IRCBridgeModule
From OpenSimulator
Configuring IRCBridgeModule
IRCBridgeModule allows you to relay chat from your OpenSim region to an IRC channel and vice versa. You can use this module to
- make in-world chat available via a text-only interface such as IRC
- control objects from IRC channels
- use in-world objects to control bots attached via IRC
- ...
IRCBridge can be used in three modes:
- in traditional mode where we relay all in-world chat from all regions to a single IRC channel on a single server, or
- in multi-channel mode where we can relay in-world chat from a specific region to a specific channel (or even to a specific server)
- in object chat relay mode where we only relay chat to and from private in-world channels
Traditional IRCBridge mode
In the traditional IRCBridge mode ("traditional" because
that was the original IRCBridge modus operandi) all
in-world avatar chat from all regions is relayed to a specific IRC
chat channel on a specific server. Chat from an avatar is reported by
an OpenSim powered IRC bot in the IRC channel. Chat originating on the
IRC channel is reported via "voice of god" in all regions (voice of
god meaning that the in-world avatars will "hear" the chat but won't
be able to see the originator anywhere in the region).
To configure IRCBridge for traditional mode operation use
the following configuration section in your OpenSim.ini
file (modifying as necessary, of course):
[IRC]
enabled = true ; you need to set this otherwise it won't connect
server = some.irc.server.net
nick = OpenSinBot
channel = #opensin
port = 6667
relay_chat = true
report_clients = true
commands_enabled = false
command_channel = 4711
relay_private_channels = false
relay_private_channel_out = 4712
relay_private_channel_in = 4713
access_password = WuffWuff
;fallback_region = name of "default" region
;MSGformat fields : 0=botnick, 1=user, 2=region, 3=message
; must start with "PRIVMSG {0} : " or irc server will get upset
;for <bot>:<user in region> :<message>
msgformat = "PRIVMSG {0} :<{1} in {2}>: {3}"
;for <bot>:<message> - <user of region> :
;msgformat = "PRIVMSG {0} : {1} [{2}]: {3}"
;for <bot>:<message> - from <user> :
;msgformat = "PRIVMSG {0} : {3} - from {1}"
Let’s go through the list of configuration options:
| configuration variable | explanation |
|---|---|
| enabled | you need to set this to “true” otherwise IRCBridgeModule will not be enabled
|
| server | the hostname of the IRC server that you intend to use |
| nick | the nickname which IRCBridge will use to connect to the IRC server
|
| channel | the IRC channel to connect to |
| port | the port on the IRC server to conect to; this is usually port 6667 |
| relay_chat | for traditional mode you need to set this to “true” to relay normal in-world chat |
| report_clients | if you set this to “true” then IRCBridge will notify the IRC channel whenever an avatar logs on, enters a region, leaves a region, and logs off
|
| msgformat | select whichever message format you want IRCBridge to use for relaying in-world messages to the IRC channel.
|
| commands_enabled | leave as is for traditional mode |
| command_channel | leave as is for traditional mode |
| relay_private_channels | leave as is for traditional mode |
| relay_private_channel_in | leave as is for traditional mode |
| relay_private_channel_out | leave as is for traditional mode |
| access_password | leave as is for traditional mode |
Multi-channel mode
With multi-channel mode we can configure IRCBridge to
relay chat from different regions into different IRC channels — or
even into different IRC channels on different IRC servers!
The following OpenSim.ini configuration file extract
configures IRCBridge to relay chat from region A into
IRC channel #opensin-A-opensim.server.net
channel = "#opensin-[%region]-[%host]"
Let’s take a closer look at what’s going on here:
IRCBridge allows us to apply run-time variable
substitution (a quite powerful mechanism).
| configuration | explanation |
|---|---|
| channel = “#OS” | will connect all regions to the same channel; multiple opensim
servers, specifying this same name would share the channel |
| channel = “#OS[%host]” | will connect all regions of a particular opensim server to the named
channel; multiple hosts specifying this same pattern would each be connected to an unique host-name derived channel |
| channel = “#OS[%region]” | will result in each region being connected to a channel derived from
the region's name; in effect, all regions will be connected to a unique channel; If two opensim servers were running an identically named region, then those regions would share the channel |
| channel = “#OS[%host]-[%region]” | will result in each server-region combination being connected to an
unique channel; this offers the best guarantee of unique name across the internet as a whole |
| channel = “#OS[%region][%k]” | this configuration distinguishes consecutive activations of the same
region by affixing an unique numeric to the end of the name |
In all of these examples, the square brackets are eliminated by the substitution process. The '%' prefix indicates that this is a run-time variable. A value in square-brackets and not preceded by '%' indicates that the value may have been supplied as a value in the IRC ini configuration. For example, the existing mechanism for naming the channel could be made unnecessary complicated by specifying:
channel = “[channelid]” channelid = “#my-irc-channel”
The substitution process is exhaustive, so a configuration variable name may be constructed from run-time values.
To illustrate this, assume that the .ini file contains:
channel = “#[%region]” #brief1 = “#chatter-1” #brief2 = “#chatter-2”
Then region brief1 will be connected to channel #chatter-1, brief2 will be connected to #chatter-2, and all other regions will connect to channels with names identical to their region names. This is a trivial example, but becomes more meaningful when we consider all of the other parameters that might need to be unique per region (server, port etc). Using this mechanism we can create an ini file that has unique settings for all aspects of IRC for each region.
The following run-time values are available to this process:
| variable | explanation |
|---|---|
| %host | external host name associated with a region |
| %region | region name |
| %locX | X coordinate of the region. |
| %locY | Y coordinate of the region. |
| %master1 | Master Avatar's first name |
| %master2 | Master Avatar's last name |
| %k | A unique numeric assigned to this region, e.g. “0” |
Finally, a more comprehensive example of a configuration file; we are assuming that we have two regions, Wonky and Borked:
channel = “[%region]” server = “[%region]-server” port = “[%region]-port” nick = “[%region]-nick” Wonky-server = irc1.server.org Wonky-port = 1234 Wonky-nick = WonkyBot Borked-server = irc2.anotherserver.net Borked-port = 1234 Borked-nick = BorkedBot
The Wonky region will connect to IRC channel #Wonky
via port 1234 of IRC server irc1.server.org and IRCBridge
will appear as WonkyBot. Our Borked region will connect to IRC channel
#Borked via port 1234 of IRC server
irc2.anotherserver.net using the nickname BorkedBot.
