🦖ARK Overseer v1.0.0

Added

• VisibleData The map list updates without a release. ARK Overseer checks once a day for a newer map list in this repository and uses it when it is newer than its own. If the check fails, the list that shipped stays in use.
• VisibleUI Update progress. After you click Update, the This computer page shows each step as it happens, from the Windows approval prompt through the download, the install and the restart. It says so when the update didn’t start or failed, and a page opened mid-update joins the running one.
• VisibleDocs Contributing guide and contributor agreement. Pull requests need a signed contributor license agreement, which keeps the AGPL and commercial licenses both possible. CONTRIBUTING.md lists the checks a pull request has to pass.
• VisibleDocs Third-party notices in every release. Each release zip includes THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md, which lists the bundled programs and packages with their licenses.
• VisibleDocs README rewritten for installing from a release. It covers the download install, updating, reaching ARK Overseer from other devices and putting it behind Cloudflare Access.
• VisibleServerDocs Install from a download. A release is one zip. Unpack it anywhere, double-click Install ARK Overseer, approve the Windows prompt, and ARK Overseer runs as a service with its own copy of Node. It needs no Git, npm or separate Node install. Uninstall ARK Overseer removes the service and asks before it touches your data.
• InternalServer Release builds. Pushing a version tag builds the release zip and its checksum on GitHub, and every push to main refreshes a rolling Edge build.
• VisibleUIServer Update from GitHub. The This computer page can update from GitHub. Pick Stable, Beta or Edge, read the release notes, and go back to an earlier release if a new one causes trouble. Updating from a checkout folder still works.
• VisibleUISecurity Cloudflare Access sign-in. If ARK Overseer sits behind Cloudflare Access, add your team domain, AUD tag and public address on the This computer page, and anyone who gets through Access skips the second password prompt. With those boxes empty nothing changes.
• VisibleUISettings Settings search finds settings by meaning. The Settings page searches every category again. Typing “baby” lists every matching setting from any category, each labeled with where it lives. A phrase no setting’s words match, such as “make dinos grow up faster”, brings up the settings closest in meaning, like Baby Mature Speed Multiplier, as fields you can edit right there. If searching by meaning isn’t available, the page says so.
• VisibleServer Update button. On the computer that runs the service, the This computer page shows the commit it runs and an Update button. Windows asks for administrator approval, the service redeploys the checkout’s last commit and restarts, and the page reloads when it’s back. The page also shows whether the last update worked.
• VisibleDocs Licensed under the AGPL-3.0 instead of the GPL-3.0, and commercial licenses are available. A game hosting company that runs a changed copy of ARK Overseer for its customers must give those customers its source code, or buy a commercial license. Running your own servers, changed or not, stays free.
• InternalData SQLite database with versioned migrations. It stores hosts, installs, servers, clusters, jobs, schedules, backups, users with their passkeys, and the audit log. It refuses to open a database written by a newer version.
• InternalSettings Settings engine for GameUserSettings.ini and Game.ini. It covers all 346 documented server options, changes only the keys a save names, and keeps each file’s encoding, byte order mark and line endings. A key missing from the file reads as unset, never as zero, and a key that is present reads as its real type, so False reads as off. npm run check confirms every documented option is either a field or listed as editable only in the raw INI.
• InternalSecurity Settings validation refuses line breaks, number fields holding anything but a plain number, and changes to locked fields. A request can no longer slip its own keys into an INI file.
• InternalSettings Local semantic search over the settings catalog. A failed model download is retried on the next search instead of failing until restart.
• InternalServer Job engine for installs, updates, backups and restarts. Jobs are stored in the database, so a job queued before a restart still runs, and one cut off by a restart is marked interrupted. Only one job runs at a time per server and per install, and a job can be scheduled for later or cancelled while it runs.
• InternalServer Live job progress over Server-Sent Events. A browser gets the current queued and running jobs when it connects, then every change as it happens. A slow connection gets only the latest progress for each job.
• InternalServer Per-server process supervisor. It starts, stops and watches each server’s ArkAscendedServer.exe, and it treats a process as its own only when the pid, executable path and start time all match, so it never stops another server. A stop saves the world over RCON and waits up to three minutes before forcing. A crashed server restarts after a growing delay, and restarts pause after more than three crashes in ten minutes.
• InternalServer SteamCMD manager. It downloads and sets up SteamCMD itself, then installs, updates and validates the ASA dedicated server as jobs with live download progress, and it reads the installed build from the app manifest. A failed or cancelled update leaves the install marked installed if the old build is intact, and broken if not. A server cannot start while its install is being changed.
• InternalServer Port allocation. Each new server gets the lowest free game port from 7777 in steps of two, so its peer port stays free, plus a query port from 27015 and an RCON port from 27020. A port counts as taken when another server on the same machine uses it for any role, or when a running program is listening on it. A server’s ports are changed only if none of them is taken, and the error names what holds each one.
• InternalSecurity Windows Firewall preview. For each server it lists the inbound rules needed for the game and query ports, notes which existing rules already allow them, and builds the exact script that would add the rest. It reads the rules Windows keeps in the registry, so it sees rules limited to one app, service or network and doesn’t count them. When it can’t read the rules, or group policy turns off local rules, the page says so. Nothing is changed until that script is applied, which takes a single administrator prompt. RCON is never opened in the firewall.
• InternalServerData Import from the Phase 0 dashboard. It reads each server’s profile, ports, player limit, mods, BattlEye setting, session name and installed build, and shows a preview with every settings and save file and its hash. Before anything is recorded it copies the settings files and the live world, player and tribe files into a snapshot, then adds the server stopped, so the old dashboard keeps running it. Nothing in the dashboard folder or the server’s files is changed. An import stops if a settings file was edited after the preview or a port or name clash appears. node tools/import-preview.js <dashboard folder> prints the preview without importing.
• InternalServer Steam library installs are left to Steam. An install inside a Steam library is recorded as such, and ARK Overseer refuses to update or validate it with SteamCMD.
• InternalServer Web server and JSON API. npm start runs ARK Overseer on port 3310 with its own database in the data folder. The API covers the host check, SteamCMD, installs, servers and their ports, settings, jobs with live progress, the firewall preview and apply, and the Phase 0 import. A firewall change runs only if it matches the preview that was shown. Browsers check each page file for changes when it loads, so an updated ARK Overseer never runs old scripts from the cache.
• InternalSecurity Sign-in. ARK Overseer has its own password, a session that can be remembered for 90 days, passkeys, and a five-minute lockout after five wrong passwords. The first password can only be set on the computer that runs it. Changing the password signs every other device out. node tools/reset-password.js clears the password and passkeys. Requests from other sites, and requests addressed to a name that isn’t this computer, are refused.
• VisibleUI Browser interface on port 3310. The first visit asks for a password, and that visit has to come from the computer running ARK Overseer. Each server has an overview with Start, Stop and Restart, a settings page for all 346 options, and a network page for its ports and firewall rules. Settings can be searched, every change is listed for review before it is saved, and leaving with unsaved edits asks first. Install and update jobs show their progress as they run. The pages fit a phone held upright.
• VisibleUIServer Setup wizard. It walks through creating a server: a check of this computer, SteamCMD, the install folder, name, map and player limit, a starting set of game rules, ports, and the admin and join passwords. Nothing is created until the last page, and a retry after a failure never makes a second install or server. The same wizard can instead import a server from the Phase 0 dashboard, showing any clash or problem before anything is copied.
• VisibleUIServer Scheduled restarts, backups and updates. A new Automation page on each server sets when it restarts, backs up, checks for updates and updates itself: every day, every week or every few hours. Players see a warning in game before a restart or an update. An update backs up every server on the install first and brings back the ones that were running, even if the update fails. If ARK Overseer was closed when a run was due, it catches up within half an hour and skips anything older. The overview shows when a newer server build is out, with a button to check now.
• VisibleData Backups. Each backup holds the world save and the server settings, with a hash for every file, and Back up now takes one on the spot. The oldest scheduled and manual backups go once there are more than the number to keep. Backups taken before an update are always kept.
• VisibleServerSecurity Runs as a Windows service. tools\service.ps1 install sets ARK Overseer up as a service that starts with Windows and runs as the built-in Network Service account from its own copy of the checkout’s last commit, with its own copies of Node, shawl and PowerShell 7, all under C:\ProgramData\ARK Overseer. The installer checks both downloads against their published SHA-256, gives Network Service only the folders it needs, and keeps other local accounts out of the database and logs. In service mode the Network page hands over the firewall script as a file to run as an administrator, since a service can’t show the administrator prompt.
• VisibleServer Stopping ARK Overseer saves every running world first. Each running server gets a SaveWorld and keeps running, and ARK Overseer picks it back up on the next start.
• InternalSettings The search model cache can live outside the code folder. OVERSEER_MODEL_CACHE sets it, and the service keeps it in its data folder.
• VisibleUIServer Gaming mode. The new This computer page turns it on. While a game runs on the same PC, ARK Overseer lowers its servers’ priority to Below normal or Lowest and keeps them off the cores set aside for the game, which is half of them unless you pick a number. It spots games that Steam, Epic, GOG, Battle.net, EA, Ubisoft or Riot started, plus any program you list, and it works when ARK Overseer runs as a service. Servers go back to normal about 30 seconds after the game closes, when gaming mode is turned off, and when ARK Overseer stops.
• VisibleUIServer Maps page for each server. It shows the current map with its picture and when it was last saved, every map saved on the server’s install with its world size, players and tribes, and the other maps ARK Overseer knows about. A saved map folder that isn’t in the map list is still shown, by its folder name.
• VisibleUIData Map pictures from Steam. Pictures load from Steam’s servers in your browser, and This computer has a switch to turn them off and show plain map names. A mod map shows the picture the mod ships with, read from the server’s own files.
• InternalDataServer Map list that can be updated without a new release. The list ships with ARK Overseer. If OVERSEER_CATALOG_URL names an https address, ARK Overseer checks it at start and once a day, and keeps a newer list only if it passes validation.
• VisibleServerData One server per install. ASA keeps a server’s settings and saves inside its install, so two servers on one install would overwrite each other. Creating or importing a second server on an install is refused and names the server already there. A database that already holds such a pair keeps working.
• VisibleUIServer Switch a server to another map. Each map on the Maps page except the current one has a Switch to this map button. Players get a countdown in game, then the world is saved, the server stops, and ARK Overseer backs up the current map’s world and the settings. It then starts the server on the new map and waits until the server’s log says it is ready for players. If the server doesn’t start, crashes, or isn’t ready within 20 minutes, ARK Overseer puts the old map back and starts it again. If ARK Overseer itself restarts in the middle of a switch, the old map and mods are put back at the next start, and a server that was running comes back on the old map. Start, Stop and Restart are refused while a switch is running. A stopped server is only backed up and pointed at the new map. A map with no save starts a new world, and the old map’s save stays on disk for when you switch back.
• VisibleModsUI Maps from mods you have already downloaded need no CurseForge key. ARK Overseer reads the mods folder of the server’s install, so a mod’s maps show up with the mod’s name and picture on the Maps page and can be switched to. Switching to a mod map whose mod isn’t in the server’s list asks first, then adds the mod as part of the switch.
• VisibleData Backups taken before a map change. They are labeled Before a map change, and pruning never removes them.
• VisibleUIData Backups page, with restore. Each server has a Backups tab between Maps and Network. It lists every backup by day with its time, kind, map, size and a note you can edit, and it holds Back up now, which moved over from Automation. A backup that ARK Overseer took before it replaced files or changed the map is marked as a safety backup. Manual and scheduled backups can be deleted; the rest are kept.
• VisibleServerData Restore everything, the world, the settings, or chosen players and tribes from a backup. The job checks every file it will use against the hashes recorded when the backup was made, warns players in game, saves and stops the server, and takes a safety backup of what it is about to replace. It copies the backup’s files next to the live ones, checks each copy, then swaps them in. If any step fails, the live files are exactly as they were and a server that was running is started again. If the server doesn’t start or finish loading on the restored files, the safety backup is put back and the server is started again. Restoring players and tribes touches only the files you tick. A backup of another map restores that map and leaves the server on its own; the restored world is used the next time it runs that map. Start, Stop and Restart are refused while a restore runs. If ARK Overseer restarts partway through, it settles the files at its next start and starts the server again if it was running.
• VisibleUISettings Named settings snapshots. The Backups page saves the server’s settings files under a name, while the server runs. Compare shows each key that was added, removed or changed since the snapshot, with both values side by side; comments and blank lines don’t count. Restore writes a snapshot’s files over the current ones after a safety backup, without stopping the server. A running server uses them after its next restart. Snapshots can be renamed and deleted.
• InternalData Database migration 8. Backups record their map and a note. Settings snapshots and unfinished restores each get a table. Every existing backup keeps its row and id, and a backup from before this version gets its map from its file list the first time the list is read.
• InternalSecurity PATCH requests get the same protection as POST, PUT and DELETE. They are refused from another site and need a JSON body. A backup’s file list is read only from inside the backup folder, is refused over 20 MB, and can name only paths under the world save or settings folders.
• VisibleUISettings Settings changed outside ARK Overseer are noticed. ARK Overseer keeps a copy of the settings files as it last wrote them. It compares the files with that copy when a settings or backups page loads, after a server stops, when it starts, and every 10 minutes. The Settings page shows how many settings differ and when they were found, and Review lists each one with ARK Overseer’s value beside the current value. You can keep the current values, put ARK Overseer’s values back, or choose setting by setting. Putting values back takes a safety backup first and keeps comments, keys ARK Overseer has no control for, and their order. A password shows only that it changed. A server with changes nobody has looked at is marked in the server list. Start, Stop, Restart and saving settings are refused while a put-back runs, and a running server uses the values after its next restart.
• VisibleServerSettings Option to put ARK Overseer’s settings back after a stop. ASA can write its own values into the settings files as it shuts down, which undoes a save made while it ran. With this option on, which is off by default, the settings ARK Overseer has a control for go back to what it saved as soon as the server stops, and the next start waits for that. Other changes stay listed for you to review.
• InternalData Migration 9 adds the settings_baselines and settings_drift tables. The first records what ARK Overseer last wrote to each server’s settings files, and the second records a change found since then and whether anyone has looked at it. Deleting a server deletes both rows.
• VisibleUI Map pictures in the server list. Each server in the list shows a small picture of its map beside its name, map and status: the Steam picture for an official map, or the picture a CurseForge map’s mod download carries. A map with no picture, or an official map while Steam pictures are turned off, shows a drawing of an island at dusk instead. The list is a little wider to fit them.
• VisibleUI Phones, tablets and touch screens. Below 721 px wide, or under 560 px tall, the server list moves into a menu that slides out from the left and closes with a swipe, so a phone held sideways works too. Between 721 and 1024 px it shrinks to a column of map pictures that expands over the page when tapped. The list scrolls by itself, so Sign out is always in reach. On a touch screen, buttons and links are at least 44 px tall, and dialogs rise from the bottom of the screen and move up when the keyboard opens.
• VisibleServerUI Clusters, for moving survivors, creatures and items between servers. A new Clusters page groups servers so players can upload at an obelisk or transmitter on one and download on another. Each cluster gets a cluster ID and a shared folder, which by default sits in ARK Overseer’s data folder. A custom folder must be on a local drive, and ARK Overseer checks that Network Service can write to it. Settings the cluster shares are written to every member, and a member can keep its own value for any of them; its Settings page marks which ones come from the cluster. Restart all restarts the running members one at a time with a countdown in game, so the others stay up, and it can be scheduled. Start all and Stop all go member by member. A change to a server’s cluster takes effect at its next start.
• InternalData Migration 10 adds cluster settings, notes and per-server overrides, and lets a schedule target a cluster. Existing servers and schedules keep their rows, and a cluster with no folder gets the default one.
• VisibleServerUI Clone a server, move it to another folder, and run an action on several servers at once. Clone, on a server’s Overview page, makes a new server on a new install with its own ports and the same map, mods and settings. It starts a fresh world unless you choose to copy the world too. Move to another folder copies the server’s install to a new folder, checks every save and settings file against its hash, and starts the server again if it was running. The old folder is kept for you to delete once the server runs well from the new one, and nothing is deleted for you. Both check free space first, and Browse folders picks the folder, as it now does in the setup wizard too. A new Servers page runs Start, Stop, Restart or Update on the servers you select, one at a time, and stops at the first one that fails. If ARK Overseer stops partway through a move or a clone, it sorts it out the next time it starts.
• InternalData Migration 11 adds tables that track a move or clone in progress. ARK Overseer uses them to recover one cut off by a restart, and a clone that fails removes only the files it created.
• InternalSecurity Passwords typed for a clone stay out of the job list and the jobs table. They are held in memory until the clone finishes, and the job list also drops any parameter whose name ends in Password.
• VisibleServer ARK Overseer answers on IPv6 as well as IPv4. http://[::1]:3310 now works on the computer running it, and so does the computer’s IPv6 address on your network. A computer with IPv6 turned off keeps working over IPv4 as before, and OVERSEER_HOST still sets a single address.

Fixed

• VisibleServer A failed update no longer leaves ARK Overseer uninstalled. The new version is copied next to the running one before the service stops, and if a later step fails, the previous version and its service are put back. The Update button used to fail this way every time, because the install tried to replace the PowerShell copy the updater was running from.