Linden and public roads. Autobahn

I started this topic in the suggestion forum, but I now see that I need to make a demo version of the system in order to get enough interest.

/13/aa/143034/1.html
I would like to see the roads to be more useful. I envision a system where instead of having to steer the vehicle, you would instead select the lane and the script would steer for you.

To accomplish this I propose the following.
1. The road prims be unlinked, named a unique name and have the description field include more information.
2. I propose that the linden roads are deeded to a “Linden road building group” This would allow residents to update and improve the roads.
3. I also propose that people can deed land to the road group for future roads.

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This system is really cool in that the road can be any direction. Even upside down!

I’ve started building a test road in Charissa (5, 5)

Since I don’t have enough land to build it horizontally I am going to have it arc upwards and then go up for about 600m before looping upside down before coming down. Since the vehicle will have to do the rotation math anyway it can track the blocks in any orientation as long as the block’s rotation is defined. This will allow me to build a full cloverleaf and test it.

Edit: See the wiki for more info
http://www.lslwiki.com/lslwiki/wakka.php?wakka=AutobahnRoad

I added a wiki page to keep track of the exact details.
http://www.lslwiki.com/lslwiki/wakka.php?wakka=Autobahn

I still have to define the exact block rotation

Planed fields are now separated by colon ":" symbols.

''Note: pipe symbols don't work in the description field''

This sounds quite interesting!!! The first week or two I was in SL, I was zooming down every road I could find, just looking around to see what there was to see. I found many quite interesting places, and never hit the dreaded ban lines once!!! I do hope that this initiative gathers momentum.

Please do not that there a LOADS of road pieces all around the SL world. So we would definitely need some kind of way to just drop a one of a few pre-set scripts into the linden roads to set it so that it can be identified easily without too much hassle as it can be a very long process. ( The script would set the name of the road and delete its own script, this would make it quicker to adjust the roads instead of "selecting-copypaste-editing-select next prim" process on each prim)

The system would need to be thought out very thoughtfully and carefully before a system be put in place.

There are many things to consider.

I have made a script that set's the road description and has a chat channel and a scanner.

The scanner updates floating text telling you that it sees you as an oncoming vehicle.

You then say "/65 remove" to have the script remove itself when you are done.

Since blocks are extrusions, there is no way to use twist and taper at the same time, so I defined the block orientation so that taper can be used to both make lane changes and curved sections. Please get my free road prims and look at my test road in Charissa (5, 5, 95)

The road script needs more commands to make it easier to change the road name and lane number. Having it set the "script pin" would also let a "master script" drop a script back into the road if an update would be needed.

Right now I am playing with the car script trying to get it to work.
1. I have removed the vehicle flags so it is just a physical object.
2. I added bouncy of 1 so it floats.
3. I added Apply impulse and Rotational Impulse from a timer to make it move.

The script gets the current velocity to decide on how much more impulse to apply.

I don’t see a command to get the current rotational velocity?

I can use llGetRot along with the timer to estimate it’s current value, but it's not as good.

Since there are two opposing view of where to put the rotation information, I changed the definition so that there is an extra field.

http://www.lslwiki.com/lslwiki/wakka.php?wakka=AutobahnRoad

If the description field contains the rotation then it will override the prim's rotation.

The reason to use the prim rotation is that this means that the road script does not have to be re-enabled every time the road prim is adjusted.

I see road building as a slow and difficult process. The SL roads have decayed to the point that some sections have grass and boulders in the road. Other sections aren’t even paved at all. This is why my proposal is to create a group where residents would rebuild the road system as well as create on and off ramps. I also see the road group as adjusting the road and making new roads as developers propose new plans.

Does anyone have any preferences on the field separator?
I usually use the pipe field since it is not used in normal use, but the editor does not let you enter a pipe symbol.

I tried using a colon ":", but Time and dates use that.

How about using a backslash "\" to separate the fields?

I usually use the pipe symbol which is supported by the script editor.

The object editor no longer lets you put a pipe symbol into the description field of and object.

Works for LSL scripts though.

   default
   {
   	state_entry()
   	{
   		llSetObjectName("TEST | TEST");
   	}
   }
   

I wonder why they included this ridicolous limitation on the Object Editor....

Oh my gosh! the £ is not allowed either! I find that offensive that the $ is allowed but not the £ symbol, that is anti-british .

I have updated the wiki definition so that there are two types of road sections.
http://www.lslwiki.com/lslwiki/wakka.php?wakka=AutobahnRoad

For the SL roads, they would have to be un-linked and then a "lane 1" or a "lane –1" script would have to be dropped into the road prims. The script would set the name and description and then delete itself.

I would like to thank everyone for the feedback and support.

I’ll have to re update my test road since it is not the same as the current definition.

1) I just noticed that you can not get the description of another prim even if the script is scanning it.

2) There is not enough time to use a chat to transfer the data and the sim can’t handle a few thousand more scripts.

3) The script can’t use the name to hold the data and still scan for a name since llSensorRepeat can only scan for one name.

4) There are simply too many objects to scan a whole area and then check each one to see if it's a road section.

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Ok, so I am back to using the prim rotation to define the lane’s direction and all objects are named one of two names. One name selects using the prim rotation, the other just uses a fixed Z offset.

This will work for simple two lane roads, but not for complex intersections as the vehicle will have problems deciding where the lanes are and you could jump off the side of a bridge if you turned the steering wheel at the wrong time.

Or maybe some chaos is ok.

The test road in Charissa (10, 10) now forms a complete loop.

It all makes me think that placing a fence on the sides of the road would be easier.

Or maybe each section would be named with the key of the next block(s).

Each prim would be named "PublicRoad " \ some data\... \ next key \ next key
Then a sensor would only have to be used when the car is first rezed to find the road.

The script would then decode the key from the prim name and use it to get the next block.

Thinking…
The name is limited to 256 chars. I am assuming llKey2Name(key id) has the same limitation that llGetObjectName() has.
A position vector is up to 27 chars long
A rotation is up to 36 chars long
A Key is 36 chars long

Ok, this sounds much better since there is no scanner, just llKey2Name(key id) calls

The vechical has to decide when it's close enough to switch to the next target based on it's current location.