Comments on OSHG Development (collection 2). HGProjects
The following selected comments are derived from the initiative by Alec Genesis and are intended to summarize the general objectives in the discussion. I think the main thrust is that we need and organized approach. A previous effort (OpenSim United) to develop an organization to support that did not succeed.
In my opinion, OpenSimulator and Hypergrid (OSHG) need such an organization now. The organization needs to represent the main stakeholders in OSHG. From the organization we need a roadmap for the development of the software that supports OSHG (including viewer and installations).
I believe we can raise adequate funds if we have a credible plan (roadmap) and credible support. As noted in an article below. New Media Arts want to help support this development and can provide a non-profit, audited channel.
Copying from a G+ comment string is tricky, so I may have left things out. Please feel free to point out important omissions in the comments section of this article. Or you can add new remarks there. If you want to write your own article for this blog, please contact me.
Terry Ford (Butch Arnold)
As some may remember, I was part of an effort last year to put together an organization called OpenSim United. The ultimate goal was to "Unite" the OpenSim Community into an organization which was governed by the community for the community. When I say "Community", I am talking about users, grid owners, and developers (viewer developers included), commercial or not.
We had hoped the organization would be able to organize the many wants/needs of the community from all sides.. Users, Grid owners, and Developers.
We initially had many users, and grid owners interested, but only one developer showed any interest in what we were attempting.. "Justin".
Justin had said he would participate as his time allowed, but we never even got the idea off the ground.
I still have the domain name;opensimunited.com which I would gladly donate to this cause.
I also would be very much interested in being part of an organization such as this, but my time will not allow me to "Manage" it.
We had talked about collecting the wants/needs (fixes, new features, etc.) of the community, organizing these wants/needs into lists which the community could then "Pledge" support in terms of money.
These Pledges could be assigned to each task and as the community made pledges, the "Bounty" for fixing,adding, etc. would continue to grow.
Any developer could, at any time choose to "Take" the then accumulated bounty for a project by submitting approved code to that end.
Once the code was approved and tested, we as an organization wouold release the bounty to this developer or "team".
I've taken some heat over the years as I support the commercial side of OpenSim as well as the "Free" side.
While "Free" is a good thing, we have to come to the realization that at some point, we the community have to step up and "Pay" for the advances and "Fixes" if we want them in an orderly and timely fashion, otherwise we are all at the mercy of those developers who volunteer time to participate and may or may not be interested in the same things the rest of us are interested in.
I as both a grid owner and a user would be happy to participate in a system like this.
I know from my efforts last year towards this organization that there are many users and many grid owners who would be interested in the same type of organization, and while there may be some differences of opinions, I'm sure if we "ALL" were to get together on something like this, we could make it happen.
A system like this could help to motivate existing developers and/or attract new developers, it could help to define a "Path" in which we, the community would follow, it would help to advance the OpenSim project in a more organized way.
Again, this would not be a private entity.. it would need to be a totally transparent organization, non-profit status, managed by members of the community and should probably have a "Board" made up of developers, grid owners and users which would "Steer" the organization. This board in my opinion should be designated by "Vote" and each members terms should be limited, but at the end of the term they could be "Voted" back into the position if the community voted to do so.
While I think we are indeed at a crossroads, and we do risk the potential of many forks, I for one would not like to see that happen.
From my perspective there are two possible directions such an initiative can take, each with pros/cons and somewhat different requirements. The preferred way would be to work with the existing core dev group as an advisory committee. The other way should the first prove to be not possible would be to start a new fork and manage development there, being open to input from the core devs and allowing them to join should they want.
While a fork is the not preferred and requires enough people to be able to actually do development it may be required. Historically I have seen the core dev group actively discourage people from helping with development in one way or another. One of the best public examples of this can be found if you read over the dev mailing list and look at how the MOSES group was dealt with. I for one found that whole situation to be very disappointing and I am sure I am not alone.
I have had a number of people approach me and express interest in doing development if there was a more managed, and perhaps open, way that could be handled. While this path would be a monumental task it is not impossible.
A fork however IMHO is the least preferred method as it further dilutes the work being done. Sure it may address the issue of being able to manage a road map and work from a community perspective, but it would also be starting from a major disadvantage due to a disconnect from the collective domain knowledge that exists in the core dev group.
Even to contribute to the existing core is a monumental task that is significantly complicated by the lack of, and often contradictory, documentation. The complete lack of any road map or managed structure has resulted in a fractured and inconsistent code base that any sane developer would run away from, as many have.
It is my opinion that OpenSim as a project currently sits at a crossroad, one where if the path is chosen correctly could see great things. I am however not so confident that the path I have seen with the current 0.9 dev branch over the past year is the correct path and I also know I am not alone in this opinion.
No one can forcibly change the way the core dev group operates within or deals with others. Only they can do that themselves. The ball is in their park so to speak to cooperatively work with the greater community and be part of the solution. I think the community has spoken several times to be willing to provide input but they have not been heard. And no, the existing dev meetings do little to nothing to alleviate this.
Don't get me wrong with my comments. I do appreciate and give the core dev group a great deal of credit for accomplishing what they have. There has been significant effort put into this project and we would not have what we do now without the devs and their efforts. I do however think that a more manged, or at least a less ad-hoc, dev method is needed, combined with a focus on the greater community and its needs.
I apologize in advance if my comments are taken the wrong way. They are not directed at all the devs but rather the general non-democratic and often hypocritical approach to dealing with others that I have seen numerous times. There is an apparent divide between the greater community and the existing core devs. IMHO that has to change one way or another or it is my opinion OpenSim can never evolve to be a platform it could be, one we can all use and enjoy.
************************
Talla Adam
The question was "fix things" but to be honest I've not seen any suggestion for something that is wanted or needs to be fixed since we got behind the broken LookAt() function that +Dahlia Trimble fixed for us on a community funded bounty.
Road Maps and documentation are really something the core team should be coming up with in consultation with the community but they seem singularly disinterested in really doing that or engaging the end-user community in a meaningful way at all, or at least since Justin Clark-Casey took the helm. That's probably why there are so many branches from Aurora all the way to MOSES branch and the Inworldz Halcyon project.
But we don't need more branches. We need a core team that talks to users and asks them what they want as well as vetting the contributions that are made so we end up with stable code that follows the course set by a Road Map we are all agreed on.
Moreover, this community has shown it can get behind a worthwhile objective financially if it's something that's really wanted. My view is we need a stable Opensim that takes the best of what is on offer where ever it comes from and stop the cliquishness that seems to run the show and sees off good coders.
I've probably said too much but, to be honest, I've been losing my belief that Opensim core can go much further. Perhaps one of the branches might make headway and keep the dream of a fully independent Metaverse of virtual worlds alive. One has to remember that all the other so-called advanced platforms from Sansar to High Fidelity have corporate interests and money behind them. They will be much more advanced but the worlds they generate will never be as independent as Opensim.
Opensim is worth saving for that very reason but there has to be unity of purpose to take it further. I'm sure we could have a web viewer one day and maybe even voxels as part of the structure. But we just don't have the leadership any more and certainly no direction.
***************************
Virtual Outworlding with Thinkerer
+Talla Adam
Talla: It would be nice if the core team produced a roadmap, but they have not, so others in the community are taking on that task. In any case, the resulting roadmap needs to represent the interests and advice of all (or most of) the stakeholders in the community. I will soon propose a plan for doing that. I suspect Will Burns is working toward the same objective. Let's see what happens.
Talla Adam
I agree Selby but if anyone else produces a road map how can we get the core developers to follow it. I think if you produce a road map then that is as good as branching Opensim yet again and you will need to pay developers to work on it or be willing to accept code contributions that fit the map.
Selected comments about OSHG development elicited by an initiative of Alec Genesis, along with a summary
The following selected comments are derived from the initiative by Alec Genesis and are intended to summarize the general objectives in the discussion. I think the main thrust is that we need and organized approach. A previous effort (OpenSim United) to develop an organization to support that did not succeed.
In my opinion, OpenSimulator and Hypergrid (OSHG) need such an organization now. The organization needs to represent the main stakeholders in OSHG. From the organization we need a roadmap for the development of the software that supports OSHG (including viewer and installations).
I believe we can raise adequate funds if we have a credible plan (roadmap) and credible support. As noted in an article below. New Media Arts want to help support this development and can provide a non-profit, audited channel.
Copying from a G+ comment string is tricky, so I may have left things out. Please feel free to point out important omissions in the comments section of this article. Or you can add new remarks there. If you want to write your own article for this blog, please contact me.
Related articles
- OSHG development committee: Planning for OpenSimulator/Hypergrid development
- Is it time to think about some kind of HG organization?
- Crowdfunding OpenSim development. It works
- Planning for the future OSHG. A discussion of HG security. HGProjects
- Plans to support development of OSHG: Moses developments
- New Media Arts plans to support the development of OpenSimulator/Hypergrid
- (More after the break)
- Where is Arcadia?
Metaverse events, current and upcoming
- Selby's daily news collection: Virtual worlds are real
- AvatarFest 2016: Sept 30-Oct 2
- Kitely adds events calendar to login page
- Events on the Hypergrid: HYPEvents
- Entertainment on the Hypergrid
- HYPERGRID EVENTS
- Destination guide: OpenSimWorld
- Opensim AAM Virtual Performers
- Sign of the Kite
- WELCOME TO SEANCHAI LIBRARIES
- In a virtual world, your deodorant never fails.
Terry Ford (Butch Arnold)
As some may remember, I was part of an effort last year to put together an organization called OpenSim United. The ultimate goal was to "Unite" the OpenSim Community into an organization which was governed by the community for the community. When I say "Community", I am talking about users, grid owners, and developers (viewer developers included), commercial or not.
We had hoped the organization would be able to organize the many wants/needs of the community from all sides.. Users, Grid owners, and Developers.
We initially had many users, and grid owners interested, but only one developer showed any interest in what we were attempting.. "Justin".
Justin had said he would participate as his time allowed, but we never even got the idea off the ground.
I still have the domain name;opensimunited.com which I would gladly donate to this cause.
I also would be very much interested in being part of an organization such as this, but my time will not allow me to "Manage" it.
We had talked about collecting the wants/needs (fixes, new features, etc.) of the community, organizing these wants/needs into lists which the community could then "Pledge" support in terms of money.
These Pledges could be assigned to each task and as the community made pledges, the "Bounty" for fixing,adding, etc. would continue to grow.
Any developer could, at any time choose to "Take" the then accumulated bounty for a project by submitting approved code to that end.
Once the code was approved and tested, we as an organization wouold release the bounty to this developer or "team".
I've taken some heat over the years as I support the commercial side of OpenSim as well as the "Free" side.
While "Free" is a good thing, we have to come to the realization that at some point, we the community have to step up and "Pay" for the advances and "Fixes" if we want them in an orderly and timely fashion, otherwise we are all at the mercy of those developers who volunteer time to participate and may or may not be interested in the same things the rest of us are interested in.
I as both a grid owner and a user would be happy to participate in a system like this.
I know from my efforts last year towards this organization that there are many users and many grid owners who would be interested in the same type of organization, and while there may be some differences of opinions, I'm sure if we "ALL" were to get together on something like this, we could make it happen.
A system like this could help to motivate existing developers and/or attract new developers, it could help to define a "Path" in which we, the community would follow, it would help to advance the OpenSim project in a more organized way.
Again, this would not be a private entity.. it would need to be a totally transparent organization, non-profit status, managed by members of the community and should probably have a "Board" made up of developers, grid owners and users which would "Steer" the organization. This board in my opinion should be designated by "Vote" and each members terms should be limited, but at the end of the term they could be "Voted" back into the position if the community voted to do so.
While I think we are indeed at a crossroads, and we do risk the potential of many forks, I for one would not like to see that happen.
*****************************
Seth NygardFrom my perspective there are two possible directions such an initiative can take, each with pros/cons and somewhat different requirements. The preferred way would be to work with the existing core dev group as an advisory committee. The other way should the first prove to be not possible would be to start a new fork and manage development there, being open to input from the core devs and allowing them to join should they want.
While a fork is the not preferred and requires enough people to be able to actually do development it may be required. Historically I have seen the core dev group actively discourage people from helping with development in one way or another. One of the best public examples of this can be found if you read over the dev mailing list and look at how the MOSES group was dealt with. I for one found that whole situation to be very disappointing and I am sure I am not alone.
I have had a number of people approach me and express interest in doing development if there was a more managed, and perhaps open, way that could be handled. While this path would be a monumental task it is not impossible.
A fork however IMHO is the least preferred method as it further dilutes the work being done. Sure it may address the issue of being able to manage a road map and work from a community perspective, but it would also be starting from a major disadvantage due to a disconnect from the collective domain knowledge that exists in the core dev group.
Even to contribute to the existing core is a monumental task that is significantly complicated by the lack of, and often contradictory, documentation. The complete lack of any road map or managed structure has resulted in a fractured and inconsistent code base that any sane developer would run away from, as many have.
It is my opinion that OpenSim as a project currently sits at a crossroad, one where if the path is chosen correctly could see great things. I am however not so confident that the path I have seen with the current 0.9 dev branch over the past year is the correct path and I also know I am not alone in this opinion.
No one can forcibly change the way the core dev group operates within or deals with others. Only they can do that themselves. The ball is in their park so to speak to cooperatively work with the greater community and be part of the solution. I think the community has spoken several times to be willing to provide input but they have not been heard. And no, the existing dev meetings do little to nothing to alleviate this.
Don't get me wrong with my comments. I do appreciate and give the core dev group a great deal of credit for accomplishing what they have. There has been significant effort put into this project and we would not have what we do now without the devs and their efforts. I do however think that a more manged, or at least a less ad-hoc, dev method is needed, combined with a focus on the greater community and its needs.
I apologize in advance if my comments are taken the wrong way. They are not directed at all the devs but rather the general non-democratic and often hypocritical approach to dealing with others that I have seen numerous times. There is an apparent divide between the greater community and the existing core devs. IMHO that has to change one way or another or it is my opinion OpenSim can never evolve to be a platform it could be, one we can all use and enjoy.
************************
Talla Adam
The question was "fix things" but to be honest I've not seen any suggestion for something that is wanted or needs to be fixed since we got behind the broken LookAt() function that +Dahlia Trimble fixed for us on a community funded bounty.
Road Maps and documentation are really something the core team should be coming up with in consultation with the community but they seem singularly disinterested in really doing that or engaging the end-user community in a meaningful way at all, or at least since Justin Clark-Casey took the helm. That's probably why there are so many branches from Aurora all the way to MOSES branch and the Inworldz Halcyon project.
But we don't need more branches. We need a core team that talks to users and asks them what they want as well as vetting the contributions that are made so we end up with stable code that follows the course set by a Road Map we are all agreed on.
Moreover, this community has shown it can get behind a worthwhile objective financially if it's something that's really wanted. My view is we need a stable Opensim that takes the best of what is on offer where ever it comes from and stop the cliquishness that seems to run the show and sees off good coders.
I've probably said too much but, to be honest, I've been losing my belief that Opensim core can go much further. Perhaps one of the branches might make headway and keep the dream of a fully independent Metaverse of virtual worlds alive. One has to remember that all the other so-called advanced platforms from Sansar to High Fidelity have corporate interests and money behind them. They will be much more advanced but the worlds they generate will never be as independent as Opensim.
Opensim is worth saving for that very reason but there has to be unity of purpose to take it further. I'm sure we could have a web viewer one day and maybe even voxels as part of the structure. But we just don't have the leadership any more and certainly no direction.
***************************
Virtual Outworlding with Thinkerer
+Talla Adam
Talla: It would be nice if the core team produced a roadmap, but they have not, so others in the community are taking on that task. In any case, the resulting roadmap needs to represent the interests and advice of all (or most of) the stakeholders in the community. I will soon propose a plan for doing that. I suspect Will Burns is working toward the same objective. Let's see what happens.
Talla Adam
I agree Selby but if anyone else produces a road map how can we get the core developers to follow it. I think if you produce a road map then that is as good as branching Opensim yet again and you will need to pay developers to work on it or be willing to accept code contributions that fit the map.
Selby Evans
+Talla Adam I won't produce a road map. The OSHG community will. That will include the Dev team if they want to participate. Halcyon already has a branch and a roadmap and funding. The 2 branches are now in competition. Other grids can go to Halcyon, if they choose. If OSHG does not have good prospects of development, the commercial grids will have to consider that.
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Mike Dickson
A roadmap needs to come from a functional project team with a process that allows others to contribute effectively to it. Ideally items on the roadmap are included in part due to input from the community at large. But a dysfunctional project (team) that is unable to describe at even a high level where they are going isn't going to produce the quality and improvements people are hoping for (except perhaps thanks to dumb luck, and depending on that is obviously a problem).
I am hopeful that one of the forks can step up and provide this sort of guidance and create the platform I think all of us are hoping for.
+Talla Adam I won't produce a road map. The OSHG community will. That will include the Dev team if they want to participate. Halcyon already has a branch and a roadmap and funding. The 2 branches are now in competition. Other grids can go to Halcyon, if they choose. If OSHG does not have good prospects of development, the commercial grids will have to consider that.
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Mike Dickson
A roadmap needs to come from a functional project team with a process that allows others to contribute effectively to it. Ideally items on the roadmap are included in part due to input from the community at large. But a dysfunctional project (team) that is unable to describe at even a high level where they are going isn't going to produce the quality and improvements people are hoping for (except perhaps thanks to dumb luck, and depending on that is obviously a problem).
I am hopeful that one of the forks can step up and provide this sort of guidance and create the platform I think all of us are hoping for.
******************************
Fred Beckhusen (aka Ferd Frederix)
I understand the frustrations. we did successfully raise the money for and fixed the lllookat bug. Lately I am finding it easier to pay for what I want, and get it compiled in my own branch. Unfortunately, I doing what we have now ... a great way to fragment Opensimulator into multiple Incompatible visions. It needs an updater to stop that fragmentation, a fix for the hairpin/loopback that haunts so many gridders. Others will have their own ideas. But the odds of any such code patches making it into opensim are close to zero. We don't even have an official branch for PhysX.
We need to find a way to hire and get more programmers for core. I had hoped Overte was the one to do it, but it is gone now, and there is no way to nudge Opensimulator in any direction other than individual self interest.
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Leighton Marjoram Shared publicly - 12:28 PM
Couldn't put it better myself this is why I can only use virtual worlds for education currently (it is possible to demonstrate how virtual worlds could be used for therapy just not hold therapeutic sessions with clients.)
Professional practice as a counsellor would require opensim to be hardened for data security (static and in transit), confidentiality and to a degree privacy.
[Quote]
"- We have policies that we must adhere to when deploying software to our networks. You just gave a good synopsis of one of the policies governing how to deploy a database. We can't allow a database to be accessed by anyone or anything without verifying identity.
- So... if we are going to use Open Simulator or some future derivative, then it must be hardened to adhere to our security policies.
- I'm not just a drone following the rules blindly, these policies are derivatives of guidance from some very smart network security advisors from both the Dept. of Defense (DoD) and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)." [end quote]
Minetheree Athanasios
I'm getting a bit lost in this conversation.
It should maybe not be overlooked that there are several forks from core around. I really have no idea if they were documented or, if done, how thorough, nor how much effort would be required.
I know of Arriba, which is being used currently by some. There is or was Aurora and also Whitecore.
If these are no longer being developed, but if they had run along with core more closely as well as maintain HG connectivity, I wonder if they can be used as a basis for further development.
They halcyon fork wants to forego the current HG connectivity until, or when, MOSES or others can create a more "hardened" one.
I don't really see those of us using core wanting to wait for some possibly idealistic hypergrid connectivity, in the meantime.
But it would seem more fruitful, possibly easier to use those other forks as the basis to build on.
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Talla Adam
+Minetheree Athanasios
Arriba and Whitecore, as far as I recall, are all forks of Aurora which itself marked quite a radical departure from core Opensim and gave us a faster system, var regions and npc's. Along the way Hypergrid got broken though. Revolution Smythe, the brains behind Aurora did code a bridge solution but that broke too. The dev's who work on the Aurora code branch, Arriba and Whitecore, don't seem to have any great enthusiasm fixing HG either. Inworldz took a very different route in which HG had no real place since the closed grid mentality was at the heart of it. Halcyon, built by Inworldz dev's, and MOSES work could change all that though and the Halcyon branch might yet become the preferred platform in the future.
I have to agree with what +Seth Nygard has said and he points out clearly what we have been up against, the bad treatment of the MOSES team being a case in point. I agree also we must never loose sight of just how much the core developers have done for us and our community would never have come into being without their work on Opensim. But the dev's have to consider what the community wants and not just keep heading in a direction none of us have a say in. Yes, we can get together and fork Opensim yet again so we can have a road map and much more community involvement - even financial. Businesses like Inworldz and Kitely will always keep back the code that gives their service an advantage over others even while contributing some code to core so, I think it safe to say the only way to get the kind of platform we all want in order to enjoy the best possible Hypergrid Metaverse may have to be a fork with very clear objectives writen in and over and above the business of the platform code itself. Not that the code is secondary but that the road map and objectives are never lost sight of.
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Minetheree Athanasios
Whatever direction this all goes toward, without hypergrid connectivity NOW I have no use for it personally.
But I also will continuing doing my own little part to champion the hypergrid.
If something comes along that is hypergrid connected, but also allows for backward connectivity to those who don't keep up or those diehards who won't embrace it, then the more the merrier.
Those types have all sorts of reasons to do what they do NOW and represent the thousands of places uncounted and without representation.
In the free hyperverse many of us like it just fine and have no issues as perms are not much of a need for us, most of us are quite happy to be as altruistic as possible and share what we do.
The list would be too long to point some of them out and I would likely miss some.
But there is one single fact about the current hyperverse, and it is referring to the few iterations of commercial but open grids...that they also get to use and enjoy and enhance their grids with opensim free content.
So many of those I was in, closed, who had much, much less to offer due to being closed. Most people in those places, exclusively, have no clue at all what they are missing and those types of systems inherently choose to keep their eyes closed.
Most of all I want to see people have eyes open choices seen clearly, and that is what I personally try to do all the time.
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Fred Beckhusen (aka Ferd Frederix)
I am going to limit my response to the question asked: what would you want fixed first? My tl;dt answer would be "attract new users', 'attract new devs', and "grow the hypergrid", as follows:
Opensimulator needs to be an Application.
We need a much simpler installation. An easy-to-use program that installs, sets up, and runs Opensim, with uninstall capabilities. It could be based on a modern install tool that people are familar with, such as InstallShield, Simple Setup or Setup Factory, along with the few custom bits that set up the network and INI files. Firewalls can be automatically opened up with these tools.
It's been done before
Years ago I my first C# program was simple setup program for a charity to give out as a Thank You for donations. You could plug in a thumb drive or DVD, run one program, and log in, and ride my horse around in a Linda Kellie Western sim. But some of the tech used in it, such as the standalone version of Singularity, and the Mowes package are obsolete now. Divas Onlook viewer needs to be integrated with it instead. The user-unfriendly log-in entries for the local server is still easily solvable at installation time by making a custom shortcut con with --loginuri parameters, which this package did. I still have the source, any interested devs should contact me privately.
A strong case can be made is that a general solution needs to be in Dot Net (just like Opensimulator is) so it runs on everything, especially on Windows 7 and 10, where 85% of the world's desktops are.
Raspberry Pi Users
I have been working on a small scale solution for the six million Raspberry Pi users out there using pure Perl. It automatically sets up and connects Opensimulator 0.8.2 to OsGrid without prompts, entirely automatically. A pure Perl web server is in it so you can customize things such as the sim name, but even that is optional. Mine is set up for Linux and Pi's, which means only the dedicated hobbyists will be able to use it.
We need more people to use and support the OnLook viewer. Opensim core already has the ability to hide a lot of viewer complexity from new users. XML settings can add or remove any UI component. This needs to be documented on the Opensim wiki, and not on just Divas blog.
See http://www.metaverseink.com/blog/opensim/onlook-server-side-configuration/#more-639
It would be lovely to see these changes in Firestorm, too. But that's another set of devs to convince, and they don't care either, as no one I know here uses it, anyway. I have not had time to try it, either. But we could get together, and put together a strong group of people that do support it, and make our own social network of support for it. For example, why do we not all get together, play with it, improve it, and steer this towards much wider use in osGrid and Metro?
For one simple example, we could come up with a "User Friendly" logo and use it everywhere on social media, and at the same time make it much simpler for people to log in and have fun immediately, without all the confusion.
Loopback needs to to be fixed
Most routers aggressively refuse the hairpinning required to reach back inside the network from the hypergrid and also connect to your home server. It shuts down many people's ability to run a home server oor to expand, like me Without hairpinning, you can only run a viewer on the server. The requirement for hairpinning in your router, also known as loopback, was a bad design decision. Removing loopback is one of the few technical fixes that can actually grow the grid and possibly attract new, technical users who are familiar with Linux and compilers and C#, ( potential devs) which we badly need.
There is already code out there that fixes it for 0.7.6, but it needs to be ported upward and wider so it works in all grid configurations, and then tested and supported by core.
Remember there are six million Raspberry Pi's out there, which can easily (and cheaply) run Opensimulator for under $50 total cost for hardware plus the micro SD. But most people will never be able to use it. All because someone made a very bad design decision, and thought routers exposed private IP addresses. They don't.
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Han Held
0.8.2 is my bird in the hand, it might eventually stop working due to bitrot, but not for a while (I expect it to be good until 2022, if not longer).
You might be surprised how active whitecoresim has been lately, though I'm not sure how suitable it would be for anything commercial. Also, no hypergrid.
I haven't tried it since 2014, but I'm reasonably sure Arribasim has hypergrid, but is it still developed?
I used bridged virtualbox instances to work around loopback issues; which worked very well for me. Might be overkill and there's no virtualbox on ARM ...but there is qemu, and it could be bridged?
********************
Fred Beckhusen (aka Ferd Frederix)
I want to add more servers ( I currently tun 3). Loopback 'sort of' works on FIOS. But it makes transport between sims iffy. Even between sims on the same computer.
Because I have to run a software loopback adapter, I also must log onto the server I want to connect to and run the viewer locally.. And that's just not possible on a Pi, or a WandBoard, or any server that does not support a GPU card. So I can only reach the machine next to me by remote accessing into my work machine and using the viewer there, which is horribly laggy. Sucks to be unable to use a WAN/LAN network as it is designed to be used. This really does need to be fixed. It's a horrible design that is unfortunatley well-baked in. Opensim knows perfectly well whether a viewer is inside out outside the netmask. It just does not care.
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Fred Beckhusen (aka Ferd Frederix)
I understand the frustrations. we did successfully raise the money for and fixed the lllookat bug. Lately I am finding it easier to pay for what I want, and get it compiled in my own branch. Unfortunately, I doing what we have now ... a great way to fragment Opensimulator into multiple Incompatible visions. It needs an updater to stop that fragmentation, a fix for the hairpin/loopback that haunts so many gridders. Others will have their own ideas. But the odds of any such code patches making it into opensim are close to zero. We don't even have an official branch for PhysX.
We need to find a way to hire and get more programmers for core. I had hoped Overte was the one to do it, but it is gone now, and there is no way to nudge Opensimulator in any direction other than individual self interest.
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Leighton Marjoram Shared publicly - 12:28 PM
Couldn't put it better myself this is why I can only use virtual worlds for education currently (it is possible to demonstrate how virtual worlds could be used for therapy just not hold therapeutic sessions with clients.)
Professional practice as a counsellor would require opensim to be hardened for data security (static and in transit), confidentiality and to a degree privacy.
[Quote]
"- We have policies that we must adhere to when deploying software to our networks. You just gave a good synopsis of one of the policies governing how to deploy a database. We can't allow a database to be accessed by anyone or anything without verifying identity.
- So... if we are going to use Open Simulator or some future derivative, then it must be hardened to adhere to our security policies.
- I'm not just a drone following the rules blindly, these policies are derivatives of guidance from some very smart network security advisors from both the Dept. of Defense (DoD) and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)." [end quote]
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Minetheree Athanasios
I'm getting a bit lost in this conversation.
It should maybe not be overlooked that there are several forks from core around. I really have no idea if they were documented or, if done, how thorough, nor how much effort would be required.
I know of Arriba, which is being used currently by some. There is or was Aurora and also Whitecore.
If these are no longer being developed, but if they had run along with core more closely as well as maintain HG connectivity, I wonder if they can be used as a basis for further development.
They halcyon fork wants to forego the current HG connectivity until, or when, MOSES or others can create a more "hardened" one.
I don't really see those of us using core wanting to wait for some possibly idealistic hypergrid connectivity, in the meantime.
But it would seem more fruitful, possibly easier to use those other forks as the basis to build on.
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Talla Adam
+Minetheree Athanasios
Arriba and Whitecore, as far as I recall, are all forks of Aurora which itself marked quite a radical departure from core Opensim and gave us a faster system, var regions and npc's. Along the way Hypergrid got broken though. Revolution Smythe, the brains behind Aurora did code a bridge solution but that broke too. The dev's who work on the Aurora code branch, Arriba and Whitecore, don't seem to have any great enthusiasm fixing HG either. Inworldz took a very different route in which HG had no real place since the closed grid mentality was at the heart of it. Halcyon, built by Inworldz dev's, and MOSES work could change all that though and the Halcyon branch might yet become the preferred platform in the future.
I have to agree with what +Seth Nygard has said and he points out clearly what we have been up against, the bad treatment of the MOSES team being a case in point. I agree also we must never loose sight of just how much the core developers have done for us and our community would never have come into being without their work on Opensim. But the dev's have to consider what the community wants and not just keep heading in a direction none of us have a say in. Yes, we can get together and fork Opensim yet again so we can have a road map and much more community involvement - even financial. Businesses like Inworldz and Kitely will always keep back the code that gives their service an advantage over others even while contributing some code to core so, I think it safe to say the only way to get the kind of platform we all want in order to enjoy the best possible Hypergrid Metaverse may have to be a fork with very clear objectives writen in and over and above the business of the platform code itself. Not that the code is secondary but that the road map and objectives are never lost sight of.
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Minetheree Athanasios
Whatever direction this all goes toward, without hypergrid connectivity NOW I have no use for it personally.
But I also will continuing doing my own little part to champion the hypergrid.
If something comes along that is hypergrid connected, but also allows for backward connectivity to those who don't keep up or those diehards who won't embrace it, then the more the merrier.
Those types have all sorts of reasons to do what they do NOW and represent the thousands of places uncounted and without representation.
In the free hyperverse many of us like it just fine and have no issues as perms are not much of a need for us, most of us are quite happy to be as altruistic as possible and share what we do.
The list would be too long to point some of them out and I would likely miss some.
But there is one single fact about the current hyperverse, and it is referring to the few iterations of commercial but open grids...that they also get to use and enjoy and enhance their grids with opensim free content.
So many of those I was in, closed, who had much, much less to offer due to being closed. Most people in those places, exclusively, have no clue at all what they are missing and those types of systems inherently choose to keep their eyes closed.
Most of all I want to see people have eyes open choices seen clearly, and that is what I personally try to do all the time.
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Fred Beckhusen (aka Ferd Frederix)
I am going to limit my response to the question asked: what would you want fixed first? My tl;dt answer would be "attract new users', 'attract new devs', and "grow the hypergrid", as follows:
Opensimulator needs to be an Application.
We need a much simpler installation. An easy-to-use program that installs, sets up, and runs Opensim, with uninstall capabilities. It could be based on a modern install tool that people are familar with, such as InstallShield, Simple Setup or Setup Factory, along with the few custom bits that set up the network and INI files. Firewalls can be automatically opened up with these tools.
It's been done before
Years ago I my first C# program was simple setup program for a charity to give out as a Thank You for donations. You could plug in a thumb drive or DVD, run one program, and log in, and ride my horse around in a Linda Kellie Western sim. But some of the tech used in it, such as the standalone version of Singularity, and the Mowes package are obsolete now. Divas Onlook viewer needs to be integrated with it instead. The user-unfriendly log-in entries for the local server is still easily solvable at installation time by making a custom shortcut con with --loginuri parameters, which this package did. I still have the source, any interested devs should contact me privately.
A strong case can be made is that a general solution needs to be in Dot Net (just like Opensimulator is) so it runs on everything, especially on Windows 7 and 10, where 85% of the world's desktops are.
Raspberry Pi Users
I have been working on a small scale solution for the six million Raspberry Pi users out there using pure Perl. It automatically sets up and connects Opensimulator 0.8.2 to OsGrid without prompts, entirely automatically. A pure Perl web server is in it so you can customize things such as the sim name, but even that is optional. Mine is set up for Linux and Pi's, which means only the dedicated hobbyists will be able to use it.
We need more people to use and support the OnLook viewer. Opensim core already has the ability to hide a lot of viewer complexity from new users. XML settings can add or remove any UI component. This needs to be documented on the Opensim wiki, and not on just Divas blog.
See http://www.metaverseink.com/blog/opensim/onlook-server-side-configuration/#more-639
It would be lovely to see these changes in Firestorm, too. But that's another set of devs to convince, and they don't care either, as no one I know here uses it, anyway. I have not had time to try it, either. But we could get together, and put together a strong group of people that do support it, and make our own social network of support for it. For example, why do we not all get together, play with it, improve it, and steer this towards much wider use in osGrid and Metro?
For one simple example, we could come up with a "User Friendly" logo and use it everywhere on social media, and at the same time make it much simpler for people to log in and have fun immediately, without all the confusion.
Loopback needs to to be fixed
Most routers aggressively refuse the hairpinning required to reach back inside the network from the hypergrid and also connect to your home server. It shuts down many people's ability to run a home server oor to expand, like me Without hairpinning, you can only run a viewer on the server. The requirement for hairpinning in your router, also known as loopback, was a bad design decision. Removing loopback is one of the few technical fixes that can actually grow the grid and possibly attract new, technical users who are familiar with Linux and compilers and C#, ( potential devs) which we badly need.
There is already code out there that fixes it for 0.7.6, but it needs to be ported upward and wider so it works in all grid configurations, and then tested and supported by core.
Remember there are six million Raspberry Pi's out there, which can easily (and cheaply) run Opensimulator for under $50 total cost for hardware plus the micro SD. But most people will never be able to use it. All because someone made a very bad design decision, and thought routers exposed private IP addresses. They don't.
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Han Held
0.8.2 is my bird in the hand, it might eventually stop working due to bitrot, but not for a while (I expect it to be good until 2022, if not longer).
You might be surprised how active whitecoresim has been lately, though I'm not sure how suitable it would be for anything commercial. Also, no hypergrid.
I haven't tried it since 2014, but I'm reasonably sure Arribasim has hypergrid, but is it still developed?
I used bridged virtualbox instances to work around loopback issues; which worked very well for me. Might be overkill and there's no virtualbox on ARM ...but there is qemu, and it could be bridged?
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Fred Beckhusen (aka Ferd Frederix)
I want to add more servers ( I currently tun 3). Loopback 'sort of' works on FIOS. But it makes transport between sims iffy. Even between sims on the same computer.
Because I have to run a software loopback adapter, I also must log onto the server I want to connect to and run the viewer locally.. And that's just not possible on a Pi, or a WandBoard, or any server that does not support a GPU card. So I can only reach the machine next to me by remote accessing into my work machine and using the viewer there, which is horribly laggy. Sucks to be unable to use a WAN/LAN network as it is designed to be used. This really does need to be fixed. It's a horrible design that is unfortunatley well-baked in. Opensim knows perfectly well whether a viewer is inside out outside the netmask. It just does not care.
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Alec here, I'm glad to see word has gotten around. I know that people would prefer to keep OS development in the public domain. I don't feel the same. I'm not suggesting a commercialization by any means, but many have tried in the volunteer, crowd sourcing spirit, but not a lot appears to have resulted. The lack of information on setup and administration for one is a fairly clear indication of that. Additionally, because issues still stand out, I feel that not enough has been done.
ReplyDeleteWith that in mind, I'm simply going to private investors and going straight into development in a controlled environment. This is by no means with the intent to withold new developments and fixes from the community. Quite the contrary, it is my aim to apply professional software development practices to bring opensim into maturity so that it can meet and keep pace with the growing virtual/augmented reality industry. Without swift action, I believe that it could be passed up, and there is so much potential, it can't be allowed to die in the hands of debate and indecision.
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