contact WebMaster technical support to arrange a demonstration.

We have also added many new features to the chat server and services. For example, services now has the ability to require email confirmation of nickname registrations. The chat server has numerous new security settings including limitations on who can join unregistered or unmanaged channels.

Overall, it's a massive overhaul including more than 70,000 lines of completely new code.

CR 2.0.1 Release
November 1, 2002

The 2.01 release of ConferenceRoom is a maintenance release. We corrected several small (non-critical) bugs as well as worked on creating a better user experience for java clients.

We did this by disabling ident checks for java clients as well as allowing the administrator the option of not holding java clients for the proxycheck check-timeout setting. Proxycheck was programmed to disconnect clients that fail the proxycheck test only during the timeout period. Now even if the timeout period is passed the client once on the server can be disconnected if the check fails. This allows you to set the check-timeout to as low a number as you want allowing your clients to get on the server faster yet still maintain security.

The change log can be found on the Chat Server update page.

CR 2.0 Release
October 17, 2002

WebMaster is proud to announce the ConferenceRoom 2.0 series servers.

After six years of selling 1.x series servers, WebMaster is now offering server software that has been changed and improved so radically, it deserves the designation of 2.0. There are significant improvements in user and security features. Also a new front end giving you the power to define the look of your chat server and your web site, rather than having the chat client define the look of your site.

The New Java Client

One of the most compelling features included in the new release is the ChatNow java client. This client puts the look and feel completely in your hands allowing almost any user interface combination that you want to apply. Graphics and layout can be changed on the fly, or on command from a channel operator or based on a room name. This will allow you to create themed rooms without the user having to reload. Font sizes can change dynamically, graphics can load or unload based on programmed events; this client really is the ultimate when it comes to customization and functionality. This is accomplished by the new ChatNow technology that is included in both the Professional and Enterprise Editions of the server. The combination of these features makes this the most powerful interface ever devised for a chat server.

Additional Major New Features Include:

Security Features: We have greatly enhanced the security options available to the administrator and channel operators and added many new features that give sites greater control while allowing for more options to the users.

Proxy Detection: ConferenceRoom now has a configurable proxy detection system built into the server. This allows you to check up to 5 protocols on as many remote ports as you configure. This will greatly reduce the amount of potential abuse that can happen when allowing standard clients.

Direct Client-to-Client Filters: This file transfer filtering will protect your users from unwanted viruses and other trojans that are sent to them when they are using standard chat clients. You can configure up a filter list, block everything, or allow your users the control over whether they want to receive remote files.

Channel Security: New features allow Channel Operators to select how many users from a single IP can get into their channel, how many joins per second and how long a person has to have left the channel prior to their being allowed back in. Also, we have included a command that doesn't allow people that have recently joined the channels to speak until a set amount of time has elapsed. These and other features give you more options on how you deal with users. The administrator of the server can set defaults and/or lock these defaults for all channels.

Logging and Avatars: At the request of many users we have combined both the scribe and developer features into the Professional Edition - we hope this will make everyone's life a little simpler!

• Avatars: Now your users can select graphical representations of themselves while they're in the chat channels. This fun feature was previously only in the Developer and Enterprise Editions and was an example for the Set/Get system (a way to place information on a user in the chat system). Both you and your users will find this a great benefit to your site. People can choose icons based on their sex, occupation, country or any other graphic system.

• Scribe: Scribe provided channel-logging services allowing an administrator to log chat channels and have them automatically placed into HTML in real time. Being able to have a complete text of a chat session is not new to ConferenceRoom, but is now an included feature. This system also allowed users to have channel agents that would sit in channels and greet users as well as a script/event system that allowed you to automate certain functions of your chat server. This was handy when opening or closing a channel, changing greetings in channels or sending automated notices with ConferenceRoom's NewsFlash system.

New LDAP Service: Your community was never better as ConferenceRoom includes a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) Server in all versions of ConferenceRoom 2.0. LDAP is a fast-growing technology for accessing common directory information. LDAP has been embraced and implemented in most network- oriented middleware. As an open, vendor-neutral standard, LDAP provides an extendable architecture for centralized storage and management of information, which is now available for today's distributed systems and services. Now your community users can use this to look up their online friends email addresses (requires the party to set their email as visible).

Pricing for CR 2.0

The Professional Edition is priced at $995.00 (USD), less than the old version when you include scribe and developer, and the Enterprise Edition will be released at $4,995.00 (USD). We have removed the price differential between the Unix and Windows versions of the products. If you are an existing customer of ConferenceRoom, please email or call for your individual quotation for upgrading your existing software.

If you have any questions arising out of the above please email sales@webmaster.com or call 1-408-345-1800.