Team 5: Virtual Casino

Baseline Use Case

Functionality:

Baseline

System Elements:

• Game Server: The middleware server responsible for serving blackjack to clients. The game server registers one interface with the orb naming service, the Floor interface which contains methods allow entrance to and exit from the gaming system. It also exports two other interfaces on request; the Bank interface and the Tables interface. These handle the monitary transactions and the actual game mechanics respectively.
• Database Server: The MS-SQL system that stores all the state for one middleware server right now and multiple ones in the future.
• Client: The application that the player uses to play the game. It has one interface, the Player interface, that it exports to the game server to allow the game server to control the flow of game play.
• Player: The human controlling the client application

Use Case:

• A player or players can now do the following:
  • Login to a game server by entering his/her name.
  • Buy "chips" using the bank interface.
  • Use the Tables interface to join a table.
  • Play a mostly regulation blackjack game against the dealer while other players play concurantly.
  • Buy more "chips" during the game
  • Leave the table, sell your "chips" back to the bank, and unregister from the game.
• Client does the following:
• Looks up the Floor interface from the ORB naming server and then loads that interface.
• Let the player register with a game server
• Loads the Bank and Tables interfaces from the game server
• When the player requests to join a table, the Client creates a player object and sends the Player interface to the Game Server letting the server drive the flow of the game.
• At the end of play the client lets the player leave the table, sell his/her "chips" and unregister.
• Server does the following:
  • Register its "Floor" inteface with the naming service.
  • Take registration requests from a player, putting the player's name in the database and returning a player ID.
  • Create "Bank" and "Tables" objects and send references to them to the client on request.
  • Sell chips to a client.
  • Assign clients to tables, with a maximum of five per table.
  • Take the Player interface from the client and run the game using that interface.
  • Allow the client to leave the game.
  • Allow the client to sell "chips" back to the bank.

Test distribution:

/afs/ece/class/ece841/public_html/team5/team5-baseline.tar.bz2

Test Sequence

1. Running the Database Server
   1. Login to msepc12.sp.cs.cmu.edu and start SQL server. Directions for access to this host available on request.
2. Running the Game Server
   
   1. Log in to any host in the ECE linux cluster.
   2. Change directory to where you wish to unpack the tarball.
   3. Type tar xjvf /afs/ece/class/ece841/public_html/team5/team5-baseline.tar.bz2.
   4. Change to the newly created project directory: cd team5-baseline
   5. If you are using CSH or TCSH for your shell type: source ./env.csh.
   6. If you are using Bourne/BASH/KSH for your shell type: . ./env.bsh.
   7. Make sure that no other orbs are running on this system by typing killall orbd and then start an orb daemon with ./startOrbd.sh&.  Make sure to wait a minute until the orb starts completely.  It gives no output to tell you when it is ready but waiting a minute is usually enough.
   8. Clear out the database of old data in case there is some corrupt data that will effect our test by running ./runDBClear.sh which will not give any output if it runs correctly.
      
   9. Start the Casino Server with ./BlackJackServer& and wait to see the message, "---Server ready and running .....".  If the orb is running on a different system use the "-h" option as such:   ./BlackJackServer -h <otherhost>.
   10. The server is now up and ready to server games to clients.
       
3. Running a Client
   1. Change to the project directory: cd team5-baseline, the same directory from which the server was started.
   2. Start client on this host with ./BlackJackClient. If the orb is on a different host, use the "-h" option as such:
      ./BlackJackClient -h <otherhost>. 
   3. When prompted by the client application enter your name and hit return.
   4. When prompted to buy chips, enter a number and hit return.
   5. The next prompt will ask you to place a bet on the upcoming hand. Type a number between 10 and the number of chips that you have bought in increments of ten.  If you bet zero you quit the game.
   6. You will be dealt two cards. If at anytime you get a total of 21 points, you win. Otherwise you will have to get more points than the dealer without going over 21 to win. If you go over 21 or have fewer points than the dealer, you lose and lose your bet. If you win you get the amount of your bet added to your chip total, if you lose that much is subtracted.
   7. If you don't win automatically with your first two cards you will be prompted to choose between hitting or staying with the cards you have. Hit "h" if you want to be dealt another card or "s" if you want to stay with the ones you have.
   8. The hand continues until either you stay or go over 21
   9. At the end of the hand your chips are added to or subracted from depending on whether you win or loose
   10. Once the hand is over you will be prompted to bet again with your remaining chips. If you are out of chips your only valid choice is to quit the game by entering zero (0) chips as your bet.
   11. The game continues until you run out of chips or decide to quit with your winnings.

Configuration/deployment issues:

• The project is not packaged into separate Server and Player jar files yet, all the classes are grouped together into one jar file. This jar file is packaged into a tar file with start scripts and the Microsoft SQS server java driver jar files.

Known problems:

• If the server is started while the orb is still starting up, an exeption may be uncaught. This has only happened once.
• If you input a non-numerical character at the prompt asking you for the number of chips to buy or amount to bet you will get an error saying, "GetInteger: Number format error." This is correct behaviour but not very well worded. It looks more like a debugging message than a prompt for the player to input the correct type of value. If you enter a number after getting this error, the game will continue.
• If try to buy too many chips, you get an input warning but no prompt telling you what the limit is.
• Once you run out of chips, you cannot buy more without exiting the application
• A table is not destroyed when the last player leaves it.
• Only one player plays at a table at one time.
• The player is not told what table he/she is at.
• The point totals for each hand are not displayed.
  
• If you kill the server, the player freezes.
• If you kill the client and restart it using the same user name, without restarting the server, a fatal uncaught exception is generated at the client and a non-fatal exception is thrown at the server. That username can not be used again until the database has been cleared.
• We do not deal with money or credit, you can buy as many chips as you want as long as it go over the input limit.
• The system can only run with one database as the host is hard coded into the java source code.