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(Note to translators: when working on this document please do not translate the commands (in bold) or the expressions in "double quotes" to the target language. They must be left in English because they are the actual commands that must be used with the dogs.)
VKC Essentials
Hi - welcome to the world of VKC (Virtual Kennel Club) Dogs and congratulations on your purchase! This document is intended to teach you the essential things you need to know in order to become acquainted with your dog and start to enjoy playing with him.
VKC dogs are "physical" in Second Life (SL), which means they obey the laws of physics in-world. They jump and run along the ground. You'll feel it if they run into you! They obey direct commands (most of the time, anyway) and also act on their own. They are curious and interact with things and people around them. As you train and condition them, they develop their own unique personality. They all start out a little different, and over the course of a little time, every dog becomes a unique personality.
When you first get your dog, please DO NOT open his contents like you would a box of clothing or you'll break him. As soon as you see him, he's ready to go.
Your VKC dog is "no-mod/no-copy/transfer", which means you can give a dog as a gift. (But please rez him once before you give him away so he can register himself.) If you ever lose your dog, come to the Clinic at the VKC Dog Park to reclaim him. We will explain more of this later in the document.
So play with your dog, teach him new tricks, and watch him grow and change as he learns. But, most of all HAVE FUN!
Getting Started
When you first purchase a VKC dog, his name is Pup. So the first thing you will want to do is give him a proper name. The command you use is -- pup name <newname>
For Example:
pup name Fido
For purposes of this manual, we will assume that your dog is named Fido and that he is a boy.
Basic Commands
Every VKC Dog knows the same basic commands when he is new (except the Chows that have a few extra). The dogs only understand commands in English. This is a list of them with explanations of what they do
(Note to translators: in the following lines, please leave the command in English, but add a translated explanation in the parentheses.)
|
Fido sit |
(sit down) |
| Fido stand | (stand up) |
| Fido down | (lay down ) |
|
Fido
bang |
(play dead) |
|
Fido
beg |
(sit up with paws in air) |
|
Fido
bellyup |
(lay on back with paws in the air) |
|
Fido
shake |
(offer paw as if to shake hands) |
|
Fido
come |
(go to the speaker) |
| Fido heel | (follow you - [only works for dog's owner]) |
| Fido wander |
(choose something at random and go to look at it) |
| Fido wag | (wag your tail) |
| Fido speak | (bark) |
| Fido howl | (howl like a wolf) |
| Fido sniff | (head down, makes sniffing noise) |
| Fido go |
(this is for Fido to go to to a person or thing. For example: Fido
go Blu -- Fido walks to Blu) |
| Fido help | (tells basic commands in chat) |
| Fido manual | (gives you a link to the online manual at virtualkennelclub.com. The manual is only available in English) |
You can also string the basic commands together. For example:
Fido go Blu speak sit
(Fido goes to Blu [person], barks and sits down)
Fido come wag sit
(Fido comes to you, wags tail and sits down)
Active, Passive and Settle
These are important and useful commands that help to make your dog's behaviour more interesting and helps to keep him safe from getting lost.
Fido active
This means that Fido will choose things to do at random from the list of tricks that he knows. It also means that he will look for interesting people or things to go and say hi to. Sometimes he will see something that is a long way off, or a long way up, and he will run off to greet it. (This can cause problems if Fido runs into a neighbouring parcel were scripts are not allowed because he will not be able to do anything and, even if you shout for him to come back, he will not be able to respond.)
When Fido is active, you can use the commands good and bad to show him which things that he does that you like and dislike. For example, if Fido comes running up to you when you log in or when you come home, say: Fido good and he will learn that you like him to do this. Alternatively, if Fido sits and howls all night and keeps you awake, you can say: Fido bad right after he stops howling, and he will learn that it is not such a smart thing to do. "Good" and "bad" take a little while for him to learn, so do not be surprised if you have to say it a few times before he starts to realize!
Fido passive
This means that Fido will be very quiet. He will not do anything until you tell him to.
Fido settle
This means that Fido will stay on the same parcel of land that he is on when you give the command. With a combination of "active" and "settle", Fido will be able to run around on your parcel and enjoy himself, but will not be able to stray very far.
Fido roam
This releases the settle command.
Teaching New Tricks
Simple Example
One of the joys of owning a VKC Dog is to be able to teach new "custom" tricks. Here is a very simple example to get you started:
Fido learn wave stand wait .2 sit wait .2 shake wait .2 beg wait .2 shake wait .2 sit
Now we'll explain what it means:
"Learn" is a special command. When you say "Fido learn <something>", he knows that the next thing that you say is going to be the name of a new trick, and that everything that comes after that (the <something> part) is a list of commands that makes up the new trick.
So, in the example, "wave" is the name of the new trick and everything from the word "stand" onwards are commands that Fido will do when he performs the trick.
You will notice the "wait" commands in the trick. These make a slight pause between the other actions. "Wait" needs an amount of time to go with it -- the time in seconds to wait before moving to the next action. In the example, it is: "wait .2". So that means 0.2 of a second. You can have whole seconds or fractions of a second in the "wait" commands to fine tune the pauses that you want in your tricks.
Toy Tricks
There is a simple free toy available for the VKC Dogs called redball. To play with the redball, put it on the ground and say: Fido fetch
Fido will go to the redball, pick it up, come to you and drop it.
The "fetch" command is special in that it only works with the redball. If you have toys that have been made by yourself of by other people, you will need to teach Fido custom trick in order for him to play with that toy.
Let us assume that you have a toy called "bone" and you want to teach Fido to fetch it. Here is the command:
Fido go bone sniff take bone come wag drop bone
But, that is a lot of typing every time you want Fido to fetch the bone. Let's make it into a trick:
Fido learn playbone go bone sniff take bone come wag drop bone
Now all you have to say is: Fido playbone and, provided that he can see where the bone is, he'll play!
Marks
A "mark" is like a SL landmark (LM), but for dogs. If Fido is standing in a particular place, perhaps by the fire in your house, you could say:
Fido mark fire
Fido would then make a mark (create a LM in his memory) and whenever you said something like this:
Fido go fire down
he would go over near to the fire and lie down.
Mark Tricks
Many people make beds for the VKC Dogs, and many people ask how to make the dog go to bed. This is how we do it:
Put the bed where you want it to go. It is important to do this now and get it right because if you change it later, you may have to redo all of the following parts again!
Put Fido onto the bed. (It is best to say: Fido passive first, so that he doesn't get excited and start running around.) It is easiest to put Fido onto the bed using the SL Edit tools. Just right click on your dog and choose Edit. Then use the arrows to position him where he should be. Close the Edit window when he is in place.
Now say: Fido mark bed (This makes Fido's mark at the position of his bed.)
Call Fido to you and say: Fido on bed sniff wag down Fido will move slowly onto the bed, sniff it, wag his tail and lay down. It is worth practicing this a few times and you may want to add a "wait" command between the other actions. When you have it perfected, you can teach it as a custom trick:
Fido learn sleep on bed sniff wait .2 wag wait .3 down
The VKC Dog Clinic
Sometimes, "despite our best efforts." things go wrong. The VKC Dogs get damaged and stop working, or they get lost and you simply cannot find them. When this happens, all is not lost! Come to one of our many VKC Dog Clinics and claim your dog. This is how it works:
Walk up to the clinic and say "claim
claim Fido
Your dog will appear in your inventory in the Objects folder as the name of its breed. When you first rez him, your dog will automatically change to its proper name. Then when you return it to inventory, he will go into the Objects folder with your dog's name.
When you reclaim your dog from the Vet Station, it is not the same as buying a new dog. It is *your* dog that comes back to you...with his memories, his marks and the tricks you've taught him!