Server Help

General Questions - Help Please?

Anonymous - Wed Feb 18, 2004 10:59 pm
Post subject: Help Please?

ok in my bid to run my own zone ive got 3 hitches.

one a program to edit server.cfg file to edit settings for the ships...its not easy testing and getting what you want just right, when you have to go into the file manually..... any programs that can do this? and where.

second....what and where can I get a list of commands that I as a sysop can use in my zone? is there a bot or a program that I can download to make things simple etc??

3third= I really need a map maker to make me the small map I have in mind.

anyone willing to help can email me 1500@caribsurf.com
or reply here....
if just to help out, or to hop on the band wagon and help finish off the creation of the best star trek zone subspace will ever see.

currently ive got the shipset done.
sounds done.
test server...

just need to finish my settings, i have what i want in mind, but testing is neccessary, for max fun.
also the map and the zone idea is the killer, think Dominion Wars.
involving deep space nine.

thanks

CypherJF - Wed Feb 18, 2004 11:52 pm
Post subject: Re: Help Please?

Cruis.In wrote:

You can open server.cfg with notepad or any text editor, just if your server is hosted, you'll need to put the new config file on the server somehow, *putfile, ftp, etc. otherwise if its running on your computer locally, saving the file will save the settings...

Quote:

second....what and where can I get a list of commands that I as a sysop can use in my zone? is there a bot or a program that I can download to make things simple etc??

http://www.shanky.com/server/commands.html

Bots or Programs to amke things simple? hm...

Quote:

3third= I really need a map maker to make me the small map I have in mind.

Good luck..

Cruis.In - Wed Feb 18, 2004 11:59 pm
Post subject: hehe

thanks for the help anyway.

so everyone manually edits settings then tests them? thats ....terrible!

<----gets to work

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 12:37 am
Post subject:

Yes, because that's what you gotta do... heh...

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 12:50 am
Post subject:

im having trouble being recognised as the sysop.
i put my name in the sysop.txt

logged in when connected and it says logged in as sysop on billing server. in green.

then no sysop commands work not to mention any other * commands.

i put my name in moderator.txt and the moderator commands work of course. so that works as designed.

but why is it not working when i log in as sysop, what am i doing wrong, i even set the validation for sysop in server.ini to 1 and nothing.

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 12:59 am
Post subject:

*brain dead right now* -- try entering your sop (sysop) password when you enter (im assuming it should have already validated you being it said sysop logged in but what the heck...)

*<password>

it wont say anything... then try *arena <msg>

maybe someone else can answer more prcecisely

lol... yeah i better get off of this thing before i make a fool of myself :X ... XD

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:02 am
Post subject:

nope. no go. heh

says logged into data server. correction.

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:06 am
Post subject:

ok i got it. instead of using ?login pw
i used *login pw.

the help file said use ?login

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:07 am
Post subject:

?login <pw> i think is the biller login...

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:17 am
Post subject:

what does one do if you log into the billing sevrer anyhow? modify files?

anyway its actually *pw and gives u access

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:25 am
Post subject:

i dont suppose theres anywhere that tells me what some of the .cfg settings do. some numbers arent clear in what range you can input. for example i would think max speed = 100

but thats not the numbers i see there....

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:34 am
Post subject:

Well, if you grab FACT's and then load the description file, it'll tell you the min/max, plus a description of the value you're editing...

or in game - esc+c will bring up the max/min/description for each value..

press f10 to save; sometimes the server will recycle though so becareful

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:39 am
Post subject:

press f10 to save; sometimes the server will recycle though so becareful

what does that mean?
oh btw i changed some settings blindly...and now the damn thing doesnt load when i click subgame hhahaha just error.....error report.

i changed the ship names warbird etc.. did that do it? or some setting i made to a ship

if i grab FACTS? where to grab it from.

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:46 am
Post subject:

Oh sorry I thought I had posted that earlier (it was in a different post):

User-Coder App's - "Rules" post will have a link; or check it out subspacedownloads.com Files-> Editors...

Subgame will close immediately (when run) if the filename for the map specified doesnt' exist...

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 1:54 am
Post subject:

hey i dont understand what you said in your last post nor still your second last please, can you elaborate?

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:01 am
Post subject:

hmm ok i see factsxxx.zip

man this settings this is so cumbersome to get done, it looks like all my efforts are wasted before i get off the ground, how can i ever get the settings i want doing it this way.....

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:05 am
Post subject:

You can't... You must start from scratch unless somebody would let you have theirs... but that's extremely unlikely... So...

use FACTS, click the 'server' tab, 'config ed',
JUST DO NOT MINIMIZE THIS CONFIG EDITOR
It'll error, a simple 'on error resume next' in their source code would have fixed this :/ bummers ... anywhooo..

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:19 am
Post subject:

ok if i minimize besides restarting it what will happen, quite useful thanks

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:23 am
Post subject:

If you minimize the config editor, it'll crash because there is an error in their form_Resize code...

if you don't minimize it then you're good

.. just make sure you save your edits often...

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:25 am
Post subject:

ok thanks heheeh

well hmm, you mentioned it displayed what would be a max allowable value i dont see that, while it looks more organised and easy to edit now, i still dont know what i can put from what not that might make it an unacceptable setting

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:27 am
Post subject:

ok when you go to change a setting.

but for example for maximum recharge rate it has default 1150 but it doesnt tell you up to how much you can ad.....see what i mean?

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:29 am
Post subject:

Once you're in the config editor, click the 'Load Descriptions' - locate your server folder, and in it there is a 'template.sss' file, select that and hit 'open'...

The low and high numbers appear in the first 2 boxes in the status bar.. I believe ship settings no longer have a max to them, but keep them within like normal ranges, don't set things for like over 1000, as far as weapons: 255 is the max item count you can have, i believe?

InitialBomb/setc can only be 0-3, you can not start out w/ l4 bombs ...

etc etc etc... im going to bed now. gnite

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 3:14 am
Post subject:

ok thank for all your help

one thing when you wake up. ive let initial bullets for warbird= 2 but nothing shows up in the bullets when i log on yes i saved and restarted server, only l1 bullets is showing up if i set that.

l3 bullets wont show up either.

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 10:26 am
Post subject:

weird... cause I believe when you set initialvalue's you should be guaranteed those, unless im thinking wrong where it depends on the prizeweight values?

Smong - Thu Feb 19, 2004 2:34 pm
Post subject:

I recomend CSEdit for editing the server.cfg. Also the template.sss in the server.zip is very useful (as mentioned above), it can be openned with a text editor.

Quote:

changed the ship names warbird etc

You cannot rename the ships in the .cfg file.

If a name is in mod.txt, it does not require a *modpass to use powers. However smod and sysop require the *pass (and an entry in smod/sysop.txt if the check is on).

The server will recycle (restart) if you upload (*putfile) a map while you are in an arena that uses that map.

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 3:27 pm
Post subject:

ok, i loaded the template with facts as cypher suggested last night, and i could get ok descriptions on the values.....template.sss loaded from continuum folder. does it make a difference which template i use? the one which came in the server dir should be the same right?

also csedit? where to get this...ill try it too.

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 3:56 pm
Post subject:

the only thing I could see different template.sss one possibly being outdated ? is there one packed w/ FACTs?

Cyan~Fire - Thu Feb 19, 2004 6:29 pm
Post subject:

Almost all values in the settings are unsigned integers, which means you can go up to 4294967295 without causing any bad things. (Although I'm not sure how the game would handle this.) The only values that are not integers are the ones with set ranges and the Initial/Maximum equipment settings (max 255).

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 6:46 pm
Post subject:

im getting through ok editing them. but it sure is hard testing the ships against each other with only 1 player..me

im putting my settings for best fun and lag. too fast rotation speed...thrust etc...= more possibilty of lag because the faster a players ship can move the faster a server must update to all players. with the advent of high speed these days that may not matter matter much... but for modem players it would matter.

i cant believe no one is interested in a star trek zone. ive seen people try them but they had no THEME. they just put in a ship set a sound set and a map with star trek designs. my zone will have as much a goal or a WIN factor as possible.
plus ive created a kick butt highly detailed ship and sound set.

since im not a server guru...theres so many things about running a server i dont know....
for example, my server isnt connected to the player database so everytime i log i it comes up with create new player.....etc....how do i get my server to be connected to the subspace player database....

i really wish i had a server guru on board with this zone with me. ill build the zone he can take care of the server etc.....

and also if a server has to be restarted for a setting saved to the .cfg file to take effect.

Cruis.In - Thu Feb 19, 2004 11:06 pm
Post subject:

query, ive got bomb 1 on some ships. but it automatically has no prox. i dont see a setting to set prox, what am i doing wrong

also since i have my ships quite bigger than the standard 36,36 adjusting the ship radius to how many pixels it is from centre, to one side, (i.e half the pixel size horizontal of the ship graphic) would make the ships correct in terms of collision detect correct? because of course i know bigger graphic means that bullets fly through the graphics extended over the standard 36,36 core. radius will correct this right? (once i set it to what my ships are)

CypherJF - Thu Feb 19, 2004 11:12 pm
Post subject:

Try setting the PrizeWeight for Prox like 60/80... my guess

Cruis.In - Fri Feb 20, 2004 12:14 am
Post subject:

what does that do? ive disabled upgrades and stuff. meaning, upgrade rotation , upgrade speed greens i have set to 0. so whatever its at for initial it remains, this beats having to change max and initial, because without upgrade numbers, initial=max

what does the prizeweight do?

ship 1 starts with a lot of prizes and i havent set it like that. secondly it has proxy. the rest start with xradar, like i have set, no prizes, and only proxy...
I was giving myself prizes yesterday in that ship, but since then the test server was down..it saves nothing really. but seems to have saved the prizes i got when i was in that ship. whats going on here heh

also how do i stop ships getting bouncing bullets altogether?

CypherJF - Fri Feb 20, 2004 1:34 am
Post subject:

You cant set who gets proxy, either they all can get it, or they all don't... unless you run a bot like zone or ASSS.

Bouncing Bullets, take it away in the prize weight..

The prize weight actually sets what gets put on a ship; and has an effect of how many of each type of prize there is in the zone, aka green.

Cruis.In - Fri Feb 20, 2004 11:34 am
Post subject:

i dont see anything along the lines of prize weight... also why is one ship getting it when this value is set the same for all. also i dont see prizeweight for prox anyhow. and id like all ships to have it.

also this help too.

also since i have my ships quite bigger than the standard 36,36 adjusting the ship radius to how many pixels it is from centre, to one side, (i.e half the pixel size horizontal of the ship graphic) would make the ships correct in terms of collision detect correct? because of course i know bigger graphic means that bullets fly through the graphics extended over the standard 36,36 core. radius will correct this right? (once i set it to what my ships are)

CypherJF - Fri Feb 20, 2004 1:01 pm
Post subject:

sorry if this next post sounds rude, ive had a crappy day...

there is a [PrizeWeight] Section in the CFG, just open it up in notepad, and you'll see... Or in FACT's I do believe it's a tab 'General Settings' just poke around in there.... Initial Settings of ships are dependently random

lol... i think .. so yeah...

Just set the radius of the ship in the cfg, to the radius of your ship.. You'lla ctually need to make it smaller i've noticed... because like 14*2 = 28, and normal ships are 32x32? ... so yeah.. just play w/ settings and test test test

Smong - Fri Feb 20, 2004 4:43 pm
Post subject:

CSEdit:
http://forums.minegoboom.com/viewtopic.php?t=336&highlight=csedit

To save scores and names, you must close the biller and server by pressing shift + F12. Close the biller before closing subgame.

Prox and bounce solution. With a high intial bounty your will probably get all the prizes with a high prizeweight:

[PrizeWeight]
BouncingBullets=1
Proximity=100

Replace 'Ship' with Warbird, Javelin, etc
[Ship]
InitialBounty=20

Cruis.In - Sat Feb 21, 2004 7:19 am
Post subject:

you mean all the prizes allowable, like say i dont have cloak allowable for that ship. then cloak prize.

actually cypher default ship sizes in ss were 36 by 36. the radius says something to set it for the centre outward. the centre would be around 18 for a 36 36 graphic, therefore 18 radius should do the trick for that, but its set at 0 default which is weird...

is i have a ship 100 by 100 id change it too 50....ill test

thanks for all the help, sorry to be such a fool.

if your post was rude then you are the nicest guy on the planet cypher.
even though you betrayed Neo.....

oh last thing, i read the thing about shift f12, but it never works for me to close it down so i X it. or right click and click on close.... also ive been closing subgame first, this hasnt corrupted any files yet. (server still loads)

but ill try to find how to close it proper... shift -f12 dont work

oh it works now....geez im so stupid

i know the bigger the pipe a better but whats the minimum i could run a zone on. like 30 players max at one time would 256k upload be enough? 1 megabyte download. but its upload that matters.

CypherJF - Sat Feb 21, 2004 11:50 am
Post subject:

about the ship size -- my bad, cause i think on the template.sss it said that it's 14 radius is default, if set = 0; anyways, it works better w/ the 14 radius, cause if you go upto a wall, the ship wont bounce off when the 'rectangle' of the ship hits the wall.. but when the ships tip hits it.. kinda nicer that way or somethign... woooooohoooo...

Quote:

if your post was rude then you are the nicest guy on the planet cypher.

lol... sorry I had a realllly crappy day yesterday...

Quote:

even though you betrayed Neo.....

I did ? o.O

Quote:

The server will still load, but it wouldn't save the scores (for subbill)..

Quote:

...oh it works now....geez im so stupid

Quote:

i know the bigger the pipe a better but whats the minimum i could run a zone on. like 30 players max at one time would 256k upload be enough? 1 megabyte download. but its upload that matters.

hM.. I still haven't figured out the bandwidth : player ratio -- and it also depends on how toned your settings are.. i mean look at TW, they've prob have the best 'toned' settings in regards to lag... slower moving ships, slower paced weapons, etc...

Look at it this way, a 56K can host up to 4 people w/o "lagging", or at least that's been my experience, however I did get upto 8 haha, that was fun

.. lol... im sure someone else can give ya the better statistics on bandwidth : player ratio...

Cruis.In - Sat Feb 21, 2004 9:35 pm
Post subject:

i dont want anyone to think the settings ar elike dsb, but to compare the maneuverability. (which i think most matters in relation to lag, because the faster more maneuverable the more the server has to update that quick movement.....

anyway i digress ive got the speed of the ships and rotation slightly on par with dsb, meaning its no faster than that, and that zone has no lag problems......i dont have super settings like i said, no 10,000 energy and 1000's of bombs persecond.

though i do have it set a shp can fire 3 bombs rapidly WHICH drains ALL energy, so they have to wait for a recharge again, this is the only concern, i might change this.

once i get a map im good to go, ive got the core settings well enough that i would have to only change 1-4 settings either to A) bring it in to perfect balance B) control lag.

again thanks for all the help...if my zone fails it wont be the first it wont be the last, and i would have tried t ocreate something where everyone could like it and have fun.

in the event of a failure, id give the shipset and soundset i made to a capable person and let him try something... all i want to do is have fun and play this star trek styled dominion wars theme i have...the fight for deep space nine....i wouldnt care who made it a reality.

peace

CypherJF - Sat Feb 21, 2004 11:53 pm
Post subject:

dont give up the ship!! ... it takes a lot of time and patience.. don't give up .. keep the settings come back to it in a couple months and try again

... at least you've begun the process of getting your feet wet; and I congratulate you on asking "specific" and "read-able" questions

...

Smong - Sun Feb 22, 2004 10:32 am
Post subject:

Cruis.In wrote:

in the event of a failure, id give the shipset and soundset i made to a capable person and let him try something

Instead, submit it to www.subspacedownloads.com .

Cruis.In - Mon Feb 23, 2004 2:35 pm
Post subject:

gee cypher, i might do that too. well im getting fairly excited heh, dont know what for, everything is done except a map.

question: any upload of files I do to the person hosting the server would require a restart correct? silly but to be sure.

how many do you believe a 256k up connection could handle about 20 players or so at once?

CypherJF - Mon Feb 23, 2004 3:46 pm
Post subject:

hm not always, if you use putfile I think it does ? i suggest if you get a host, get one who can provide FTP access.. much faster and efficient

...

Cruis.In - Mon Feb 23, 2004 3:57 pm
Post subject:

yeah ive got ftp access. but then he has to restart or can i issue a command once logged in as sysop on the server to restart it?

second
reading through server.ini and stuff in preparation
course the server works and all
but just wondering about this, this is in the [billing] section of te server.ini

Port=185
ServerId=4483
//Make the same as in [Misc] Port=
GroupId=1
ScoreId=0
//Make the same as in [Misc] Port=

he is saying to make what the same as misc port?
the port=185 up there?
also misc from the same server.ini file where under [misc] section it has port=382 (by default)

is he saying make port there under the billing section same as port under misc? or port under [misc] from subbill.ini because subbil.ini has a [misc] section, which is its only section

i figure even with all the diff port numbers the server sitll works anyhow and people connect.

Cyan~Fire - Mon Feb 23, 2004 4:25 pm
Post subject:

The command to restart the server is *recycle. It's SMod up.

About ports:
Billing:ServerId=Billing:ScoreId=Misc:Port
Billing:Port, however, should be the same as your subbill.ini port, which should be different than your server.ini Misc:Port.

Cruis.In - Mon Feb 23, 2004 7:35 pm
Post subject:

thanks alot cyan fire. i hope you guys will try my zone when its done....

Cruis.In - Mon Feb 23, 2004 7:49 pm
Post subject:

server.ini [billing]
Port=185
ServerId=185
//Make the same as in [Misc] Port=
GroupId=1
ScoreId=382
//Make the same as in [Misc] Port=

[misc]
port=382

subbill.ini
[misc]
port=185

correct? serverid matches port in [billing]
scoreid matces the port in server.ini [misc]
and server.ini [misc] port is diff than subbill.ini port

Cyan~Fire - Mon Feb 23, 2004 8:53 pm
Post subject:

No, you misread my post. ServerId and ScoreId should be equal to Misc:Port, not Billing:Port.

Cruis.In - Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:07 pm
Post subject:

ok i think i got it.
just waiting on stepup123 now to see if he comes through with a map. and woosh! been making last minute preps to sound graphics and stuff.

toyed with the idea of removing the thrust graphic all together...just trying to get more of a different-for-the-better feel into it.

but i digress to my next question, is it best to use the newer subbill2.exe written by SOS?

i now close my zone with shift-f12 now and it remembers names and scores. however each time i do go to login, a msg in red comes up saying

"this zone is not connected to the central player database, you should use a different password for this zone, as your passwords may be exposed to zone staff, do you wish to continue?"

how do i connect to the central player database. does this involve getting my server connected on sscx, or one of those things? since i have my own server i wouldnt have to be hosted would I? to receive this central player database hook up.

Smong - Wed Feb 25, 2004 2:33 pm
Post subject:

I think there is a little checkbox with that password warning message. Since you are zone staff I think it is safe to tick it (that way it won't ask you every time).

Cruis.In - Sat Feb 28, 2004 2:53 am
Post subject:

hey this happened last night.
i created my own map finally

I downloaded my hosts server.ini file changed it to read the new map name (made sure map name was correct) saved it.

then I put *putfile mapname.lvl and *putfile server.ini so the server would now read the new map, then I *recycled . the server never came back up...i tested the map with my own local server and it worked fine... what could have caused the crash of the server doing that? cant or shouldnt putfile server.ini?

if something is wrong how to fix it besides a reboot (ill know tomorrow if it reboots when the host logs on.)

SuSE - Sat Feb 28, 2004 3:34 am
Post subject:

if it was red - did you still try to enter?
is the zone on a static ip? if not, did you redownload zone list?

Cruis.In - Sat Feb 28, 2004 11:53 am
Post subject:

hey APPARANTLY it couldnt find the map, i *putfile mapname shouldnt it go to his server dir, where ,ini looks for the map?

yep static i.p

Cruis.In - Sat Feb 28, 2004 12:00 pm
Post subject:

apparantly i placed in the .ini mapname=mapname.lvl

apparantly i should have just put map name withut .lvl my host renamed my file with an extra .lvl extension and it works...heh get it?

SuSE - Sat Feb 28, 2004 12:28 pm
Post subject:

the setting should be as follows:

Quote:

DefaultLevelFile=mapname.lvl

occasionally weird map names will wig it out

Cruis.In - Sat Feb 28, 2004 11:39 pm
Post subject:

ok, i renamed it, might have been too long, works now.

next: Ive placed some flags in the centre of my map, flags that you cant pick up, however they dont show up in there... they show up scattered around the deep space nine structure on my map, they are fixed in position....ive tried every flag mode what am i doing what?

Cyan~Fire - Sat Feb 28, 2004 11:57 pm
Post subject:

OK make sure you have:
[Flag]
FlagMode=2
CarryFlags=0

that should do it.

Cruis.In - Sun Feb 29, 2004 12:15 am
Post subject:

i believe i had that, but didnt work... will try it again

Cruis.In - Sun Feb 29, 2004 12:20 am
Post subject:

well that didnt work, you might be happy to know that it made all the flags disappear. that were randomly around the place.

why would flags be anywhere other than where i have laid them down on the map...

Cruis.In - Sun Feb 29, 2004 12:59 am
Post subject:

finally after much prodding it did it, using your settings uploading the map constantly and wam it changed...yippe

Cyan~Fire - Sun Feb 29, 2004 10:51 am
Post subject:

That's good.

Something you might try to make sure the server has the correct map is to *getfile it after you put it up and see if the map you receive is the right one.