i’ve not logged into Second Life for over two years and thought that most of its shackles no longer had a hold on me
i often mention how my perspective on prims and price are still framed to an extent by Second Life and probably always will be. you know, it’s like your grandparents telling you things like “i remember when a soda was a nickel!” =D
in my case, it will be “i remember when a sim cost $295 and you only got 15,000 prims” =p
so what is this last shackle?
well, it is one that i did not even know i had until i met with Ohn Lang tonight on Hax Nuit (btw Ohn – it was as if Ener Hax was looking in a virtual mirror and saw Ohn Lang looking back - long lost kindred spirits maybe? wow, i am so sentimental and sappy!) =)
Ohn, WhiteStar, and Ilan were in Hax Nuit the other day looking at viewer ping times and techy stuff that’s over my head and they mentioned that they’d like to add scripting to Hax Nuit. Ohn specifically would like to add NPCs (that completely blows me away, it’s all i can do to adjust a sit script!) =p
in Second Life i’d be very hesitant to let anyone have build permissions. the only person that i ever trusted with that on the iliveisl estate was DreamWalker (but that also has a huge emo backstory) because if someone accidentally hoses your work inSL, you are probably screwed or at least set back many hours. add to that the $295 a month and 15,000 prim limit and it can also be a costly mistake if something goes wrong. that kind of concern cuts into collaboration and dampens synergy quite a bit
but not in something like Kitely o_O
Hax Nuit is sitting on an what would be an unused region, but thanks to an old daydream, the fortuitous learning about Kowloon Walled City, and encouragement from WhiteStar, this region has become a reality (bet he’s never thought of himself as a muse, but he was a big part of the inspiration and is a source of knowledge). that, in itself, breaks an SL paradigm because very few people would have $295 a month (and the $1000 setup) to whimsically build a region just for its own sake (sake? the rice wine?) =p
however, Hax Nuit is static and while i enjoy exploring as a way to escape, many people prefer a more interactive environment. because Kitely is so inexpensive AND because you can easily export and import your OAR, the issue of someone accidentally (or purposely) trashing your work becomes a non-issue. that doesn’t mean i’ll allow anyone to do whatever they want, the price of Kitely is so low that they can go get their own region, but when i meet someone with deep passion like Ohn and WhiteStar who express a sincere interest to add their time and talent, then why not?
the why not part is a new feeling, one that i felt i could not afford inSL. and that new feeling is a great feeling =)
thanks Kitely for allowing for this kind of fun collaboration and synergy
there are also other positive ramifications of this. for team projects, like many educational ones inSL, you were always dependent on the one person whose name was listed as the estate owner. if they decided to no longer pay the bills, your work was gone (it’s a massive bummer to think of all the fantastic sims now gone forever). but with Kitely (or your own server), team members can all have a copy of the OAR(s) and have a permanent record of their work
expect to see some nifty (and efficient) scripting added to Hax Nuit and thanks Ohn for opening my eyes to this and i look forward to meeting my first NPC! =)
Ohn was also patient with me as i dusted off the cobwebs of making a group – it’s been years since i did that! (back when i walked uphill in the snow to school and opensim was on a stick)
I just played with NPC’s myself, and it was an eye opener.
it’s actually easier than it looks.
Not sure you can do it in Kitely though, some things have to be turned on, on the console.
But they are fun, if a little creepy.
John Sheppard
8 Jan 13 at 11:33 pm
NPCs work OK on Kitely — only issue is sim restarts.
graham mills
9 Jan 13 at 1:06 am
Well our Region on Kitely has Npc’s:) since its beginning, just need to find where to touch to rezz them!
ZZ Bottom
9 Jan 13 at 7:42 am
o_O “where to touch to rezz them”!!!
oh my, is that what you kids are calling it today?! =p
is there a way to set an avatar detector so that when people rezz at a telehub and are the first to fire up the region, the NPCs start up?
Ener Hax
9 Jan 13 at 7:56 am
Couple of possible ways depending on how OpenSim is configed.
If OpenSim in Kitely has RegionReady Enabled, then that sends a msg on channel -800 when the sim is fired up & running, which can then execute other scripts and even rezz out NPC if needed.
See this example as to how to make use of RegionReady.
Reference: http://forums.osgrid.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=2863
Next Method would be to use a Sensor to sense an arrival on region which then rezzes NPC’s. Sensor can lag a sim if not properly done. Luckily in Hax Nuit the Arrival point is set @ the Hovercraft so it could be accomplished with a short sweep, medium timed scan every 30 seconds or so. (using TimerEvent not llSleep)
Last option is to have a trigger pad that when Avatar-X makes physical contact, the collision triggers action resulting in rezzing NPC’s or whatever.
Collision Detection Scripting Note: Collisions in OS are 7x faster than in SL, therefore collision dampening (debouncing) needs to be addressed to not over run the physic’s engine with mass collision detections, this is a common issue many scripters unfamiliar with the fine details of scripting in OpenSim do not account for, which causes other side effect issues.
In either case, if an NPC is rezzed, the script for that NPC should also likely do a 60 second sense for Avatar’s being present, if not present within X metres radii to self-delete, to prevent having left over NPC’s / Scripts. Good Housekeeping makes a happier simulator.
@Ener… Once I know how to get to the clone or whatever was setup I’ll go and have a look at it. Feel free to E-Mail me the required info on how to access the clone of Hax Nuit. Note that I am seriously busy in RL for the next few days at least and so… in due time ;-)
WS
WhiteStar
9 Jan 13 at 8:54 am
hi WhiteStar, you should have a group invite when you log into Kitely =)
and silly me, i was all confused as to what i needed to set up so the “normal” Hax Nuit is set for you to play around on if you like
Ener Hax
9 Jan 13 at 8:56 am
John is right. NPCs are easier than you might think. I have a greeter NPC available on my ohn freebies world. Like everything there, the scripts are modifiable so you can experiment on your own. She (the NPC) is rezzed automatically whenever the region is started. She’s simple, and greets new people when seeing them for the first time, and welcomes them back on next sight (doing so only once when you first come into the region). I made her for someone else’s region for a more lively greeter tool.
If you visit the ssh world, an educational world, you will see many NPCs, which are programmed to wander around the world. Some are programmed to answer specific questions. They are also rezzed automatically when the world starts.
Kitely has NPC functions enabled for the world owners. There is a post on the Kitely blog that lists supported functions. See
http://www.kitely.com/virtual-world-news/2012/04/18/supported-ossl-functions/
ohn
9 Jan 13 at 11:30 am
Was so focused on adding to the “npcs are easy” topic I completely forgot to say what an absolute treat it was to meet the famous Ener! I’ve been reading Ener’s blog posts since I joined Kitely. A couple of weeks ago I actually got up the nerve to follow the instructions in her posts for setting up the sim on a stick and it worked perfectly!
I have my own private little local world thanks to you Ener :)
ohn
9 Jan 13 at 11:37 am
Perhaps a measurement that Opensim has “made it” is when coordinated griefer groups start operating in Opensim worlds.
The good news is we’ll know Opensim has “made it”, as above.
The bad news, the system and community may be less suited to deal with it.
Backup oars will be vital as per the article here, but it needs the gumption of a region owner to check.
As per the Elf Clan in SL, business meant more vulnerability to letting people in whose intentions were not quite aligned with the sim owners.
I don’t want to be only negative here, but as the Good Book says “Success begets griefing” (Chapter 3, verse 5).
Breen Whitman
9 Jan 13 at 12:53 pm
Ener, I left you a message inworld in Kitely, but you might not go there regularly.
I settled on an idea for the first NPC set, a mother and child. The story line: mother and child live/squat in an abandoned corner apartment in the SE side of town. The mother cannot leave the apartment as she is not well. The son sometimes goes out wandering to play, and sometimes to forage for food to bring back to mother. I’ve recorded the first path for the child and did a mockup in my private building world.
My *current* thought is to make it so that sometimes when the son goes out he gets “lost” or loses track of time while playing. Visitors will be encouraged by mother and/or son to return the son safely back to the mother. When successful, the visitor can be rewarded in some way (haven’t decided how yet). Scripting will track who has engaged with the mother and son, which will then determine how that visitor will be interacted with 1st, 2nd, subsequent encounters.
For these two characters, can you suggest names for mother and son? I would like them to be consistent with your theme and I am terrible at coming up with names.
Ohn Lang
14 Jan 13 at 11:44 am