had i known that LL would discontinue their ed/not-for-profit pricing, i may have categorized posts better (that darn hindsight) =)

i have talked (blabbled and rambled) so much about the trials and tribulations of moving from SL to OpenSim over the last year

many educators and non-profits are left scrambling with very little time to act =(

now that you read my earlier post about breathing and are fully relaxed . . . *running in circles, hands in the air, screaming* o_O

the reality that you only have a very short time to act is sinking in. depending on what you do in Second Life, 10 weeks may be great but for endeavors that have organically grown, 10 weeks is going to fly by *ZOMG*

even one sim can be overwhelming to think about moving

it was easy for us. i had several big builds (Haxor Lunar Lounge, some houses, and some small items like the petite fall-out shelter, water tower, zeppelin, and odds and ends)

and we were moving from a land business to an unknown and not-yet-developed idea. in many ways, it was starting from scratch and in a vacuum (no one was depending on us)

starting a new endeavor is easier than moving an existing one, imo

for one thing, many people will have created their sim(s) with many purchased items. my Eville Atomic Lounge was filled with great retro furniture that i could not export and have yet to replace

it’s one thing to have to grab all your stuff and, in itself, is a very big task. a task that may involve many creators and collaborators

between now and the end of December, many people will be busy just getting their stuff out (gee, you have a day job too?) =p

budgeting and exploring what alternative to use may take a tremendous amount of energy too! =(

some will have to write up ROI analyses, present budget info, do legal work, and who knows what else (none of it fun i bet)

i doubt many people will be able to simply have their presence in SL up until their end date and then seamlessly switch over to OpenSim (or maybe something else)

but, you can be in control within 20 minutes of your virtual world future for virtually no cost

while you are in limbo (if you are in limbo) install sim on a stick! if Ener can do it, so can you!™ =D

i hate sitting still (hmm, ya think?) and being able to start putting your assets in order and rebuilding can start on a USB stick installation of OpenSim

• get you stick up and running
• upload your terrain RAW files
• upload your terrain files and set their heights
• divide your parcels as you had inSL
• add any Linden plants you had
• import your builds and insert their scripts

doing those things will make you feel in control and help bring your task into focus in a manageable way. these things don’t require you to create anything new

don’t focus on what you are missing, focus on what you have *lol, more art of zener* =)

and from my tests, you could even do all this on one stick to establish a baseline and then copy that stick onto a new stick. no need to reinstall OpenSim or export your OARs. it worked for me and may save time if you have a team

if you have multiple sims in Second Life, maybe split sim re-creation up among your team. make sure to backup your stick! since the entire stick is small filesize wise, i find it way easier to just duplicate the entire thing as a backup. but exporting the OARs would give you the greatest flexibility

backup, backup, backup

coming from a Second Life paradigm makes the task of backing up a new one. i was pretty blunt with a comment this morning about an artists that lost 5 solid months of work. and you know, coming from Second Life, you assume that backups are being made and are 100% reliable. so not making a backup was understandable

but with OpenSim, you are back into a “normal” computer paradigm and can make backups. you do it for other things (i hope) and you must do that for your OpenSim work

so while you are waiting, or in limbo, maybe sim-on-a-stick is a stop gap and even a way to move forward

Ener on a stick! =p