Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead - Linux Standalone Server 1.52 BETA UPDATED to b.71900

[Maruk]

UPDATED:
Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead - Linux Standalone Server 1.52 BETA build 7900 is available now for testing.

Please provide us with feedback to this topic.

It should significantly improve stability and performance, esp. on quad-core systems)

Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead - Linux Standalone Server 1.52 BETA
================================================== =============

Copyrigt (c) 2010 Bohemia Interactive Studio. All rights reserved.

For more information please visit
http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/A...dicated_Server


Installation instructions:
==========================

1. Following programs must have been installed on your Linux-box:
tar, gcc. Optional: md5sum (for setup integrity check)

1a. On some verions of Linux (this was reported for RedHat 9
and Gentoo linux 2.4.20) the NSCD deamon must be installed to
run ArmA 2 server successfully. Caching of DNS would be sufficient.

2. Copy the whole "ArmA 2 Operation Arrowhead" directory from Windows
to some Linux-directory (arma2arrowhead). DON'T DO ANY DATA CONVERSIONS
(even "dos2unix" translation of text files is not necessary).
Example: you can use PKZIP (WinZip, PowerArchiver, etc.) on
Windows and "unzip" on Linux.
Don't use upper case letters in the ArmA2 directory name
(/home/bob/arma2arrowhead will be good, /home/bob/ArmA2ArrowHead
may cause some troubles).
ArmA2 directory should contain subdirectories "Addons", "Bin",
"Campaigns", etc.

3. Copy the "server-x.xx.tar.gz" (x.xx is version number) file into
the arma2arrowhead directory. Unpack and install it with commands:

arma2arrowhead$ tar -xjf server-x.xx.tar.bz2
arma2arrowhead$ ./install

Watch the messages - they will inform you whether your installation
is successful.

4. Dedicated server can be started in foreground:

arma2arrowhead$ ./server

Or in background:

o$ nohup ./server > out.txt 2> err.txt &
[1] <pid>

5. Running server can be stopped by executing:

$ kill -s SIGINT <pid>

Where <pid> is process-id of mother server thread (printed out in
"nohup" command).

6. ArmA2 ArrowHead server has a feature: command-line parameter
"-pid=<pid_file>". It causes creation of <pid_file> with
PID of root ArmA2 process. If IP port specified in "-port=<nn>"
parameter is busy (in usage), ArmA2 will terminate immediately
and <pid_file> won't be written..

7. The "arma2server" script is provided for automatic server
start/restart/status query/etc. Please be sure to edit
CONFIGURATION PARAMETERS in lines 12 to 18 !
After this is done, install (hard-link?) the script into
"/etc/rc.d/init.d/arma2server" file. After that it can be managed
by "chkconfig" (see info/man).

[_X_]

Awesome. I'm very glad to see that you're keeping us informed. Going to try this out now/tomorrow.

[Defunkt]

Great, thank you BIS. Can I ask for details on how the folders should be arranged and the command line set for a combined OA-with-A2 installation?

[Maruk]

There are two ways to run merged version.

Very simple way is to start the exe in this style:

ARMA2OAPATH\ARMA2OA.exe -mod=ARMA2PATH;ARMA2OAPATH\EXPANSION"

However, best way is going to be replicate structure of merged game installation (e.g. sprocket versions installed into each other) but I currently have not it avail on this system. It is important to understand the role of mods now in the game: to pre-filter games for clients.

It is highly recommended that servers report to have the correct mods, depending on what is currently running there (e.g. A2, A2+OA, A2+OA+USERMOD etc.)

[TCEd]

so... seeing that our ArmA2 Linux server still doesn't have a patch for the recent 1.07 patch, will this patch work instead? If not, then can anyone give me a clue as to when you plan on releasing the Linux server files for recent 1.07 patch???? Our main battle server is dead in the water atm...

[Defunkt]

Originally Posted by Maruk

However, best way is going to be replicate structure of merged game installation (e.g. sprocket versions installed into each other) but I currently have not it avail on this system. It is important to understand the role of mods now in the game: to pre-filter games for clients.

Okay mixed success with this so far. Within my existing ArmA2 install I have created...

./expansion/addons
./expansion/dta
./expansion/battleye
./expansion/keys

...and copied these files from my Windows install (or beserver .so/.cfg) making sure they're all lowercased. I've replaced the 1.05 server binary with the new one and it starts fine with...

./server -mod=expansion (other parameters omitted)

...and I can load and play OA content quite happily. When I try to run a mission that uses A2 content, either a custom mission or a default mission like 01. Deathmatch the log shows "Reading mission..." and my client shows "Wait For Host" and neither progresses after that no matter how long I wait (no further entries are written to the log). CPU utilisation sits between 60 and 90% (one core). Running Debian (Etch).

[Defunkt]

Noticed (when trying -exthreads=1) in the server browser it was showing ca;expansion;@expansion so removed the -mod parameter but no change to described behavior. Not sure if the server thinks I'm in the game or not (browser shows me as playing), I suppose this might be a client issue.

EDIT: Not sure why this didn't append to the previous post as usual.

[LoneStar]

Thank you very much for all this information Maruk

Really appreciated

[Defunkt]

Originally Posted by Defunkt

Okay mixed success with this so far.

...

I suppose this might be a client issue.

Working now, the only things that changed in the interim were;

1. I added -cpucount=2 to the server startup script (not in the original ArmA2 version).

2. I added the correct Operation Arrowhead Player ID to my squad.xml.

[_X_]

Ran the server with only -cpucount=8 and it stayed up for about 5 hours before it segfaulted while running the 16 player CTI map. I played a bit at the start and 10 minutes before it crashed and had about 10 people playing on the server towards the end. Performance wise it seemed comparable to ArmA2, but my memory is a bit fuzzy tbh; the fps was at 20-25 with it dipping blow 20 every now and then. Nobody seemed to desync and as far as I could tell there was no JIP lag (this seems more wrong to me than anything ).