What happens when SL becomes very popular very fast?

[Persephone Emerald]

42 minutes ago, Coffee Pancake said:

This also ignores what is technically happening when items are processed and rendered.

The myth of high rez textures being bad is a stubborn one that might have been somewhat true a decade ago, it very much isn't true now. Textures are not bad because they can be 1024, they are bad because there can be hundreds of them.

 

Do NOT use multiple smaller textures. This is the worst.

Use the biggest texture the platform allows, currently 1024.

Put as many different parts of the model onto the same texture map as possible.

This is faster to process as only one set of images needs to be decoded, faster to render as everything on the same texture can be rendered in the same pass.

There is a very solid technically supported argument for allowing textures bigger than 1024 and mitigating people using them inappropriately with better software (some of which LL have already been doing).

 

If you can upload 1 texture with multiple sections, it's also cheaper than multiple textures.

[EliseAnne85]

8 hours ago, Coffee Pancake said:

This also ignores what is technically happening when items are processed and rendered.

The myth of high rez textures being bad is a stubborn one that might have been somewhat true a decade ago, it very much isn't true now. Textures are not bad because they can be 1024, they are bad because there can be hundreds of them.

 

Do NOT use multiple smaller textures. This is the worst.

Use the biggest texture the platform allows, currently 1024.

Put as many different parts of the model onto the same texture map as possible.

This is faster to process as only one set of images needs to be decoded, faster to render as everything on the same texture can be rendered in the same pass.

There is a very solid technically supported argument for allowing textures bigger than 1024 and mitigating people using them inappropriately with better software (some of which LL have already been doing).

 

It was an item that was not mapped at all.  It was a SL prim part I made into a long stick that held a party favor on it that I stuck the 128 on.  But, I may as well just tint it the next time.  Those small textures loose so much detail it's not worth an upload and after the party people forget about it anyways.

But, I'm glad you mentioned this as I was just yesterday wondering about beads.  The beads are all on one map with the other stuff but I reduced the whole map to a 512 and did not make small bits for the beads and thought I was doing it wrong but maybe I did right.

But, I am having some loss in detail in certain clothing that I think needs a 1024 one map rather than a 512 one map but the tinies might scoff at it if it's 1024.  The 1024's I want to use for the Dinkie clothing are mapped into one map.  I have a Dinkie friend builder who told me to make everything 512.  Was she right?, wrong?, what?  

[Coffee Pancake]

Always and only use 1024, and cram as much in as you can. 
 

 

[Jennifer Boyle]

On 10/17/2022 at 11:36 AM, Coffee Pancake said:

Rigged animated meshes are the killer. Processing those scales linearly. The more you have the more time it takes, the slower it goes - every single frame.  This is especially true for bodies with high poly counts, one specific body being notably far worse than all the others.

After someone posted that mesh bodies with their many faces were the main cause of lag, I did an experiment. I was in a room with about a dozen people on an island where no one else was. We all detached our mesh bodies to see what would happen. The frame rate didn't change.

Comments?

[Cali Souther]

I've been watching my complexity lately - noticed a lot of my older jewelry,  some free hair,  etc. was shockingly high in complexity. 

I've always been careful with scripts,  but now try to reduce both.   

My mesh body is only 5054 ...      I had a free hair that was 56k !    I tossed it in the trash.

I'll give up / be as careful as I can - but I'm not going back to the old system body.  No way Jose! 

[Storyof Oh]

My fear is one day i'll log in after a break and find SL gone...i still have Avination nightmares and Melanie still has my scripts rotting somewhere. I think the change now is that new people will find it hard to get truly addicted and invested in SL. In 2003 you could earn money camping, get your little parcel, fill your inventory with free stuff rip it apart and make better stuff to sell. We were oblivious to sex bed scripts released copy mod transfer. Back room hysteria stayed there. We enjoyed the casinos, the banks and expanding, creating and renting out. Then the casinos and banks were deleted. SL started giving players free homes and furniture killing off private rentals. The expansion of the Marketplace basically did away with the need for an in game store. Prim restrictions and 'rules' deterred renting large land areas. When Zindra opened there was the opportunity to swop land for free and get double prims what not to like? However once your virtual sales covered monthly costs but rarely now. Once the $ was £1.40 now  a $ almost £. What was equivalent of a night down the pub is now more expensive.  When mesh arrived a lot of hobby creators found it tough to adapt. Their wares basic. Old haunts disappeared as you TP'ed into a living room. When visiting a popular spot you're often greeted with antagonism over you lovely hair and outfit so even dress up loses its sparkle. SL did offer magic but then descended into a copy of real life as people wanted Ikea homes with no imagination to live in a fantasy. Second Life becoming more First Life.  It will still thrive if there can be some creator simplification and it made cheaper for those actually making and selling content. Newbies need the interesting welcoming destinations and not just a sex hit but also encouragement to create a little and learn simple skills. I have a massive vanity project of inventory I created, my own land and builds downsizing only once, and cannot yet bear to walk away but after almost 20 years and aged 70 you do start considering your sanity and the expense. How many of the early players face the same? New blood needs content and empty malls and land areas for sale or rent are not it.

Are there still bots in the sky impersonating traffic or are they now replaced by 'store models'? Keeping new players needs genuine venues and something to engage them in the knowledge they may have an attention span deficit. Meanwhile i will still walk like a duck back to my house by the sea and watch the beautiful sunsets with my virtual cat and dog.

[Coffee Pancake]

4 hours ago, Jennifer Boyle said:

After someone posted that mesh bodies with their many faces were the main cause of lag, I did an experiment. I was in a room with about a dozen people on an island where no one else was. We all detached our mesh bodies to see what would happen. The frame rate didn't change.

Comments?

vsync perhaps ... 

Anecdotal guesswork is not a reliable way to understand how the viewer works. That's what the source code to the viewer is for.

We have spent significant time profiling the viewer and measuring what it spends it's time doing.

[Carolyn Zapedzki]

On 10/13/2022 at 5:05 PM, Rowan Amore said:

No.

 

People do NOT interact when they get logged into these areas.  They get the heck out as soon as possible.  

Yep, I soon TP somewhere else, being grateful I have clothes and that I wasn't changing when SL logged me out. 😄

[Carolyn Zapedzki]

On 10/18/2022 at 7:08 AM, Persephone Emerald said:

If you can upload 1 texture with multiple sections, it's also cheaper than multiple textures.

I used to do that a lot before going prem+, saved hell of a lot of lindens. Not as many textures to rezz as well,  for example 1 texture having 6 images in 1, 1 texture to rezz instead of 6.

[SeattleChris]

On 10/14/2022 at 5:21 PM, Arielle Popstar said:

Or maybe they see the writing on the wall that since the PC is a slowly dying market and the mobile one is gaining more and more ground, they better come up with something to stay ahead of the curve. The cell and mobile are a necessity nowadays whereas high end gaming computers increasingly a luxury. Platforms that have no support for web and/or mobile connections will not survive or even be able to develop any sort of mass appeal. 

Sure, but Second Life is still a world where the users are the content creators. An SL viewer/client on the phone? Great. Blender? Not so much. Not for me, anyway. In the peculiar instance of Second Life, if they chase away the PC users, they chase away the creators. No doubt all those info hubs will load great on mobile clients, but say goodbye to creative content.

On the other hand, there's definitely truth to what you say. Even currently popular MMORPGs complain about attrition as people move to mobile games and apps. So even less sandbox-y environments with shared goals and objectives aren't hitting the mark.

Maybe that's a Catch-22 for Second Life, but also maybe improvements in VR technology will make some sort of middle-ground possible. (The end to the chip shortage will probably help, too,  if that ever happens.) Second Life on a 2.5" screen sounds like torture. But if I could pop on a headset, I'd be willing to deal with being a glitchy 2d Hiro Protagonist while the tech catches up. (Provided no one chases me with one of those nuclear watchdogs.)

[Carolyn Zapedzki]

On 10/17/2022 at 6:08 PM, EliseAnne85 said:

A bunch of us should get together as tinies wearing 1024's and see how much lag there is then because the tiny avatars are very low poly.  A Dinkie is about 17k triangles, I think or somewhere in that ballpark, whilst a very heavy poly body that is very popular and very nice is 1 million triangles though.  Also, the tinies don't have much in the way of scripts going whereas a human avatar is scripted from head to toe, even down to the grommets on their shoes.  

But, again on the 1024's.  There are some things for Dinkies I'd like to make in 1024 as it looks better.  I'm trying to shrink down some things before I put them on the 512 but that looks more bad than I thought.  I dunnoooooo what to do.  It's very frustrating.   Many of our cards render 1024 so I'm confused, and as I said, very frustrated.   And, PBR is commercial grade, so I'd think people would want to create with 1024.  

I have noticed that for things like posters/sales images etc there's a slight degredation in quality from 1024-512, but that's close up from a distance they look the same, but it is clothing that has to have 1024

[EliseAnne85]

24 minutes ago, Carolyn Zapedzki said:

I have noticed that for things like posters/sales images etc there's a slight degredation in quality from 1024-512, but that's close up from a distance they look the same, but it is clothing that has to have 1024

I agree, but I also think some furniture does too.  The smaller items like the necklace and the tattoo show almost no difference.  For the tattoo, the 1024 looks a bit darker and not so blurry even though it's blurry intentionally.  

[EliseAnne85]

On 10/18/2022 at 2:57 PM, Cali Souther said:

I've been watching my complexity lately - noticed a lot of my older jewelry,  some free hair,  etc. was shockingly high in complexity. 

I've always been careful with scripts,  but now try to reduce both.   

My mesh body is only 5054 ...      I had a free hair that was 56k !    I tossed it in the trash.

I'll give up / be as careful as I can - but I'm not going back to the old system body.  No way Jose! 

In my posts I am not suggesting get rid of bodies or other things.  Heavily scripted items one could still wear for a photo, for example.  

What I am saying is SL is user-generated content and is NOT streamlined content like some content is for a specific game.  The content is streamlined to work in that game.  That is not the case for SL.  But, then they come and complain that it's LL's fault and that they can't make a viewer.   

The same could happen all over again with a new viewer and new specs.  The new specs out-dated because now everyone is buying a 50 million triangle body.  And, then they will come to the forum again and complain LL can't make a viewer.

The thing is, if we want streamlined content, we have to go to a streamlined game.  

However, there should be a cap put somewhere/somehow in the new viewer so the whole problem doesn't start all over again.

LL cannot read minds.  How can they make specs and a viewer for stuff they don't even know what it is yet because they are not creating it?  LL will make a viewer and specs for their new mesh avatars they are coming out with.  That's all they can do.  I just get sick of all the posts saying it's LL's fault.

Again, if someone wants streamlined content, they go to one of those games.  

Edited October 20, 2022 by EliseAnne85

[Coffee Pancake]

2 hours ago, Carolyn Zapedzki said:

I have noticed that for things like posters/sales images etc there's a slight degredation in quality from 1024-512, but that's close up from a distance they look the same, but it is clothing that has to have 1024

Images in SL are progressively encoded on purpose - so the viewer fetches and processes a bit more data when a bigger image is needed. The main point is that given a 1024 source image, if it wont be rendered on screen bigger than 512 pixels, the viewer shouldn't load the 1024 version. This is from the days when bandwidth was important.

This massively increases the overall amount of per image processing that has to happen but it means big textures don't consume bandwidth or get fully rendered when they aren't needed. It's not perfect and can be further improved.

Theoretically we could have 4K textures and if the viewer smarts are doing their job correctly, no one will ever need to care. (Except for creators, as a 4K texture can hold all the parts of most everything we have in SL that uses multiple images now - an object using one big texture is MUCH faster to render than 4 smaller ones.).