Imnotgoing Sideways

Alpha shuffling is practically a decade old, has existed in SL from the beginning, and has no public plans to be fixed. More recent shadow capable clients have included an automatic toggle to 1-bit alpha if too few grays are found in the mask, but that breaks just as much content as it fixes. (._.) My advice at this point is; work around it. Games that use OpenGL have been doing it for years. (._.)

I'm frigg'n Immy. ()y

JLU ()

The approach I plan on taking is to mesh building materials. Instead of rendering an entire 'house' in mesh, just do the parts. The benefit being, most physics boxes can be 8 vertice cubes. Walls, stairs, floors, doors, windows and all... Separate components which can be assembled in a myriad of ways inworld... All with fractional PE values... Yielding dynamic, efficient, and attractive structures. =^-^= A fun example is this: http://darkly-cute.com/blog/wp-content/gallery/sl-mesh/meshexample2.jpg It has a PE of 0.80. It replaces 3 prims. When we linked it to the box that made the floor it climbed to, the combination of the two objects = 1 prim. So... We went from a linkset that used 4 prims to one that effectively used only 1. The physics bouding box for those steps was a tapered and skew trapezoid. So, it behaved like 3 ramps aiming at the same point as the floor. If I remember right, it only had 16 or so vertices. While the physics weight of the prim build was somewhere in the 30 range... The mesh was 0.24. SAVINGS! =^-^=

Do you remember the years and years in which people have been complaing about vehicle performance, rubberbanding, projectile weapon issues, and bridges that cross simlines only to dunk the traverser into the water? () Yeah, physics is a server-side CPU nightmare. (>_<) The "prim count" scoring system has been defective from the start. In rendering, it makes a cube equal to a tortured and hollow torus... In spite of the near 20x contribution to lag which said torus has. In physics, it makes a flat floor equal to a cut path and hollow tube, again in spite of the lag extremes caused by cut path and hollow. (>_<) This is why "Megaprims lag" has been a mantra. It's not because the prims themselves had any problems... Just that so many uses for them involved cut, slice, and hollow that the resulting physics calculations have been insane. (._.) So, in comes mesh and PE. Prim equivelence is more of a value of how much an item contributes to lag. The higher the number, the laggier the object is. If you find yourself getting blown out of the sky once a physics model is in place, consider your build to be due for optimization. For example, while a window makes for a wonderful visual 'hole' in the wall... There's no serious need to cut that hole in the physics box. Leave it flat so that you may go from 32 vertices to 8 for a single wall. () It takes a lot of CPU and memory to monitor each and every vertice in the physics box. Having it 'tick' 8 times ~vs~ 32 times is a great reduction in lag, in addition to potential reductions in PE. It'll be the little details like that which make all the difference. =^-^= Though, if you've already considered that, poke around for other things. In the end, do everything possible to minimize the vertice count for your physics bounding. There are surely some things still in line for consideration. Even a silly solution is still a solution. ()y

I know what I know because I pay attention. That's all. () As for PE... It's a fix for a faulty accountability system that should have been implemented long ago. Prim counts were okay to keep things simple, but, they allowed for horrbiy laggy builds which have been the relative ruin of SL. With PE, builders will be accountable for the lag their creations generate. Create an over-detailed, over-textured, over-blown item... Expect it to detract from prim counts and cost a ton while uploading. () Instead of complaining about the mysteries of this "new" building method, why not study and practice it? Really, I have no history of being a builder. If you ever visit my store, you'll see a sad and disappointing array of glasses and doll keys best reserved for freebie malls. But, when and advancement comes my way, I try to advance with it. () Really. Learn. Make it fun. I strongly suggest watching the tutorial videos posted on this blog http://blog.machinimatrix.org/ . EVERYTHINGI know about Sculpts, Mesh, and Blender; I learned by watching those videos. () Mesh is far easier than sculpts. Sculpted prims were a kludge put in to SL in order to imitate mesh tools available on other platforms. It still serves a valid purpose. But, the added difficulty and gross limitations really make it unreasonable to continue wrestling with sculpt tools when the system has now been simplified with Mesh. =^-^= Yes, using mesh comes with a cost, but, it's far less a cost than anything we've seen before. In exchange for a more dynamic means of measuring the "prim count"; we get the opportunity to reduce lag, improve the experience, ease off on LOD issues, and generate far more detailed and shape-appropriate creations. If you don't? You pay. Waste costs now. =^-^= For the longest time, what has been the greatest complaint about SL? LAG. SL is laggy. Popular-MMO-Game gets 120 FPS and SL gets only 5. People crash just by turning left. Why? Triangles. To bloody many of them. Why? Because prims have too many. We've been allowed to be wasteful for practically free. Now we get the opportunity to be beautiful for a minor fee. () But, if y'alls is all out to just complain... Fine. More customers for me once I get my butt in gear. =^-^=

Mesh optimization is by no means "new"... It's older than SL. () Here's the fatal flaw... Prims and sculpts are the worst building tools for a 3D world. Sure, they make things 'easy' but they include so many excess faces that there's no guessing why SL can lag systems which can render the latest games at 100FPS. () I don't have a history in mesh creation. I'm still learning Blender... To the point that I just figured out how to set materials(faces) just a few weeks ago. 99% of the sculpty builders in SL have had a head-start compared to me. () But, I use logic. Every vertice has to be calculated. Every calculation requires processor time and memory. The more processor time and memory you use, the slower your experience gets. That's just how things work. =^-^= So, when building in mesh, pretty much do half of everything you did to make sculpts and duplicate your efforts in lower polygon models. 1024 vertices is overkill for most anything and everything. If something is going to appear as 20x20 pixels as someone walks by... Why does it ~need~ more than 200 vertices? () Slow down and think before you bash the tool based on failed projects. Render your favorite non-SL game in wireframe and note the triangle count. Work logically and intelligently while educating yourself in the process. It's just math. You're getting worked up over something you can learn right now. Emotions have no place in logical rendering efficiency. ()y

Any mesh I've made so far has counted for < 1 prim. With proper optimization, I can make meshes to replace prims and actually seemingly subtract from each other when linked due to rounding. () People who use 100 PE to = 1 prim are simply bad builders. =^-^= My favorite example so far is a rounded staircase I made for a friend. It replaced 3 prims with 0.50PE... Once linked to the build, it effectively disappeared from the parcel prim count. () A good chef will never blame a spoon for bad soup. ()y

First, I'll say... In SL, anyone claiming they can do anything to your computer, internet connnection, or account... Well... They're not only idiots, they're also liars. () When you connect to Second Life, you're only establishing a two-way link between you and the Linden Lab servers. Nobody knows more than what you tell them. Nobody can do anything unless you let them. () There are three scenarios possible: 1) They can crash your client. But, that's nothing... Log back in, Abuse Report, go elsewhere. () 2) They can crash the sim you're in. Also nothing... Log back in, Abuse Report, go elsewhere. () 3) If (and only if) you're allowing streaming media to play. If (and only if) the media is being hosted from their own location... They can capture your IP address. But, EVERYTHING captures your IP address. They can do little to nothing with it. =^-^= ... Plus, with DHCP being rather standard... Odds are you'll have a different address next week anyway. () There's no need for you to take any extreme measures. Definitely use a secure password and rotate it often to prevent others from guessing it and logging in as you. But, your payment info with Linden Lab is exactly as secure as your password. There's NO other way to reach it. So, pulling out as suggested earlier, is an overreaction. (>_<) Finally, there's no need for you to 'prove' anything. Just file an honest abuse report as soon as possible. The servers keep logs, the responding Linden can gather what they need from that to determine if there has been a TOS violation and act accordingly. () And... Expect buttheads around every corner. I deal with goofs who claim they can track me, get me arrested, and what-have-you. Believe me, they most likely don't know their way around a LSL script. Treat the losers as they deserve to be treated and let them lose. ()y

I'd typically just scrub the whole list. If anyone came back offended, I'd point out that I did it for their sake. ()

Dun worry. We knows who you are. There's no need for a pin, badge, or whatever if peoples like you enough. =^-^=

The Intel graphics chip will be a bottleneck. To date, I haven't seen an Intel GPU which can render SL well. That's not to say it's impossible. Just, expect low FPS. Since SL isn't a combat game, this may not be a problem. ()y

Updates are on a weekly schedule. They won't stop until the grid is perfect and bug free. Honestly, I'm glad they're doing it this way. ()y

Why bother using the cart at all? It's not like you're saving money or shipping fees by buying in bulk. The cart has been a questionable feature to me since day one. What actual purpose does it serve beyond extra clicks? ()

The interface seems Twitter-like. I'm guessing there's a way to block follows via mute. In the end, it doesn't really matter unless you regularly use your profile stream. ()y

You could buy land and build a store, rent store space from a land owner, or rent a 1-prim parcel to put a Marketplace magic box. Soon enough, we'll have direct-delivery and you'll be able to sell without even a chunk of land. ()y

It's not the alt. It's what you do with the alt. =^-^= What people really don't like is deception. And that tends to be a typical function of alts... Pretending to be someone else around the people who know them. While others treat alts as 'disposable' accounts in order to do something that's likely to get them banned in hope that they keep their main avatar. In that light, yes, alts are a plague. (>_<) But, alts don't have to be deceptive by default. Land/group owners may have alts running as bots for assisting people or sending group invitations. Or store models to show off outfits in a way that gives the buyer a better idea of how things will look on an actual avatar. () For busy people, an alt is a way of escaping a constant inrush of instant messages and teleport offers. Or even roleplay characters that never have to break character. =^-^= Back when we had the surname list, there was also a little bragging rights game of seeing who could abuse the system by making the most screwy names from the current crop. Myself, for example. I have 20 alts. Many of which are chosen for their name, a few are dedicated roleplay characters, and I even tinker with bot software once in a while. If someone don't like that, tough! ()y

I actually tried to figure out a reason why not and I couldn't. There surely are plenty of premium members in SL who would prefer to not interact with teens or have their content restricted with teens (G land) in mind. ()

That's perfectly normal. Not a bug. () What you have is what I'll call "Fractional PE" objects. I've been experimenting with them since the open beta. Basically, a properly optimized simple mesh with simple physics will have a PE of less than 1. () But, the build dialogue treats the PE as an integer. So, from having a PE from 0.01 to 1.00, the display PE will be 1. =^-^= Get two mesh objects with a PE of 0.50 and link them together, the resulting PE will remain 1 after summing and rounding the linkset. () I checked with Charlar and he stated that this value will always be rounded in order to avoid confusing people. So, at this point, it'll be up to the uploader to indicate the fractional value of the PE, if it's important. () You'll find it while uploading. When you get your upload quote, look at the far lower left of the upload dialogue, you'll see PE displayed in a 0.00 format. This gives you an opportunity to record the resulting fractional value in addition to simply cancelling the upload to pop back in to your mesh app and cleaning some details up in order to reduce the number. () Less is more! =^-^= Here's the fun part. As long as we continue to have this fractional PE, it'll be a boon for mesh building materials. Sort of like, reinventing prims. There's no super good reason to make an entire house out of a single mesh. Right now, we have Box, Prism, Cylinder, Sphere... as prims. Well, imagine building a house with Wall-2windows, Wall-1door, WindowFrame, DoorFanWindow "prims"... Nearly all having fractional prim values. =^-^= Prefab makers, the old texture stores, and inworld builders with no mesh experience will still have great tools to work with, if not better. () Now... To address your GAIN in PE. I'm assuming the rest of the house is made of regular prims. Be it hollow boxes and various other things to be as prim-efficient as possible. Well, here's the fatal flaw. Prims are the most inefficient building materials on the grid. Really, they're lag nightmares by default. How else can we explain why games with apparently 10x the detail can get 100FPS on computers which can only get 10FPS in SL? (>_<) So, when building with mesh, while exersizing efficiency and reducing the overall prim count... When linked to a regular prim build or adding scripts, the lag is taken into account and the overall score is changed. () My mindset is; while building in prims, the prim count is an old an innacurate measuring method of resource usage. Mesh and PE is more along the lines of "LAG POINTS"... A far more reasonable score for the effect each linkset has on the server, network, and client. Reduce ~that~ number by making more efficient prim-replacing mesh components, and watch lag fade away. =^-^=

I wouldn't worry a thing as long as distribution is managed on Adult (Zindra) sims. That way you'll have the readership base you're after and all the legally required due dilligence has been done. ()

Channels are basically listen filters for everything inworld. Avatars listen to CH0 exclusively. When scripting an object to listen, it's the one thing you can't leave un-set or null. The value is an integer, so, the entire range of a single integer variable is available. () Basically, it's to prevent everything from listening to everything else. Though, if you want your avatar to listen to CH3, you can wear an object set to listen to everything on CH3 and llOwnerSay the received messages. ()y

Well, this don't sound half bad. Giftie stuff and hideaway sandboxes on top of tier and stipend. I ain't gonna look a gift horse in the mouth. =^-^= Though... It'd be fun to see if premiums could get Lab funded access to the new Google translator API. ()y

Odd... All the information I found fell into place as I expected it. In fact, Things weren't as delayed as I had feared and the results have been more than satisfying. () As a builder, moving from sculpties to mesh has been a liberating experience. So far, I've been able to make a large number of fractional-PE meshes with plenty of detail. Last night, I even made a wall with 3 windows that has a PE of 0.50 to replace a 6-prim wall on my friend's cafe. () I can't call that a bad thing. ()y

The SL avatar is rigged. But positions and animations are practically totally freeform. It's easily explored at no expense. Ask around at groups like NCI, Oxbridge, or Builder's Brewery. In particular, try grabbing up the freebie pose packs that are available and see if you can find someone with a copy of the "Sit Target Setter". It's a script and an object that are quite useful with setting correctly aligned poses in just about everything. ()y

It's pretty much 'furniture first - sits later'. The scripting for sit positions is dynamic. So, if it looks like a chair, it can be a chair. () Poses are nearly all resident made. So, not only does LL not have available animation files, they can't for copyright purposes. () Follow real-world dimensions for real world furniture for the best results. It can be scaled after importing anyway. ()y