Using the Network Trait

What is it for?

The network trait is used to simplify networking on the client and server by creating a straight forward API

Creating a Remote

Pretty straight forward you just take the suffix of the instance for example the 'Event' part of RemoteEvent or the 'Function' part of RemoteFunction and put 'Create' infront of it.

Example of remote creation:

Network:CreateEvent("MyRemoteEvent") --> RemoteEvent
Network:CreateFunction("MyRemoteFunction") --> RemoteFunction

We can also create unreliable remote events utiling the same method:

Network:CreateEvent("MyUnreliableRemoteEvent", true) --> UnreliableRemoteEvent

Connections & Bindings

Connections simply put is the association between a given RemoteEvent/Signal and a function that can occur many times. This association in the context of normal Roblox signals is called an RBXScriptConnection.

Using this information we can call the :Connect method to associate a callback with an Event like so:

-- Server.luau:
Network:Connect("Say", function(Player: Player, Message: string)
	print(`{Player.Name} said: '{Message}'`)
end)

-- Client.luau:
Network:Fire("Hello, world!")

Not only can you associate the callback to the Event but you can also dissociate them using the return connection's :Disconnect method:

local Connection = Network:Connect("Say", function(Player: Player, Message: string)
	print(`{Player.Name} said: {Message}`)
end)

task.wait(3)

Connection:Disconnect() --> Removes the association
Connection = nil --> Dereference the dead connection so it can be garbage collected

Bindings on the other hand are a bit different, there can only ever be one callback associated with the RemoteFunction. While the work similarly there are some key differences between the two, for example instead of returning an RBXScriptConnection :Bind returns a function that unbinds the callback when called.

Let's try creating a binding that returns a boolean true if the player was able to start the trade and false if the trade could not be started:

-- Server.luau:
Network:Bind("Trade", function(Player: Player, OtherPlayer: Player)
	-- Is the caller in a trade:
	if Player:GetAttribute("InTrade") then
		return false
	end

	-- Is the other player in a trade:
	if OtherPlayer:GetAttribute("InTrade") then
		return false
	end

	-- Do something to start the trade

	return true
end)

-- Client.luau:
Network:Invoke("Trade", Players.VyonEXE) --> That's me :D