Firestorm Community Viewer Survey

[Celestiall Nightfire]

Loathed V2, even after trying it several times, and had gone back to 1.23.5.   Last night I downloaded Firestorm.

Yea! for the pie-menu!!  I can de-dock the sidebar, and have an actual screen again, to see SL.  Good job.  Really like this.

 

Oh, I took the survey too.

[Freya Mokusei]

I think you're making a few assumptions about the LL legal team. They may work out, they may not. This link implies there was some trouble previously, but my memory isn't good enough to recall. As I said I didn't use Emerald for very long, and I fully admit to not knowing too much about the technical aspects of OTR.

 

I've never seen it used for anything as pure as recipes.

I agree that it is the least offensive of the options in the survey, however.

I guess my point is that you can either be that viewer that attracts/encourages all of the dramafolks, stalkers and griefers, or you can say "No, I think we can be better than that."

[Void Singer]

---

Freya Mokusei wrote:

---

Void Singer wrote:

the best way to combat drama is not to get involved in it, not jump to conclusions, and drop people like hot rocks that do those things.

---

I hate to pounce on this, since I'm aware of the wonderful work you do, but I do take exception to this statement. It's nothing personal, but I've seen this view expressed elsewhere and it's invalid.

Saying "get better friends" doesn't help anyone when the functionality is being pushed into peoples' view by the viewer. The viewer is a part of of SL culture (boob-physics, media privacy, Emeraldgate), and people use it to determine what is 'socially acceptable'. People will use these features regardless of how drama-avoidant people would be otherwise.

 

It's hard not to take the phrase 'X isn't friends with you anymore.' personally.

It's hard not to ask someone WHY they think they need to hide their online status from you.

 

Sure, people can use hacks and tricks to find out these things using standard LSL.

People could make a list of their friends and check against it to see who's been deleting them.

 But how many people do that routinely? Feel free to post in contradiction if you do.

The difference is that by putting the features in the viewer, you encourage people to use them as standard (case in point, Show LookAt, since being publicised by Emerald, is now a feature many people use daily).

 

Before Emerald included the features mentioned in this survey, I'd never ONCE* heard someone complain about a hidden status or removed friendship, now it seems people complain every other day. People need a viewer that ENCOURAGES cohesion within the community, rather than one that draws your attention to negative events.

 

* I'm sure they happened, but in much smaller numbers that never made it to my ears.

---

no offense taken at all.... and I do agree that choice of wording on that message is a little unfortunate... not entirely their fault, it should never have been called a "friends" list to begin with IMO... it's a "contact" list... not everyone in mine for sure is a friend, I have business associates, clients, colleagues, friends, etc in there. the difference in having a notice and not to me is minimal, since you can see by looking that they've removed you from their list (because they will also be removed from yours).

But I've had more than one person either accidentally remove me, or thought I was no longer active and done so, and it gives me a chance and an opportunity to renew that connection immediately if I didn't notice it otherwise, or at least to realize that I haven't made contact with that person recently and remind me to do better.

could I do it manually? yes, and I did before I had access to that feature, it was either tedious or error prone process.

 

I routinely hide my online status in the viewer, it's my versions of a do not distrub sign, because frankly busy mode is broken crap, and my inworld time is reserved for Me (ok and my clients when I'm working) and being well enough known that I can get a lot of random traffic. but I also realize it's easy enough to look me up if it's necessary, and there are a small core of people that I don't hide my status from that are welcome to contact me at any time. I take it as a simple replacement for busy mode, that if a person is otherwise engaged they'll respond when they're available.

I rarely use the online indictors myself, but they are extremely useful in knowing when is the best time to send items to people... for instance to avoid IM caps or busy mode discards, but also to know when people are dropping into my region and popping righ back out, to see if they crashed (in which case I can offer help) or perhaps dropping griefer bombs, or stealth vendors (in which case I can quickly remove them). if they weren't in the viewer I'd be wasting resources to use simple scripts to track exactly the same behavior.

 

and I do agree it's not enough to "get better friends", you also have to *BE* a better friend yourself, which can be hard... the fundamental attribution error rears it's ugly head there, we all assume that when people do things that have a negative impact on us that it's for negative reasons, but when we do the same things, we often have a positive or neutral reason for doing it... so when it happens it's best to try to imagine a reason why we might do it with good intentions, and then with that in mind, ask.... it probably wouldn't hurt if more people did that on forums too... and not to suggest that I'm better, because I fail at it too sometimes

[Dresden Ceriano]

I'm sorry but I have to laugh at you for linking to that site as any kind of defense of anything, not to mention the person who said that could be grossly mistaken, and probably doesn't know what they're talking about. Of course, I haven't read the whole thread, but I probably will after I post this. As spiteful and vindictive as the people at SLU can be, I often find it very amusing to peruse their vitriolic sentiments... just for kicks.

Now this...

---

Freya Mokusei wrote:

I've never seen it used for anything as pure as recipes.

---

How could you ever have "seen" it used as anything? Make your assumptions all you like.

Funny that "that" viewer that attracts all of the "dramafolks" and stuff, as you claim (but of which you have no proof what-so-ever) ended up being one of the most popular viewers in SL (in V1 form anyway).

...Dres

[Perrie Juran]

---

Void Singer wrote:

I routinely hide my online status in the viewer, it's my versions of a do not distrub sign, because frankly busy mode is broken crap, and my inworld time is reserved for Me (ok and my clients when I'm working) and being well enough known that I can get a lot of random traffic. but I also realize it's easy enough to look me up if it's necessary, and there are a small core of people that I don't hide my status from that are welcome to contact me at any time. I take it as a simple replacement for busy mode, that if a person is otherwise engaged they'll respond when they're available.

I rarely use the online indictors myself, but they are extremely useful in knowing when is the best time to send items to people... for instance to avoid IM caps or busy mode discards, but also to know when people are dropping into my region and popping righ back out, to see if they crashed (in which case I can offer help) or perhaps dropping griefer bombs, or stealth vendors (in which case I can quickly remove them). if they weren't in the viewer I'd be wasting resources to use simple scripts to track exactly the same behavior.

---

I am not using Firestorm  atm so I don't know if Firestorm has it but I totally love the 'auto respond to IM' feature in Phoenix.  I find that the simple "sorry if I don't reply right way but I'm busy doing whatever " works wonder's and it doesn't screw up other functions like "busy mode" does.

[Dresden Ceriano]

I believe that is included at this time, if not it certainly will be, I'm sure.

...Dres

[Ceka Cianci]

there is a preview video on the phoenix site for the beta firestorm viewer..oh here i forgot..i'll just link it here lol

 

[Arrehn Oberlander]

---

Perrie Juran wrote:

I don't know if Firestorm has it but I totally love the 'auto respond to IM' feature in Phoenix.  I find that the simple "sorry if I don't reply right way but I'm busy doing whatever " works wonder's and it doesn't screw up other functions like "busy mode" does.

---

 

Firestorm does have an autorespond mode that works without placing you into away or busy status. It's very useful!

[Void Singer]

---

Perrie Juran wrote:

I am not using Firestorm  atm so I don't know if Firestorm has it but I totally love the 'auto respond to IM' feature in Phoenix.  I find that the simple "sorry if I don't reply right way but I'm busy doing whatever " works wonder's and it doesn't screw up other functions like "busy mode" does.

---

 that's useful too, although there are times i'd rather not inform people that I am indeed online... I tend to get lots of random "hi" messages.... which annoys me to know end.... just "hi" is something you say to a person you pass on the street, not someone you are trying to talk to... people you talk to  might start with hi, but you immediately follow with what you intended to say.... it's a pet peeve of mine.

the only thing I don't like about the auto responder is that it's not intuitive... if someone has one on, then crashes or relogs, the thing triggers again when we resume the conversation, which I find annoying, so I don't use it in general, although at time when I don't want to talk to anyone because I'm busy (or afk while my av is monitoring) then I use it.

[Dresden Ceriano]

Hi.

...Dres (lol)

[Void Singer]

see, now I'm not gonna tell you where you could find that grease =P

[Dresden Ceriano]

...Dres

[Pussycat Catnap]

---

Arrehn Oberlander wrote:

 

Based on the popularity of the other community viewers we've created,  we believe these features will have an impact on your SL experience regardless of what viewer you currently use. Many of the issues are social interactions, and are not just about technology. This is why this post is in this forum, and not the technology forum.

---

Wait... what?

Have you gone back down the Emerald path of hacking stuff? Or adding more privacy invasive features like the 'which of my friends are hiding' button?

If not - why would a non-Firestorm user be impacted by what you're doing?

If you're still staying clean - then your features would only impact your users, and not anyone else.

 

[Freya Mokusei]

---

Dresden Ceriano wrote:

How could you ever have "seen" it used as anything? Make your assumptions all you like.

Funny that "that" viewer that attracts all of the "dramafolks" and stuff, as you claim (but of which you have no proof what-so-ever) ended up being one of the most popular viewers in SL (in V1 form anyway).

...Dres

---

Getting awfully defensive up in here.

I skipped out on stating 'your milage may vary' because I figured that was obvious. My apologies for that presumption, and I hope you can see some of the circles in your logic.

Enjoy the thread.

[Peewee Musytari]

---

Phil Deakins wrote:

I've never looked at Firestorm and I won't look until the cam controls are very much like the V1 cam controls; i.e. translucent when not in focus, moveable, and small. Has that been done in Firestorm?

---

Here is a screenshot of my Firestorm setup, as you can see it looks much more like V1 than V2 and you can even have pretty lights on the pie menu.....Loving it!! 

[Void Singer]

---

Pussycat Catnap wrote:

why would a non-Firestorm user be impacted by what you're doing?

---

 because if a feature can be used on firestorm that is not available on vanilla V2, it impacts the community as a whole by creating a discrepancy in abilities... this is true of EVERY feature, but is most noticeable in the features mentioned in the survey... some of which override defaults elsewhere by others, although with the notable exception of OTR, all of them can be duplicated in some fashion within the vanilla client. (OTR would take a little extra work to do reasonably without modification or an external app)

 

ETA:

ooooo glowy pie? yummy

[phaedra Exonar]

Thanks for letting us have a choice, first thing I did was turn of the pie menu, and please keep the side bar as an option, I love being able to move the buttons around.

Only problem I've see so far, that just appeared today is that I can see the edges of the #Firestorm LSL Bridge v1.7 attached to my avatar.

[Peewee Musytari]

---

phaedra Exonar wrote:

Thanks for letting us have a choice, first thing I did was turn of the pie menu, and please keep the side bar as an option, I love being able to move the buttons around.

Only problem I've see so far, that just appeared today is that I can see the edges of the #Firestorm LSL Bridge v1.7 attached to my avatar.

---

HI Phaedra,

If you go to Preferences > skins, you can choose them with or without the sidebar.

As for the Bridge, that is a known problem, along with the one where you see yourself wearing a rock lol To fix it, go to your # Firestorm folder, detach the bridge and delete it & then go to Avatar > Avatar Health and click on "Recreate new bridge".

You should see a bridge and script appear in the folder and when the script jumps into it and disappears that line will vanish too.

[Phil Deakins]

Thank you for the screenshot, Peewee. The cam controls do look acceptable - in spite of the extra buttons above them, whatever they are. I suspect they are extra cam controls that have always existed but I've never used, so they'll do

[Dresden Ceriano]

---

Peewee Musytari wrote:

---

phaedra Exonar wrote:

Thanks for letting us have a choice, first thing I did was turn of the pie menu, and please keep the side bar as an option, I love being able to move the buttons around.

Only problem I've see so far, that just appeared today is that I can see the edges of the #Firestorm LSL Bridge v1.7 attached to my avatar.

---

HI Phaedra,

If you go to Preferences > skins, you can choose them with or without the sidebar.

As for the Bridge, that is a known problem, along with the one where you see yourself wearing a rock lol To fix it, go to your # Firestorm folder, detach the bridge and delete it & then go to Avatar > Avatar Health and click on "Recreate new bridge".

You should see a bridge and script appear in the folder and when the script jumps into it and disappears that line will vanish too.

---

Just wanted to mention, you'll need to be on land where you can rez things that's scripts enabled.

...Dres

[Arrehn Oberlander]

There's different cam controls on different skins, so feel free to experiment and find the one you like the best.

[Solar Legion]

I'm one of the ones that complained biterly concerning online status for several reasons, among them being the fact that, prior to the implementation of that feature, I have had several friends as well as content creators/creator CS staff gripe at me for IMing them to see if they are online. Their view was that, if they show up as offline, you should leave them alone unless its bloody well life or death importance.

Once these features were implemented, I siply ceased to IM anyone who showed as offline in my friends list yet online in their profile. when it coems to CS staff? I'll double check using various other avenues to see if they are "ghosting" (online but hidden) or not. If they are Ghosting, I leave them alone.

The whole "unfriend notificvation" system is also a boon as I and several other of my friends have discovered that the server which houses that information can occasionally lose entries in the list. when this happens, the system still sends out the notification - enabling me to send a friend request again. If they truly did drop me of their own volition .... I let it go. If not, they add me back and chalk it up to the server being a flake. 

[rich Dubratt]

I was on firestorm all day and I for one can tell you that it is not user friendly. you have to keep changing from local chat to walking. you cant forget to click the text bar before typing. otherwise you end up doing all kinds of jumps flying and whatever else SL can makle you do. the graphics are making my computer lag when the phoenix viewer does not it is terrible to find the different maps, controls to make you move or camera to let you look around. binstead of spending money to make things more difficult why not just leave what works alone. I give firestorm the poorest rating a viewer can get. it is worse than linden labs viewer 2.

[Dresden Ceriano]

Welcome to the forum, Rich.

Remember that Firestorm is still in beta, it will take some getting used to. I don't see how the chat vs walking thing is any different from any other viewer, but that could be because I only ever right click my avatar and use the arrow keys for movement. I'm sure given time you could figure out what the best solution is for your own style. But of course, you don't have to do that, you can use whatever viewer works best for you.

Personally, I find Firestorm one of the most user friendly V2 based viewers out there for the simple fact that they've made it so customizable. Because of that, it can seem more complicated than the regular V2 viewer or even Phoenix. One good thing about it is that the Phoenix team has started giving Firestorm classes to help people learn more about the different settings and help them become more familiar with the things they can do with the IU. That plus the excellent resource that is the inworld Phoenix/Firestorm Support group shows that the Phoenix team are committed to providing their users a level of service you will never see from LL.

So, really, it's all about choice. Use whatever viewer you feel most comfortable with and works best with your system, whether it be one of LL's V2 based viewers, Firestorm, Kirsten's or whatever. But by all means, find a V2 base viewer now and start getting used to it, because V1 viewers (such as Phoenix) will soon become obsolete.

Take care... Dres

[Arrehn Oberlander]

You can use the preferences to easily change this behavior to one you would prefer:

 

Preference: Chat:  Pressing letters keys:  () Starts local chat  (*) affects movement

 

 

Firestorm has many, many more preferences and customization available than V2, allowing you to tune it to the style of viewer you best prefer.

 

Thanks,

-A