Social Island, Welcome Island, pop ups that won't go away...

[Silent Mistwalker]

HUDs aren't windows. They are objects.

[Rolig Loon]

21 minutes ago, Silent Mistwalker said:

HUDs aren't windows. They are objects.

And the information system that is the topic of this thread is neither a HUD nor a window.  It's a floater. 

[Silent Mistwalker]

1 minute ago, Rolig Loon said:

And the information system that is the topic of this thread is neither a HUD nor a window.  It's a floater. 

Exactly. 😁

[CharRiffi]

32 minutes ago, Silent Mistwalker said:

HUDs aren't windows. They are objects.

pedantic

adjective

Characterized by a narrow concern for book learning and formal rules, without knowledge or experience of practical matters:

academic, bookish, donnish, formalistic, inkhorn, literary, pedantical, scholastic.

 

They got a picture of you right under that definition. 

 

Edited November 7, 2021 by CharRiffi

[Rowan Amore]

[Jaylinbridges]

I just reported the facts as they are.  Folks who simply report the world as it is today, are not stupid.   If you read this entire thread you will find the Linden employees who wrote the floater script think this is a non-issue.   They don't work for Firestorm, and look at GUI functionality for newbies only through their own SL viewer.  If you don't like that, bombard their SL Jira's with suggestions.  They will stick it in the pile, right at the bottom.

 

Edited November 7, 2021 by Jaylinbridges

[Prokofy Neva]

On 11/4/2021 at 3:22 PM, Jaylinbridges said:

Nothing has changed since this thread started.  If you use Firestorm you need to drag the Guidebook from Toolbar Buttons menu to the bottom buttons on the screen, as mentioned a few times here.  Firestorm would need to make the Guidebook a default button on the bottom, like the SL viewer.  There's really no reason to do that, since most real newbies start with the SL viewer.  The other method to close the guidebook is use the Help menu > Guidebook.  FS does not list the Guidebook there.  I suppose they could add it as a "fix".  

Pressing F1 while the guidebook is the active floater is not obvious to most, plus there is no border change in the Guidebook floater that tells you it is the active window, unlike all MS windows and FS windows - because it's a floater and not a window and it's not a HUD.   The guidebook also does not mention using the F1 key.  So if you use Firestorm to enter the Welcome Island you better search for this topic to keep up with floater technology.

SL isn't going to provide instructions for using the Firestorm viewer, and FS isn't going to add a Guidebook default button to accommodate the experienced FS user that makes a new Alt.  So we have a draw.

 

Well, I have an idea! Listen, guys! Let's make a GIANT, floating and REVOLVING round sign that says PRESS F1 IN THE VIEWER TO GET THE KNOWLEDGE BASE. Last time I checked the new user ramp-in -- to the extent you can, given that it automatically detects oldbies' IP address and hence doesn't send them to the ne plus ultra experience -- that ridiculous thing was *still there*.

Because...newbies know what a viewer is...because "press F1" is just so grandly intuitive to most people. And the hilarious thing is, it's now outdated, right?

I could say more about this, and I even have an art work devoted to this lovely theme.

The point is, whether the Guidebook (nee Knowledge Base page) is a HUD, a window, or some creature unknown to sim-kind like the Linden tree, it's in the view. You can't bat it away easily. There is no moving or clicking on it to get it away. You have to "just now" as they don't tell you. They could tell you, but you won't see it or remember it, especially when new. Therefore it shouldn't be like that. What's wrong with having it be like the Advanced and Developer menus, something you click a box to get in preferences -- where you could also have an explain on how to unget it.

 

[Prokofy Neva]

On 11/6/2021 at 9:31 PM, Rolig Loon said:

And the information system that is the topic of this thread is neither a HUD nor a window.  It's a floater. 

A floater, and yet not a toast; a toast, you could tear off and move to the side. So I'm for making it a toast.

[Rolig Loon]

2 hours ago, Prokofy Neva said:

There is no moving or clicking on it to get it away. You have to "just now" as they don't tell you.

Well, not quite ....

On 7/15/2021 at 10:04 AM, Dyna Mole said:

As instructed on the Guide Book's menu, "Click the GUIDEBOOK button in the bottom toolbar or Help menu > Guidebook".  (The GUIDEBOOK button is on your viewer's taskbar by default if you are a SL newcomer, and the Help menu is at the top of your viewer screen.)

So even if Firestorm has elected to not put the Guidebook icon on their task bar by default, the way it is in the Standard viewer, you can still read the Instructions and open Help >> Guidebook.  😉

EDIT:  Ah, no....  I take that back.  Firestorm has not put that in their Help menu  either.  So if you are a newbie and you got hold of Firestorm instead of starting with the standard viewer, that doesn't work.

Edited November 8, 2021 by Rolig Loon
Additional information

[Prokofy Neva]

2 hours ago, Rolig Loon said:

Well, not quite ....

So even if Firestorm has elected to not put the Guidebook icon on their task bar by default, the way it is in the Standard viewer, you can still read the Instructions and open Help >> Guidebook.  😉

EDIT:  Ah, no....  I take that back.  Firestorm has not put that in their Help menu  either.  So if you are a newbie and you got hold of Firestorm instead of starting with the standard viewer, that doesn't work.

Rolig, I don't know why people are so resistant to the obvious complaints the non-initiated make.

I am not a newbie.

I am not on Firestorm.

I am on the bog standard SL Viewer.

I get the Guidebook, yet I can't easily, intuitively, quickly get rid of it in the view.

When many, many people have that frustrating experience, you/the Lindens don't keep saying "you're wrong, problem in chair, not in computer, read the UI" you say, "How can we fix it?"

There are so many problems.

Start with the idea that white typeface on brown -- the opposite of what people are used to, which is black on white (note what you are reading right now) -- is edgy and cool and the right choice. But it creates glare, it defeats attention concentration.

Then there's the fact that this very important information about how to get rid of the sight of that thing is not put at the TOP but at the BOTTOM of that UI -- in a setting where much of the time, you are looking up top to figure out how things work. Stupid. Why.

Then the first things in that widgget are "back to tour" which should be last, and "moving your avatar" which shouldn't be gone to until you first master the problem of the damn guidebook itself which blocks the view of a moving avtar, HELLO. 

Then there's the issue that "button in the bottom toolbar" is one of those things that even I, as an oldbie, flinch at. It's like "mouselook," something I avoid, because it's hard to find, go into, and then come out of.

Why is something so important like getting rid of the view of that thing cast below the line of sight to the bottom tool bar, when all the other things I am either struggling to learn or struggling to do are on the top tool bar? There's that.

And mind you, all this nonsense is going on in a field of vision where this giant belt is circulating above your head, like a flock of bats, with giant type, which says F1 IS IN THE VIEWER NOW, CLICK TO GET KNOWLEDGE BASE. F1 is a thing on the top of the viewer. But getting/getting rid of the Guidebook is on the bottom.

So these triumphant "gotchas" and pulling out of search strings out of a sea of bad UI decisions just don't move me. I know a bad job when I see it -- I have to instruct new people, or old people who never had a rentals, how to do all these hard things using these awful interfaces designed by people with theory, not experience inworld.

Finally, let us all have a moment of silence for Clubside Granville, who, way before it was appreciated, had three ideas for the Lindens in 2010 which he couldn't get them to notice, despite spending $25,000 of his own money creating various projects around SL:

o have guided tours around the Mainland on foot, road, seat, air, and put recommended sites in the viewer

o create a multi-player combat game within SL

o have a Guidebook.

 

Edited November 8, 2021 by Prokofy Neva

[cunomar]

Agreed , that popup is a bloody nuisance and what is more instead of mentioning welcome and tutorials it should state

"if anything doesn't work as you think its supposed to then relog 17 times at 17 different destinations and it MIGHT work"

A realistic welcome if ever there was one lol .

[Coffee Pancake]

A floating text box insisting you RTFM is not and never will be good onboarding.

Show me any other game that introduces mechanics & UI functionality by pinning a readme to your screen.

Yes yes .. SL isn't a game, but it looks like one which comes with some expectations. Leveraging those expectations increases accessibility. Following a step by step introduction to controls that interactively adds UI to the viewer is faster and cleaner.

[MeshArtistSL]

My friend just created her SL account after I bugged her for ages to do so. She logged in with the Firestorm Viewer and the guidebook stays stuck no matter what she tries. She has followed all the steps outlined above, nothing works. If she logs in with the SecondLife viewer, she can detach the guidebook but if she logs out and back in with Firestorm, the guide is back.

[Silent Mistwalker]

1 minute ago, MeshArtistSL said:

My friend just created her SL account after I bugged her for ages to do so. She logged in with the Firestorm Viewer and the guidebook stays stuck no matter what she tries. She has followed all the steps outlined above, nothing works. If she logs in with the SecondLife viewer, she can detach the guidebook but if she logs out and back in with Firestorm, the guide is back.

 

[Rolig Loon]

9 minutes ago, MeshArtistSL said:

My friend just created her SL account after I bugged her for ages to do so. She logged in with the Firestorm Viewer and the guidebook stays stuck no matter what she tries. She has followed all the steps outlined above, nothing works. If she logs in with the SecondLife viewer, she can detach the guidebook but if she logs out and back in with Firestorm, the guide is back.

That should tell you something.  Don't use Firestorm as a newbie. 😏

[Jaylinbridges]

3 hours ago, MeshArtistSL said:

She has followed all the steps outlined above, nothing works. If she logs in with the SecondLife viewer, she can detach the guidebook but if she logs out and back in with Firestorm, the guide is back.

Then your friend did not follow the steps posted here earlier:

1. At the top of Firestorm,  click on Avatar - ToolBar Buttons.  Find Guidebook button in toolbar window and drag it between the buttons on the bottom of Firestorm.

2. Press the new Guidebook button once or twice and the floater goes away. It toggles on and off with guidebook button.

OR

1. Left Click on the Guidebook floater, and Press F1 on your keyboard.

Do not move or click your mouse pointer before you press F1, or you will get the Firestorm Wiki Help instead, which knows nothing about the SL floater.

Those are the only ways to get rid of the Guidebook  floater using the latest Firestorm.

This is the 3rd or 5th time these steps have been listed in this thread.  The rest of the comments are just noise.

 

 

Edited November 25, 2021 by Jaylinbridges

[Whirly Fizzle]

The next release of Firestorm  (soon ᵗᵐ) will have an X on the guidebook floater to close it.

ᵀʰᵃⁿᵏ ᶠᵛᶜᵏ

[Jaylinbridges]

13 minutes ago, Whirly Fizzle said:

The next release of Firestorm  (soon ᵗᵐ) will have an X on the guidebook floater to close it.

Can you do that before it's in the SL viewer?  Didn't they say it was either not needed or too hard? 

[Rowan Amore]

Lots of things in Frestorm.that are 'too hard' for the SL viewer.

[Lindal Kidd]

Oh, all right, I'll say it: SL is too hard for OLDBIES!

At least this oldbie. Now that it's come up, I confess that I have never understood the difference between Floaters, Toasts, and Chiclets.

And just last week, someone taught me a new way to move my avatar around.

[regalle]

open lower menu bar ,  add guidebook button then  turn off guidebook , remove guidebook button

[Jaylinbridges]

You must write instruction leaflets for digital watches...

[JoannHope]

On 7/15/2021 at 4:07 PM, Rowan Amore said:

I doubt they will all leave.  However, if they are vexed by something as simple as removing a popup, the rest of SL would be a nightmare for them anyway.  

I hadn't used an SL viewer in almost 12 years.  I ran it the other day and created an alt just to check out the new user experience.  I got the popup hud.  It took.maybe 2 or 3 minutes of poking around to get rid of it.  Even though I've been here awhile, it was a totally new experience for me just as it would be for a new user.

Let's not make a mountain out of a Mole hill.

I am getting tired of reading "It's simple" and "they won't ask they'll just leave" and "if they can't do something as simple as click on the guidbook icon in the SL view..." THE PROBLEM IS NOT THE SL VIEWER. I had absolutely NO PROBLEMS removing it on the SL Viewer. That helpful guide ITSELF says how to get rid of it by clicking on the guidebook icon. LISTEN UP!!! THE PROBLEM IS ON THE FIRESTORM VIEWER, NOT THE SL VIEWER. The guidebook Icon IS NOT ON THE FIRESTORM VIEWER. Teleporting to another sim that had nothing to do with linden sim or welcome island DID NOT WORK. Logging off and back on REPEATEDLY did NOT work. Resetting default female avatar did not work. ON THE FIRESTORM VIEWER nothing that people told me to do worked. 

 

Even though nothing they told me didn't work, I was grateful to them for trying. MAINLY BECAUSE NOT A SINGLE OF THEM TALKED TO ME -A NEWBIE- AS IF I WAS STUPID. Unlike a lot (not all) of the people commenting in this thread.

Do you really think newbies are so stupid that it didn't occur to ANY OF YOU that kept repeating "it's simple" "oh you know the newbies won't ask" or "they won't do this, they won't do that" it didn't occur to you that maybe JUST MAYBE the problem they've having WAS NOT ON THE SL VIEWER!?!! But on another viewer, for example FIRESTORM?!?

For those of you making comments, 'nicely' calling the newbies having this problem (NOT ON SL VIEWER BTW) 'stupid', obviously forgot that YOU TOO WERE NEW ONCE!!!

Edited December 8, 2021 by JoannHope

[panterapolnocy]

14 minutes ago, JoannHope said:

Do you really think newbies are so stupid

Gently pokes with a link to https://community.secondlife.com/forums/topic/475893-firestorm-guide-book/#comment-2339770 ; Information, any information, is out there - it just needs to be found, sometimes with more, sometimes with less effort. Life is too short to worry and be angry about some things... smile, and continue your adventures.  

On 11/25/2021 at 11:19 PM, Whirly Fizzle said:

The next release of Firestorm  (soon ᵗᵐ) will have an X on the guidebook floater to close it.

+1.

Edited December 8, 2021 by panterapolnocy

[Lindal Kidd]

Thank you, @JoannHope, and welcome to Second Life!

You're absolutely right; as a helper who hangs out on Welcome Island, I get the "How do I remove the Guidebook" question often. These days, I answer that with a question, "What viewer are you using?", because you are absolutely right. In the stock viewer, it's ridiculously simple, and the answer is right there in the Guidebook itself.  But in the Firestorm viewer, it's not, and the Guidebook toolbar button is both non-obvious, and not even in the default Toolbars.

That's a little surprising, because the Firestorm team usually notices stuff like that and corrects it.  But what's more surprising (to me, anyway) is that so many newbies are starting off with Firestorm.  Either they were told it was the viewer they should use by a friend, or they are an alt encountering Welcome Island for the first time, or maybe somehow they came across the Firestorm page and downloaded it to see "what game this is".  (Yes, I actually encountered one fellow who thought he was playing something called "Firestorm"!)