Why Can't You Set Home on Linden Infohubs Anymore?

[Prokofy Neva]

This is a mystery to me.

Especially because when a message drops down telling you, when you attempt to set home on a Linden infohub (the old telehubs), that you can only do this on your own land or at a Linden infohub.

This has been broken for a long time (a year?) and it must have been deliberately disabled. 

I will have to test whether it's been disabled on Mainland, but now enabled on the new BelliHub.

 

[Qie Niangao]

I was able to set home to a couple Zindra "safe hubs" and the Miramare infohub with Catznip, and my alt could do so at the Dore, Hyles, and Bear infohubs with the Linden viewer (7.0.0.580085, the "GLTF Material Import" version) but not at Iris despite the ⓘ marker on the map.

[Coffee Pancake]

There is no mystery .. it's right there in the error message.

You can only set home at a Mainland Infohub.

Belli isn't mainland.

This is not a bug.

[Claireschen Hesten]

The screen capture looks like Violet Island which isn't a marked info hub, which could explain the inability to set as home location. Some time back had an alt try setting home at Idu which officially use to be part of a four region LL info hub welcome center, it's no longer map marked if that makes a difference and it didn't work 

[Ingrid Ingersoll]

Yeah I wish you could set your home location to Violet (which is a mainland sim) but there's a setting that isn't switched on for that sim in the system to allow it as an infohub. You can do it at Waterhead, Ahern etc. 

When Violet was created, it was for "overflow" when they expected a sudden influx of users at some point way back. 

Edited May 18, 2023 by Ingrid Ingersoll

[Aethelwine]

There is a list on the Wiki, but it does need an update

https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Infohub

I checked a few and so far as I can tell, Iris, Boardroom, Pooley and Ahern won't let you set home there. Although with regards to Ahern the 3 adjacent regions all will let you set home there. 

Edited May 18, 2023 by Aethelwine

[animats]

Boardroom is not an info hub. It's a model region, showing one of the standard pre-built regions you can order from Linden Estate Services. Meeting rooms and break-out spaces. It has a landing area with some signage and a "buy Lindens here" vendor, so it looks like an info hub.

It has recently been used as a party space by some group which goes there regularly and sets up  a temporary club, attached to a seated avatar.

(I sometimes go to Boardroom for viewer testing, because it has curved translucent windows, a problem with alpha blending. It was always empty until recently. I was amazed to find 30 avatars there.)

[Aethelwine]

6 minutes ago, animats said:

Boardroom is not an info hub. It's a model region, showing one of the standard pre-built regions you can order from Linden Estate Services. Meeting rooms and break-out spaces. It has a landing area with some signage and a "buy Lindens here" vendor, so it looks like an info hub.

It has recently been used as a party space by some group which goes there regularly and sets up  a temporary club, attached to a seated avatar.

(I sometimes go to Boardroom for viewer testing, because it has curved translucent windows, a problem with alpha blending. It was always empty until recently. I was amazed to find 30 avatars there.)

I am not entirely clear what I am seeing looking at the Revision history, it looks like Boardroom got added to that page in 2014.

[Qie Niangao]

I went to Pooley and found that I could set home to the location of the Pooley Stage parcel, but not elsewhere in the region, so then I went back to Iris and found there's a 16m² parcel right in the center of the temple with an invisible telehub prim that is the location of the infohub, and I could set home to that microparcel only, so the ⓘ marker on the map is correct in both those regions.

There's no such marker for Boardroom although there are a bunch of avatars there who may have been washed ashore at an infohub (but one of them was wearing a large Nazi swastika banner overhead, so maybe it was just a meeting of the local chapter auxiliary).

[Sid Nagy]

Who needs a home position these days?
The favorite landmarks bar is your friend.

[Magnek Fang]

1 minute ago, Sid Nagy said:

Who needs a home position these days?
The favorite landmarks bar is your friend.

Oversensitive security orbs and Linden damage. And not all my favs show up.

[Prokofy Neva]

20 hours ago, Qie Niangao said:

I was able to set home to a couple Zindra "safe hubs" and the Miramare infohub with Catznip, and my alt could do so at the Dore, Hyles, and Bear infohubs with the Linden viewer (7.0.0.580085, the "GLTF Material Import" version) but not at Iris despite the ⓘ marker on the map.

Not at Ross or Violent either. I will keep checking. Could it be that Catznip preserved a feature that is not on the LL viewer?

[Prokofy Neva]

15 hours ago, Coffee Pancake said:

There is no mystery .. it's right there in the error message.

You can only set home at a Mainland Infohub.

Belli isn't mainland.

This is not a bug.

OK, read my post, "When you attempte to set on a MAINLAND infohub" -- Mainland. Belli is a separate estate than Mainland, contiguous though it be.

I am attempting this AT A MAINLAND HUB. Not at Belli. My question was whether Belli DID have it whereas Mainland infohubs/former telehubs do not, such as Iris, Violet, Ross, etc. 

[Aethelwine]

43 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

OK, read my post, "When you attempte to set on a MAINLAND infohub" -- Mainland. Belli is a separate estate than Mainland, contiguous though it be.

I am attempting this AT A MAINLAND HUB. Not at Belli. My question was whether Belli DID have it whereas Mainland infohubs/former telehubs do not, such as Iris, Violet, Ross, etc. 

It seems to be 2016 when Ross, Calleta etc were moved to the Former or inactive hubs section. Plum and Violet moved there in 2014. The 2011 version of the page didn't have any section on former and inactive hubs.

At the top of the page you can press the "revision history" button and you get a list of edits to the page by date, the Prev link in each listing shows some information about the edit and at the bottom how the page would have displayed at that time.

I would have thought if you raise a support ticket to ask what happened at Ross to lose the Infohub status you should get an answer. It remains a great location to visit and to find things of interest to do.

Edited May 19, 2023 by Aethelwine

[Qie Niangao]

2 hours ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Not at Ross or Violent either. I will keep checking. Could it be that Catznip preserved a feature that is not on the LL viewer?

Oh, oops, I created the confusion I was trying to prevent: It didn't matter which viewer I used. First I started using Catznip, then had the same thought that it could possibly be a viewer thing so I switched to the (candidate) Linden viewer, and both behaved the same. 

I checked BelliHub and despite the name it's not an InfoHub and can't set home to there.

Thing is, I'm no longer sure what an InfoHub really is at this point. Idly scanning the map I came across the ⓘ marking at the center of a private region called "Sapphire Island" but that location is access restricted and I got bounced to an administrative microparcel at the edge of the region. Another map marking is on "Fusion" but the whole region is access restricted. (Some private map markings I could access appear to correspond to Telehub locations so I thought maybe the markings correspond to a region's telehub routing point. But I don't think the Mainland InfoHubs have telehub routing set, else we'd always land at that location regardless of where in the region we try to teleport. So I don't know how those map markings are determined.)

[Love Zhaoying]

2 hours ago, Qie Niangao said:

Oh, oops, I created the confusion I was trying to prevent: It didn't matter which viewer I used. First I started using Catznip, then had the same thought that it could possibly be a viewer thing so I switched to the (candidate) Linden viewer, and both behaved the same. 

I checked BelliHub and despite the name it's not an InfoHub and can't set home to there.

Thing is, I'm no longer sure what an InfoHub really is at this point. Idly scanning the map I came across the ⓘ marking at the center of a private region called "Sapphire Island" but that location is access restricted and I got bounced to an administrative microparcel at the edge of the region. Another map marking is on "Fusion" but the whole region is access restricted. (Some private map markings I could access appear to correspond to Telehub locations so I thought maybe the markings correspond to a region's telehub routing point. But I don't think the Mainland InfoHubs have telehub routing set, else we'd always land at that location regardless of where in the region we try to teleport. So I don't know how those map markings are determined.)

It is sounding a lot like the OP just "assumes" that certain locations are InfoHubs.

[Coffee Pancake]

Setting a home location has nothing to do with the viewer.

All viewers just send a request to the region - "Set home here plz?" - and the region decides.

[Prokofy Neva]

23 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

It is sounding a lot like the OP just "assumes" that certain locations are InfoHubs.

Maybe because they were called that historically and still are.

Note that Qie pointed out that Iris is one still marked "infohub" and called that. We have a second-tier helping site and build there. I didn't realize that Iris, too, is not a place where you can "set home to here". What is this about?

But it seems, as often occurs in SL, some Infohubs are more equal than other Infohubs...

Edited May 20, 2023 by Prokofy Neva

[Prokofy Neva]

On 5/18/2023 at 4:22 PM, Qie Niangao said:

I went to Pooley and found that I could set home to the location of the Pooley Stage parcel, but not elsewhere in the region, so then I went back to Iris and found there's a 16m² parcel right in the center of the temple with an invisible telehub prim that is the location of the infohub, and I could set home to that microparcel only, so the ⓘ marker on the map is correct in both those regions.

There's no such marker for Boardroom although there are a bunch of avatars there who may have been washed ashore at an infohub (but one of them was wearing a large Nazi swastika banner overhead, so maybe it was just a meeting of the local chapter auxiliary).

What if you are a newbie and can't figure out how to find that invisible telehub prim and 16 m2?

That reminds me how I made the amazing discovery that telehubs are really only those invisible prims -- Xenon Linden explained it to me back in the day (builder of the Moth Temple in Iris and many other wonderful thing). It turned out that anything, any build, any place could be a telehub (later infohub) and didn't have to have ugly builds on it.

[Love Zhaoying]

1. I wonder if you can successfully "nominate" or "request" a location to be a "new" InfoHub?

2. Also, isn't there a standard Land setting, for instance that anyone can set in their "owned" land, to allow other users to "Set Home to Here"?

3. Finally, don't "actual" InfoHubs show in the Map with a specific Icon? Instead of wondering "Why won't this 'InfoHub' place let me 'Set Home to Here'?", just..Look at the map?

 

[Qie Niangao]

7 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

1. I wonder if you can successfully "nominate" or "request" a location to be a "new" InfoHub?

2. Also, isn't there a standard Land setting, for instance that anyone can set in their "owned" land, to allow other users to "Set Home to Here"?

3. Finally, don't "actual" InfoHubs show in the Map with a specific Icon? Instead of wondering "Why won't this 'InfoHub' place let me 'Set Home to Here'?", just..Look at the map?

1. Somehow there are InfoHubs on private islands, so it must be possible, at least on private estates. I'd be interested to know the process by which estates make their unofficial InfoHubs appear on the map. (Also, I found a couple I'd nominate for removal as InfoHubs. Seems to me it dilutes the stated InfoHub brand as "a place where Residents congregate and socialize" if it's not even publicly accessible.)

2. I know groups can grant an Ability to "Allow 'Set Home to Here' on group (deeded) land, but that would only apply to group members, and specifically those in whichever Roles are designated to have that Ability. I don't know of a corresponding land setting that would permit it for individually-owned parcels (but I'm not thinking of a reason why there shouldn't be).

3. Apparently non-Mainland InfoHubs don't (can't?) allow everyone to Set Home to that location, so the map icon doesn't universally correspond to that property. I agree that on Mainland, we've yet to find an exception (after discovering the specific, arbitrarily small InfoHub parcels in a couple regions).

[Prokofy Neva]

11 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

1. Somehow there are InfoHubs on private islands, so it must be possible, at least on private estates. I'd be interested to know the process by which estates make their unofficial InfoHubs appear on the map. (Also, I found a couple I'd nominate for removal as InfoHubs. Seems to me it dilutes the stated InfoHub brand as "a place where Residents congregate and socialize" if it's not even publicly accessible.)

2. I know groups can grant an Ability to "Allow 'Set Home to Here' on group (deeded) land, but that would only apply to group members, and specifically those in whichever Roles are designated to have that Ability. I don't know of a corresponding land setting that would permit it for individually-owned parcels (but I'm not thinking of a reason why there shouldn't be).

3. Apparently non-Mainland InfoHubs don't (can't?) allow everyone to Set Home to that location, so the map icon doesn't universally correspond to that property. I agree that on Mainland, we've yet to find an exception (after discovering the specific, arbitrarily small InfoHub parcels in a couple regions).

Qie, all of these locations used to have that function. You could "set home to here" on Ross and these other old telehub locations. So that means it was removed/suspended. Why?

Newbies used to be randomly sent to a list of telehubs and later infohubs, and among these were indeed Ross, Violent, Iris. In fact, I used to have to have a sign explaining that this happened because people didn't understand why they were there OR that they were automatically set to home there, and would have to change "set home" to some other location if they wanted to.

[Love Zhaoying]

16 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

1. Somehow there are InfoHubs on private islands, so it must be possible, at least on private estates. I'd be interested to know the process by which estates make their unofficial InfoHubs appear on the map. (Also, I found a couple I'd nominate for removal as InfoHubs. Seems to me it dilutes the stated InfoHub brand as "a place where Residents congregate and socialize" if it's not even publicly accessible.)

2. I know groups can grant an Ability to "Allow 'Set Home to Here' on group (deeded) land, but that would only apply to group members, and specifically those in whichever Roles are designated to have that Ability. I don't know of a corresponding land setting that would permit it for individually-owned parcels (but I'm not thinking of a reason why there shouldn't be).

3. Apparently non-Mainland InfoHubs don't (can't?) allow everyone to Set Home to that location, so the map icon doesn't universally correspond to that property. I agree that on Mainland, we've yet to find an exception (after discovering the specific, arbitrarily small InfoHub parcels in a couple regions).

It is starting to seem like "InfoHubs doesn't mean what we think it means".  You'd at least think it meant a) everyone can go there, b) it's a "safe place" open to the public, and c) in general, people can set "home" there.

[Qie Niangao]

26 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Qie, all of these locations used to have that function. You could "set home to here" on Ross and these other old telehub locations. So that means it was removed/suspended. Why?

Newbies used to be randomly sent to a list of telehubs and later infohubs, and among these were indeed Ross, Violent, Iris. In fact, I used to have to have a sign explaining that this happened because people didn't understand why they were there OR that they were automatically set to home there, and would have to change "set home" to some other location if they wanted to.

I don't know why Ross and Violet (and Boardman, etc) lost their InfoHub status. I vaguely remember some fussing about the specific crowd at Violet, but removing InfoHub status wouldn't automatically fix that. Maybe they didn't want innocent newbies to see the blue icon and stumble into (and set home to) a congregation of performative deplorables? (But I have no memory of that ever being a problem at Ross. Not that I'd necessarily know.)

There's probably a long history of confusing transitions here. Telehubs and InfoHubs and Welcome Centers and Safe Hubs all have subtly different meanings corresponding to subtle changes in the social theory of Second Life, perhaps. I'll be damned if I can figure out what any of it means now, and the Knowledge Base articles appear to be written with carefully engineered ambiguity to potentially remain no less valid into the next Second Life "social theory" of new user retention.

How many SL residents (or Lindens) can draw even the current Venn diagram of 

• places where you may be deposited on login when your last location is unresponsive
• places to which everyone can set home
• places with blue icons on the map, and
• places newbies may rez when graduating from their initial rez point.

How that Venn diagram changed over time may be unknowable at this point, and any underlying "why" is surely now the lore in that fantasy role play called "Second Life". How many sides has the InfoHub die?

[Love Zhaoying]

3 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

How many SL residents (or Lindens) can draw even the current Venn diagram of 

• places where you may be deposited on login when your last location is unresponsive
• places to which everyone can set home
• places with blue icons on the map, and
• places newbies may rez when graduating from their initial rez point.

How that Venn diagram changed over time may be unknowable at this point, and any underlying "why" is surely now the lore in that fantasy role play called "Second Life". How many sides has the InfoHub die?

If you put it THAT way, it's a conspiracy!!!