The PD Support Service (PDSS) is a batch analytics service that scans character and guild PDR save files from Backup Service snapshots and generates statistical reports. Despite its name suggesting a relationship with the Persistent Data Service (PDS), PDSS reads the standard BS-based PDR character saves — the same files that CPlayerManager writes via CBackupMsgSaveFile.

The service binary is pd_support_service (ryzom/server/src/pd_support_service/). It is built on the same generic module host as GUS, but its real functionality comes from a built-in character/guild scanning system and scheduled job commands.

PDSS reads character save files (account_*_?_pdr.bin) from a BS backup directory, deserializes them into CStatsScanCharacter objects (a lightweight PDR-compatible mirror of the full character data), applies filters, extracts information, and writes CSV-style output files.

This was used at Nevrax to generate daily player activity reports: active player counts, inactive player analysis, per-shard breakdowns, churn metrics.

Scan jobs are defined in script files (under scripts/) with three types of directives:

• inputFileRule — select which save files to scan (FDC cache, file age, date range, largest file per account)
• filter — select which characters pass through (by skill level, guild membership, money, shard)
• infoExtractor — select which data to extract from matching characters (name, position, skills, play time, activity dates)

Example — filters_active.pdss_css:

inputFileRule AddFilesFromFdcCache
inputFileRule FileAge 0 14
inputFileRule LargestFile

Example — fields_active.pdss_css:

infoExtractor Name
infoExtractor Race
infoExtractor Cult
infoExtractor Position
infoExtractor HighestSkills
infoExtractor Money
infoExtractor Sessions
infoExtractor PlayTime
infoExtractor ActivityDuration
infoExtractor FirstActivityDate
infoExtractor LastActivityDate
infoExtractor ActiveMissions

Example — filters_lvl1_inactive.pdss_css (low-level players who quit):

inputFileRule AddFilesFromFdcCache
inputFileRule Since 01/01/2007
inputFileRule FileAge 7
inputFileRule LargestFile

filter BestSkill 1 1
filter NoGuild

Jobs are queued via the addCharScanJob command with an output path and one or more script files:

addCharScanJob ../stats/active14_aniro  filters_active.pdss_css fields_active.pdss_css filters_aniro.pdss_css

Multiple script files are combined — the first might define what "active" means, the second what fields to extract, and the third filters to a specific shard.

The JobUpdatesPerUpdate setting controls how many file reads happen per service update tick, keeping the service responsive.

Each job produces:

• A character table CSV with one row per matching character and columns for each info extractor
• Frequency tables that count occurrences of values (e.g. how many characters last logged in on each date)

Scanning a backup directory with tens of thousands of save files is expensive. The FDC cache (fdcCacheAddFileSpecRecurse) pre-scans the directory listing once and caches it in memory, so multiple scan jobs can share the file list without re-scanning the filesystem.

fdcCacheClear
fdcCacheAddFileSpecRecurse /home/nevrax/save_shard_backups/latest/characters/account_*_?_pdr.bin

PDSS supports HourlyCommands and DailyCommands config variables. In the Nevrax deployment, daily commands would:

1. Run external shell scripts (hourly_script.sh, daily_script.sh)
2. Rebuild the FDC cache from the latest BS backup snapshot
3. Queue scan jobs for various reports (active 7-day, active 14-day, inactive per-shard, inactive by date range)

In addition to character scanning, PDSS can scan guild save files via stats_guild_scan_job.cpp and stats_guild_commands.cpp, extracting guild-level statistics.

PDSS runs standalone — no NS, no TICKS, no shard connection needed:

DontUseNS = 1;
DontUseTS = 1;
DontUseAES = 1;

InputFileDirectory = "/path/to/save_shard_backups/latest/characters/";
OutputFileDirectory = "../stats/";
ScriptDirectory = "../live/service_pd_support_service/scripts/";

PDSS is built as part of the Ryzom Core server suite. The scanning code is functional and can read current PDR character saves. The original .pdss_css script files are included in the source tree under ryzom/server/src/pd_support_service/scripts/. PDSS is not part of the standard Ryzom Core 4 shard deployment but can be run standalone against any BS backup directory containing character saves.

• Server Reference — All shard services
• Backup Service — Where the save files come from