XNA at Microsoft Gamefest

The Discussion

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  Good Stuff!

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  At  Last !!!!

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  Sorry it took so long to get up.  We are going to do some more interviews with the XNA team.  So what are your questions for the team? 
  
  Has anyone built something with XNA on Channel9?

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  I would like to get further details on what the policy and legal issues there are with networking support that was mentioned in the video. It seems like a major component that is missing from XNA right now.
  
  Mark

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  Yeah I could see networking being tricky on xbox. Perhaps a tightly wrapped api with network contexts (Live, System Link, Local?). I'd imagine that communication with other xboxes would only be possible via obtaining a connection via a gamertag (and then only gamertags within the current users friendslist... or provided by the 360's own friends interface). Thus no connecting to arbitary IP's, messaging spamming or even transmitting data to unknown Gamertags. Obviously if the context given was Live the api would enforce the Silver member restrictions.
  
  Abuse of data would also be an issue, there are a couple of ways of dealing with it; perhaps a light packet mode that would transmit data as fast as possible (maybe with some prediction services?) possibly with a set limit per frame or per client/peer? Possibly key value pairs - a big restraint but workable.
  
  A chunkier non realtime version for non realtime events and maybe a full sync method (xml based? key/value collection? again maybe with a data limit?).
  
  I could see something like;
  
  LivePlayer livePlayer  = LiveFramework.InviteFriend(); //goes to 360
  
  LobbyMember lobbyMember = new LobbyMember();
  
  lobbyMember.Name = livePlayer.GamerTag;
  
  gameLobby.Add( lobbyMember);
  
  // then maybe get a connection via that player. The context would be Live versus System Link (and perhaps Local splitscreen).
  if(livePlayer.Status != LiveStatus.Offline)
  {
     XnaConnection connection = livePlayer.GetConnection(livePlayer.NetworkContext);
  }
  
  blah...
  
  Obviously this is oversimplified and adding in voice as well might be tickier (gameVoiceChannel.Add(liveplayer.Voice) would be a dream ). 
  
  Probably not good enough for halo but maybe for simple games and an easy entry point into what is normally a world of pain. But hey I'm just thinking out loud here

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  Boyd Multerer(sp? sorry) mentioned that we should "brush up on MDX".  From what I understand, MDX is no longer being developed but instead was rolled into XNA.  Is he saying that we should brush up on MDX 1.1 or is he really saying, brush up on XNA?
  
  Or, what is he saying? Any ideas?