I always just stick to raw socket API myself. It's a pretty simple concept at the core level, you open a connection and send strings of data back and forth. JSON is a great format to pass serialized objects over the connection it is pretty easy to encode and decode. To get started search google for the operating system you are targeting, the language and the word "Sockets". This will get you started, once you are successfully working with sockets, sending and receiving information then you will want to start looking in to JSON libraries. Same thing, look for the language you want to use and the word "JSON".

Other people may tell you to use pre built game oriented networking libraries but in actual practice this normally hurts you more than it helps. They impose quite a bit of unseen overhead and require a lot more coding to actually use, and at the core level all networking is simply sending and receiving strings of data. The more you work with raw sockets the more you'll understand it's always better performance to implement your own networking code. (And it's normally < 100 lines of code)

(And it's normally < 100 lines of code)

I highly doubt that since native functions provided by most operating systems dont implement any sort of packet division. Thats basically sth one has to do himself or use a library.

http://www.pcs.cnu.edu/~dgame/sockets/client.c

http://www.pcs.cnu.edu/~dgame/sockets/server.c

Check those out, they are the simplest forms of socket communication examples. Packet division depending on what you mean is handled at the hardware level or at the underlying os level. In short if you send a string you get the string on the other side. You will need to devise a terminating character or sequence so that you can tell what part of your string represents an entire message but this isn't very difficult either. I often use a character that I know will not appear within the actual message (say char 1). When I receive a char 1 break the message, parse the JSON object act and respond. It really is that simple for basic networking.

SFML provides a network abstraction layer, why not consider using it?

Also, I suggest you check out the multiplayer forum on this site, and read over the FAQ there, it has tons of answers about writing multiplayer games, from no experience to advanced.

(And it's normally < 100 lines of code)

I highly doubt that since native functions provided by most operating systems dont implement any sort of packet division. Thats basically sth one has to do himself or use a library.

To be honest, it is about this number of lines, remember that the server and client in most examples also duplicate some code, (on the reading and sending).

What I suggest is to create your own socket wrapper because it will ultimately simplifiy things and then allows you to solve things in an encapsulated manner (i.e how you deal with Nagle's algorithm etc...)

The great thing about network programming is that it isn't too hard. (Unless I assume, you get to MMORPG levels of things ;)

(And it's normally < 100 lines of code)

I highly doubt that since native functions provided by most operating systems dont implement any sort of packet division. Thats basically sth one has to do himself or use a library.

To be honest, it is about this number of lines, remember that the server and client in most examples also duplicate some code, (on the reading and sending).

What I suggest is to create your own socket wrapper because it will ultimately simplifiy things and then allows you to solve things in an encapsulated manner (i.e how you deal with Nagle's algorithm etc...)

The great thing about network programming is that it isn't too hard. (Unless I assume, you get to MMORPG levels of things ;)

I agree, make a simple wrapper class, attach the class to the characters or to the game manager if your using one and voila. Yes you will need some form of a server but the networking itself is all the same. Create a socket, connect or accept it, send and receive and that's all she wrote. Writing advanced servers for say MMO's or large networking social systems or what have you is just a matter of writing the logic based on multiple "socket" connections. Where each socket somehow relates to a "user" or "player".