NOTE: mono addins works in both .NET and mono. If you run Wifi in Windows you do not need to install mono in order to run mono addins. Everything you need is already included in the OpenSim distribution.

Wifi for Grids

Let me recap how Wifi has been deployed in grids up to now. Again, operators of D2 standalones don’t need to know any of this, since Wifi comes pre-installed in D2.

Up to now, every time I made a new D2 release, I also made a special package (a zip file) with just the Wifi DLLs (see here). Some people in the community have written detailed instructions on what to do with these DLLs, which boils down to copying files manually to certain folders and then adding a few configuration sections to the Robust configuration file. (Wifi for grids runs in a Robust server)

From here on, I will stop producing this extra zip file. Instead, I am producing a mono addin package (which happens to also be a zip file, but with more information inside), and I’m making it available from the metaversink mono addins repository listed here. Installation and future updates are done via the generic mono addins mechanism, not by copying files by hand.

So here are the detailed instructions for how to install Wifi in your grid when updating from OpenSim 0.8.0 to OpenSim 0.8.1. Note: If you are making a new install from scratch, skip to step 6.

1. Make a backup of your WifiPages folder to somewhere safe, especially if you customized some of them. Likely you won’t need this backup, but better safe than sorry.
2. Update your robust installation to 0.8.1
3. Make sure to incorporate any OpenSim configuration changes in your Robust configuration file
4. (From here on, all console commands are supposed to be given from the opensim bin folder)
5. Edit your Robust configuration file and remove the DivaWifi server connector. Depending on how old your config file is, this may be at the end of a very long string called ServiceConnectors under [Startup] or in a variable under [ServiceList]. Wherever it is, remove it, because Wifi now will run as a mono addin.
6. Still in your Robust configuration file, go to the [Startup] section. Set the RegistryLocation and the ConfigDirectory to folders outside of the bin folder. For example:

    [Startup]
       RegistryLocation = "../../addins-registry"
       ConfigDirectory = "../../addins-config"

   Alternatively, you can give absolute paths, for example:

    [Startup]
       RegistryLocation = "/home/opensim/addins-registry"
       ConfigDirectory = "/home/opensim/addins-config"

7. Still in your Robust config file, go to the [DatabaseService] section. If you had

   StorageProvider = "Diva.Data.MySQL.dll"

   switch it back to the default

   StorageProvider = "OpenSim.Data.MySQL.dll"

   Don’t worry, Diva Wifi will use the right one, but the rest of your Robust will use the default.
   Save and close your Robust configuration file.

8. Populate the mono addins registry with all the OpenSim core addins:

    $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry reg-update

   where /path/to/registry is the RegistryLocation you set in the configuration file, so for example ../../addins-registry or /home/opensim/addins-registry. IT’S VERY IMPORTANT THAT THIS PATH IS EXACTLY THE SAME AS THE ONE YOU WROTE IN YOUR CONFIG FILE FOR RegistryLocation.

9. Add the metaversink addins repo as one of your sources of addins, and update its contents locally:

   $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry rep-add http://metaverseink.com/repo
   $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry rep-update

10. You can now see the list of all the available addins:

    $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry list-av

11. Install the Diva.Wifi addin:

    $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry install Diva.Wifi

Note that this command, as is, will install the latest version of  Diva.Wifi. This may or may not be what you need. Typically, several versions of it will be available from the Metaverseink repository (e.g. for OpenSim 0.8.1, 0.8.2, etc.), and you can see them all when you list what’s available (with the command in step 10). So, if your OpenSim installation is not the latest, you  need to install the particular version of Diva.Wifi that corresponds to your OpenSim version.

At this point, you can run your Robust server:

$ [mono] Robust.exe -inifile YourRobustConfig.ini

As you will see, it will warn you that Wifi needs to be configured, something like this:

2015-04-04 14:53:54,273 ERROR – Diva.Wifi.WifiServerConnector [Wifi]: PLEASE EDIT ../../addins-config/Wifi.ini BEFORE RUNNING THIS SERVICE

If you don’t see this warning message, something is wrong, likely the path to registry is inconsistent. Recheck the previous steps starting in step 8.

What does this warning message mean? Up to now, the Wifi configuration section was included into your Robust configuration file; from here on, it is in a separate file. That file is placed under ConfigDirectory/Wifi.ini, where ConfigDirectory is whatever you set in your Robust config file (see point 5 above). So, for example, ../../addins-config/Wifi.ini or /home/opensim/addins-config/Wifi.ini.

So edit that file and set up everything appropriately as you had before (copy-paste from your old file will do it). The configuration variables themselves didn’t change. Only one was added: don’t forget to set Enabled = true.

Once you’re done, save the file and restart Robust. This time everything should work.

IMPORTANT: from here on you can delete the [WifiService] section in your main Robust configuration file, because it will not be used anymore. Wifi configs will be read from /path/to/addins-config/Wifi.ini

Updating Wifi in the Future

I know changes of process are always a bit painful, and you may be wondering why I changed this. The reason is twofold: (1) much easier updates from here on; and (2) additional optional goodies coming up. Let me explain the updates.

When you follow the instructions above, your installation of Wifi will be relatively independent of your installation of OpenSim. The Wifi app itself is in /path/to/registry/addins/Diva.Wifi.0.8.1.0.3/ and its configuration file in /path/to/config/Wifi.ini.

The next time that I make a new release of Wifi, all you have to do is to update Wifi, something like this:

$ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry rep-update 
$ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry list-update 
$ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry update Diva.Wifi

Voila! No copying things by hand anywhere. I’ll make sure to repeat these instructions again next time I make a release of Wifi.

Optional Diva Addons

The second reason why I did this is to be able to provide additional functionality in a modular manner. Take another look at the available addins:

$ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry list-av
Available add-ins:
 - Diva.AddinExample,0.8.1.0.1 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.AddinExample,0.8.1.0.2 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.Interfaces,0.8.1.0.1 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.MISearchModules,0.8.1.0.2 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.Modules,0.8.1.0.3 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.TOS,0.8.1.0.1 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.VirtualOffice,0.8.1.0.1 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.VirtualOffice,0.8.1.0.2 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.Wifi,0.8.1.0.2 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.Wifi,0.8.1.0.3 (metaverseink.com)
 - Diva.Wifi.GridManagement,0.8.1.0.1 (metaverseink.com)

What is all this? These are all Diva addons — modular functionality that I have been working on for some of my grids — several versions of them. Some of these addons are for Wifi, others are for the simulators. Also, some of them are free, others require a license. Here is an explanation of what they all are:

• Diva.AddinExample is just an example of how to write addins for OpenSim. It’s intended for OpenSim developers. An explanation can be found here. It’s free, but you really don’t want to install it, it’s a dummy addon.
• Diva.Interfaces is a generic piece of code upon which many Diva addons depend. It doesn’t provide any functionality by itself. Its free, but it doesn’t do anything by itself.
• Diva.MISearchModules contains functionality that people may want to install on their simulators, so that their content and images are listed in the MISearch engine. It’s included in D2, and it’s free.
• Diva.TOS contains functionality to support a Terms of Service acceptance step when people login or HG-teleport to a grid. It pertains to simulators. The Wifi part is already included in the free Wifi app, and this addon is included in D2. This addon is also free.
• Diva.VirtualOffice contains a simulator-bound feature that supports the upload and display of PDF files inworld. It requires a license.
• Diva.Wifi is…Diva Wifi. Free.
• Diva.Wifi.GridManagement is an addon to Wifi that provides a much richer set of features for grid management, such as estate and group management; it requires a license.

Up to now it was really painful to deploy this additional functionality on my grids, and pretty much impractical to make it available to others. This new mechanism makes it much simpler for me, and makes it possible for me to share it. Let me explain what you need to do if you want to install one of them, for example, Diva.MISearchModules.

1. Go to your opensim installation — the simulators, not robust. Change to the bin folder.
2. If you have a D2 installation, you can skip this step. If you don’t have a D2 installation, edit your configuration file OpenSim.ini, go to the section [Startup]. Set the variables RegistryLocation and ConfigDirectory to outside the OpenSim installation, for example:

   [Startup]
       RegistryLocation = "/home/opensim/addins-registry"
       ConfigDirectory = "/home/opensim/addins-config"

3. If your simulators installation folder is the same as your robust installation, you can skip this step. Otherwise do this to get the metaverseink repo and cache its contents locally:

   $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry rep-add http://metaverseink.com/repo
   $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry rep-update

   where path/to/registry is whatever you set it in RegistryLocation in step 1. In D2s it is ../../addins-registry

4. Install the addon:

   $ [mono] mautil.exe -reg /path/to/registry install Diva.MISearchModules

5. Reboot your simulator(s). You will likely get warnings about having to configure these addons. Follow the instructions in the warnings, and reboot the simulators again.
6. README files, if any, are placed under /path/to/registry/addins/<addin>

If you are interested in any of the non-free addons, let me know.

OpenSimulator 0.8 brings one much requested feature, profiles, and a fantastic new feature, variable-sized regions (varregions for short), something we got from an offshoot of OpenSim with collaboration from viewer developers. Profiles and varregions both work out of the box for new installations of D2, so if you’re doing it from scratch, you don’t need to read this. But if you are upgrading your D2, there is some manual upgrading to do. Please read on!

Profiles

For profiles to work in D2, edit your existing bin/MyWorld.ini and add this section somewhere:

[UserProfiles] 
  ProfileServiceURL = "http://myworld.com:9000"   (replace with your domain name)

Then add this extra variable under [LoginService]:

[LoginService] 
  SRV_ProfileServerURI = "http://myworld.com:9000"  (replace with your domain name)

How to Change D2 from Mega to Varregion

During all this time, D2 has been packaged with a precursor of varregions called mega-regions. Mega-regions, however, failed to work well on many details like crossing borders or teleports to the middle of the area. Varregions involves improvements in the viewers, so users need to use a relatively recent viewer like Singularity, but they solve all of the problems that mega-regions had, and make the specification of the space much simpler too.

Starting in this release (r24886, OpenSim 0.8), new installations of D2 use varregions out of the box instead of mega-regions. The default size of the space is as before 512×512, but it can easily be changed. Because the old mega-regions are difficult to deal with, existing D2 worlds are not automatically updated to varregions, so they will continue to work using mega-regions if nothing is done. However, I strongly recommend D2 users to update their worlds immediately after updating D2.

Please note: upgrading to varregion will eliminate the existing parcels in all but the SW area; you will need to redo the parcels again. Although this is inconvenient, I highly recommend changing to varregions now, because support for mega-regions in OpenSim will eventually be dropped.

1. Update your D2 to diva-r24886

    $ [mono] Update.exe

2. Change to diva-r24886/bin and restart OpenSim as usual

    $ [mono] OpenSim.exe

   Note that this will run your world still as a mega-region. Everything should work as before.

3. Make oars of all of your regions. Assuming the default 4-cell megaregion configuration:

    # change region "<SW>"  (where SW is the name of the lower-left region)
    # save oar sw.oar
    # change region "<SE>"   (where SE is the name of the lower-right region)
    # save oar se.oar
    # change region "<NE>"  (where NE is the name of the upper-right region)
    # save oar ne.oar
    # change region "<NW>"   (where NW is the name of the upper-left region)
    # save oar nw.oar

4. Shutdown OpenSim:

    # shutdown

5. IMPORTANT: Make a copy of bin/RegionConfig.ini for backup, in case you need to go back to mega-regions.
6. Edit bin/RegionConfig.ini. Again, assuming the default 4-cell megaregion that came with D2, you should see 4 blocks of region specification there, one per region. Leave the first one, and delete, or comment (with semicolon ‘;’), the other three. On the first block that is left, add the following variables:

    SizeX = 512
    SizeY = 512

   So, your entire (single) block should look something like this:

    [My World 1]
    RegionUUID = "bd60a94c-bebe-bebe-96bc-26564f652111"
    Location = "2238,2550"
    InternalAddress = "0.0.0.0"
    InternalPort = 9000
    AllowAlternatePorts = False
    ExternalHostName = "myworld.com"
    SizeX = 512
    SizeY = 512

7. Restart OpenSim

    $ [mono] OpenSim.exe

   You will now have 1 large region that has all the content, but the terrain everywhere except the SW area is wrong. Don’t panic! You are now going to load the rest of the terrain.

8. Leave the SW corner as is, since it already has the right content. Load the other 3 oars with the corresponding displacement:

   # change region "<SW>"  (where SW is the name of the lower-left, and now only, region)
   # load oar se.oar --displacement "<256,0,0>" --merge --force-terrain 
   # load oar ne.oar --displacement "<256,256,0>" --merge --force-terrain 
   # load oar nw.oar --displacement "<0,256,0>" --merge --force-terrain

That’s it! You now have a D2 with a proper variable-sized region that will work much better than the mega-region we had before. From here on, saving OARs will involve only this one region, not four. This is a true single region, not many regions pretending to be one, like mega-regions.

If you had previously changed the default 2×2 mega-region of D2 by adding more regions in bin/RegionConfig.ini, you need to delete all but the first region in that file and set the size to whatever your space size is. You will also need to save all of the oars for all of your regions and then load them into the single varregion with the corresponding displacements.

Changing the Size of Your World

If you want you can increase the size of your region by changing SizeX and SizeY in bin/RegionConfig.ini, and then restarting OpenSim. Two constraints must be observed: (1) SizeX=SizeY (so, only square regions are allowed); and (2) the size needs to be a multiple of 256.

I don’t recommend regions larger than 1024×1024, though, because the terrain will be massive.

D2 is meant to be a personal virtual world server, so some of these addons have limitations that reflect the spirit of a personal virtual world. For example, in D2 you can create at most 2 groups. I have an unlimited version of Groups, too, but that is meant for larger worlds.

Anyway, you can find all the information about these addons here. The Wifi web app has been extended with some minimal support for managing groups.

These addons are works in progress, and I will keep improving them. This is their first release to the public, so expect some hickups. Please report those issues here, but make sure to read the documentation first.

Have fun!

Last week I packaged a release of the Diva Distribution (D2) for OpenSimulator 0.7.4. I’m glad to see that D2 continues to be very popular. Not just there’s already a large number of downloads, but other distributions such as sim-on-a stick also continue build on it. D2 is very easy to install because of the Configuration tool that comes with it. It’s also very easy to keep up-to-date because of the Update tool that is included.

Nevertheless, medium-to-advanced users of D2 often want to change a thing or two from what comes in the package. One thing that I often hear is people not wanting to use mega-regions and, instead, wanting to use plain regions. Another thing I often hear is wanting to add more regions. These are all perfectly good things to do with your D2 installation. However, there’s the wrong way and the right way of changing the default configurations. If you change them the wrong way, things may work fine for a while, but they may break in the next update. This post explains the right way of changing the D2 configurations.

First of all, let me explain how the D2 configuration is designed. D2 uses a hierarchy of configuration files, each possibly overwriting  configuration variables defined in the parent. The hierarchy is shown in the picture on top of this post: the first config file is OpenSimDefaults.ini, the second is OpenSim.ini, the third is DivaPreferences.ini and the forth, and last, is MyWorld.ini. OpenSimDefaults.ini and OpenSim.ini are the regular OpenSim configuration files; the other two are specific to D2. DivaPreferences, as the name says, contains my preferences. If you look in there, there are several modules and connectors that you really don’t want to mess with; it also contains some of my preferences, such as mega-regions (CombineContiguousRegions=true) and permissions. MyWorld, as the name says, contains the configuration variables that are specific to your world — things like URLs, names, etc. But it can have much more.

OK, so having explained this, let me explain how to change configurations the right way. Remember, the hierarchy is overwritable, meaning that settings in the lower levels overwrite settings in the upper levels of the hierarchy. So, whenever you want to change something in your D2 installation, you should do it only, and exactly, in MyWorld.ini. Here is an example.

Suppose you want to use normal regions instead of mega-regions. That is established by the variable CombineContiguousRegions in the [Startup] section. If you look carefully, that variable is first defined in OpenSimDefaults.ini as false (so, no mega-regions). OpenSim.ini uses that default. DivaPreferences.ini, however, overwrites it to true (so, mega-regions are on). If you want to set it back to false, edit your MyWorld.ini and add that variable like this

 [Startup]

  ...

    CombineContiguousRegions = false

Reboot your world, and the change will take effect. (WARNING: if you have been building on the default mega-region of D2, I strongly advise you not to make this particular change, because your buildings in all but the SW region will become phantom)

You can do the same for just about any configuration variable you may want to change! — physics, voice, etc. If the section doesn’t exist in MyWorld.ini, simply add it there.

Why MyWorld.ini and not the other configuration files? Because the next time you update your D2 installation, the new package will bring along new OpenSimDefaults.ini, OpenSim.ini and DivaPreferences.ini files that reflect eventual changes to configurations in OpenSim; the changes you made in those files will not be carried along to the new installation. Of all the 4 configuration files depicted in the picture above, the only one that is preserved between updates is your MyWorld.ini file.

I hope this clarifies things! And happy Virtual-Worlding!

There are many improvements in OpenSim, most notably the new LSL NPC stuff — this allows you to create and manipulate Non-Player Characters (bots) directly from scripts. Really cool!

Hypergrid-wise, the most noteworthy development is the support for Friends across the Hypergrid. As explained in a previous post, I have created a world-to-world social network platform in OpenSim! Diaspora, anyone? Well, I get to actually do it and deploy it in  your worlds

Have fun!

P.S. I also made a new release for Wifi that works with Robust 0.7.2. Enjoy!

New fluid style: the original style.css style sheet has been replaced by fluid.css. “Fluid” means that Wifi pages adapt to the size of the browser window. If you made changes to style.css, you may want to backport them to the new style sheet. See the result:

Any number of avatar types: Wifi started with 3 types of avatars for your users: Male, Female and Neutral.  We changed the syntax, so that you can now have any number of avatar types. The new syntax is AvatarAccount_<Type> = “<First> <Last>”. If you’re using Wifi outside of the diva distribution, please make sure to change your existing configuration file to reflect this syntax. (Diva distro users don’t need to worry about this, the syntax been updated automatically) See the result:

Expansion/Contraction of inventory folders: you knew this was coming, and here it is. Inventory listings now are expandable/contractable. See the result:

These are the 3 major improvements to Wifi, but there are several other smaller improvements listed on the release notes. If you had customized the customizable Wifi pages (such as splash.html, welcome.html, footer.html, etc) you may want to compare the new versions of these files with yours, and backport your customizations to the new ones. In the diva distro, if you choose to port your Wifi pages, the new files that come in the new release are kept as .diva files, so that you can easily compare.

Noteworthy is that Wifi now supports JavaScript, and that is what’s enabling the inventory expansion/contraction. A lot more is on the way…

Enjoy!

It took a long time, but OpenSim 0.7 is finally here! It’s quite difficult to explain the value of refactorings and of  re-conceptualizations of the software, which is what happened to OpenSimulator between 0.6.x and 0.7. Those things tend to be intangible at first (“WTF? This does the same thing! And it has bugs that it didn’t have before!”, etc.); the ROI only shows up later.

As an example of the new interesting things that can now be done, this new release features an embedded Web application for handling user registrations. It’s called Wifi. The features of Wifi are quite simple:

• Account creation, optionally controlled by the administrator
• Configurable default avatars for new accounts
• Account updates by both users and administrator
• Account deletion by administrator
• Password recovery via email
• Simple user inventory management

These features are enough for the worlds I run; they’ll be enough for many people, I think. This is just the first release, I expect Wifi to improve as we go a long — especially if more people want to help… I welcome help on this!

See it in action in one of my test worlds. Feel free to create a dummy account, login to it, recover your password, etc. And login to the world afterward. You can also use it for testing your own installation of the diva distro by hypergriding to it. (Note: this world is just for demonstration of Wifi and of the latest diva distro release; it will be shut down in a couple of weeks)

Wifi has a few interesting properties that make it a good fit for small-to-medium OpenSimulator-based virtual worlds. First of all, it doesn’t require the installation of Apache or other Web servers; it’s all done within the OpenSimulator code base. If you’re like me, you will think of this as a major win. Not having to install an additional major component like Apache and PHP/Python/what-have-you means less administrative hassle, less load on the machine, and just plain joy. Web app! No Apache! Just OpenSimulator! Yey!

Second, using the OpenSimulator code base brings many technical benefits. This isn’t an immediate benefit, but it is a benefit in the long run. Unlike the Apache-based Web apps that interface with the DB directly, Wifi interfaces with the OpenSimulator services layer using the core code, and therefore it is isolated from future changes to the OpenSimulator DB schema. In short, and of interest to diva distro users, Wifi will probably never be in the situation that other apps of the same kind are, always on the verge of being discontinued due to the hassle of making it catch up with the OpenSim schema. In the long run, this is a very good thing.

Third, technically, Wifi is a set of components that can be loaded up by both standalone simulators and Robust servers. What this means is that the exact same thing can serve diva distro worlds as well as larger grids in one seamless environment, OpenSimulator. I haven’t packaged it up for grids, but I might consider doing it at some point. So if your world grows to a medium grid, Wifi can handle it with no hassle.

Enjoy!

And, of course, also enjoy the extra security in HG 1.5, but that is invisible.

Here are the relevant links:

• Latest diva distro
• How to set it up in 5 steps (6 for *ix)

If you already have a diva distro up & running, simply run Update.exe on it and follow the instructions. This time, it’s really important that you read the release notes.

One last important note: the sequence of upgrades has a ‘pivot’ release at r12751. In other words, r12751 is a mandatory stop from all older releases. From r12751 on, upgrade gets you the latest. This new release today is r13458.

The OpenSim Library has been a neglected part of OpenSim since I can remember. Apart from a few animations and example scripts, there hasn’t been anything interesting there. Even though it was possible to add things to it, the process was so cumbersome and error-prone that no one cared to do it. So the Library stagnated. That stagnation has finally come to an end.

As of today, it is now possible to add any arbitrary elements to the OpenSim  Library simply by using IARs. I’m going to explain it below. For starters, the latest release of the Diva Distro already has some new freebie content in the Library (see picture above — zoom in). I added three outfits, 2 female and 1 male, that you can use to replace the horrible Ruth avatar; and I added a very small collection of objects. They are available to everyone with the latest diva distro, diva-r11766. (Remember that to use the content in the OpenSim Library you first must copy it to your own inventory, and then wear it or rez it.)

I have a larger object collection available from the github site. I didn’t include this in the distribution, because it’s quite large, larger than the distribution file itself. You can download it and place it under bin/Library if you want.

You can add more IARs to your Library, so that the content of your choice can be made available to all your users. The process is very simple: produce or get one or more IARs with your favorite content, and place them under bin/Library — that’s all. The content of those IARs will be added to the OpenSim Library automagically.

A few details. In general, IAR content is placed at the top level of the Library. If, however, if you are careful with the name of the IAR files, you may be able to control their placement better. For example, if you want to add things under, say Clothing Library, name your IAR something like “Clothing Library part1.iar”. When the first 2 words of your IAR file name match one of the existing subfolders of the Library, the content will be placed under the match. Content always adds up, so you can have several IARs, and they will all be loaded.

One important limitation: this only works for standalones, for the time being — which is what the diva distro is all about anyway. It will be nice to make this work for grids, but that will require substantial changes in the way IARs are coded.

Enjoy!