Part I : Craft virtualchristine´s Second Life/OpenSim Blog The craft core
A portfolio Author
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Craft Core
The very first 35 sims in Craft as beginning 201 2
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VIRTUALCHRISTINE` S FIRST OPENSIM GEOGRAPHY GUIDE!!! CRAFT -THE FRIENDLY GRID!!! TAKE A TOUR OF MY HOME WORLD!!!!!ATTN NEWBIES!!THERE`S NO PLACE LIKE HOME!!! Page 4
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ello my dearest dears! How wonderful, here we all are again ( and there are so many of you now, my beloved readers) ready for another grand adventure in OpenSim, this time on my home world Craft- the Friendly Grid. For my new readers, OpenSim is the software platform that hosts hundreds, possibly thousands, of independent grids. A great many of these grids, or worlds, as they are often
r a c a r e t g b e y a i i H p
referred to, are connected by an amped up teleportation system called the hypergrid, which allows you to plunge down that rabbit hole from world to world, exploring and having adventures to your hearts content. In order to get in on the action, you need to become a resident of a hypergrid enabled grid. Which means that you have to sign up somewhere and log on.( If anyone immediately needs more concrete info on OpenSim,or the Hypergrid, or grid registration please read my easy to
understand OpenSim posts!)
I
signed up with Craft through sheer dumb luck. I was still on SL, and had downloaded the Firestorm browser to deal with a problem on my tiny rental, when I realized the browser´s grid list included grids that were NOT ON SECOND LIFE!! I started googling the names, and lo and Pagethe 5 behold, they were all from
much touted, ever elusive OpenSim. Not that any of them looked very interesting, mind you, they looked more like, to be blunt, crummy wannabe SL´s, but still, I was determined to see for myself what everyone was talking about. As some of you probably already know, there is not alot out there about the basics of OpenSim. Well my dears, there was even less before yours truly started blogging about it! I sifted through a ton of completely unhelpful technonerd Page 6
gobbldeygook, and,well,crap, before one blog mentioned in passing, that Craft, region Hydra, was a good jumping off point for the OpenSim beginner. Eureka! A clear statement! I recognized the name from my Firestorm Grid List, so I just signed up and logged on.
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wo months on, and everything looks different. Where I saw crummy, I now see diamonds in the rough. The lack of co ordinated information, I now see as the small downside of thousands of people´s ability to express themselves through their own grids, as opposed to having a single Big Daddy presentation of the product. And the more I travel the Hypergrid, the more I am convinced that Craft is utterly unique. Founders Tao Quan
and Licu Rau are incredibly sharp. Craft is fun. It´s mega friendly. It´s cutting edge. It´s beautiful. It´s smart. It´s diverse. It continually does the unexpected. My virtual life has gone from only being light entertainment, to someplace I can go to charge my batteries and confide in people. In my five years wandering the metaverse as a Lady Hermit, I never thought I would make the following statement- This is my community. Let me show you around. Page 7
And virtualchristine, cartography queen is back in the
saddle! I have made my beloved readers this map of our
tour! It shows the middle section of the Craft, which is a
little over half of the grid in total. You will notice we don´t even cover the whole middle, but belive me, our 39
destinations will keep you busy for a while. I always put
region names in BOLDFACE. You can plug these names into your world map and get a teleport. Or you can use my map in conjunction with‌
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The HYDRA Station teleport panel for Craft. It´s the red
circle in the middle of my map. For my posts, I usually go out the door to my right, and use the panel across from the hypergate, which leads to other grids. This time, we are staying in Craft.
This domestic panel is located inside HYDRA Station´s one room; you can´t miss it. You use it by clicking on a panel, then
OPENING YOUR CHAT WINDOW and clicking the offered teleport. If you can´t manage that, you can type in any of the panel names on your world map search engine, and it will offer you a teleport. Or you can just go for a walk.
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The circular building at my feet is HYDRA Station. As you can see, it is surrounded by connected sims. There is more to the north that hasn´t rezzed. This is all Craft´s “heartland”. Some of the sims are on the main domestic
panels, and some aren’t. Let´s start on the eastern peninsula, to my left, named ONDA, which doesn´t have a panel.
Type the name ONDA into your world map search engine, and teleport. Remember, flying over a sim crossing on land is very iffy throughout OpenSim,and over water can just be
ridiculous, even if it seems like a short distance. The physics are different here. Do yourself a favor and teleport! Page 1 3
1) This is ONDA, which is probably Italian for wave. Why?
Craft is an Italian Grid, and while lots of residents speak lots of languages,the translators you find everywhere come in handy. For my non western readers ,who may have only seen dumb
stereotypes of Italians as greasy, spaghetti sucking mobsters, I
would ask them to google A) Rome and Renaissance ; or B) ” western civilization as we know it” and count the Italian names . Fix yourself a snack and get comfortable. You´re gonna be there a while. Farther east, over the water you can see the
lighthouse at PELAGO(13). It too, is accessible by foot. Page 1 4
Now lets go north, over the dunes behind me to…
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2) OPERA, Licu Rau´s lovely town square. The western gate leads to 3) PLAYA, the northern gate to 9)
CAMPOS and the eastern gate to 11) SINUS. Licu
won´t mind if you just jump the wall. Once inside, you should go for..
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…what I think of as Craft´s Bella Notte, which I am certain is Italian for beautiful night. Would Lady and the Tramp lie?
Well, Lady wouldn’t. Wasn´t it cute when their noses touched as they ate the spaghetti … Oh, just set your sun position to midnight already.
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3) PLAYA is probably Italian for beach. I am offshore in the snazzy motorboat, which is stationary, but plies you with free swimsuits and champagne. Directly behind the public beach
you can see the gardens and vineyard of AGRA(5) , and to the right, the Library building at CAMPOS(9).
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4) DUNE is exactly that. Do you see HYDRA Station in the right hand corner?
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5) I love wandering around AGRA, a charming, middle European wine growing village.
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