MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

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foobar1234
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MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by foobar1234 »

I'm wondering if it is possible to run MapTool as a standalone server or if not whether it is planned for a future release.

I have a headless (SSH-only and Dynamic DNS access) Raspberry Pi which I use (besides many other things) as a Mumble server when playing Pen'n'Paper games with Map Tool over the internet. But it would be great if I could use the exact same device also as a MapTool server. Then everyone could just connect to it without needing one of the players setting up a server on his own computer and without the need of exchanging IP addresses.

Is this possible with MapTool?


cniemira
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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by cniemira »

Found this thread a few days ago when I was looking to do the same: run MT on a standalone server. Didn't want to muck with port forwarding and dynamic DNS, etc, so I knocked a solution together. Here's a quick stab at a standalone server. There's a jar here. Seems to work, but I'm sure it's horribly insecure. Buyer beware and all.

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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by wolph42 »

cniemira wrote:Found this thread a few days ago when I was looking to do the same: run MT on a standalone server. Didn't want to muck with port forwarding and dynamic DNS, etc, so I knocked a solution together. Here's a quick stab at a standalone server. There's a jar here. Seems to work, but I'm sure it's horribly insecure. Buyer beware and all.
can you give the code (or whatever it is that makes the live easier for the devs). Ill inform Craig of this so he can have a look at it for his 1.4 edition hes currently worknig on.

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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by cniemira »

Yup, it's in github, so the source is there for the taking.

It's a pretty nasty hack, though. There's a lot of code duplication because of the way MT is initialized, and the GUI is created very early on. To make it work really cleanly would require a bunch of changes to the MT core classes, and I dunno what's involved in the 1.4 release. I'd be happy to contribute some patches if it would help, though.
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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by JamzTheMan »

cniemira wrote:Yup, it's in github, so the source is there for the taking.

It's a pretty nasty hack, though. There's a lot of code duplication because of the way MT is initialized, and the GUI is created very early on. To make it work really cleanly would require a bunch of changes to the MT core classes, and I dunno what's involved in the 1.4 release. I'd be happy to contribute some patches if it would help, though.
Please do, Craig is doing us a great service moving us forward, and the new source is in GitHub as well. Hit him up and fork 1.4 and see where you can take it! I hope to get back to MT coding this spring myself once RL projects subside.
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smaudet2
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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by smaudet2 »

Thought I'd pipe in for this, I forked the standalone server code I found and added some build stuff to make it easier to patch in:

https://github.com/smaudet/maptool-StandaloneServer

I'm trying to get this working with a remote GM, if I have success with this I'll post here about it.

Currently it seems to be working with the latest build, and I'm using Java 8 on server/client, so far both linux.

EDIT:

Some notes:

1) Works fine if you just load a file, and change the vision. Haven't really been around the program long enough to know if feature X works, but as long as you are just doing what amounts to read only changes, things seem fine.
2) Seems to break as soon as you start modifying the map. Some changes will propogate to clients, but, puzzlingly, I get a message on the GM machine that fog of war won't work. And, it doesn't. But, I can still create new maps, and force my clients onto them and such.
3) No way to persist my changes. I mean, sure, I can save locally. But no easy way to save the the server.

If you can afford to keep your GM copy open, or don't need to make any fog of war changes, and don't need to make map edits this'll probably work for you. No idea how difficult fixing this stuff would be.

EDIT2:

So I have gathered a couple other bits of information which bear mentioning here...

This is for Maptool 1.3 AFAIK, however Maptool 1.4 is close to release. I've tested with/against Maptool 1.3 so far, but ideally I should be able to pull down, build, and test against 1.4. I will post back here with results of that effort, as well as any significant changes I have to make.

Also, MOTE has just been released. I hear rumors that there is closed beta access to the source code, however, considering that that project was KickStarter-ed, it is essentially closed source. Which IMHO makes it a dead beat, for the community anyways. However, they were planning on making a standalone server, which is currently nixed in favor of finishing other features according to their blog. Nevertheless if you are willing to pay some Moula and are willing to wait, and can't figure out how to use this addition (not hard but perhaps you don't have the time/patience to figure out how), then that may be another solution for you.

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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by RPTroll »

Awesome stuff. Recommend reaching out to Craig about patches for a standalone server.
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S0AndS0
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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by S0AndS0 »

https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/view ... 36#p766836
@foobar1234 I've posted the first working draft of how-to setup RPi server for headless or headfull hosting at the above link. In the future I'll be hosting a web site off a RPi that'll have full guides on the different devices I work on.
For a dynamic IP i suggest duckdns or no-ip as those are easy to update, then grab a ~.tk address and edit it's records to point at your domain or the name servers at either duckdns or no-ip. You'll have to set a static IP on your NAT or in your /etc/network/interfaces file and open Maptool's ports with iptables for external client connection to bounce all the way through from the outside world. But in less then a half an hour of setup you should have a server ready to try gaming with.
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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by Kloutier »

I was looking for this same solution. has there been any headway on this and does this still fail with OpenJDK?

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Jagged
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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by Jagged »

Yeah, great stuff. You guys should definitely look at the 1.4 build. It is only just starting to pull away from 1.3b91, so please log into GitHub and make a fork and we can get you added to the 1.4 Forum :)

1.4 Eclipse build instructions can be found here. But I doubt you need them :)

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Re: MapTool as a dedicated (standalone, headless) server?

Post by smaudet2 »

Kloutier wrote:I was looking for this same solution. has there been any headway on this and does this still fail with OpenJDK?
Nope, but I'm looking into things again. I stopped with 1.3, I'm getting back into it with 1.3, I expect to transition pretty soon to 1.4 though here.

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