OpenSim

Working in 3D

Chris Hart — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:32:06 GMT

When people come to me talking about work in 3D, I can almost guarantee I'll hear the word "PowerPoint" in the first paragraph. What is it about this particular tool and why do they want it in 3D?

Start by separating this out. We're all very used to thinking 2 dimensionally. The desktop, the application, the image on screen, the chat window - most of the day-to-day work environment is very flat, predictable. Break out of the office, get folks together at a conference, we all cram into a room to watch a PowerPoint - one person delivering a message to many. But in the middle of that, small meetings, brainstorming sessions, people sitting around a table drawing on a whiteboard, putting the pieces of a project together. All the companies I have worked at have had the same experience - whether it be brainstorming a book project while at Wrox, to deciding how to deliver a solution to a customer while working as a consultant. These meetings of somewhere between 2 and 20 or so people tended to be the most productive and essential of the working day.

Now, while it's possible to deliver the big presentation on a screen to a bunch of folks at a conference, that's not where I see the true power of 3D. I see it as a way to collaborate on a project, to get together and bounce around ideas. It's how I work with my team on ReactionGrid, and using tools like those developed by our friend Jeff Lowe (http://theimmersivelife.wordpress.com/facilitatortoolbox/), we are able to express our ideas and come up with real results. It's those tools combined with the virtual environment of smaller teams getting together to work together that I think work the best, and it's projects like these that are the most exciting and fun to work on. I don't have to be in the same physical space, if the team are virtually there with me and we can discuss all that is needed in a productive manner in a virtual space.

So when someone asks why I do all this 3D stuff, it's not for big presentations with virtual chairs, auditoriums and PowerPoint screens - not primarily in any case - I do this for the fun and excitement of true virtual working and the potential of these tools to make a real difference to our working environments. It's very early days, the tools AND the platforms all still in constant flux and development, but it's really starting to come together. Friday's brainstorming session with the ThinkBalm community on ReactionGrid really was a fantastic session for just this sort of experience, and I highly encourage anyone interested in learning more about that community to visit http://www.thinkbalm.com/community/.

OpenSim on SQL Server

Chris Hart — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 12:03:11 GMT

Edit: March 09 - this post is a little out of date, some folks have had trouble as a result. I've tweaked the instructions so you are less likely to have problems from now on! Also, see opensimulator.org/wiki/MSSQL

Over the past week I've made some great progress on my OpenSim experiment. For starters, I've got my server configured in Grid mode, and I have all ~~four~~ five of the main servers running on SQL Server. This did require a bit of development - the inventory server was quite broken for SQL Server, so James and I fixed the code and submitted a patch, but the good news is that this means it'll be in a better state for the rest of you from now on.

If you're committed to switching from SQLite as much as possible then I would recommend configuring your server to run in grid mode. Even if you are working locally, there's something a bit more comforting about seeing messages relevant to each server on each of the console windows, rather than all jumbled up in one console window. Makes it much easier to see bugs and have a think about how to fix them, for starters.

So, where to start? Well, good news and bad news - the good news is that this is possible, the bad news is that it's not simple, and unless you figure out how to export content from a SQLite-based OpenSim, you'll be starting from scratch on your new sim. Before you start, you obviously need a SQL Server to work with. As long as you can install SQL Express on your OpenSim server, you have everything you need, and since SQL Express is a free download, there's no cost involved. Get SQL Express from here, then get SQL Management Studio Express from here - this will give you a tool for running queries and editing your database.

Now, I'm assuming you've done the right thing and already configured your system so you have a Subversion client installed, right? TortoiseSVN is my favourite, with its extremely simple shell integration. So, you have an OpenSim directory and you can grab the latest source code from the Subversion repository - this is pretty important, since the code changes very frequently. Now you will need to head to SQL Management Studio Express and create a database ready to store your OpenSim data. Right-click on the Databases node and and select New Database. Call it OpenSim, accept all defaults and click OK.

The next step is to create a user account for running your OpenSim on SQL Server. Firstly, you need to enable Mixed Mode authentication on SQL Server.

Right-click on your database server in Management Studio and select Properties, then go to the Security tab and select SQL Server and Windows Authentication mode, click OK. Back in Management Studio, expand the Security node and in the Logins section right-click and create a new user, called whatever you like, select SQL Server authentication, give it a strong password and select the OpenSim database as the default database. Click OK.

Then navigate to the OpenSim database and go to the Security, then Users section. In there, create a new user, select your new admin account and make sure it has the db_owner role in the Database role membership section. Click OK and you should be ready to use that account to connect to the database.

Edit: you don't need to create any tables by hand - that happens automatically provided your connection string is working.

Time to edit the Ini file. I recommend heading to the OpenSim documentation on configuration for more in-depth details on this process, but here's an abbreviated version that might help fill in some gaps for you. While there is a mssql_connection.ini file, I also have settings in my main ini file too - I haven't yet dug through the code thoroughly enough to know which ones are used and which ones are not.

Edit: you should not need the mssql_connection.ini any more. Having separate connection details for each server allows you to scale by using different machines for the different servers, hence makes a bit more sense than one central ini.

There's a sample mssql_connection.ini.example file in the OpenSim code repository, so make a copy, rename it mssql_connection.ini and replace the appropriate values with the correct data for your server. As an example:

[mssqlconnection]
data_source=servername\SQLEXPRESS
initial_catalog=OpenSim
persist_security_info=True
user_id=adminuser
password=password

In the main ini file, [EDIT 25th Oct: NOTE that the section below marked asset_database should be set to "grid" - this is very important or you end up using SQLite for asset storage!]

gridmode = True

storage_plugin = OpenSim.Data.MSSQL.dll
storage_connection_string = "Data Source=servername\sqlexpress;Database=OpenSim;User=adminuser;password=password;";
storage_prim_inventories = True

inventory_plugin = OpenSim.Data.MSSQL.dll
inventory_source = "Data Source=servername\sqlexpress;Database=OpenSim;User=adminuser;password=password;";

userDatabase_plugin = OpenSim.Data.MSSQL.dll
user_source = "Data Source=servername\sqlexpress;Database=OpenSim;User=adminuser;password=password;";

asset_database = "grid"
asset_plugin = OpenSim.Data.MSSQL.dll
asset_source ="Data Source=servername\sqlexpress;Database=OpenSim;User=adminuser;password=password;";

The other part of the puzzle is getting your sim running in grid mode, and for that to work you need to be a little more clever with IP addresses and the like, but don't let that put you off. Know your server's IP address, then enter it in the following section with the following port numbers:

grid_server_url = http://192.168.0.1:8001
grid_send_key = null
grid_recv_key = null
user_server_url = http://192.168.0.1:8002
user_send_key = null
user_recv_key = null
asset_server_url = http://192.168.0.1:8003
inventory_server_url = http://192.168.0.1:8004 
messaging_server_url = http://192.168.0.1:8006

Notice there are some keys listed in here that are null - you should change these so that you only allow access to people who know both your server's IP AND the appropriate keys to grid up with you. And from looking through the code, it appears that the keys are any valid string value, though I haven't yet tested this out.

You may also want to double-check that the IP address is configured correctly for your region (head to the OpenSim\bin\Regions\default.xml file) and make sure that the IP addresses are set appropriately. Again, check the OpenSim site for a bit more information on this.

Once you have configuration sorted, time to run the servers and keep your fingers crossed! The OpenSim site strongly recommends starting servers in a specific order: UGAIM: UserServer, GridServer, AssetServer, InventoryServer, Messaging Server, and then Region Server (OpenSim.exe). Note that the first time that you fire up the servers in grid mode, you are asked for some information to create some system-specific configuration files. Make sure that when you start up each server you enter the data correctly - the data you will need to enter is exactly the same as that entered in the ini file, so make sure you fill in the fields so that they match. Once you have configured one server, move on to the next. Once you have all five running, you're almost ready to log in!

Here's a handy tip - now you have 6 console windows open, click on one of them on the task bar, then ctrl+click on the other four windows. Right-click on any of them and select Tile Horizontally and you will see all your servers neatly arranged, and you can watch things happening as you log in and do stuff on your sim.

Just before you connect, you need to create a user account, so go to the user console and create a new user account. Then it's time for the client bit - if you're using the SL client, set your loginuri startup switch as before, but this time you'll connect to port 8002, not port 9000, so for example:

"C:\Program Files\SecondLife\SecondLife.exe" -loginuri http://192.168.0.1:8002

Once you launch your client, you should be able to connect to your grid and off you go. Fingers crossed, and I hope it works for you.

Exploring the OpenSim Universe

Chris Hart — Wed, 28 May 2008 09:58:59 GMT

Over the past few weeks I've taken a big leap into the world of Open Source development and started messing around with OpenSim, the BSD licenced 3D virtual world based on Second Life, but reinvented from scratch using C#. It's an immense project that's been in development for a while, and it's starting to look pretty good.

Getting hold of OpenSim is relatively easy, especially if you're a developer and have used Subversion before. Grab the latest code, run the pre-build tool, build the solution and you're just about ready. Make sure you run the correct exe for your system (64bit machines have to run a 32bit launcher), and you are hosting your own little simulator that you can connect to.

So, next step is to connect to the newly-created world. You can either use the standard Second Life client with a modified startup shortcut, or you can download and use the realXtend viewer and specify your server as part of the launch. And then you're in your own little world...

Now, since that picture was taken I've completely broken the server by attempting to hook it up to SQL Server, but that's all part of the fun - and there are so many bits and pieces to look at and tweak that this is proving to be quite an entertaining project.

So, why am I doing this? Well, I've been working with Kyle for a while on MS Island on Second Life, and this is part of an exploration of open source alternatives to the Linden Labs controlled world. Project Manhattan is the first project we're working on, and it's still in its early stages - but it certainly makes a welcome change from SharePoint development.