Posted April 16, 2021 Development Update - 16APR2021 Soldiers, this month will be the true test of what we've been working towards for the past couple of months. Project cloud is in it's closing phase. Meanwhile we also got an additional hire, SGT D.Sklenar, who already did a lot of the 94A tasks but now has officially been inducted into 94A with potentially some ambition to learn 12T duties in the future. Servers Dedicated Box: Dedicated box, alongside TCAdmin has been canceled. From now on we are completely swapped over to the new server. Project Cloud: Project cloud, which was the track to upgrade to a more scalable solution (infrastructure that grows/shrinks with unit size and demands) is coming to an end. After months of testing, monitoring, budgeting and so on we've finally reached a balance that we are happy with. So the cancellation of the dedicated box also marks the end of project cloud as it is now our default server infrastructure. With that cancellation, we've created 1 extra private server, and 2 public servers (modded but not password protected). Refer to DEVORD #004 to see what each server is meant for and what events take priority. Our goal is to have any enlisted member start any of the servers. So working towards that we have now broadened the permissions to start the server from only C-Staff/COE to also include squad leaders. If they head over to "Unit Administration" -> "Servers" they will be greeted with the following page from where they can start any server: So with that said, short term plans for the servers are the following items: Integrate config editing in the forums, currently this is done through FTP. Server configuration is already stored on the website so this shouldn't be too complex, Work towards a shared mod drive. Currently each server has its own 30GB of mods, at ~10 cents per GB this means that we have 12$/month of duplicated data. Perhaps we could have a shared mod drive that all servers attach to instead which would bring the cost of storing mods down to ~$3. Currently the only way to get mission files onto a server is through BMO's github repository. We need to figure out a way to install temporary mission files onto a server without cluttering their github with R&R and test missions. Website We wrote a script to remove accounts that were flagged as spammers and were not approved within 14 days. This cleared up an astounding 3000 forum members. This will hopefully speed up some sections of the forums as member querying became faster. Other than that, nothing significant was done on the website this month. We still have a couple of things in the pipeline but I'd rather wait with revealing those until we have something more concrete. Mods 3rdID Custom Mod: In collaboration with S-2, for the first time in our Arma operations history, we made our own custom equipped African units. This includes a few OPFOR and GREENFOR units as well as civilians! For now it is a fairly limited set of units but we are looking at expanding this list as operation Silver Guardian evolves. This was introduced to further immerse the players while also giving the Zeus more tools to make the most enjoyable missions. I will not reveal screenshots of those, you'll have to wait and see until you're face-to-face with them in-game ?. So for the next month we will continue to look towards more efficient cost saving techniques without making the entire setup overly complex. This month we will also focus on documentation and training to further increase the maintainability of our infrastructure so that more people will be able to take care of our servers. 1SG J.Drake, COE NCOIC Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
