Questions about optimised loading times.

[JoeWUniform]

Hi, I have some questions about any known ways to improve the loading / streaming startup times for the Furioos service and Unity.

We are working on a fairly broad app that could end up with quite large file sizes and therefore long loading times so we’re trying to get ahead of these issues.

 

1. Initial app download & unzip to machine

Is there anything that can be done on our end, in the app building / packaging process that will help the Furioos system to faster download / extract our app?

 

2. App launching & loading

Are there any known things that will slow down the startup of our apps on the Furioos machines, or any tips that might help with faster initial launching?

 

3. Asset bundles & Addressables with unity?

We are looking into unity’s Asset bundles in regards to app size, initial load etc.

Are there any known issues / things to avoid when using these with Furioos?

I assume from what I’ve read that the bundles can be packaged within the zip file for loading at runtime without much issue, or even hosted on a server and downloaded when required and I’m hoping the Furioos service won’t have issues with this.

 

4. Seperate Exe files in one zip?

One other idea we’ve had is to package separate parts of our project into separate launchable exes within the zip file after loading into an initial hub exe. Would the Furioos service work with this sort of thing? Or is the user session locked to one launched exe?

 

We are doing our own research into these options now but I thought it might be useful to ask here in case there are any known issues or tips that might come in handy.

Cheers for any help or suggestions, everything is useful,

Joe.

[Michaël KORBAS]

Hi Joe,

1. Initial app download & unzip to machine

The only way to reduce the copy and extract part is to reduce the size of the project. You save time by reduce the number of files to extract too.

We are working with our cloud provider to provider a new storage system based on SSD to reduce copy and extracting process. Right now this feature is still in preview, but we have an early access on it so, we can try to provide you a premium storage, you should get better result with it.

2. App launching & loading

The start process depends on your application size too, the application runs on a SSD so right now there is nothing we can do to reduce the launching time of your application once the copy and extract part is done.

3. Asset bundles & Addressables with unity?

You can package the bundles in your application but it will increase the size of your zip file and increase the loading time before your app getting ready.
I think the best way to reduce loading is to put asset bundles on a remote server and download them.

4. Seperate Exe files in one zip?

Yes you can start an other exe from a hub app.

Hope theses answers will help you.

Michaël

[JoeWUniform]

Hey Michaël,

Thanks for the helpful information!

We’ve been testing different file/build sizes to try and minimise load times as per our client’s requirements.

We’ve just tested with a 10gb build, and the Furioos loading time is around 3mins from hitting the run button.

Our current project will probably be roughly this size or bigger when completed so we hope to get this time down somehow.

We have been looking further into asset bundles and storing required files externally rather than bundled in the app. This is because out of this 10gb, we may only require a small portion of all assets depending on what the user requires for that session so we are hoping to separate these files somehow.

Do you plan to offer any way to store supporting files separately from the exe for faster loading in the future? We can store and load them ourselves from our own cloud storage service provider but if there are any plans to implement this as part of the Furioos service it would presumably be faster than our own solution.

Please let me know.

Cheers,

Joe.