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\documentclass[10pt,twocolumn]{article}
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\usepackage{oxycomps}
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\bibliography{references}
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\pdfinfo{
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/Title (SpatialDB: A Database for Storing Dense Three-Dimensional Voxel Structures)
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/Author (Nicholas Novak)
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}
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\title{SpatialDB: A Database for Storing Dense Three-Dimensional Voxel Structures}
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\author{Nicholas Novak}
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\affiliation{Occidental College}
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\email{nnovak@oxy.edu}
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\begin{document}
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\maketitle
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\section{Introduction and Problem Context}
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% What my project is
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In my senior comprehensive project, I have designed and implemented a database
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application that is designed specifically to store complex shapes in ``voxels'',
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or three-dimensional pixels.
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% Applications of voxels
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A voxel\cite{enwiki:1186283262} represents a single point or cube in a
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three-dimensional grid, at a variable size. This feature allows them to
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approximately model many three-dimensional structures, in order to reduce the
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computational complexity in analyzing the shape, which has led to many
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data-related use cases outside of computer science. For example, to model the
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inner workings of the brain, Neuroscientists track oxygen concentration through
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neural tissue on a voxel grid as part of fMRI studies\cite{norman2006beyond},
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and Movie studios such as DreamWorks use voxel data structures to model light
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reflections for visual effects\cite{museth2013vdb}. The output of MRI scans in
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hospitals are very high-resolution voxel grids. Most recently, machine learning
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models are being trained on the LIDAR data from self-driving
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cars\cite{li2020deep} in order to better process their environments. However,
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voxels are not often thought of as a way to store three-dimensional shapes, and
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existing research focuses mainly on efficiently representing and processing
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shapes. My approach models this problem of voxel storage and representation, and
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turns it into a problem of database design.
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\subsection{Using Minecraft as a Model for a Database}
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% The problems with Minecraft
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Minecraft\footnote{https://www.minecraft.net/en-us}, released 2009, is a sandbox
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game that is played in a world entirely composed of cubic voxels, where the
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player has complete freedom to manipulate the world by building, destroying, or
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exploring any part of it. I am focusing this database on the requirements of
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Minecraft because the game involves some additional challenges that traditional
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databases do not consider. Primarily, the world of Minecraft is infinite in the
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horizontal $x$ and $z$ axes, but fixed in the $y$ axis, which limits the amount
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of information that can be stored by the database at once. The world also
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contains a denser voxel grid than in many other applications, meaning that far
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more of the blocks in the world are filled than empty.
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A game is also a real-time application, which means that any performance issues
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will be immediately be present to the user. Most databases can be evaluated on
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only their speed, but as the Minecraft server processes new information 20 times
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per second, the game has a time budget of 50ms to handle all game logic,
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including the storing of data. Less time processing the data in the world means
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that more time will be freed up for the game to process other work, although
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finishing work earlier will not necessarily be faster for the end user, if it
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still under the budget of 50ms. Most databases do not meet this requirement, and
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even though they may be faster, their complexity does not mean that they will
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always finish operations within this time limit.
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These limitations also make Minecraft unable to take advantage of a cache, since
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the number of different operations that can be done on the world is infinitely
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large, remembering any previous operations will often not be helpful for the
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system's performance. Minecraft also provides a good benchmark for the database,
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because the unpredictability of players stresses the system's ability to return
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results in a variety of settings.
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\section{Technical Background}
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\subsection{What is a database?}
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When I refer to the concept of a database, I am referencing a program that sits
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more or less as a ``black box'' between the user and a software application,
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storing any data required for the application. In most existing applications,
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this is done by a category of databases called ``relational databases'', which
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offer a very general-purpose way to store user data that is highly connected.
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For instance, a person stored in a relational database would be efficiently
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linked to with any of their associated information, such as name or age.
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% The model of a database
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In database terms, any amount of data added to the database is called a
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``write'', data retrieved from the database is called a ``read'', and any
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questions asked, such as ``how many people have done this'', are called
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``queries''. Developers ask these questions through computer languages, one such
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example being Structured Query Language or SQL, which allow
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the database to be queried efficiently.
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\subsection{Challenges With Existing Databases}
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% Software development and SQL
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Most software engineering projects start with a simple front-end and back-end,
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typically implemented with some sort of Model-View-Controller architecture, and
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connected to a relational SQL database \cite{sqliteOnlyDatabase}. This idea was
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popularized by frameworks such as Ruby on Rails and Django, where the model was
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most often modeled by structures within the database. This framework allowed
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software developers to not have to worry about inner workings of the database,
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and focus on writing business logic. This is how many start-ups were built, such
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as GitHub \cite{githubSingleSQL}, who recently moved off its single SQL database
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after 13 years, citing performance issues.
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% Challenges with working with SQL: Performance
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Using a single SQL-speaking database can be a significant advantage development
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speed, but the database can have some issues keeping up with the demands of the
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application as the performance requirements expand.
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% Caching
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As soon as this happens, companies typically put smaller caching applications in
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front of their database, such as \verb|Redis|\footnote{https://redis.io/},
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\verb|memcached|\cite{nishtala2013scaling}, or \verb|TAO| \cite{bronson2013tao},
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to allow the application to remember some of the commonly asked questions and
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reduce load on the database by not having to do the same work again.
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\subsubsection{The Complexity of General-Purpose Databases}
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% What is being done about this
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Modern SQL databases are also very complex. Three of the most popular SQL
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databases, PostreSQL, MySQL and Sqlite have 1.4 million lines
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\footnote{https://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/GSoC\_2018, in reference to the
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text ``PostgreSQL is over 1.3M lines of code and some of the code paths can be
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tricky to reach.''} of code, 2.9 million lines
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\footnote{https://www.openhub.net/p/mysql}, and 150,000 lines
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\footnote{https://www.sqlite.org/testing.html} respectively.
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% Why are databases inefficient?
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Why are databases so complex? Most of the reason for the complexity is that
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because these database systems so general-purpose, they cannot assume anything
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about the data stored in them. For the database, finding an efficient plan to
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answer each query is a known NP-hard problem\cite{chatterji2002complexity}, and
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to keep itself fast, the database must construct this plan with a complex set of
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approximations, based on the assumptions that it can make, which leads to
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ever-evolving complexity.
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% Impossible to maintain
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With this complexity, it is impossible for a single person to understand the
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complete inner workings of a database. Thus, the problem of the company's
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database often becomes a dedicated person in companies that can afford it, or
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become entire teams of engineers at larger organizations such as
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Google\cite{googlePerfTeam}.
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% Intro to special-purpose databases
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What happens in the larger companies that can afford more engineering time, and
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have a specific problem that they cannot solve with a traditional database?
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Typically, this leads to the creation of special-purpose database solutions. For
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instance, the global scale of iCloud and Apple's cloud solutions required them
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to create FoundationDB\cite{zhou2021foundationdb}. A different set of challenges
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in the Facebook inbox led to the creation of Apache
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Cassandra\cite{lakshman2010cassandra}, which is optimized to allow for many
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emails to be received, at the expense of search speed, which is done far less
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frequently.
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\subsubsection{The Special-Purpose Database}
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Limiting a database's design to a specific use-case can make the development
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process much simpler, to the point where it can be done by a single person, and
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can offer higher performance. The first question that needs to be asked is
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whether the application is \textit{write-heavy} or \textit{read-heavy}.
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Read-heavy applications occur often in web development, and most social media
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platforms have far more users reading the content, than writing new content for
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the platform. In contrast, write-heavy applications are often seen in analytics
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workloads, where data is written from many sources, and analyzed infrequently by
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users.
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My application has a relatively even write and read balance, and I evaluated
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three different storage data structures before choosing to implement my own
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% Special-purpose databases
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Recently, companies such as Tigerbeetle\cite{tigerbeetleDesign} have taken this
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domain-driven approach to database design even further, while designing a
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database from the ground up to do financial accounting, which outperforms a
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reference MySQL implementation at 76 accounting transactions per second, to
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1,757 transactions per second \cite{tigerbeetlePerf}. This highly specialized
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and domain-specific approach to creating databases is what my project is going
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to be based on, to create a database around the challenges that the game
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Minecraft has.
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\subsubsection{Key-Value Databases}
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One of the main architectures that I considered for my project is a design
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called a key-value store\cite{kvdatabase}, which would store the relationship of
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a single voxel to its value. Many other voxel databases use this method to
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achieve constant-time operations on retrieving points, which means that
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regardless of the size of the dataset, the database will always be able to
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return a result in the same amount of time. This structures is behind many of
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the high-performance caches that are commonly used to speed up web applications,
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such as Redis and RocksDB\cite{dong2021rocksdb}. In order to provide high speeds
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for this data, the key-value mappings are usually stored in main memory, which
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is far more expensive and limited than the system's disk drive, but offers
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a speed advantage of several orders of magnitude\cite{latencyKnow}.
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\section{Prior Work}
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\subsection{Voxels for Efficient Computation}
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Most existing literature on the topic of using voxels to store shapes focuses on
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the application of the voxel grid for efficient computation. Since voxel points
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are completely independent of each other, this allows for efficient parallel
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processors, which are increasingly more common on consumer hardware, to take
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advantage of this speedup. In VDB\cite{museth2013vdb} Museth demonstrates that
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by modeling a sparse voxel grid in different resolutions, a computer cluster can
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efficiently approximate a physical structures such as a cloud, in order to
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calculate expensive lighting operations.
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\subsection{Parallel Processing on Voxel Databases}
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Williams\cite{williams1992voxel} expands upon the uses of a voxel database to
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model graph and mesh-based problems. Taking advantage of the parallelism in the
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grid, many problems can be reframed in the representation of voxels, and solve
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those problems far more efficiently. This model however, assumes that every
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voxel is stored in shared memory, making this process only viable to solve
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problems that can be modeled on one machine, and are far more computationally
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expensive, rather than data-intensive.
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\subsection{Large Voxel Data Set Processing}
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Another approach to the problem of storing voxel data is the distributed
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approach in Gorte et. al. \cite{gorte2023analysis}. Since memory is limited
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within one computer, this workload can be split up between many servers, which
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allows very large datasets to be worked on by a single workstation through an
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API. This method keeps many of the same performance considerations, but also
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assumes that the voxel data is not very dense, and uses a three-dimensional
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data structure called an octree, which allows the user to change the resolution
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of the data that they are working on. In the paper, Gorte acknowledges the need
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to split large datasets up into smaller regions, which is similar to the concept
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of ``chunks'' in my implementation.
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\subsection{Previous Special-Purpose Databases}
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The design of my database was also inspired by the LSM tree and data-driven
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designs of Tigerbeetle\cite{tigerbeetleDesign}, which is also able to handle
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concurrent operations on the same design. Another database,
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CockroachDB\footnote{https://www.cockroachlabs.com/product/}, uses a key-value
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mapping backend to store a SQL-like tables and rows. Finally, the design of
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caching layers in modern SQL caches such as Noria\cite{gjengset2018noria} show
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that it it possible to efficiently remember the complex queries found in SQL,
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and replicate these in real-time.
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\section{Methods}
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Almost every part of the database was designed so that most operations could be
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done in constant time.
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The database provides a simple interface to read and write data, consisting of
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the following:
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\begin{itemize}
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\item Read a single block
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\item Write a single block
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\item Change a range of blocks
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\item Read a pre-defined ``chunk'' of blocks
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\end{itemize}
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The process of fetching the data for a single point in the world starts at that
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point's $x, y$ and $z$ location. The world is infinite in size on the horizontal
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$x$ and $z$ axes, but limited in the vertical $y$ axis. In my database, the
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world is composed of an infinite grid of ``chunks'', or columns that are a fixed
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16 x 16 blocks in the $x$ and $z$ axes, but 256 blocks in the vertical $y$ axis.
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Once you know a point's location, you can find with a modulus what chunk the
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point is located within. From there, the database only needs to retrieve the
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data for the chunk stored at that location.
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Initial implementations for my database focused on tree-based approaches for
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finding the files for chunks, but with their complexity and non-constant
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complexity, I decided to store each chunk separately. However, with worlds with
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chunk counts in the hundreds of thousands, the filesystem implementations had
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issues with searching through so many files, which led to performance problems.
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Finally, I settled on merging all the chunk data into one file, and use the
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filesystem's \verb|seek| syscall to lookup the offset for the correct chunk. A
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simple hash table was then used to store each chunk's location with its offset
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in the file, which keeps the memory cost low, even with chunk counts in the
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millions. This allows for constant-time searches for the chunk's data.
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Once a chunk is retrieved from disk, the format of the chunk is broken down into
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smaller cubic slices of the chunk, called ``sections'' each section is a
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16x16x16 cubic area that keeps an index for every chunk. The point's $y$
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position tells the database what section the point is in, and a simple formula
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is done to convert the remaining $x$ and $z$ axes into an index within the
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section.
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Every section additionally stores a look-up-table, that stores a mapping of a
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\textit{palette index} to the state of a block. When the value for the point is
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retrieved from the section, the value returned is not the block's state, but
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simply an index into this palette. The palette lookup is done in constant time,
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and when a new block is added into the section that needs an additional state in
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the palette, this value is added in constant time as well. The existence of this
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palette supports the efficient operation of another part of the database, which
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is the ability to change large portions of blocks in the world.
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Once the value of the point is found in the palette, the value can be returned
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to the user. A visual diagram of this process can be found in figure
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\ref{fig:lookup}.
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\begin{figure}
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\centering
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\includegraphics[width=8cm]{block-search.drawio.png}
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\caption{The process of looking up a single block}
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\label{fig:lookup}
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\end{figure}
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The ability to change a region of blocks is also a common operation within the
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database, and which isn't locked to a specific range of chunks. This operation
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is implemented as overwriting the palettes for a specific region. By overwriting
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every palette index to the same value, every value in the chunk effectively gets
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set to the same value. This does however create the need for an additional
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``compaction'' step, where the palette is shrunk to remove duplicate values, and
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every block within the section must be updated to point to the correct index in
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the palette. This compaction is done upon any subsequent writes to the section
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by inserting a block, because only this fixed-size section needs to be changed,
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preserving the time of the operation as constant time.
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Finally, the retrieval of a single chunk can be done efficiently, because the
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database already stores chunks separately, and serializes these to the client.
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% \cite{vohra2016apache}.
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\section{Evaluation Metrics}
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\subsection{Reading Single Voxels}
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Reads and writes of single voxels are the most common fundamental operation for
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my database, and the database should be handle this operation in the same amount
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of time, regardless of the size of the world. Both my implementation and the
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simpler key-value store meet this criteria.
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\subsection{Changing Regions of Voxels}
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Changing regions of voxels should be able to be done in linear time. This is
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because resetting or changing a region of voxels is important while drawing
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shapes of various resolutions. Lower resolution shapes are less precise, and
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thus are able to be written faster.
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\subsection{Memory Requirements}
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The memory requirement is set quite low, at 256MB, in order to require the
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database to store most of its data on disk, and limit its memory usage to
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important caching features. This limitation was chosen for larger datasets that
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don't fit within memory on a single machine, because memory is much more
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expensive than disk storage, and would limit the analysis to smaller voxel grids.
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\subsection{Reading Regions of Voxels}
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The ability to retrieve large shapes from the database is important, because in
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order to export a shape, another operation must be present to efficiently do
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this. This operation therefore must be done in constant time, because as
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Gorte\cite{gorte2023analysis} identifies, many researchers might want to work
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on the same dataset, and exporting all this data would become inefficient for
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the database to process. In the use-case of Minecraft, this allows the server to
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support many more players at once, by not sending every individual block to each
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client. This requirement is not met by the key-value database, but is reached by
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my implementation, by sending the stored chunks on disk.
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\subsection{Reading Neighboring Blocks}
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The last common operation in most voxel databases is the ability to read points
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that are neighboring another point. This is important because many voxel shapes
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approximate cubic shapes \cite{gorte2023analysis}, and in Minecraft, players are
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constantly affecting voxels that are nearer to each other.
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\section{Results and Discussion}
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Benchmarking on my laptop, inserting values in various spreads around the voxel
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world, I get the following benchmarks, comparing an in-memory implementation of
|
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SpatialDB, the disk-based implementation of SpatialDB, and a memory-based
|
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key-value implementation in figure \ref{fig:reads}:
|
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\begin{figure}
|
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\centering
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\begin{tabular}{c | c | c | c}
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Spread of Points & In-memory & Disk & KeyValue\\
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\hline
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128 & 4275 & 4146669 & 176.7\\
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512 & 4184 & 3319162 & 190.6\\
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2048 & 2613 & 422938 & 184.8\\
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65536 & 2382 & 18814 & 186.1
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\end{tabular}
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\caption{Time (in ns) to operate on a single voxel, based on the size of the
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world (spread)}
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\label{fig:reads}
|
||||
\end{figure}
|
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|
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These results show that the scaling remains consistent between the in-memory
|
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version and the key-value store, although my implementation is about two orders
|
||||
of magnitude slower than the latter. This scaling is however not met by the
|
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performance of the on-disk database. Originally, I thought that these poor
|
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results were the result of no caching being done on the chunk files, which would
|
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have made searches much slower, but still doesn't explain the improvement in
|
||||
performance by larger worlds. This led me to implement a disk cache, which had
|
||||
similar results, to the final implementation where I combined all the data in
|
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one large file, and selectively read sections from that file. This leads me to
|
||||
believe that as the points tested grow more spread out, since the world is only
|
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so large, many points will be outside of the loaded chunks, and instantly return
|
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empty.
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|
||||
This change could likely be addressed by a change in caching methods, and
|
||||
remembering the data for more chunks, but this still doesn't address the slow
|
||||
speeds for accessing data in the first place. The slow speeds are most likely
|
||||
the decoding of the JSON data stored on disk, which is relatively large at
|
||||
about 4 megabytes in size. A custom encoding method could be designed to replace
|
||||
this scheme, or additionally pre-allocate the entire storage space in the
|
||||
chunks, so that chunk data could be retrieved without decoding the entire chunk.
|
||||
However, this would require a much more constrained data layout, and limit the
|
||||
implementation of different voxels.
|
||||
|
||||
Additionally, compression
|
||||
|
||||
\section{Ethical Considerations}
|
||||
|
||||
\subsection{Considerations of Computing Resources}
|
||||
|
||||
Since databases are at the core part of most complex systems, they are often
|
||||
built to be run on hardware that the normal consumer can afford
|
||||
\footnote{\url{https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/12.2/ntdbi/oracle-database-minimum-hardware-requirements.html}}
|
||||
\footnote{\url{https://wiki.lustre.org/Lustre_Server_Requirements_Guidelines}}.
|
||||
|
||||
The large hardware requirements of these databases come from the environments
|
||||
where they are implemented, and at many of these companies, the ability to
|
||||
keep buying faster hardware allows the company to work on other things that are
|
||||
more important. However, what this does to the player is effectively prices them
|
||||
out of the game that they would be already playing, especially since the
|
||||
database would also have to run alongside the existing Java application of
|
||||
Minecraft, which quickly exhaust system memory.
|
||||
|
||||
In the design of my server I have to prioritize both performance to take
|
||||
advantage of the existing hardware, but make sure that the accessibility for
|
||||
the application does not decrease as a result.
|
||||
|
||||
\subsection{Considerations of Complexity}
|
||||
Another factor to consider in the implementation of my database is how complex
|
||||
the existing systems are. Some of the most popular SQL databases, PostgreSQL and
|
||||
MySQL have 1.4 and 4.4 million lines of code respectively
|
||||
\footnote{\url{https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24813239}}.
|
||||
|
||||
With so much complexity going on, this significantly decreases the overall
|
||||
knowledge of the system, as well as the individual user who has to debug their
|
||||
game. Most of this is from the large amount of query logic that handles caching
|
||||
and speeding up certain queries, so knowing more about the specific problem that
|
||||
I am trying to solve removes this process from having to be done.
|
||||
|
||||
Especially since most of the people in the Minecraft community are volunteers in
|
||||
the open-source community, debugging this large of an application would be out of
|
||||
scope for enjoying a game, and likely lead to it being replaced with something
|
||||
more simple. The reliability characteristics are also less than what are
|
||||
required for Minecraft, since they are being compared against a single-threaded
|
||||
Java program which has been tested to do the correct thing.
|
||||
|
||||
\subsection{Considerations in Security}
|
||||
|
||||
Since these databases are very complex, there is also the risk that having a
|
||||
server exposed over the internet through the Minecraft game server might leave
|
||||
it exposed to attacks. While this is a large issue, an even more important
|
||||
implication is the ability to configure the database correctly. Since these
|
||||
databases are extremely complex, it is also very hard to make sure that they are
|
||||
configured securely. There have been many high-profile data
|
||||
breaches\footnote{\url{https://www.zdnet.com/article/hacker-ransoms-23k-mongodb-databases-and-threatens-to-contact-gdpr-authorities/}}
|
||||
that involve a single server, even at larger companies that have dedicated teams
|
||||
that involve a data breach.
|
||||
|
||||
My plan to mitigate this risk is to implement the database in a memory-safe
|
||||
programming language, which should remove the risk class of memory-unsafety
|
||||
bugs, which account for around 70\% of all bugs in the Chromium browser
|
||||
engine\footnote{\url{https://www.chromium.org/Home/chromium-security/memory-safety/}},
|
||||
which is entirely written in non-memory safe C++.
|
||||
|
||||
And if the database information is ever able to be leaked through the Minecraft
|
||||
protocol, the attacker would have access to the full data, because I am planning
|
||||
to store it unencrypted for performance reasons, and rely on the encryption of
|
||||
the Minecraft client. And, the data involved does not involve personally
|
||||
identifying information, so the usefulness of the data would be close to
|
||||
nothing.
|
||||
|
||||
But, perhaps the most important security risk is if an attacker is able to
|
||||
access the database directly and bypass all the isolation in the Minecraft
|
||||
protocol, in order to wipe or corrupt the data for malicious reasons. This would
|
||||
likely lead to the Minecraft server being unable to be played, and degrade the
|
||||
experience of the players. It is my plan to take advantage of the limitations of
|
||||
the types of Minecraft items to provide resilience and easy backups to the
|
||||
system, because of the purpose-built nature of the system
|
||||
\footnote{\url{https://twitter.com/eatonphil/status/1568247643788267521?s=20}}.
|
||||
|
||||
\subsection{Considerations in Fairness}
|
||||
|
||||
In the implementation of databases, it can often be beneficial to make certain
|
||||
operations faster, at the expense of others that are not done as often. For
|
||||
instance, if I notice that players often pull items in and out of their systems
|
||||
often, but almost never search through the list of items, I can take advantage
|
||||
of this to speed up the database for the most common operations. However, this
|
||||
can be problematic if the things that I choose to sacrifice affect a certain
|
||||
group of users.
|
||||
|
||||
This tradeoff between speed and reliability occurs so often in Computer Science
|
||||
and is described in terms of percentiles. For instance, if we notice that some
|
||||
event occurs about half the time, we can say it is in the 50th percentile.
|
||||
Similarly, if an event only occurs 1\% of the time, we can say it occurs in the
|
||||
99th percentile. The impossible effect of not hurting anyone when a decision
|
||||
like this is make is written about by Google \cite{dean2013tail}, who have to make every
|
||||
decision like this at their scale.
|
||||
|
||||
My plan is to not have any tradeoffs that affect the normal gameplay of the
|
||||
server, and keep it within the 50ms timeframe that the Minecraft has allocated
|
||||
to itself. Apart from this, one of the main goals of the project is to give
|
||||
consistent performance, so any further decisions will be made around the
|
||||
existing implementation of the Minecraft server.
|
||||
|
||||
%https://www.embedded.com/implementing-a-new-real-time-scheduling-policy-for-linux-part-1/
|
||||
%https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/scheduler/sched-design-CFS.html
|
||||
%https://helix979.github.io/jkoo/post/os-scheduler/
|
||||
|
||||
\subsection{Considerations in Accessibility}
|
||||
|
||||
By creating this system, I also have to consider if the players are going to
|
||||
require a certain type of computer. Requiring a certain operating system or a
|
||||
more powerful computer would limit access to many of the people that were
|
||||
playing the game before.
|
||||
|
||||
However, by basing the goal of the project on improving the performance of the
|
||||
already existing implementation, any improvements would result in more people
|
||||
being able to play than before. Also, by designing the system for normal
|
||||
hardware and in a cross-platform way, this does not limit the people that are
|
||||
able to access the improvements.
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
\subsection{Considerations in the Concentration of Power}
|
||||
|
||||
With any improvements to performance to servers in Minecraft, this would allow
|
||||
many of the larger hosting companies, who rent servers monthly to individual
|
||||
people, to drive down their hosting costs, and allow them to have larger returns
|
||||
over the smaller providers. However, since this market is so competitive between
|
||||
companies, because of how easy it is to set up a company, and the options
|
||||
between companies aren't very different, I would expect any improvement to be
|
||||
quickly disappear into the competitive market, and benefit everyone equally.
|
||||
|
||||
\section{Future Work, and Conclusion}
|
||||
|
||||
\printbibliography
|
||||
|
||||
\end{document}
|
102
paper/oxycomps.sty
Normal file
102
paper/oxycomps.sty
Normal file
@ -0,0 +1,102 @@
|
||||
% A simple two-column LaTeX style for Occidental College's CS senior projects.
|
||||
% Based on latex8.sty by Paolo.Ienne@di.epfl.ch
|
||||
|
||||
\usepackage{times} % use Times as the default font
|
||||
% define bold 11pt Times font for second-order headings
|
||||
\font\elvbf = ptmb scaled 1100
|
||||
|
||||
\usepackage[style=numeric,sorting=nyt]{biblatex} % format the bibliography nicely
|
||||
\usepackage{xpatch} % used to patch \textcite
|
||||
|
||||
% change \textcite to do family-name (year)
|
||||
\xpatchbibmacro{textcite}
|
||||
{\printnames{labelname}}
|
||||
{\printnames{labelname} (\printfield{year})}
|
||||
{}
|
||||
{}
|
||||
% sort bibliography by last name
|
||||
\DeclareNameAlias{default}{family-given}
|
||||
|
||||
\usepackage{amsfonts} % provides many math symbols/fonts
|
||||
\usepackage{amsmath} % provides many math environments
|
||||
\usepackage{amssymb} % provides many math symbols/fonts
|
||||
\usepackage{caption} % fixes caption spacing issues
|
||||
\usepackage[usenames,dvipsnames]{color} % allows for colored text
|
||||
\usepackage{enumitem} % allows adjustment of list spacing
|
||||
\usepackage{graphicx} % allows insertion of graphics
|
||||
\usepackage{hyperref} % creates links within the page and to URLs
|
||||
\usepackage{listings} % provides the lstlisting environment
|
||||
\usepackage{url} % formats URLs properly
|
||||
\usepackage{verbatim} % provides the comment environment
|
||||
|
||||
% set dimensions of columns, gap between columns, and paragraph indent
|
||||
\setlength{\textheight}{8.875in}
|
||||
\setlength{\textwidth}{6.875in}
|
||||
\setlength{\columnsep}{0.3125in}
|
||||
\setlength{\topmargin}{0in}
|
||||
\setlength{\headheight}{0in}
|
||||
\setlength{\headsep}{0in}
|
||||
\setlength{\parindent}{1em}
|
||||
\setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-.304in}
|
||||
\setlength{\evensidemargin}{-.304in}
|
||||
|
||||
% remove the space between list items
|
||||
\setlist{noitemsep}
|
||||
|
||||
% style code listings
|
||||
\lstset{
|
||||
basicstyle=\ttfamily\footnotesize,
|
||||
breaklines=true,
|
||||
showstringspaces=false
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
% style the title
|
||||
\def\@maketitle{
|
||||
\newpage
|
||||
\begin{center}
|
||||
{\Large \bf \@title \par}
|
||||
% add two empty lines at the end of the title
|
||||
\vspace*{2\baselineskip}
|
||||
{
|
||||
\large
|
||||
\begin{tabular}[t]{c}
|
||||
\@author
|
||||
\end{tabular}
|
||||
\par
|
||||
}
|
||||
% add small space at the end of the author name
|
||||
\vspace*{.5em}
|
||||
{
|
||||
\ifx \@empty \@email
|
||||
\else
|
||||
\texttt{\@email}
|
||||
\par
|
||||
\vspace*{.25em}
|
||||
\fi
|
||||
\ifx \@empty \@affiliation
|
||||
\else
|
||||
\@affiliation
|
||||
\fi
|
||||
}
|
||||
% add empty line at the end of the title block
|
||||
\vspace*{\baselineskip}
|
||||
\end{center}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
% style the abstract
|
||||
\def\abstract{%
|
||||
\centerline{\large\bf Abstract}%
|
||||
\vspace*{\baselineskip}%
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
% define email and affiliation
|
||||
\def\email#1{\gdef\@email{#1}}
|
||||
\gdef\@email{}
|
||||
\def\affiliation#1{\gdef\@affiliation{#1}}
|
||||
\gdef\@affiliation{}
|
||||
|
||||
% correct heading spacing and type
|
||||
\def\section{\@startsection {section}{1}{\z@}
|
||||
{14pt plus 2pt minus 2pt}{14pt plus 2pt minus 2pt} {\large\bf}}
|
||||
\def\subsection{\@startsection {subsection}{2}{\z@}
|
||||
{13pt plus 2pt minus 2pt}{13pt plus 2pt minus 2pt} {\elvbf}}
|
307
paper/references.bib
Normal file
307
paper/references.bib
Normal file
@ -0,0 +1,307 @@
|
||||
// Introduction
|
||||
|
||||
@misc{sqliteOnlyDatabase,
|
||||
title={SQLite the only database you will ever need in most cases},
|
||||
url={https://unixsheikh.com/articles/sqlite-the-only-database-you-will-ever-need-in-most-cases.html},
|
||||
journal={https://unixsheikh.com/},
|
||||
publisher={https://unixsheikh.com/},
|
||||
author={Sheikh, Unix},
|
||||
year={2021},
|
||||
month={Apr},
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@misc{ enwiki:1181180757,
|
||||
author = "{Wikipedia contributors}",
|
||||
title = "Model–view–controller --- {Wikipedia}{,} The Free Encyclopedia",
|
||||
year = "2023",
|
||||
howpublished = "\url{https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Model%E2%80%93view%E2%80%93controller&oldid=1181180757}",
|
||||
note = "[Online; accessed 13-December-2023]"
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@online{googlePerfTeam,
|
||||
author = {{Google Performance Team}},
|
||||
title = {System Performance},
|
||||
month = {May},
|
||||
year = {2023},
|
||||
url = {https://research.google/teams/system-performance/},
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
// Applications of voxels
|
||||
|
||||
@misc{ enwiki:1186283262,
|
||||
author = "{Wikipedia contributors}",
|
||||
title = "Voxel --- {Wikipedia}{,} The Free Encyclopedia",
|
||||
year = "2023",
|
||||
howpublished = "\url{https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voxel&oldid=1186283262}",
|
||||
note = "[Online; accessed 13-December-2023]"
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@article{norman2006beyond,
|
||||
title={Beyond mind-reading: multi-voxel pattern analysis of fMRI data},
|
||||
author={Norman, Kenneth A and Polyn, Sean M and Detre, Greg J and Haxby, James V},
|
||||
journal={Trends in cognitive sciences},
|
||||
volume={10},
|
||||
number={9},
|
||||
pages={424--430},
|
||||
year={2006},
|
||||
publisher={Elsevier}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@article{museth2013vdb,
|
||||
title={VDB: High-resolution sparse volumes with dynamic topology},
|
||||
author={Museth, Ken},
|
||||
journal={ACM transactions on graphics (TOG)},
|
||||
volume={32},
|
||||
number={3},
|
||||
pages={1--22},
|
||||
year={2013},
|
||||
publisher={ACM New York, NY, USA}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@article{li2020deep,
|
||||
title={Deep learning for lidar point clouds in autonomous driving: A review},
|
||||
author={Li, Ying and Ma, Lingfei and Zhong, Zilong and Liu, Fei and Chapman, Michael A and Cao, Dongpu and Li, Jonathan},
|
||||
journal={IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems},
|
||||
volume={32},
|
||||
number={8},
|
||||
pages={3412--3432},
|
||||
year={2020},
|
||||
publisher={IEEE}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
// Literature Review
|
||||
|
||||
@article{williams1992voxel,
|
||||
title={Voxel databases: A paradigm for parallelism with spatial structure},
|
||||
author={Williams, Roy D},
|
||||
journal={Concurrency: Practice and Experience},
|
||||
volume={4},
|
||||
number={8},
|
||||
pages={619--636},
|
||||
year={1992},
|
||||
publisher={Wiley Online Library}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@article{gorte2023analysis,
|
||||
title={Analysis of very large voxel datasets},
|
||||
author={Gorte, Ben},
|
||||
journal={International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation},
|
||||
volume={119},
|
||||
pages={103316},
|
||||
year={2023},
|
||||
publisher={Elsevier}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@online{tigerbeetleDesign,
|
||||
author = {{Tigerbeetle Developers}},
|
||||
title = {Tigerbeetle Design Document},
|
||||
month = {July},
|
||||
year = {2020},
|
||||
url = {https://github.com/tigerbeetledb/tigerbeetle/blob/main/docs/DESIGN.md},
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@online{tigerbeetlePerf,
|
||||
author = {{Tigerbeetle Developers}},
|
||||
title = {Tigerbeetle Design Document},
|
||||
month = {July},
|
||||
year = {2020},
|
||||
url = {https://github.com/tigerbeetledb/tigerbeetle/blob/main/docs/HISTORY.md},
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@online{nomiSlowME,
|
||||
author = {{Jokercortex}},
|
||||
title = {Moron's Guide to Managing Mechanical Monstrosities},
|
||||
month = {Feb},
|
||||
year = {2020},
|
||||
url = {https://github.com/Nomifactory/Guides/blob/latest/guides/AE2ForDummies.md},
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@misc{btree,
|
||||
author = "{Wikipedia contributors}",
|
||||
title = "B-tree --- {Wikipedia}{,} The Free Encyclopedia",
|
||||
year = "2023",
|
||||
url = "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=B-tree&oldid=1146616935",
|
||||
note = "[Online; accessed 13-May-2023]"
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@misc{kvdatabase,
|
||||
author = "{Wikipedia contributors}",
|
||||
title = "Key–value database --- {Wikipedia}{,} The Free Encyclopedia",
|
||||
year = "2023",
|
||||
url = "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Key%E2%80%93value_database&oldid=1135560734",
|
||||
note = "[Online; accessed 13-May-2023]"
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@online{latencyKnow,
|
||||
author = "Jeff Dean",
|
||||
title = "Latency Numbers Every Programmer Should Know",
|
||||
year = "2018",
|
||||
url = "https://gist.github.com/jboner/2841832",
|
||||
note = "[Online; accessed 12-Dec-2023]"
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@online{cockroachData,
|
||||
author = {{CockroachDB Developers}},
|
||||
title = {Structured data encoding in CockroachDB SQL},
|
||||
year = {2017},
|
||||
month = Mar,
|
||||
url = {https://github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach/blob/master/docs/tech-notes/encoding.md},
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@article{dong2021rocksdb,
|
||||
title={Rocksdb: Evolution of development priorities in a key-value store serving large-scale applications},
|
||||
author={Dong, Siying and Kryczka, Andrew and Jin, Yanqin and Stumm, Michael},
|
||||
journal={ACM Transactions on Storage (TOS)},
|
||||
volume={17},
|
||||
number={4},
|
||||
pages={1--32},
|
||||
year={2021},
|
||||
publisher={ACM New York, NY}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@misc{lsm,
|
||||
author = "{Wikipedia contributors}",
|
||||
title = "Log-structured merge-tree --- {Wikipedia}{,} The Free Encyclopedia",
|
||||
year = "2023",
|
||||
url = "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Log-structured_merge-tree&oldid=1153046573",
|
||||
note = "[Online; accessed 13-May-2023]"
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@online{lsmUses,
|
||||
author = {{Braden Groom}},
|
||||
title = {Understanding LSM Trees: What Powers Write-Heavy Databases},
|
||||
month = Jun,
|
||||
year = {2020},
|
||||
url = {https://yetanotherdevblog.com/lsm/},
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@article{chang2008bigtable,
|
||||
title={Bigtable: A distributed storage system for structured data},
|
||||
author={Chang, Fay and Dean, Jeffrey and Ghemawat, Sanjay and Hsieh, Wilson C and Wallach, Deborah A and Burrows, Mike and Chandra, Tushar and Fikes, Andrew and Gruber, Robert E},
|
||||
journal={ACM Transactions on Computer Systems (TOCS)},
|
||||
volume={26},
|
||||
number={2},
|
||||
pages={1--26},
|
||||
year={2008},
|
||||
publisher={ACM New York, NY, USA}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@inproceedings{abadi2008column,
|
||||
title={Column-stores vs. row-stores: how different are they really?},
|
||||
author={Abadi, Daniel J and Madden, Samuel R and Hachem, Nabil},
|
||||
booktitle={Proceedings of the 2008 ACM SIGMOD international conference on Management of data},
|
||||
pages={967--980},
|
||||
year={2008}
|
||||
}
|
||||
|
||||
@article{athanassoulis2019optimal,
|
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Block a user