Configuring hippoVend Vendors

hippoVEND is a popular vending system from Hippo Technologies that allows you to easily sell products in Second Life. hippoVEND consists of one or more servers that supply information to product vendors. As customers visit your Second Life store, they may purchase from your vendor. The server acts to actually deliver the product and it records the sale. As a sale takes place, the hippoVEND Server can notify SL Commerce Manager so that the data becomes available immediately in your reports.

The hippoVEND Server supports the Automated Notification System, just as SL Marketplace does. However, the configuration and function is slightly different.

Note: You must create an account at SL Commerce Manager before data is accepted from any external service such as Hippo!

To configure your hippoVEND Server, log in to Second Life, click the server and choose Edit. Find the configuration note card, which is named “_config”. For general information on configuring the hippoVEND server, please visit http://www.hippo-technologies.co.uk/resources/hippovend/gettingstarted.php.

Near the bottom of the card, you’ll find five lines that look like this:

    USE ANS: <Yes/No>
    ANS EMAIL: <address>
    ANS URL: <address>
    ANS SECURITY CODE: <string of numbers and or letters>
    ANS VERIFICATION: <Yes/No>
    

Edit the note card, supplying it with the following values:

    USE ANS: Yes
    ANS EMAIL: 
    ANS URL: http://www.slcommercemanager.com/Add/Transaction
    ANS SECURITY CODE: YourCode
    ANS VERIFICATION: Yes

The Security Code is a code that you create and can be a string of letters and numbers. When a transaction is made in your vendor, this code will be transmitted to SL Commerce Manager, allowing SL Commerce Manager to verify that the transaction came from an authorized source, since only you know your Security Code.

Note: You must enter this Security Code at SL Commerce before your configuration is complete.

The ANS Verification option instructs the hippoVEND Server to continue sending its notification until it receives an acknowledgement that it has been received by SL Commerce Manager. However, the hippoVEND Server has a relatively small queue, so items may be purged from the queue. Since SL Commerce Manager runs on a load balanced, redundant platform, downtime is not expected to be significant.

For hippoVEND ANS-specific configuration information, please see: http://www.hippo-technologies.co.uk/resources/hippovend/ans.php

hippoVEND: http://www.hippo-technologies.co.uk/products/hippovend/index.php

For information on how to upload historical data from the Hippo web site, click here