Launch Your Virtual World Fast

Transcription

1 Launch Your Virtual World Fast Learn how to build your own virtual world with free open source software Copyright 2009 by Michael McAnally, Document Version 1.0, July 2, 2009 Figure 1. Virtual Meeting and Training Space PART IV BUILDING INSIDE THE VIRTUAL WORLD This article assumes you have completed Parts I, II, and III of the preceeding articles. We ve reached a point now where we have a relatively stable virtual world in which to build. However, before we get started building, let s fix a few things first. 1 P a g e

2 PHYSICS Make sure your opensim.exe command window is shutdown and open the opensim.ini file in your notepad editor. Search for ## PHYSICS and comment out the physics = basicphysics by putting a ; (semicolon) in front and then delete the ; in front of physics = OpenDynamicsEngine line, a little lower down in the file. This will change the physics engine used from the basic engine to the ODE (Open Dynamics Engine). Basicphysics doesn t support collisions between objects except between your avatar and the ground. See example below. Then save the file. ; ## ; ## PHYSICS ; ## ; if you would like to allow prims to be physical and move by physics with the physical checkbox in the client set this to true. physical_prim = true ; Select a mesher here. ZeroMesher is save and fast. ; ZeroMesher also means that the physics engine models the physics of prims ; sticking to the basic shapes the engine does support. Usually this is only a box. ; Meshmerizer gives a better handling of complex prims by using triangle meshes. ; Note, that only ODE physics currently deals with meshed prims in a satisfactoring way ; ;meshing = ZeroMesher meshing = Meshmerizer ; Choose one of the physics engines below ;physics = basicphysics ;physics = POS physics = OpenDynamicsEngine ;physics = modified_bulletx 2 P a g e

3 MAP Now let s get the map feature working. Go into the Regions directory and edit each RocketVirtualn.xml (n= 1 thru 11) file(s) with notepad and change the value in the lastmap_refresh value to 0 (zero). Save each file and run opensim.exe, allowing it to start up. This will force a quicker refresh on the region map images for your virtual world. If you click on the map button in HIPPO viewer you should see a complete map of your virtual world appear. You can use the zoom slide bar at the bottom right to scale the maps size, as well as drag the map around in the center of the window itself. Locate the RocketVirtual3 region land area and click there. Now click on the teleport button and you will be transported to that region. 3 P a g e

4 From the top menu of HIPPO, select World > Set home to here. Region RocketVirtual3 is now set as your home location. Whenever you select World > Teleport Home, you will be sent back to this location. EDITING YOUR AVATAR S APPEARANCE As you have noticed your avatar is the default female avatar. That s okay if you look like her, but for most of us that s not the case! So how do you edit your avatar s appearance? It s not that intuitive. Click on the Inventory button in the bottom right of the HIPPO viewer. This will open an inventory window. Notice that >Body Parts and >Clothing can be right-clicked to access a menu which allows you to create a New Shape, New Skin, New Shirt, New Pants, and so forth. Do this first, then go to the top menu and select Edit > Appearance... 4 P a g e

5 Now I m sure you can easily figure out how to edit each characteristic of your avatar. Just remember to Save your choices as you go along and make sure they are (worn) in the inventory window. Be creative and have some fun. There are no rules you have to look exactly like you do in the real world. 5 P a g e

6 BUILDING A MEETING AND TRAINING SPACE Now that we have established a home base in the virtual world, you might ask yourself, what do I want to build? Well there are a number of good business reasons to use virtual spaces. These include the following: No Travel Expenses (Transportation, Airplanes, Cars, Hotels, Duplicate Office Facilities) Lower Overall Carbon Footprint Location Independence No Meeting Room Needed Uses Existing Network Infrastructures (Phone, , Network, Internet) High Return On Investment (ROI) Used for Meetings, Training, 3D Models, Demonstrations Both Productive and Fun! So let s build a meeting and training space with a script I provided earlier in Part III. Go to the OpenSim command window and type the following command and press enter: command-script create_building.script This will create a building which should begin appearing in the RocketVirtual3 region area in your HIPPO viewer. Check it out. 6 P a g e

7 Congratulations! You now have a virtual world in which to meet others. Please return to Rocket Virtual for new content and frequent updates. Copyright 2009 by Michael McAnally, RocketVirtual.com 7 P a g e