Second Life: Talking to the Weather Makers pg 1

Thank you for taking the time for our readers today Garrin

It's my pleasure, Arra. Glad to meet with you.

How did the concept for your weather system first emerge?

Well, it was a few years ago, and I was helping a good friend set up a group of Role Play sims. We wanted it to be as feature-rich and unique as possible...like every other RP out there...and one of my first projects was to see about getting some dynamic weather. I looked around and found some very good products, but they all required manual control to change the weather. That's fine if you want to go for a specific effect, but as a sim-owner and land manager, something that ran itself would be best. I knew a bit of scripting, so I started work on it.

When you started did you have any form of background in meteorology?

Oh, no...Nothing more than climatology course in college. I used what I did know about weather systems to create the basic framework of what I wanted...like when it is cloudy in Second Life (there is a variable for cloud cover in every sim) and if the atmospheric pressure is past a certain marker (another Second Life environment variable), with a random chance, it will start to rain...and so on. The actual science came when I had to look for formulas that converted these Second Life variables into something else the system needed...like temperature, relative humidity, heat index, a ton of others. Most were simple but some were very hairy.

Weather must have become a serious part of life for a while, almost hobby status I would imagine.

Absolutely. I paid closer attention to my own local weather forecast and did plenty of reading. I began to notice neat correlations between my real life weather conditions and the simulated one here...because I used the Texas climate as the initial model.

What was the development cycle like for the system, and how long did it take from research to prototype?

Oh, wow. Well, it was pretty unorganized at the time. I worked on it when I had time away from my other responsibilities here. There was a lot of trial and error...I'd say I had it took maybe three months over time, but actually working on it was only a week's worth coding time totaled. That first prototype was pretty fun, and it showed me some big holes that needed to be filled...like a HUD... Typing commands on a channel was pretty cumbersome. And at this point, I had not thought about selling it...so the user experience was very unpolished.

What types of weather will your system produce for a land owner?

Good question. I noticed that dynamic weather was nice, but to be really appealing a variety of climates should be available. That's when I came up with the idea of Climate Settings. Custom notecards that held all the info on any particular regions' environment like monthly average rainfall, monthly average dew point, how much the temperature varies per year, etc. Since I used the Koppen Climate model, I chose the most likely to be used: Tropical, Temperate (Mediterranean, maritime) Continental Climate, dry climate, arid climate, and Polar.

What sorts of accessories are available for your weather system?

The core unit gives you three things: The Weather Station, Copiable Weather Generators, and the HUD. Add-ons are definitely optional, but make things more interesting...there is a tree that changes foliage according to the season, as well as flower paths that can be laid down that change. For the winter, I have icicle and snow overlays that can be rezzed on roofs or wherever that are modifiable so the owner can put them anywhere they want snow or fade in when it gets below freezing. There's a radio that listens for the current conditions and warns of extreme events like thunderstorms, freezing, and tornadoes. Oh and a little weathervane that shows the wind direction...the image is togglable between 4 or 5 different looks. Oh, also there is an analog dial thermometer that can be rezzed.