ChinRey

Really interesting pictures but first: hhefestos wrote: Is a fitted mesh object, with a png texture. I'm not sure if that was clear from the replies you got earlier but this has nthing to do with png as such. It's a problem with textures using transparency and what format they've been uploaded in has no significance. hhefestos wrote: I tried setting the sl texture "alpha mode" in "masking" but the alpha actually dissapears. So i´m forced to set it in "blending" Not sure if you understand the difference between alpha masking and alpha blending. With alpha blending each pixel in the texture can have one of 256 levels of transparency, ranging from 0 (completely transparent) to 255 (completely opaque). With alpha masking each pixel is either completely transparent or opaque. Since all alpha textures use bledning as default, you need to set the threshold where transparency is switched on or off. By default that threshold is set to 0 which means the whole texture will be opaque. hhefestos wrote: When I rez the hair on ground it looks fine .... But when I wear it, it seems like the overlapping faces of the hair conflict with each other As I said, really interesting. It's fairly easy to explain why you get alpha bleeding but harder to tell why there's a difference between the rezzed and the worn hair. I do have a theory ot two though: When two surfaces with alpha testures overlap, the viewer has to decide which one is the closest. That calculation is based not on how far away the surface is but how far away the center of the object is (and in this context each part of a linkset counts as a separate object) so it can easily go wrong. One possible explanation for the difference in the two images is that a minute shift in viewing angle changed the relative distance of the different locks. Another possbile - but not very plausible - explanation is that when an object is worn distance from the avatar center is also included in the calculation. I've never heard of anything suggesting that before and I can't see any reason for it but this is SL after all... I assume the reason why the avatar's ear shows up is that the hair is so narrow its sides are hidden inside the head. If you study a well made SL hair, you will notice that the makers has tried to avoid overlapping alphas whenever possible. Most of the hair wil be textured with a regular non-transparent texture. Only the outermost locks will have transparency and the maker will have spent qwuite a bit of time and effort trying to keep them from overlapping.

PunkM8 wrote: Not just any poseball but one that strips the avatar on sit totally worth L$1,000,000 Of course! I'd be very surprised if the sale figures of Sassy's poseball hasn't skyrocketed recently. Rlv stripping a mesh avatar is, I wouldn't say fascinating but it certainly is ... interesting.

That's a very interesting suggestion and something that really should be put to the test. Technically everything in the inventory are links, the only difference is that "links" are intenal, pointing to another entry in the inventory list, while everything else are external links, pointing to an entry in another database somewhere. Every entry on the list will of course add to the total amount of data but it would certianly be possible to optimize internal links to use less data than external ones. The question is, did LL do that? They've never been big on database programming/managment and this is a quite subtle point while the SL inventory system as a whole is rather crude even by their standards.

Innula Zenovka wrote: It's not just a question of how many script events there are. As I understand it, scripts normally inflict their largest performance hit on a simulator is when the object containing them first rezzes. Yes, that is a very good point that I missed. Running scripts may not cause too much server lag but loading them certainly does. It is possible Mono's bytecode sharing will eliminate that problem but I wouldn't bet on it.

Just to add one detail to Rolig's answer, the parcel windlight you can set with Firestorm will only work if the visitor also uses Firestorm (or a Firestorm based third party viewer), other viewers will just ignore that setting. But Alwin's answer is the significant one here: it is not possible to force anybody to use a specific windlight.

There shouldn't be a limit to the number of outfits you can have and if there is, it's certainly much higher than 100. But every single item in every single outfit is added to your inventory list and that list can easily become long enough to cause problems like the ones you describe. Good rule of thumb here: Less than 50,000 items in your inventory: you should be fine 50,000-100,000 items: you're pushing the limits More than 100,000 items: you're asking for trouble Edit: Rolig's post is rather worrying, you didn't delete the original items after creating the outfits, did you? If you did, I really, really hope you can get redeliveries because if not, they're lost forever and the only solution is to buy them again.

agentronin wrote: What is a multiscripted arrow? I don't know either but my best guess is that it's an arrow with multiple scripts compatible with different combat systems. agentronin wrote: What is their advantage in combat? If my guess is right, nothing. It's just that they can be used in more environments. If Innula's guess if s right, nothing at all. agentronin wrote: Why would a gorean sim adminstrator forbid them? Again assuming either my or Innula's guess is right, lots of people still believe that scripts add to the overall lag and the more scripts you have the more lag you get. That's mostly a myth and not usually true - it certainy isn't in this case. But even so, there is a limit to how many script events a sim can handle. Once the number goes beyond that limit, the server will run out of time to execute them all and scripts will start failing at random. The reason the administrators would forbid them may either be that they believe in the script lag myth or that the sim actually has problems with script overload. For an active combat rp sim either explanation is equally plausible.

Qie Niangao wrote: Sorry, but that's incorrect according to all LL's public pronouncements on the subject. Yes but they said that about SL too, didn't they? I have no doubt that LL today has a far more realistic view on this matter than they had 10+ years ago but even so, they do seem to contradict themselves a little bit there. The sum of all we've been told so far is: In Sansar you can both have your cake and eat it. Only time will show what are facts and what are exaggerations. Qie Niangao wrote: That said, it may be that content creators would want that kind of graphics power in order to assess their creations under VR, Not necessarily content creators but their clients maybe. To quote Terry Partchett, "what every true artist wants, really wants, is to be paid." Hobbyists create for their own sake and they can afford a little bit of ... is "pretentiousness" too rude a word here? If you do it for a living you can't really afford much of that; you have to accept the fact that whoever pays the fiddler calls the tune. Qie Niangao wrote: but it's also important to note that Sansar is expected to support mobile platforms too, lower-powered than the average used for Second Life, and (last I heard) those would be supported at Sansar launch. The question is what kind of support. We have text-only client software for Second Life too and there doesn't seem to be any reason why Sansar can's have that basic support right from the start. It's trickier with graphics. Software can be written to handle 3D content more efficiently and 3D content can be better optimized than what is common today, even outside SL, but there is a limit. Cutting edge 3D technology is a very competitive field and I think it's safe to assume that the big names are all working hard to push those limits. I don't actually doubt that Sansar is pushing them further than anybody has managed before but as far as I know there is nothing to suggest they've made any sort of quantum leap in performance. And even if they have, those images will still have to be rendered on a screen big enough or close enough to your eyes and with high enough a resolution there's actually room for all those details. Can a smartphone provide that? Keep in mind that Ebbe has already said that they don't consider smartphone-strapped-to-your-head style VR headsets as an option of Sansar. Qie Niangao wrote: For the foreseeable future, the mobile market will swamp that of VR headsets (especially as the trade press reports headset sales have leveled-off at a disappointing level -- already? or just for the moment?). Ebbe predicts a hockey stick curve for VR headset sales. He may be right, he may be wrong but I don't think anybody in their right mind ever expected sales to skyrocket right from the start.

Let me see if I get this right: somebody is giving you 10% provision from their Marketplace and/or inworld vendor sales and they refuse to stop it even though you have told them you don't want their money? You can't change the settings of somebody else's store of course so no, you can't remove yourself that way. It is possible that blocking a person will also stop money transfers from them but I'm not sure about that. In any case, if all else fails, you can always refund the money manually. That'll work. (Edit: Rolig beat me to it as usual But this time I keep my answer here anyway since it mentions that it also applies to inworld vendor systems.)

Klytyna wrote: As for the maps, I meant bump/displ;acement maps of the kind that have been used in 3d rendering for over a decade, greyscale images, where typically black is a lowering of the surface at randertime and white is a raising of it. Yes, that's probably heightmaps. Basic and very simplified terminology: A normal map creates the illusion of 3D by altering the directions of the normals across the surface. It is always color coded. A displacement map alters the actual geometry of the surface, raising some parts, lowering others. A heightmap says what effect is required, not how to achieve it. The client software generates either a normal map or a displacement map based on it. The term "Bump map" is a bit tricky to define since it can have different meanings in different contexts. It can be more or less synonymous to heightmap but it can also be a generic term for all the three kinds of maps. Bumpiness is an SL only term for a set of normal maps introduced long before we had a general normal map function. Two of them, Brightness and Darkness are generated by the viewer, using the texture as a heightmap, the others are perfectly regular color coded normal maps. The only things special about them are that they are poorly chosen and poorly implemented. (You can even look up the UUIDs of those maps and use a script to add them as "modern" normal maps although it's hard to see any reason why anybody would want to do so ) Edit: Almost forgot: Parallax map: A kind of normal map on steroids, combining normal manipulations with some degree of displacement.

"Finish" or "Store". Either will do.

Perrie Juran wrote: Against what law? This one

Did you remember to click the "Save" button after you made the changes?

Amethyst Jetaime wrote: Lastly that other forum can eat up people for lunch if there is disagreement. Hardly conducive to get other's who may be a bit shy or thin skinned to join in a discussion. I believe everybody here will agree that I'm not shy and not particularly thin skinned either but I still know that from personal experience. That place can be vicious. In case there's any doubt, I wasn't seriously suggesting to move over there of course.

Amethyst Jetaime wrote: If you or your friend delete each other from your friends list and then re-friend, that gives you another card, possibly a duplicate of one you had. When you add somebody to your friends list, not one but two calling cards to them are created. When you un-friend somebody, only one of the cards is deleted. Amethyst Jetaime wrote: Otherwise you shouldn't have cards reappearing after you delete them, unless it's a SL glitch. There have been at least two bugs fairly recently that caused calling cards to be duplicated en masse. They have both been fixed now but if you haven't cleaned out the mess since then, you're going to have a mountain of duplicate calling cards in your inventory. Edit: unless you have added calling cards manually, the easiest way to clean up that folder is simply to delete everything in it. Your own calling card and cards to people on your friends list will be recreated next time you log on but this time with only one copy of each.

YoSung wrote: Must I buy all clothes again ? Probably yes. Mesh appliers are available for some old system clothing, skins and tattoos but usually not and the appliers are rarely free anyway. YoSung wrote: I don't understand all that ( ADD doesn't make it easier ) Do not think of a mesh body (or a mesh body part) as being similar to a system avatar. A mesh body is a piece of mesh clothing you wear on top of your regular avatar. Once you realize that, it's actually quite easy to figure out the basics how it works.

In the group info window, check the "Anyone can join" checkbox and make sure the "Cost to join" checkbox is unchecked.

Thank you, Chic. Since this was posted in the Land Forum I only thought of the safe rental aspect and overlooked the other complications. There are a few more we haven't mentioned yet and to sum it up (so far and including those extra complications): You can find a reliable private sim owner to rent from but you have to be careful. Using a Mainland property may not be a good idea since there is no way of knowing what kind of clashing builds the owners in the neighbor sims put up while you're at work. Also, on Mainland you probably won't be able to use the system ground since it can't be retextured and there are limits to how much it can be reshaped. Buying a sim for the purpose will cost up to 600 USD in setup fee. It may or may not be worth it. Don't expect to be able to sell the land quickly afterwards. The SL (un)real estate market is already oversaturated. You can always abandon the land though - there's not that much money to regain from reselling anyway. As for content and copyright: According to the Terms of Service you do not under any circumstance have full copyright to anything made in or uploaded to Second Life. Although there is an abundance of ready-made content in Second Life, it is very unlikely that you can find much you can use. Generally there is no rhyme nor rhythm to scales or proportions of Second Life content and LoD issues may also be critical. (You also have to be careful to avoid the depressingly large amount of illegal content on the market but usually those items are disqualified for LoD reasons too.) If you consider the Opensim option Chic suggested: To clear a possible misunderstanding: despite the name an Opensim sim does not have to be connected to the OS grid or any other grid. You can run it yourself as a free standing sim or as part of a small private grid. Opensim uses the same athmospheric/shader software as Second Life so you can expect to get the same visual effect there. Although there is a lot of content available for Opensim, you probably don't want to use pirate copies for a project like the one you describe and that means you are lucky if you find any ready made and optimized content at all. With a free standing sim you should be able to use content from Turbosquid and such legally but any 3D models not made specifically for SL/OS need to be optimized for the environment (especially the clumsy LoD system) and that may well require almost as much work as creating the items from scratch. And of course, there are no legal mesh bodies available for Opensim so if the system avatars aren't good enough, you'll have to have them all custom made. In any case: The content you need to create and/or adapt is likely to cost far more than renting or buying land.

Klytyna wrote: Vulcans, being logical creatures dont use StupidColor Normal maps at all, they use good old grey scale bump/displacement maps, where dark is lower and light is higher... You mean heightmaps? Ebbe has promised us we'll have those in Sansar. It might be ... interesting to see what shape the ears of the programmers he's hired for Sansar are. Edit: No, I was wrong, it was displacement maps Ebbe promised we'll have in Sansar.

Pamela Galli wrote: Look at how much activity there is in the SL Discussion forum there, or how many say they rarely or never log in. Another reason for us to move on over and shake it up then. Oh well, we got a good non-answer from a Linden and I suspect that's all we can expect from there. Can't blame her for it either really. She's got a job that both requires and forbids her to answer and that's never easy. I have occasionally quoted great people in my posts here, I think it's time for one from Oz Linden (I found it in Prok's profile): "Sorry.... 'why' is not one of the questions we're usually allowed to answer"

Derek Torvalar wrote: Tis the insidious nature of POOP. This is off on a tangent, Derek, but what does Perl Object-Oriented Persistence have to do with this forum? I always assumed it was written in php. Then again, if it really is perl code, that would explain a few things currently discussed in another thread.

Pamela Galli wrote: Please, LL, recognize the importance of the forums to those seeking information, insights, and support from them. There is at least one popular alternative forum dedicated to Second Life but outside of LL's control. Maybe we should all move there instead... (Edit: I'm tempted to post a link to another forum here just to see what would happen. One of the ways to define those unknown limits is of course to test them out and that link would definitely be testing. It wouldn't be a valid test though. Whether they admit it or not, the moderators know they've gone to far. So they're treading on eggshells at the moment and may well accept posts they would normally have rejected for a while.)

MissDeeMeanur wrote: Did you miss this bit, ChinRey? No I didn't but I treated it separately from the rest of the guidelines. That's what the last paragraph in my reply is about - and to some degree the second paragraph too.

Alazarin Mondrian wrote: Hi! One of the reasons I clear my cache frequently is that on my main account my main avatar is a Dark Spots Designs dragon and for some unknown reason one of my lower legs occasionally attaches itself to some point that is way to one side of my leg. No idea why but cache clearing does fix it. It is almost certainly related to the inventory issues you have with your main. It is hard to see why your main have inventory problems and not your alts though. 50k-55k items is definitely too much to be ideal but it shouldn't be enough to cause issues like the ones you describe. This is a shot in the dark but somebody (I think it was Rolig or Lindal) mentioned recently that a long friends list can give some of the same problems as a bloated inventory. I'm not sure if the explanation lies there but it's worth looking at. Speaking of the friends list, you did remember to remove duplicate calling cards when you cleaned your inventory, didn't you? they can contribute a lot to inventory bloating and many people overlook them. Bitsy and Alwin already mentioned this but I'm not sure if they made it clear enough: there is a way to box up old outfits you don't use but don't want to loose: box up copies of the originals of the items, not the links in the outfits folder. As long as there are no no-copy items involved, you can have as many boxed copies of the same thing as you like so one box for each outfit. You should be able to save a lot of inventory space that way. Amethyst Jetaime wrote: The links are just information, not really an inventory item. Not quite. A link counts for just as much in the inventory as any other items there. In a sense all items in the inventory are links. Some are internal links to other inventory listings, some are external links to entries in the assets database and both kinds take up the same amount of space in the inventory list.

Kristin Linden wrote: We encourage you to review the Community Guidelines Done! As far as I can see, there's nothing there that can explain why the thread that triggered this discussion was removed. One of the posts in the thread should probably have been removed because of offensive language and another post - one of mine- should probably have been removed too, not because of what I wrote myself but because I quoted and replied to that offensive language post. But that's really not enough reason to remove the entire thread. The main problem however is that none of the participants in the discussion have been given any kind of explanation why. Add to that the other seemingly arbitary post removals that have been mentioned through this discussion and the result is that at the moment nobody can be really sure what is allowed and what isn't allowed in the forums. A forum like this can only work properly if the participants have reason to trust the moderators' judegement and right now, with no explanations whatsoever, I can't see that we have that.