Do Scripted Horses Cause Much Lag?

[Dana Mureaux]

I have a new renter who has created a skybox (or skypasture, I guess I should say, heh) with (so far) seven horses. I've seen these scripted horses (10 scripts each) around SL, but I don't know anything about them. Does anyone know if they cause a lot of lag?

[Identity Euler]

Hi,

If you have estate manager rights you can check scripts in Estate menu. You will see the top scripts.  

Edit

I should have a look at category first. If you can see the parcel options in About Land there are also scripts visible in 2.6 viewer. I am not sure about other viewers. That works for mainland. 

[Jacki Silverfall]

Where I live they are not allowed to move. I would say yes they cause lag, but it depends on how many there are and if they walk around. When they start flying through your living room it's time to shut em down. lol

[Dana Mureaux]

I own a mainland sim, not an island, so of course the Region/Estate stuff is not available to me; just one more middle finger from the friendly folks at Linden Labs.

I don't use their viewer either, so I don't have whatever information it would give me about lag, thus I expect I'll just have to rely on other people's anecdotal evidence as to whether or not these horses do cause any significant lag.

I do thank you though for taking time to reply.

[Dana Mureaux]

Thanks for the tip about the horses walking around or not. When I was watching them, they just stood there looking dumb (kinda like Congress) so perhaps I've nothing to worry about, at this point at least.

By the way, I like your line about dogs and cats. Here's one of my own favorites: Dogs have owners - Cats have staff.

[Identity Euler]

It's better to have evidence than opinions. Other viewers which base on 2.x code should also have this option. You can check the scripts easy on parcel. 

[Dana Mureaux]

I certainly do agree that it's better to have objective data rather than subjective opinion. I'm not willing to install LL's viewer for any reason, but perhaps the Firestorm viewer from the Phoenix people would give me that data you speak of. I'll have to look into that. I believe you can get a preliminary copy of that viewer if you jump through a couple hoops. Thanks again.

[LoveAngeL Lyre]

Hello Dana. 7 horses yes it is very  possible to cause lag. It called Scripted Objects & Collisions Lag. Too many scripted objects causing collisions on a region and all avatars there feel the same lag because this server (server where region hosted) has to work too hard and cannot keep up with the demands of the avatars currently in it. As already mentioned, in many places arround they are not allowed.

[Pussycat Catnap]

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[Peewee Musytari]

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Dana Mureaux wrote:

I certainly do agree that it's better to have objective data rather than subjective opinion. I'm not willing to install LL's viewer for any reason, but perhaps the Firestorm viewer from the Phoenix people would give me that data you speak of. I'll have to look into that. I believe you can get a preliminary copy of that viewer if you jump through a couple hoops. Thanks again.

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You can get Firestorm from https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Third_Party_Viewer_Directory and yes it does have the v2 script info on About Land.

[Qie Niangao]

On Mainland, however, you simply can't get the runtime data about scripts, merely the memory usage -- but for that, you don't need any particular viewer at all, it's a simple script that must be available for free.  I sometimes wear my version as an attachment to check memory use of objects on parcels I don't own, or attachments of other avatars, neither of which is available directly in the standard viewers.

And memory-induced lag is worth knowing about in the context of horses.  Those scripts consume sim memory whether or not the horses are moving, physical, phantom -- even if the scripts are set not running by other scripts.

Back when script memory limits seemed imminent, there was some speculation about what would likely be the per-square-meter parcel limits.  I can't remember the details now, but I'd guess it would work out that one horse would use up about 512sq.m. worth of script memory, which (if correct) would mean that eight completely idle horses would need something like a 4096 to be within practical memory constraints.

That's ignoring the script execution lag, but you can't really see the numbers for that except on Estates, and those are influenced by how the horses are managed.  The same for physics lag, although Top Colliders doesn't measure all the ways physics can be exercised.  So, even on Estates, these metrics are better for identifying a cause of lag than for measuring how much lag any particular source is causing.

[Dana Mureaux]

Thank you for that explanation. As regards memory usage, it would seem I can already get that just from the usual pie menu that appears when right-clicking on something. If you select "More" and then "More" again, one of the choices on the third iteration of the menu is "S. Count" which gives you the message "Scripts Counted: 10 [448K]" in local chat (when right-clicking on one of the horses). Coincidentally or not this renter has seven horses on his 4096m parcel, which puts him right near the approximate limit you refer to, of eight horses per 4096 square meters.

Evidently I will never have any good hard data on how much lag these horses (or anything else) are causing on my sim. Consequently I'm not sure what my response should be to this renter. I did not specifically state that horses were not allowed, yet I would expect that he is aware that these horses are generally considered to produce lag and that neither I nor any other landlord would be likely to welcome them. That and the fact that he has placed his little pasture at 2000 meters altitude may well mean that he was hoping I would remain unaware of his four-footed friends. Then again, it may be that he has done this in all innocence, or else he feels that he is entitled to do it.

I would welcome anyone's opinion of what my response should be. My feeling is that I should let him know I AM aware of his little not-so-O.K. Corral and that I will not permit him any more horses than he already has, and that they must remain stationary and not walk around.

 

[Jacki Silverfall]

It's your land do what you feel is best. I think you already know what to do. Let him know you know and set your limits. Also, I don't know about covenents on mainland but you should state your restrictions to all new tenants.

[Dana Mureaux]

Well, I do let prospective renters know what the terms are. My HippoRent box automatically gives them a notecard if they click on it and/or when they make their first rental payment. I tried to put everything important in that notecard, but it didn't occur to me to say anything about horses. I have since revised the notecard to say that any scripted object that causes significant lag is not allowed.

[abdisoccer]

Depending on the kind of horses they are. If the horse is healthy, they will not slow.

[Void Singer]

they have the potential to yes... do they? eh... maybe.

being on mainland ctrl+shft+1 is your friend... that the stats console to look at, and you can often see the normal numbers for the region are, and when they go to hell... what you can't do is tell what's causing it without some obvious event...

ask your renter to derrezz them for a while, monitor, then re rezz them, monitor and see if there is a noticiceable shift... if not then you are all good... if so, you'll have to decide if the shift is an acceptable amount, and may be able to take a guess at limits to put in place.