FlareNet

FlareNet is a high-level wrapper for ENet C#, providing a simple server-client reliable-UDP network. The focus of FlareNet is cleanliness and readability.

This is an ongoing project and will continue to be updated.

Features

• Server-client connections
• Client connection management
• Channels
• Encryption
• Throttling
• Packet sending options
• Logging
• Real documentation

Building

Just open the solution and build. If it doesn't work, make an issue and complain.

FlareNet is not yet intended to be used for non-PC platforms.

Known Issues

• PayloadHandler needs to be changed to use a ring buffer.
• Sending a network payload involves grabbing the network tag every time.

Getting Started

Starting a server or client

Creating a new server or connecting to an existing one is very straightforward.

using FlareNet;

// Create a server on the port 2000
FlareServer server = new FlareServer(2000);

// Create and connect a client to an IP and port
FlareClient client = new FlareClient("127.0.0.1", 2000);

Processing data

Message.Process() has overloads for almost every type that anyone could possibly want to be synced and allows extension methods for types that FlareNet does not process (i.e. Unity's Vector3 type).

To send data between server and client, an object implementing the INetworkPayload interface must be set up to process the variables to be sent or synced. This interface also requires implementation of the ISerializable interface, which can be used to make objects serializable.

Each network payload must have a NetworkTag attribute with a unique ushort identifier.

[NetworkTag(101, PacketOptions.Reliable)]
class ExamplePayload : INetworkPayload
{
    private int exampleInt = 18;
    private string exampleString = "speeen";
    private ISerializable nestedSerializable = new Foo();

    public void Sync(Message message)
    {
        // If reading from the buffer, the message assigns values. If writing to the buffer, the message reads values.
        message.Process(ref exampleInt);
        message.Process(ref exampleString);
        message.Process(ref nestedSerializable);
    }
}

Registering a payload callback

Callback methods to handle payloads a client receives can be added through the client. When a client receives a payload of the type a method is listening for, that method will be called when the client is polled.

void ExampleCallback(ExamplePayload p)
{
    // Use payload here
}

// Add a method to be called when a payload type is received
client.AddCallback<ExamplePayload>(ExampleCallback);

// Remove the method from being called
client.RemoveCallback<ExamplePayload>(ExampleCallback);

// Clear all callbacks for a payload
client.ClearCallbacks<ExamplePayload>();

Polling a client

Clients must be polled manually to ensure payload callbacks are called on the correct thread.

The performance impact of this operation has not been benchmarked.

client.PollMessages();

Sending a network payload

Sending a payload over the network is very simple.

Overload functions for more specific behaviour are available.

byte channel = 0;
ExamplePayload p = new ExamplePayload();

client.SendMessage(p, channel);

Acknowledgements

Go check out nxrighthere. ENet C# and NetStack are both from him, and this project wouldn't exist without either of them.