Jenni Darkwatch

AFAIK OpenSuse uses KDE. The crash is due to a number of issues relating to how the viewer uses GTK libraries and how KDE supports it. One blunt fix is to rename the ~/.gtkrc-2.0* file(s), the viewer should start then. Problem is, it'll make all Gnome programs look fugly. Another possible solution is to just block the SL client from accessing that file. That can be done with Apparmor, though I am unsure how to do it in Suse. In general, drop this into the /etc/apparmor.d directory (name it "secondlife-bin"): # Last Modified: Wed Feb 13 02:34:38 2013#include <tunables/global>/**/do-not-directly-run-secondlife-bin { #include <abstractions/base> #include <abstractions/user-tmp> network, # Dumb but doable - allow everything /** mixrwkl, # And the crashy culprit... denying this effectively stops the PCRE crash under KDE deny /home/*/.gtkrc-2.0 mrwkl,} Restart to activate the rule, or try "rcapparmor restart" If you're using a different viewer you may need to adjust the name of the executable from "do-not-directly-run-secondlife-bin" to whatever the TPV uses.

I think it's about the best the engine can do, short of adding support for more advanced height field techniques (parallax maps or any other kind of displacement mapping)

Thanks for the very helpful demonstration. I think it'd be great if someone could create a comprehensive guide on materials - so far I'm still experimenting, trying to find out what values mean what specifically as well as the exact effects of the alpha layers. With the specular map I've pretty much figured it out, normal not so much. Thank the Gods for local textures, otherwise I'd be broke by now. Btw, this info is what I am working off: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Alpha_Modes_Do%27s_and_Don%27ts and http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Second_Life%27s_light_model_for_materials

Thanks for the offer It's not my image, so I can't really pass it on. My usual procedure is pretty much like you describe, except I'm using Gimp (I'm on Linux).

Coby Foden wrote: LillyBeth Filth wrote: I am assuming the SL Terrain Editor does not accept Materials (?) That's right, the only things which do not accept materials are the SL avatar and terrain. Actually... that reminds me of something: Does rigged mesh accept materials? I don't have any to try, hence the question. Worn objects do support materials, that much I know (and dread).

It's a touchy topic. Sure, SL takes progressively more skill to create competitive items. That's been true in a number of areas. Animations for example: The times where somone could create dance anims by hand are long gone. MoCap rigs are a must for such anims. Yet there's still plenty of pose makers and people who generate animations by hand - and they sell. Just high-end anims are firmly in the hands of pros. With building it's been the same thing. Building with prims is easy enough that most people can learn it more or less well. Creating sculpts on the other hand is well above the head of the average creator (it still is over my head btw). Mesh introduced building with standard tools. Some of those are actually not much more difficult to use than SL's built in prim tools. Blender is the elephant in the room: It's unintuitive, very hard to learn and even harder to get any proficiency in it. Materials is the same: It's actually not too hard to make materials, but it does take time and practice. There's a reason there's plenty of builder classes. Even building with prims takes some practice. IMO he didn't say bye to non-pro or user content. If he had, we'd have build tools only for licensed creators. IMO, he simply did a very bad choice of words.

You'll have to go into their group role and give them terraform rights, i.e. "Edit Terrain" rights.

Sure, feel free to add it to your FB page. No need to credit me - you're the one who created the (great) textures All I did was add the mask on the alpha channel, and it looks good without that, too. Edited to add: The door bugs the heck out of me btw and is a good example just why I prefer pre-made normal/specular maps. The texture is low contrast, which makes masking the metal parts a lengthy procedure. Essentially I end up doing 3 normal/specular maps and combining them in the end: One for the wood grain, one for the gaps between the wood slats and one for the metal parts. And I'm simply not that good with textures

As far as I know no, it doesn't have material support. Would be great if it did Btw, I did purchase a set of your textures yesterday with normal/specular maps. They work great, and adding the environment mask was dead easy. Certainly saves a lot of time even with having to download and edit the maps. Here is what it looks like. None of the pictures used shadow, then only difference is "Advanced Lighting Model" off in the first pic and on in the second pic.

To chime in with "no materials" vs "materials": I feel it's a matter of impact. Materials make relatively little impact with small or generally little-noticed items. On the other hand, a road or even large patches of snow (or water/glass as seen in other threads) benefits greatly from materials. As far as I'm concerned, I'd totally prefer a vendor which has _good_ normal/specular maps for their products, since I waste way too much tme making those myself.

Thanks for the graphical explanation - that did clear a few things up for me in regard to the effects of the alpha channel(s)

One way to figure out of the normalmaps behave as intended is to apply them to a blank white surface. I've done that many times only to discover that they do behave oddly on some texture surfaces.

Just a little heads up for Gimp folks: It's pretty easy to add normal maps for existing textures. The two most useful plugins there are these, IMO: Gimp Normalmap: http://code.google.com/p/gimp-normalmap/ InsaneBump: http://registry.gimp.org/node/28117 The latter also generates specular maps for you. The plugins are both not entirely intuitive to use but are actually quite capable for adding normalmaps and/or specular to existing textures.

IMO bottom line: If it's not the fans making the noise, the card has problems. Electronics should not make any noise. Not even transformers and the like.

Try checking the GPU fan speed and temp while running SL. Most vendors have some kind of monitoring tool they ship with their GPU.

I do not think you can just create the folder. If I remember correctly, the Outbox was non-functional on Linux - not sure that ever got fixed. I know it doesn't work on my side either, but I run the viewer sandboxed so it's not likely to work anyway.

Thanks to your friend the crossing is indeed open again. I went ahead and dropped change into the donation prim and will keep doing so whenever I pass through. I'd still prefer the Lindens solve the issue permanently but for the time being, this works nicely.

Like Sy, my current visit on SL was motivated by my employer requiring me to look into it. Someone had heard IBM uses it for telepresence, and we do fly every employee in from across the world once every year for training purposes. The requirement in hardware upgrades, additional employee training and so on immediately disqualified SL in that regard. Then someone wondered if there was potential for marketing. Weeeeellll... even if we somehow, magically managed to get _every_ SL resident to look at our marketing, it's still pathetic compared to RL. Bottom line: SL is a toy. There are ways SL could evolve to be useful for businesses, but not with LL at the helm, sorry. Lack of vision, if nothing else.

Possibly overheating. Laptops aren't built for gaming, sorry.

Thanks for your efforts, really appreciated.

Yeah I just talked to one of the orb owners... let's say the communication was less than polite: [22:12] (Me): Excuse me, may I take a moment of your time? [22:12] [Orb Owner]: what do you need help with? [22:13] (Me): Actually I was wondering if there was _any_ way at all you could open a channel for sailors across your land on Rollo? [22:13] [Orb Owner]: I am only a guest here [22:14] (Me): I know, you rent it. Your land is the only connection between the north and south continents. There's two security orbs that boot anyone trying to sail across. [22:14] [Orb Owner]: have a good day [22:14] [Orb Owner]: joi gin! [22:14] [Orb Owner]: mute[

About the only way I can see LL resolving the issue would be by adding a set of 5 coastal waterway sims: North of Soncino, go up three sims then go west two sims until it connects to the channel there. Unfortunately I don't know any Lindens and even if I did, their office hours are inaccessible to me since I'm at work at those hours. Edited: Actuall they could go a different route. A channel through NW Erik, then the abandoned land NE Erik, eastalong the southern edge of Leif (all abandoned and already water), then southern edge of Thorkell which is partially abandoned. There _is_ an owner in the SE corner of Thorkell but I'd imagine LL could strike a deal there. 'course, it's all speculation.

Actually it seems tha route is still impassable. The SE corner of Thaurlag is group owned indeed, but the owner does not seem to be interested in letting anyone join the group. I didn't bother him/her further since I noticed the needed connection on Askold is owned by some land group and could thus become impassable at any moment as well.

I didn't know about that channel... that would indeed re-open the route for sailors with one precarious corner sim crossing: Jharm SE corner -> Herkja SW corner -> Arnthrud -> Thorlaug -> Askold -> Loorq The group requirement is a bit odd but I can live with it. At the moment I'm mulling writing an automatic warp script that - when dropped into a vehicle - just warps me across Rollo or Herkja when I approach the sim from either direction.

No. Unfortunately it doesn't meet minimum requirements. You were lucky it worked in Windows.