Torley Linden

Ever wonder why other avatars are striding so pretty while you march like a soldier-duck hybrid? That's because they have animation overrides, scripted objects that replace your default animations with way cooler ones when worn. All you usually need to do is right-click and Wear the AO in your inventory, then click an ON button (if it's not automatically activated). Yes, they're that awesome. In this friendly video, I show you exactly what animation overrides are and what they can do for your avatar's expression. This is an essential Second Life thing to know, because everyone comes across them sooner or later. (I've often been asked "Why is my avie not walking like yours in a video you made?") Special thanks to Hellespont Hoorenbeek for reminding me I needed to do this, it's a great example of a "SHOW IT IN MOTION" question that deserves to vividly be answered. Go to the Animation Override category in the Marketplace to pick up one or more! They range from free to premium-priced and like cars, there are basics in common but many variations between models. Looking for a specific style of animation override? Head on over to ze Wanted forum and ask away! What other essential product types should all Residents know about?

I recommend you await support's specific answer, but historically (since I've been asked the same thing many times), the answer to this has indeed been: "It's technically possible but highly unlikely, unless Lindens made a huge initial mistake in assigning a rating on a mainland region". The main reason is that changing a maturity rating could disrupt existing content (especially if you have neighbors). Also, it's important to be consistent and fair: if someone heard you got a mainland region's rating change, they'd petition to have theirs changed, a cascade effect of other Resis would stream forth, and it'd open up a can-of-worms of requests that'd slog down our ticket queue. It's a good, curious question tho.

@Oliver Linden Lab's had internal discussion about having an URL-shortener before, no word on if we'll do it. I know some other services like WordPress have "rolled their own", so to speak. In the meantime, Resi innovation rulez. Speaking of... @Meadhbh I've gotta check that out! Thanks! @Hellespont So glad you noticed, AOs can make an incredibly expressive difference and everyone should know about them, because it's such an inevitable question. I'd like to see AOs available from the get-go.

This is another one of those "Mmm subtle" kinda tips. You may already know that with Viewer 2.x, we've superbly integrated SLurls (web-compatible links that teleport you to a specific Second Life place, as used in the Destination Guide), and that pasting a SLurl into chat shows it in brief. Side tip: Pasting a SLurl can be a quicker way of broadcasting it to nearby friends while traveling as a group, instead of having to drag a landmark on each person or send individual teleport requests. Did you also know that SLurl-pasting works the same way in your profile? Watch this video to see how you can easily include a favorite SLurl or more in your profile, so others can come visit. What's your fave creative use for SLurls that more Residents should know about?

If you ever mess up your avatar appearance, don't worry. You can easily reset your avatar to a default one, including the avatars available when you first signed up for Second Life. This video shows you how: For text steps and more details, go to the wiki help page counterpart.

The Second Life Discussion Guidelines have moved here. ^ As a friendly reminder, please read the guidelines before commenting on the blogs or posting in the forums so you can be awesome! This change was done by Torley Linden as part of making help easier to find... because the previous version couldn't be read by non-logged-in Residents and contained numerous formatting glitches and old references (for example, "Xstreet" instead of "Marketplace"). The meat and spirit of the Discussion Guidelines' content remains the same, and been cleaned up on the wiki help pages, where future versions can be updated easier. Please let Torley know if there are further errors to correct.

One of the new features we've introduced with Viewer 2.3 Beta are "hints", little text bubbles that come up and tell you more about a feature when appropriate. You may be familiar with this convention in other apps. For example, if someone types to you, you get a prompt on how to text chat. And there's one for the new display names feature too. You can click the "X" to hide a hint, but if you'd rather globally turn them off, just disable Help menu > Enable Hints

Great discussion, especially with some of you helping each other! @Keli I hadn't seen that article before but it's a very helpful explanation. Joel Foner was Sidewinder Linden and I used to check with him to fact-check and understand technical "under-the-hood" stuff — and that's what we need a continuation of here, clarifying why this Maximum Bandwidth setting is the way it (still) is.

@Suella Yay! At least we can share this process of discovery together! @Celierra That's a good one for those who want to generally have their typing anim on, but not all the type. I remember when that was the general workaround before we added the preference to disable typing anim. @Sue Dayum, I wish I had seen their tutorial! Do you remember who made it/ where it is? @Irene Me too! That was one of the things that started me on a "right-click everywhere..." journey. @Boroondas That IS a quirky mystery. So glad you brought it up, that's weird — it's especially bizarre when such an undocumented feature has been around years.

What if I told you that you can get less lag in seconds, with a few simple clicks? No, this ain't a scam, but like some infomercials, it's completely risk-free. Y'see, I love "smart" defaults because they help give us a better experience out of the box, whether we're new to Second Life or doing a fresh install. But I keep coming across Resis who, despite having a fat broadband connection, feel "laggy" because they didn't know they could up their Maximum Bandwidth. GOOD GOSH. SPREAD THE WORD: One of the not-so-bright defaults, as I griped about with you guys some time ago (the Internet never forgets), is the default Maximum Bandwidth setting. It defaults to 500 kbps, which makes no sense because HELLO WE'RE NOT ON DIAL-UP ANYMORE. But srsly, like Geordi La Forge said on Reading Rainbow, you don't have to take my word for it. Try it yourself. Go to Me menu > Preferences. In PREFERENCES window, click Setup tab. Move Maximum bandwidth slider all the way to the right... yeah, crank that baby! (Supposedly years ago, setting your Max. Bandwidth too high would result in bad packet loss and overall decreased performance, but tell me if you still notice that. It may not even be true anymore.) Links to followup on: How to open the Advanced menu (so you can see the STATISTICS BAR in the video) "Default Bandwidth Setting Too Low bug - VWR-21872, which you should vote for if you care... and see my comment in there, more history

For Aquarius and those of you who wanna turn off the hints in the meantime, just uncheck Help menu > Enable Hints:

Skip if you already know this — apparently it's been around for awhile and I had no clue. You can drag an open texture preview onto any applicable surface, whether it's a prim face or a profile picture. This may be a quick shortcut if you've already got a texture open and were under the assumption (like me) that you had to drag it from the PICK: TEXTURE window or from your inventory. What's a Second Life trick that you wish you discovered earlier, because it seems totally obvious in hindsight? (Don't be shy, there's always something new to discover in Second Life, and I encourage this curiosity! The only wrong answer is not learning.)

@SuezanneC and @Tinker and @MB.Robonaught It's true with a number of features, that right-click menu as an additional option is also useful (and more convenient). We'll keep an eye on how Copy To Clipboard is being used, to inform further involvement. @Winter Thanks for going ahead and reporting that, it's been awhile since I played with Unicode group titles. @Vick That's my wife. I feel even worse now.

Jack Linden recently announced "Viewer 2.3 Beta Available Today With Display Names and More"! In response to hot Resident requests, we made a bunch of design upgrades so that it's simple to do some everyday things you'll be using often. Question: "How can I grab a complicated display name made out of characters I can't even type?" Answer: We've added an easy Copy To Clipboard button. All you need to do is open a Resident's profile, which is is accessible in many places via an inspector (green circle icon with an "i"). Just click Copy To Clipboard, then Ctrl-V (Cmd-V on Mac) to paste both the display name and unchangeable username in any standard text field, including outside of Second Life. This video shows you how in action: Remember, this is currently only available in the Viewer 2.3 Beta, so be sure to get the special Viewer and go to a supported region like this: Because we need to ensure that Display Names operates correctly, we will not enable Display Names for the entire grid immediately. Today, it will work in a few thousand regions; once we see how it performs, we will dial that up over the next few weeks until the whole grid is enabled. If you want to try using Display Names, then head to Blake Sea and Bay City, as those areas will be enabled first. Learn more about display names in our help pages! ^ I was writing these but have been transitioning them into the care of Bea Linden, feel free to comment and let us know your suggestions.

@Cybin I totally hear what you're writing. But, what you suggest could also cause further problems, like non-Premium/Concierge Resis clicking a "Live Chat" link that sends them to the self-help "fallback" page, and being confused and heaping "this is broken" tickets on top of that. However, I resound with your notion of making it clear what support your account type has, and I already forwarded this thread to be considered by the Lindens who work on the Support Portal.

@Deltango While I'm not suggesting "whole universe on a single page, closely related topics would provide context without feeling overwhelming. What tends to happen is, as a wiki page grows larger, parts of it get split into sub-pages. If there are particular help pages that should be divided, let me know those URLs. I agree about your well-articulated merits of sensible hierarchy — and to complement that, also note the distinction between "browsing" and "searching". When someone doesn't want to dig through a lot of links (common scenario: they have a problem, are frustrated, and want an answer FAST), they search, and if search functions as expected, their requested info is at the top or near that. We do have other organizational tools (navboxes, categories) that can be used as-needed, and organization also depends on the target audience. I periodically check our backend stats for most-searched terms on wiki.secondlife.com , to see if there are any hot ones that aren't bringing up the right pages. Trawling the forums and seeing "I can't find an answer to this!" also gives indication. Re: Marketplace category suggestions, please do add to https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/WEB-2896 @Boroondas We still use FlaggedRevs for the Knowledge Base. Most pages *are* editable by any logged-in Resident, with the notable exception of Linden Lab Official: namespace ones and some pages put on temporary lock (which I try to indicate in page history when I do it). If there are some erroneous pages that should be editable, paste URLs. @Cybin and @Suella Thanks for explaining, I often find that... well, if I can't find it, what an even harder time Resis must have. OK, gonna bring this inconsistency to support + webdevs, since you can "Submit a Ticket" on both. UPDATE: Thanks to a support guru for the following info... the "Live Chat" link inconsistency isn't easy to fix, and here's why: while the overall secondlife.com recognizes whether you're logged in OR out, it doesn't have the same specific, account type recognition as the Support Portal (there's different underlying tech involved, but we visually theme them to look cohesive). Since "Live Chat" is only available to certain account types (like Premium), given that limitation, it's misleading to show that link to all logged-in Residents.

@Boroondas "can" and "done" are different, and more Residents would help if they were taught how. I often find opportunities to not just correct broken links, but go beyond that and compile useful pages, that in turn inspire others to contribute. Like Limits. Which extension? I'll research. I may know who to ask about those "Age verification" emails, but you're right, that points out room for more + better "HEY LINDENS FIX THIS LINK" feedback methods. If you don't know who to contact, that's frustrating. Also, sometimes I'm full of irony. @Cybin That's on my to-do list to advocate for, then. Thanks! UPDATE: I'm not seeing that link, have a pic? @Deltango Some of us do a lot of communicating so other Lindens can get real work done. @Void Suggest that to Cerise for the top table in this thread? She's got a good gateway going. @Blondie You're right, that's under Documentation Team's domain to update. I've updated some old Viewer references as I find them, but it'll take broader help for bigger things to happen, and a major upgrade is planned. @Suella I don't know how to see the most popular searches on blogs.secondlife.com — I can cross-check some data with Google Analytics, but your observations are helpful. I've long felt we need a visible Google Custom Search that searches all relevant Second Life resources. It's annoying to have to use all these little specific search engines and not find what you're looking for. (Which led me to make this post.) ONE SIMPLE SEARCH FTW. @Paulo What Cybin said, but I'm aware if there's broken links in support emails (see above), I'd like to get those fixed. Please always give actionable specifics so I may continue on my... help rampage. @JubJub I'm taking that to our web/marketing peeps, thanks. UPDATE: It's on the schedule to be removed. @Darren I do agree about the "hit F1" part.

I won't mince words, and I know it's human to feel this way: IT SUCKS WHEN HELP EXISTS AND YOU CAN'T FIND IT. You search, it doesn't turn up. You manually browse, you attack the darkness, still doesn't come out. You're all like "Double-you-tee-eff!!!!!" until a helpful fellow Resident points out that there's a broken link that was blocking you, or something else which should be ridiculously easy to fix. But that helpful Resi also understandably gives an exasperated sigh on the inside, because they have to manually do this each time someone has the same problem — and it's a hot problem! If only a Linden knew and did something about it. That's what this is about, since Resident Enlightenment (good gosh, what is that?) is one of my so-called "key responsibilities". Let's talk real, not theory. Leading off from my recent post specifically about the Scripting Library, you know I love folding multiple steps into one, removing slop and waste so you get what you expect. Or better. And often, putting useful instructions in front prevents much wasted time later. That's why I'm on a rampage — a help rampage — to connect the dots. For example, I often encourage Resis (endearing abbreviation for "Residents") to check out the help pages on the Second Life Wiki (linked to from the Support Portal) and to search and contribute. But as followup, I found myself tediously typing out the same instructions time and time again — I paused myself and dealt with the root, by updating the wiki's own navigation links and pages. The wiki now has a revised, friendly About & Help page, and it'd be swell if you took a sec to have a look. Among numerous other "little things that make a big difference", I've also (for now) highlighted the wiki's search box in yellow to give it emphasis. This, in response to the many "How do I search?" I get. Seem obvious? Don't laugh, we were all new once. Also, astutes may be wondering 'Why's there a Go and Search button?" See that previous link. Okay too much words for now so a picture. My wiki co-showrunners (listed on that About & Help page, of course) are working on further goodness. Still can't find something you've seen before? Let me know the specifics in the comments and I'll research. Now, onto the forums... These might not have proper "stickies" (why?) and Featured Content has been buggy, but as a "something far better than nothing", I can certainly add a widget box which makes super-useful threads more visible, as seen in the Scripting Library. (I can change font size later, this is all subject to adaptation and removing unneeded redundancy.) Do you have a nomination for an ultra-useful forum thread that you're frustrated having to bump up for newcomers? Let me know in the comments. To set expectations, I'm only including what's broadly useful (which sadly, disqualifies lolcats, altho they're broadly memeful) and in some cases, it may be better to have a single link to a page collecting useful links, as is the case with the earlier Scripting Library example. But I don't know that until I hear from you. Also, for the purposes of this post, I'm focusing on the (1) wiki and (2) forums, but I'd still like to hear about "help breakers" that are flat-out wrong or confusing on our official secondlife.com properties and in the Viewer. Like the fact we do support 64-bit Windows 7. I'm done now. But I'll be back in the comments, promise.

@Trinity Yeah, the specific amount depends on camera angle, LOD, and sometimes graphics card, it seems. I remember doing this with baked shadows a lot, longtime workaround worth knowing, thanks for sharing. http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Prim_flicker should be updated.

@Ardy Thanks for sharing that followup, right-click the Mini-Map has long been worth mentioning for extra options. @TriloByte Mac user here too, I got garbled — thanks for calling attention to this. @Heath I haven't tried that yet, anyone else had success? @Calica Not like in 1.23, alas, but I used to thrive on that mode!

Along with general usability touch-ups, Viewer 2.2 also brings a builder-friendly feature, useful in situations like making a single texture appear cohesive across several prims. Esbee summarizes this as: Builders can more easily align textures across linked prims using planar mapping: This feature allows builders to align textures across faces so that several prims can look like a single prim. Simply select the faces of a set of linked prims, then open the Textures tab of the Build tool, make sure your Mapping setting is set to “Planar”, then click the checkbox labeled “Align planar faces.” This video shows you how you can get started making it work in action, which looks like magic. And we like magic. More context behind this feature's benefits and limitations can be found in SNOW-586 (which almost reads like a patch's equivalent of a How It's Made ep), and a gracious thank-you to Resident Thickbrick Sleaford and others who helped get it into release. Even with Mesh on the horizon, "classic" prims continue to enjoy broad use. As I like to say: simply use what's useful. And keep being creative!

Fall is upon and so's Second Life Viewer 2.2! As highlighted in Esbee's post, Viewer 2.2 brings more of the "little stuff that makes a big difference". In this video, I show you some of the tweaks that could/should very well find themselves into your daily Second Life — from common-sense button bar reordering to Mini-Map improvements — all so you can get on and enjoy. Don't forget to check out our Release Notes for more details. Many of the 2.2 changes are linked to Bug Tracker issues with explanations, to help you understand the "story" behind why and how something got fixed.

Curious about the history of Second Life scripting? This is for you! Preserving our history is essential to understand the progress of earlier generations that in turn, informs our future decisions and prevents us from making the same mistakes they worked through, so we don't have to. Hopefully. As one of the lead Lindens working on wiki.secondlife.com, I love seeing exceptional contributions to the help pages, and I wanted to highlight Cerise Sorbet's Old forum Scripting Library index Contains links to templates, examples, and more you can use in your creations. Shows that one Resident can make such an overarching, positive difference! Not only does it have sortable tables and brief descriptions to quickly summarize what's in each thread, older threads are colorfully catalogued (as "Museum" and "Attic"), making their historical status clear. In turns, this builds upon the previous, venerable curation by Nada Epoch, whose scripting forum moderation was already esteemed when I joined Second Life in 2004. Forums as a tool have their uses for thriving discussion, but the wiki is often a more effective medium for collaboratively upgrading a single source, including the LSL Portal. But I've found using both are quite complementary, since (1) wiki talk pages can be awkward for newcomers to chat in and (2) vibrant forum discussions often lead to wiki help pages, as I've done and seen across 1,000s of edits. Resis who are wiki-shy often team up with the more experienced to learn and communicate changes. Further behind-the-scenes on how I apply this to help you and fellow Residents of Second Life can be found on Rapid Knowledge Iteration. To discuss the Scripting Library index with Cerise and others, jump into the matching forum thread And... Curious about editing the wiki yourself? Learn more! Often, I've found editing the wiki stems from a personal perspective, passion about a topic, where you not only wish something could be better, you act on it — whether it's correcting a typo, adding a key fact, leading all the way up to writing whole guides and indexes. What you spend a few minutes on could save many hours for yourself and others in the future.

@Dimitrio I just had a flashback to the first time I played Tringo! And it was with creator Kermit Quirk in attendance. Come to think of it, I remember most of the first times I ever attended certain kind of events. Made such an impression on me. I used to surf from trivia contest after trivia contest and became surly if there was a gap of half an hour between 'em. @Ann I'm gonna check out http://virtualadvisor.ning.com/events , thanks for the suggestion. Sorry, I didn't mean to leave comments open here -— continue the discussion in the forum thread!

There's an amazing array of events in Second Life. Many of them have "real world" analogues... with a twist! For example, first life concerts aren't inundated with nearly as many ASCII art audience reactions. Whether you want to attend a crowded party that packs the hizzouse or are more into relaxing art shows, all that's missing is HOW TO FIND THOSE EVENTS, ARRRR. Well fear not! I've been compiling a Guide to Finding Events which, as the name apparently suggests, is exactly about that. It covers the default secondlife.com and in-Viewer events search, as well as manual methods, and Resident-created callouts. Try 'em all out and see what's most comfortable for you, because your interests are an extrusion of your unique personality! I happen to enjoy the serendipitous spontaneity of flashmobbing. I used to drop in on gameshows a lot because I'm trivia crazy. And I ♥ seeing many awesome avatars in the same place at once, 'cuz having a remarkable avatar is a key conversation-starter. But I'm sure stuff is missing from this guide, which is where you come in. Let me know your favorite ways to find events in this forum thread, such as... hunting the green dots, those "poker chip stacks"! But do heed this gem from Veritable Quandry in response: I should caution that TP'ing directly to a spot with two dots can have...interesting results. Wise words. And this being Second Life, it's not limited to two dots, either.