So Linden Lab Wants Us All To Be Naked?

[Perrie Juran]

A recent comment in a thread prompted me to look at something I hadn't looked at before and I was seriously shocked by what I found.

Some of us here remember the days of the ARC Wars.  A serious blemish in the history of Second Life.  In the never ending quest to fight lag and to lay blame for it, people started looking at this number called "avatar render cost," or "ARC" for short.  And bedlam took over the grid.

All of the sudden there were ARC Police showing up everywhere pointing fingers at anyone who's ARC number was not in 'the green.'  They would IM you and chastise you for being in the 'red.'  I even witnessed the public humiliation of Avatars when one of these ARC Police would announce in Local Chat, "Everyone want to know why you are lagging so bad? Blame it on So and So.  Their ARC number is off the scale!"

It was a terrible time in the history of Second Life.

So now Linden Lab has introduced a new standard of Measure, Avatar Render Weight (pops).  I had  never really looked at this till a recent comment prompted me to and was amazed by what I found.

Just  as in days of old, Linden Lab has chosen to color code the numbers, as your cost goes up, the colors change till until you are, gasp, IN THE RED ZONE!

So the past few days I have been watching these numbers.  I believe it is at 40,000 units you pop into the RED ZONE.  And just about every where I went almost everyone was IN THE RED.  We are talking about 99% of the Avatars I saw were IN THE RED.

Stopping by a well known Formal Dance club, the average Avatar (males a little lower than females overall) was weighted at about 130,000 units.  One girl I saw there topped the chart at around 220,000 units.  At other clubs 80,000 to 120,000 units was about the norm.  I never saw any one in THE GREEN. (OK, I know in the official viewer it's 'yellow,' but I mainly use Firestorm). 

So I thought to myself, lets try a nude beach.  And while the numbers decreased dramatically, most were still in the RED.

So soliciting the help of a friend I started looking at what was causing these high numbers.  Some of the most common and biggest culprits were Prim Shoes.  Shoes from some of the top designers were adding on average 40,000 and even more points.  Pieces of Jewelry would add 10,000 to 20,000 points.  Prim feet would add 30,000 to 40,000 points, hence the high numbers at the nude beach.  You can do your own tests to see what other things do.

So what is my point to all of this?

Linden Lab needs to get "real" about the issue of Avatar Render Weight.  Most of us want to look good in SL and the fact of the matter is you can not do it with out going into what Linden Lab has designated as THE RED ZONE.  Color coding the numbers at the current levels is completely out of touch with reality.  And if it is indicative of how they are dealing with the problems of lag and region crossings, then the problem is even bigger.

Unless they want us to spend all our time naked in SL.

just my two cents worth.

[Phil Deakins]

I'd never heard of that before.

 

Just a note: Turning 'Show Draw Weight for Avatars' on disables the ability to see floating text anywhere on the parcel you are in, and maybe in the whole sim you are in. Turning it off again doesn't return the floating text but TPing to a different sim and back sets it back to normal. Just an oversight on LL's part.

[iCade]

Wow, just did a test while fishing. About 10 people around me. Every single one of them red, including myself.

 

[12:37] #Firestorm LSL Bridge v2.3: 'iCade Resident' [84/84] running scripts. 2064Kb consumed for 0.053779ms of cpu time.

Dunno about you, but for a fully decked out avatar including jewelry and such, my Kb count is pretty reasonable. (This includes the scripted fishing rod, and shubbie pet fishing helper.)

This isn't good at all.

[Perrie Juran]

---

iCade wrote:

Wow, just did a test while fishing. About 10 people around me. Every single one of them red, including myself.

 

[12:37] #Firestorm LSL Bridge v2.3: 'iCade Resident' [84/84] running scripts. 2064Kb consumed for 0.053779ms of cpu time.

Dunno about you, but for a fully decked out avatar including jewelry and such, my Kb count is pretty reasonable. (This includes the scripted fishing rod, and shubbie pet fishing helper.)

This isn't good at all.

---

For brevity's sake I left out the "Script Wars" from my post.  Well, maybe not quite a War yet but we have been seeing small scattered skirmishes. 

[Perrie Juran]

As an addendum, it would be interesting to see what the default/library Avatars rated at.  I don't have the umption to do it myself.

I can say I was slightly surprised but I can proudly say that despite your heavier atmosphere and gravity, Marvin weighed in at just under 6,000 units.  But like I tell all the girls I date, once you go green, you never go back. 

 

eeta:shpelling

[Bree Giffen]

I can see it now. People running around yelling, 'You're overweight!!'

[steeljane42]

I'm not sure if LL checked anything before making those "zones". Most of avatars in the red zone even if they don't wear much.

I checked all my outfits and the lowest I have is 75k, most above 120k. Just as you said, it's mostly boots that add a lot and also prim hair ( I don't like mesh hair, so don't have any to check ). Even short styles ones adding over 30k.

This avatar, which I use only to check how my main looks and checking stores when my main is busy, have 51.3k and it's default avatar "female party outfit". So even default LL avatars in the red zone, that's hilarious lol.

I'd say the red zone should start from 200k, yellow should be 150k-200k, below 150k is green obviously.

[Jonathan Sivocci]

Hello Perrie

 

I remember the arc period all info can be found here, http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Avatar_Rendering_Cost

 

Altho i never really payed any attention to it. never really had any issues iwth high arc persons. (except a few who had, a massive amount) but did not spend time looking for them either. 

 

I think it's something we all (creators and consumers) have to take some responsebility too, remember the old days where a house was 900 prims (right now 80 prims with mesh/sculpted prims). things change, as Sl changes, creators do so too. grasping new possibilities. Lets just hope things get better in the long run, but i would not worry to much about the arc rating, it's just a number set by LL, if it was, 1000 before and it's 10.000 right now (with the same items on your avatar. nothing changed) except the hight of the number. 

[Perrie Juran]

---

Jonathan Sivocci wrote:

Hello Perrie

I think it's something we all (creators and consumers) have to take some responsebility too, remember the old days where a house was 900 prims (right now 80 prims with mesh/sculpted prims). things change, as Sl changes, creators do so too. grasping new possibilities

.

Lets just hope things get better in the long run, but i would not worry to much about the arc rating, it's just a number set by LL, if it was, 1000 before and it's 10.000 right now (with the same items on your avatar. nothing changed) except the hight of the number.

 

---

I do understand that in order to get a hold of and fix lag issues, especially Server Side, they need acurate information, i.e., how much computational power is being used and is needed.  But by setting the Warning (orange) zone and the Danger (red) zone so low, it is equivelant of saying you can't look decent without overloading the system.  And that is just plain bull dinkey.

 

[Echo Hermit]

---

Perrie Juran wrote:

A recent comment in a thread prompted me to look at something I hadn't looked at before and I was seriously shocked by what I found.

Some of us here remember the days of the ARC Wars.  A serious blemish in the history of Second Life.  In the never ending quest to fight lag and to lay blame for it, people started looking at this number called "avatar render cost," or "ARC" for short.  And bedlam took over the grid.

All of the sudden there were ARC Police showing up everywhere pointing fingers at anyone who's ARC number was not in 'the green.'  They would IM you and chastise you for being in the 'red.'  I even witnessed the public humiliation of Avatars when one of these ARC Police would announce in Local Chat, "Everyone want to know why you are lagging so bad? Blame it on So and So.  Their ARC number is off the scale!"

It was a terrible time in the history of Second Life.

So now Linden Lab has introduced a new standard of Measure,

Avatar Render Weight (pops).

  I had  never really looked at this till a recent comment prompted me to and was amazed by what I found.

Just  as in days of old, Linden Lab has chosen to color code the numbers, as your cost goes up, the colors change till until you are, gasp, IN THE RED ZONE!

So the past few days I have been watching these numbers.  I believe it is at 40,000 units you pop into the RED ZONE.  And just about every where I went almost everyone was IN THE RED.  We are talking about 99% of the Avatars I saw were IN THE RED.

Stopping by a well known Formal Dance club, the average Avatar (males a little lower than females overall) was weighted at about 130,000 units.  One girl I saw there topped the chart at around 220,000 units.  At other clubs 80,000 to 120,000 units was about the norm.  I never saw any one in THE GREEN. (OK, I know in the official viewer it's 'yellow,' but I mainly use Firestorm). 

So I thought to myself, lets try a nude beach.  And while the numbers decreased dramatically, most were still in the RED.

So soliciting the help of a friend I started looking at what was causing these high numbers.  Some of the most common and biggest culprits were Prim Shoes.  Shoes from some of the top designers were adding on average 40,000 and even more points.  Pieces of Jewelry would add 10,000 to 20,000 points.  Prim feet would add 30,000 to 40,000 points, hence the high numbers at the nude beach.  You can do your own tests to see what other things do.

So what is my point to all of this?

Linden Lab needs to get "real" about the issue of Avatar Render Weight.  Most of us want to look good in SL and the fact of the matter is you can not do it with out going into what Linden Lab has designated as THE RED ZONE.  Color coding the numbers at the current levels is completely out of touch with reality.  And if it is indicative of how they are dealing with the problems of lag and region crossings, then the problem is even bigger.

Unless they want us to spend all our time naked in SL.

just my two cents worth.

---

And this is the main reason why I hang around on my own around the grid most of the time. No one can have a go at me for having too many scripts on, or being too blingy, or not wearing mesh (f*ck mesh). Although there is rather a splendid nudist beach I do like to hang around at.

Naked volleyball anyone?

 

[Jenni Darkwatch]

First off, that value means zilch for servers. It's entirely a client-side indicator of how much impact ones avi has on people seeing that avi. Ever wonder why FPS drops precariously for some people in busy venues and not at all for some other people in the same venue? Computers aren't equal in performance. Consequently, the meaning of this value is subject to PC performance.

For me it's a measure of who to (perma-) mute first when a venue seems to lag Either that or turn off shadows+lighting... usually, muting people is preferable for me, it helps me reach my goal of having the entire planet muted for some reason or another.

[161488303349]

---

Jenni Darkwatch wrote:

For me it's a measure of who to (perma-) mute first when a venue seems to lag

Either that or turn off shadows+lighting... usually, muting people is preferable for me, it helps me reach my goal of having the entire planet muted for some reason or another.

---

 

jejejjeje (:

[Perrie Juran]

---

Jenni Darkwatch wrote:

First off, that value means zilch for servers. It's entirely a client-side indicator of how much impact ones avi has on people seeing that avi. Ever wonder why FPS drops precariously for some people in busy venues and not at all for some other people in the same venue? Computers aren't equal in performance. Consequently, the meaning of this value is subject to PC performance.

For me it's a measure of who to (perma-) mute first when a venue seems to lag

Either that or turn off shadows+lighting... usually, muting people is preferable for me, it helps me reach my goal of having the entire planet muted for some reason or another.

---

Thank you for clarifying.  I was in that reply speaking in a more general sense.  Servers can 'lag,' but regarding the Avatar Weight, yes, the Wiki does say,

"Render weight represents the amount of work your computer must do in order to display an object."

For someone with a low end computer a group of high end Ava's could present a problem.

 

[161488303349]

---

Echo Hermit wrote:

Naked volleyball anyone?

 

---

i actual saw some people doing that one time

i had to leave tho bc the avatar physics nearly crash me

jejejjeje (:

[kattatonia Wickentower]

very interesting.... I was curious so I put on the girl next door starter av and she weighs in at textured (not sure why it says textured) 18585 which isn't even in the green, it's yellow. 

My regular av for comparison purposes weighs in at 113,853 and she's in the red of course. I also checked out my low arc hunting outfit (which is really just a black mettallic skin and eyes and it weighs 1309 and is green

I wouldn't go so far as to conclude that LL wants us naked, but, this certainly suggests that there are still costs to be considered and yeah, i wouldn't be surprised at all if we start hearing about it from Lag Vigilantes

 eta: also checked out my naked self and yup, she's in the red at 74,333.

[Dillon Levenque]

---

Jenni Darkwatch wrote:

First off, that value means zilch for servers. It's entirely a client-side indicator of how much impact ones avi has on people seeing that avi. Ever wonder why FPS drops precariously for some people in busy venues and not at all for some other people in the same venue? Computers aren't equal in performance. Consequently, the meaning of this value is subject to PC performance.

---

 

Yes, that's the main point: both the original ARC and the new measure are CLIENT issues, not server. I was told early on that ARC was a huge lag producer so I've tried to watch that all along, but it was more than a year after I learned about ARC that I read up a bit and found out it had nothing to do with the servers.

I know some people are in the 'upgrade or f off' camp and consider anyone with a less than optimal setup not worth worrying about, but I don't think most people feel that way. Clearly if you're going to be somewhere with a whole bunch of people you want to reduce your ARC/weight. A person might have the zoomiest rig and Internet connection in the world so none of that matters, but ignoring the fact other people are not at the same hardware level is to say the least selfish.

[Czari Zenovka]

---

Jenni Darkwatch wrote:

 

... usually, muting people is preferable for me, it helps me reach my goal of having the entire planet muted for some reason or another.

---

A regular forumite years ago made an outfit for my avatar.  The top says "Mute the World."  There was some thread about gesture spam and I made the comment that I just mute the world...and now I have an outfit that proclaims it.

/makes note to dig that outfit out of storage and wear it again

[Czari Zenovka]

---

Dillon Levenque wrote:

 

 

I know some people are in the 'upgrade or f off' camp and consider anyone with a less than optimal setup not worth worrying about, but I don't think most people feel that way. Clearly if you're going to be somewhere with a whole bunch of people you want to reduce your ARC/weight. A person might have the zoomiest rig and Internet connection in the world so none of that matters, but ignoring the fact other people are not at the same hardware level is to say the least selfish.

---

Well spoken!  I vividly recall the "ARC Police" since I was taking a 10-week class at that time and the instructor was adamant about us (the students) attending class with an ARC in the green.  I found a skin with painted clothes on it that I used for that class.

Several years later down the road I took a class at a large school in SL called "Let's Lessen Lag" and discovered that scripts are what really lag a parcel or sim's performance.  I rezzed the free script counter at home and began pulling scripts out of all my modifiable hair/shoes/jewelry/clothing, etc.  I am much more conscious of script usage now and try my best to keep my wearable scripts on the low side.

Edit: Grammar

[Dillon Levenque]

 

---

Czari Zenovka wrote:

---

Dillon Levenque wrote:

 

I know some people are in the 'upgrade or f off' camp and consider anyone with a less than optimal setup not worth worrying about, but I don't think most people feel that way. Clearly if you're going to be somewhere with a whole bunch of people you want to reduce your ARC/weight. A person might have the zoomiest rig and Internet connection in the world so none of that matters, but ignoring the fact other people are not at the same hardware level is to say the least selfish.

---

Well spoken!  I vividly recall the "ARC Police" since I was taking a 10-week class at that time and the instructor was adamant about us (the students) attending class with an ARC in the green.  I found a skin with painted clothes on it that I used for that class.

Several years later down the road I take a class at a large school in SL called "Let's Lessen Lag" and discover that scripts are what really lag a parcel or sim's performance.  I rezzed the free script counter at home and began pulling scripts out of all my modifiable hair/shoes/jewelry/clothing, etc.  I am much more conscious of script usage now and try my best to keep my wearable scripts on the low side.

---

 

Yep, scripts actually do cause server-side lag, and I have one of those script scales, too. I enjoy stepping on it just about as much as I enjoy stepping on my scale in RL: it so seldom has good news. It may just be the fact I'm going to different venues but it seems to me I've seen more places lately, especially ones expecting crowds, where a script counter is right at the Landing Point. Sometimes with a suggestion, sometimes required. Nonetheless, reducing the amount of work everyone else's PC has to do to rez you is a good idea, so that part is important too.

[Leia36]

It is a problem for me to. My AV has numerous huds and attachments that are not detachable due to RLV restrictions. I do my bit, I delete scripts in hair clothes, jewelry and shoes and I still weigh in at  hefty 288. There is not much more I can do to reduce it.

We have had this debate at the hub. One of the other managers called me out in local chat. I went home, stripped my AV of everything that could be removed and the number was still 130 odd. When we got into it and discussed it objectively I was backed by the sim owner, she pointed out that the scripts in her build far outweighed anything the AVs were wearing and were the real cause of the horrendous lagg

[Perrie Juran]

---

Leia36 wrote:

....................she pointed out that the scripts in her build far outweighed anything the AVs were wearing and were the real cause of the horrendous lagg

---

Going to several different busy venues this of course was readily apparent.  Scripts notwithstanding, bad texturing could add to it also.  Regardless, I would experience more lag in one Club with only 30 people present versus another with 55 people.

[Perrie Juran]

---

Jenni Darkwatch wrote:

First off, that value means zilch for servers. It's entirely a client-side indicator of how much impact ones avi has on people seeing that avi...................................

---

But this now does prompt a question.  Will this change when they switch over to Server Side Avatar Baking?

My brain says it shouldn't, but it is still a question.  I know the point of that is to improve Avatar rezzing for everyone.

[Jenni Darkwatch]

---

Perrie Juran wrote:

---

Jenni Darkwatch wrote:

First off, that value means zilch for servers. It's entirely a client-side indicator of how much impact ones avi has on people seeing that avi...................................

---

But this now does prompt a question.  Will this change when they switch over to Server Side Avatar Baking?

My brain says it shouldn't, but it is still a question.  I know the point of that is to improve Avatar rezzing for everyone.

---

My understanding is that the baked skin is stored as part of an outfit, which should mean it's rendered once and done with. Practically speaking, server-side baking should only happen once anyway, when the avi is first "set up", and after that only if relevant parts of the avatar change. Therefore the cost should only be incurred once when equipping an outfit for the first time or altering an outfit.

I used a lot of "should" there - I'm not in the know, just reading the occasional tech blurbs from Lindens which make me believe the explanation should be more or less correct.

[Ceka Cianci]

i think we need more blankets and less blankets..Oo

[Czari Zenovka]

---

Dillon Levenque wrote:

 

---

Czari Zenovka wrote:

---

Dillon Levenque wrote:

 

 

I know some people are in the 'upgrade or f off' camp and consider anyone with a less than optimal setup not worth worrying about, but I don't think most people feel that way. Clearly if you're going to be somewhere with a whole bunch of people you want to reduce your ARC/weight. A person might have the zoomiest rig and Internet connection in the world so none of that matters, but ignoring the fact other people are not at the same hardware level is to say the least selfish.

---

Well spoken!  I vividly recall the "ARC Police" since I was taking a 10-week class at that time and the instructor was adamant about us (the students) attending class with an ARC in the green.  I found a skin with painted clothes on it that I used for that class.

Several years later down the road I take a class at a large school in SL called "Let's Lessen Lag" and discover that scripts are what really lag a parcel or sim's performance.  I rezzed the free script counter at home and began pulling scripts out of all my modifiable hair/shoes/jewelry/clothing, etc.  I am much more conscious of script usage now and try my best to keep my wearable scripts on the low side.

---

 

Yep, scripts actually do cause server-side lag, and I have one of those script scales, too. I enjoy stepping on it just about as much as I enjoy stepping on my scale in RL: it so seldom has good news. It may just be the fact I'm going to different venues but it seems to me I've seen more places lately, especially ones expecting crowds, where a script counter is right at the Landing Point. Sometimes with a suggestion, sometimes required. Nonetheless, reducing the amount of work everyone else's PC has to do to rez you is a good idea, so that part is important too.

---

LOL re: the comparison with stepping on a RL scale, which is why I don't own a scale RL.  :matte-motes-tongue:

One school where I take classes (and where I got the script counter) has one that shows the script count on each student in a class, or else it's a cumulative one...not sure.  I do know that the instructors check it prior to each class, or at least the classes I've taken they did.  I've never seen anyone called out, unless it was in IM; maybe the regulars there know to have a low script count to attend class.

I've seen script counters at the tp in point of some large stores as well but no requirement to be under a certain limit.

Edit: Grammar