Finding someone's previous username

[Kimberly Lemongrass]

Hey all. Now that the the name change feature is out, how do we find someone's previous username(s)?

[Rolig Loon]

Ask them?

[Sylvia Tamalyn]

1 hour ago, Rolig Loon said:

Ask them?

 

[Kimberly Lemongrass]

On 4/17/2020 at 6:35 PM, Rolig Loon said:

Ask them?

Ehhh, that's not always possible.

[Anna Nova]

I'm not telling, neither!

So there!

[Amina Sopwith]

40 minutes ago, Kimberly Lemongrass said:

Ehhh, that's not always possible.

You can always ask. But as with any demand for personal information, they're under no obligation to tell you. 

The only reason it wouldn't be possible to ask would be if they've blocked you, in which case it would be best just to leave it.

[Garnet Psaltery]

It's none of your business.

[Chaser Zaks]

While there are some valid reasons why you would need to know someone's previous name(EG: Keeping track of trouble makers), you generally do not need to know.

If you just need to keep track of trouble makers, what I recommend doing is making a table like so:

UUID	Username	Previous names	Reason
796b1537-70d8-497d-934e-0abcc2a60050	Chaser Zaks		Hiding meat in the water
f0ff75a0-9eb9-4503-bb6d-9addeeef86bd	Second Life	Linden World	Lags a lot

You can always resolve someone's username from their UUID, UUIDs will never be changeable. You can also resolve someone's previous name to their UUID, but you will have to know the previous name(This is useful if you can no longer find a trouble maker's last name).

Edited April 21, 2020 by Chaser Zaks

[Anna Nova]

Get a time machine.

Go back to March.

Record everyone's UUID and Name.

Come home to VT (Virus time), and write a script to look up every UUID you see.

Simples!

 

[Janet Voxel]

2 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

Get a time machine.

Go back to March.

Record everyone's UUID and Name.

Come home to VT (Virus time), and write a script to look up every UUID you see.

Simples!

 

 

[Paul Hexem]

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/LlRequestUserKey
http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/LlRequestUsername

[Rolig Loon]

32 minutes ago, Paul Hexem said:

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/LlRequestUserKey
http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/LlRequestUsername

Nope.  llRequestUsername will return the user's current username, not any previous one.  If you already know a user's previous name, you can use llRequestUserKey to get the user's UUID and then use llRequestUsername to get the current name, but not the reverse.

[LittleMe Jewell]

On 4/17/2020 at 7:19 PM, Kimberly Lemongrass said:

Hey all. Now that the the name change feature is out, how do we find someone's previous username(s)?

You can't.  As Rolig says, you can get from an old username to a new username, but you cannot go backwards.

[Paul Hexem]

11 hours ago, Rolig Loon said:

If you already know a user's previous name, you can use llRequestUserKey to get the user's UUID and then use llRequestUsername to get the current name, but not the reverse.

That's what I was getting at, yes.

There's no need to look up anyone's previous name- you simply use said functions to keep track of their new name(s) for ban lists or whatever.

[Rolig Loon]

6 minutes ago, Paul Hexem said:

There's no need to look up anyone's previous name- you simply use said functions to keep track of their new name(s) for ban lists or whatever.

But that wasn't the question.  The OP asked how to find a person's previous name,. and you can't do it with those LSL functions. She didn't say anything about wanting to ban people, or whatever. There's a whole thread in this forum about people not being able to recognize each other now that they have changed names. If I didn't already know who you used to be, Paul, there's no way I would be able to find out with those functions.

[Paul Hexem]

1 minute ago, Rolig Loon said:

But that wasn't the question.  The OP asked how to find a person's previous name,. and you can't do it with those LSL functions. She didn't say anything about wanting to ban people, or whatever. There's a whole thread in this forum about people not being able to recognize each other now that they have changed names. If I didn't already know who you used to be, Paul, there's no way I would be able to find out with those functions.

Right. What the OP is asking can't be done. With said functions, you can do the next best thing- because there's really no technical reason to need to know otherwise.

[Rolig Loon]

6 minutes ago, Paul Hexem said:

With said functions, you can do the next best thing- because there's really no technical reason to need to know otherwise.

I suppose that all depends on how you define "need". I don't truly "need" to know what your name was before last weekend.  After all, I didn't know much about you then and I still don't know much about you right now other than your current name. However, I can't figure out which one of the many new names in the forum since Thursday might be someone I have known here for years, disguised under a new name.  I don't want to ban any of them but, dammit, I need to know who my friends are now.  A UUID isn't the "next best thing" when I can't recognize a friend.   ( This feels like an artificially induced senior moment. I have too many of the real ones already. )

[Drayke Newall]

20 hours ago, Amina Sopwith said:

You can always ask. But as with any demand for personal information, they're under no obligation to tell you. 

There is a vast difference between personal information privacy and a username/avatar name. Whilst you are correct they are under no obligation to tell you, there are some cases where it is handy to know and beneficial for the person who changed their name. 

LL should take the method Steam and other platforms use by which on the profile you can see a dropdown box that lists all previous alias. Claiming that an avatar name is protected under personal information is a stretch and to be honest, I would take the stance that the refusal of the person to provide it would only mean they have something dubious they want to hide given that, an avatar name is a throw away commodity.

[Mollymews]

 

33 minutes ago, Drayke Newall said:

there are some cases where it is handy to know and beneficial for the person who changed their name.

just on this bit

when a person finds it beneficial to them to tell us what their previous name was then they can do this now. Type their old name into their Second Life profile. Which many people who have a general public facing persona, like shop keepers and performers for example, are doing

from this we know their new name and their self-published old name. We can confirm this should we need/want to with the llRequestUserKey function

[Drayke Newall]

37 minutes ago, Mollymews said:

just on this bit

when a person finds it beneficial to them to tell us what their previous name was then they can do this now. Type their old name into their Second Life profile. Which many people who have a general public facing persona, like shop keepers and performers for example, are doing

from this we know their new name and their self-published old name. We can confirm this should we need/want to with the llRequestUserKey function

Whilst yes this is true you are missing the bigger picture. As far as I am aware, you cannot do a search of their old name as search doesn't look into the description fields of the profiles even if they type it there. This will mean you still need to know the new name of the person to find them or their store.

For example, I talk to a friend and ask him to recommend someone that makes a nice tree. They cant remember the shop name but can remember the username of the person (as they don't use a display name and the username is unique). As such, I then go and search for that username only to find it isn't listed and therefore I never find that person that sells it. This means not only do I miss out on that nice tree, but the shop owner also doesn't get a sale because of word of mouth failing due to the username change.

As far as I know the same applies to even shop groups and land searches where it only searches the name of the parcel or the name of the group and/or the name of the creator of the group. If the shop owner places the name in the keywords in marketplace it may come up, but I would dare say that wouldn't be allowed as it would skew the keyword search.

Whilst yes, my example may be not common it does however show (as one example of probably more) a clear flaw in the system with username changing of where knowing a persons old avatar name without asking the person for it is sometimes necessary.

Edited April 22, 2020 by Drayke Newall

[Mollymews]

33 minutes ago, Drayke Newall said:

For example, I talk to a friend and ask him to recommend someone that makes a nice tree. They cant remember the shop name but can remember the username of the person (as they don't use a display name and the username is unique). As such, I then go and search for that username only to find it isn't listed and therefore I never find that person that sells it. This means not only do I miss out on that nice tree, but the shop owner also doesn't get a sale because of word of mouth failing due to the username change.

our friend can remember the username of the shopkeeper. We search for this and get a blank.  We then run the username our friend remembers thru: shopkeeper = llRequestUsername(llRequestUserKey(old name)) and voila, we have the new name of the shopkeeper. Look then up in Search, there they are, and off we go to their shop

if there aren't already (I haven't looked) I think there is going to be a plethora of scripted devices on MP that can do this for those who can't script this up for themselves

[Drayke Newall]

2 hours ago, Mollymews said:

our friend can remember the username of the shopkeeper. We search for this and get a blank.  We then run the username our friend remembers thru: shopkeeper = llRequestUsername(llRequestUserKey(old name)) and voila, we have the new name of the shopkeeper. Look then up in Search, there they are, and off we go to their shop

if there aren't already (I haven't looked) I think there is going to be a plethora of scripted devices on MP that can do this for those who can't script this up for themselves

Ok fair enough didn't know that but still, it's something that overly complicates things where it shouldn't. For something that would have been very easy for LL to implement to just show old alias' in the profile that are a searchable field (as they are not subject to privacy laws or ToS's) we now get another convoluted system that requires a person to firstly know of such a script, then to have to get that script from the marketplace, run that script (and know how to do it etc, as we all know how dim some people can be with such things) just to find out details that should be accessible just like other platforms do in the profile.

But that said, I am also of the opinion that if you have bought a name change you should be able to switch back to the old one and new one free of charge given they are both still technically associated with your account. But that's irrelevant to this thread.

Edited April 22, 2020 by Drayke Newall

[Maitimo]

7 hours ago, Mollymews said:

when a person finds it beneficial to them to tell us what their previous name was then they can do this now. Type their old name into their Second Life profile. Which many people who have a general public facing persona, like shop keepers and performers for example, are doing

That's basically what I've done. My old name is now the first thing mentioned in my profile. I've also put it in my signature here on the forum.

[Marigold Devin]

On 4/18/2020 at 2:19 AM, Kimberly Lemongrass said:

Hey all. Now that the the name change feature is out, how do we find someone's previous username(s)?

Unless they've outed themselves - as some have done on these forums already - you generally aren't going to be able to.

You have calling cards in your inventory, from anyone who ever IM'd you in world. I think even they would have had a name change (but I am not sure of this). 

[Sylvia Tamalyn]

41 minutes ago, Marigold Devin said:

Unless they've outed themselves - as some have done on these forums already - you generally aren't going to be able to.

You have calling cards in your inventory, from anyone who ever IM'd you in world. I think even they would have had a name change (but I am not sure of this). 

The names on calling cards do not change from the original, or at least did not on the one I have from a friend who changed his name.