Pentasis Adamczyk

I know this thread is almost 3 months old, but I too have experienced this, for a while now. I used to have no problems with SL until last november (2010), then my framerate suddenly dropped after a viewer update (using viewer 2.x). It used to be around 17 (not really high perf. but it was ok) and then it dropped to 3. Nothing changed in hardware or internet connection. Since then I doubled my internet speed and bought a better videocard, but framerate is still 3 of 4 fps with some sudden bursts to 39 (for 1 second). Ping time is ok as is packet loss. I disabled every single program in the background that I could. But no dice. When using a 3rd party viewer my framerate is still not ok, but a bit better (14 on avarage). So basically I really wonder what is going on. I nagged LL for months but finally discontinued my premium account since loggin on became impossible. I still try once a week, and sometimes things seem ok for half an hour and I am happy only to get disapointed again the next day.

One more thing, I am assuming all these replies get read and I am fed up with Jira's so here's another request: Make it so you can click through the chat text. Being unable to click a HUD when text is shown makes that HUD position useless.

I reverted back to 2.1.1 because of many issues. At first I suspected a server problem but in the end I unequivocally determined it was a viewer problem. I opened a Jira for it (which is a bit of a mess because I thought it was a server problem at first). For now they are asking for crash-logs, but I have no energy or time left to reinstall 2.2.x again to test it and generate logs, this has taken up 2 full days as it is. So if anyone experiences the same problems as described in that Jira, please provide it with info. https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-23193

This viewer is becoming more and more usable. However, regarding the detachable sidebars: I myself don't care for minimizing windows once they are detached (I fail to see the difference between a minimized titlebar and a tab on the side). What I do hope though, is that it will be possible in future to completely CLOSE a window. Meaning it won't be either minimized or a tab. Some tabs are useless and I would like to remove them from my view completely. Another thing is the sub-tabs (for example friends and groups are part of the same tab) those can still not be split apart. And as such can neither be seperate windows nor seperate tabs (for those who want it). I very much like all the other changes, but regarding the detachable sidebar I sincerely hope this is just a start and many, many more improvements on it will be made?

I was going to post a jira for this but I might as wel post it here. To reduce the confusion and clutter this will cause in our friends list. It might perhaps be a good idea to make the entries in our friends list editable. So we can give our friends/contacts custom names (in this list) which we can remember and we do not have to search for them when they change their name. So for example, John35265 has a display name of Mr. Right. I send him a friend request and store him in my list as Jo. Now when he changes his display name to Sad Git, he will still show up in my list as Jo. (think of your addressbook or the name that apears on your phone when someone calls you.) Now, I admit this adds yet another layer of names to the stack, but at least that is a name we can remember and is easier to find in our contact-list than to search for someone who has changes his/her name to something we don't know.

Kinda makes you wish they had given typewriter manufacturers a course in how to build computers before they introduced them. Seriously though, last time I did anything slightly "professional" in 3d was way back when I just had my Commodore Amiga. I downloaded Blender last week because the last version is finally in beta and its interface is a vast improvement over the last. I have to learn blender from the start as well, but I feel in no way threatend by this. Agreed, your business is far older, more established and better than mine, and I probably stink at creating meshes as well (I couldn't make a decent sculpty if my life depended on it). But that is the way it works. I don't agree with it either, but it works like that in RL and it works like that in SL. Yes, some will have a serious advantage over others, but that is true now as well. How would we respond if everytime a new user came online and we were asked to stop creating stuff until they reach "our level"? Hell, I'm a decent scripter but a lousy builder myself and I have been building like hell for the past 8 months to get builds that can compare somewhat with the excellent builds from people like you. It's not fair, but I don't complain, and I certainly don't hate you for it ;-)

Blog ate my reply Thank you !!!!!! I have a small question: I was under the impression that one of the things that was tested was the impact on lag, right? Can you tell us a bit about that? Will mesh add to lag, if so how much or not at all?

I have great emotional problems accepting this project. I won't leave SL because of it, since such "threats" are just silly. @Jack: Please answer the following question I have seriously. The Display Names project is about the freedom to express yourselves inworld -- including using the tag above your head. As people live out their Second Lives their needs for the name above their head may change -- perhaps they meet someone and fall in love, or they make a new professional affiliation or decide to roleplay. This is why an important principle behind this change is that Display Names not be unique or limited. Historically SL had a unique name-given system. In fact when I joined SL something went wrong and I ended up with a different last name than the one I wanted. I learned to love it. I fail to see how changing my name is about expressing myself? Like I and many other pointed out, lastname-changes in marraiges and RP-names can be solved by other means without destroying our identities. You call this "rethinking identities", but in fact all our true identities remain in our user-names. Because that is at the end of the day what identifies us. Consider a simple sign that says: Here lives John Doe. Who is this John Doe? is it a user name or a display name? There is no way of finding out since signs do not automatically link to profiles. And neither do notecards. The display name is useless as an identifier in SL just because it can change. A new user may well have a username like hhh4673g and then sets his display name to John Doe. Now after a while he starts building stuff and begins a small shop. At some point he starts becoming popular. By which name do you think he will be known to the public? If it is "John Doe" then he needs to compete with all other John Doe's in search and he open to major griefing (since his username is less known) and he will never be able to change his display name again. If he gets known by his username then he will start wishing he had chosen his username better and probably starts filing a jira asking for the ability to change it. In the end display names do not identify us. They will be used for nothing more than fancy tags over our heads. New users will not know that to begin with since they will assume that their display name is what idetifies them. Thus resulting in stupid user names (= identities) that they will hate having. Look, this is not another post about "did you think about that LL?" I am seriously asking you. I am assuming you thought this through. You keep saying it is about expression of freedom. So please explain that to me (and please don't start with couples and RP again, since that could have been added much easier and less obtrusivly). Thanks :-)

I like it. Good clean design. Usable. And hopefully it reflects the new way of working. I love the use of whitespace. Whitespace is good. One point of "advice" if I may? The sections on the left (like "Description" and "Environment") sort of blend into the background. They don't stand out well enough. This could be improved either by using a different font or font color, or by introducing a vertical divider, or something like that. Other than that. Great job! ok, one more remark ;-) Consider moving related and duplicate issues to the right column in a smaller font?

I didn't post about double-clicks so we can talk about it here. I posted it as an example. Let's not dilute this thread any further :-)

Please allow me to give an example. I see in the backlog you are also working on “VWR-20713: Double-click on land to teleport” I am taking this because it is relatively “simple” item to discuss and it involves options ;-) Personally I would rather “auto-pilot” to the spot I double-click instead of teleport. And I know of others who would like that as well. Not only that, but in emerald I sometimes double-clicked by accident and I don't like that either, so we must first define the problem perhaps like so: When a user double-clicks on ground, one of three things can happen: The user teleports to that location. The user walks to that location (or flies if the user is flying). Nothing happens. How do we make it so that we have this functionality and still don't overcomplicate the interface or introduce unnecessary steps/clicks in the UI. Second question: Is this all the functionality needed or are there other use-cases for double-click on land? It is just an example. But I think this type of posts will give more positive and useful feedback than posts about design philosophies, no matter how well intended ;-) Discussing before creating is NOT about having people tell you HOW they want it, but about what they need and more importantly about what they don't want. It is still up to you to translate it into a good product.

@Q: Ok, so this weekend I read and viewed everything published and related by/to snowstorm over the last few weeks. My perception has changed a bit by this. I genuinly believe now you are trying to change the way you work and you want to involve us as users in the process. I also understand that this is a major change from your previous way of working and a big change like that cannot be made overnight. I hope you acknowledge that as well. Not only is this a big change for you (LL) but also for us as users. My first question to you therefor is: Do you understand that your old way of working has created an atmosphere of distrust and unsastifaction for the users, and that you (LL) are the only one in a position to slowely mend our relationship. Not just by telling us that you want to do, but by actually doing so? Perhaps a redundant question since you implicitly said as much on SLCC. Unless I am mistaken? Now, if it is known that we "have been conditioned" to respond based on previous experience with you, I think it would be best to try and avoid controversial subjects for a while ;-) Making a remark about "too many options" during office hours was not the smartest move therefor, and then creating a blog post about is was even worse I think now. I would suggest trying to keep blogpost about actual progress and discussion of features/implementations for now. Try and keep it open and fun. See these blogs as a sort of brainstorm session involving the community. One thing I still have problems with is this: The current sprint is working on detaching the sidebar. Where did we get to discuss the way you are doing this with us? I guess the Jira, but I don't think that would be the proper place. I really think that a better approach would have been to work out what you are planning with the sidebar, post that here and let us brainstorm about it. I undertstand your view on how people have difficulty undertstanding something if they cannot work with it yet. But also consider that some can, and that in a stream of thoughts llike here on the blog there is bound to be an idea or two that you hadn't thought of. But not just that, polls may not be the way to go, but looking at discussions like the one taking place here, gives you a huge insight in how people think and work. in this thread alone I quickly counted more than 10 posts that tell me a lot about how people use the viewer. Even though that was not the intent of the poster. But even if those arguments make no sense to you, letting us discuss your ideas about changes before you start working on them at least gives you the opportunity to explain to us why you made that descision despite given arguments. The alternative is to maintain and feed our "expected behavioural response" so we can keep yelling "LL doesn't listen". again, after reading all about snowstorm I have slightly changed my mind and am at least happy with what I hear. I am not happy yet as to how what is said is being implemented. To keep the discussion simple: You are working on detaching the sidebar right now as I write this, but I have no idea what that practically means. What will it look like? how does it work? What will change? So in effect, it is still a black box and you are still giving us a release with a "tada" effect (even though it isn't your intention). Tell us now, in detail the changes that will occur by making the sidebar detachable, and let us share our thoughts and ideas about it, before you start spending time and money on coding.

I agree with most you say, but 2. Go back to 1.23, They are very adament about not doing this, and I suspect this is because the code-base of vwr 2.x has some stuff that is needed in the near future and which is missing from 1.23 and which is probably not easy (if not near impossible) to integrate in 1.23 without spending huge amounts of time and money on it to rewrite it. This is also why (when you read between the lines) they are confident use of TPVs based on 1.x will decline and we will adapt to 2.x. The best course of action would be to rip the code-base and the UI-code of the viewer apart from each other, but it seems nobody had the foresight to have the viewer developed modularly at even the higherst level. So I suspect the UI-code is mostly integral to the base (which I think is not even the fault of LL for the most part but of the software c ompany that wrote the viewer, since modular design is a good idea in most cases). In dutch we have a saying which is, roughly translated: "from behind you can look a cow in it's arse" which means that it is easy talking afterwards. Unless some TPV party is willing to rewrite 2.x so that major parts can be seperated and redone in a plug-in kind of argitecture, I really think that we are "doomed" to having to work with this "turd". One thing I am sure of, LL will not revert back to 1.x no matter what, and any TPV viewer based on 1.x will slowely become obsolete. TPV should really consider jumping on the 2.x wagon so they can at least give us a better alternative to the official one, once we must switch, and mark my words, switch we must, sooner or later because of newly introduced features that everybody will want to and need to use and will never work on 1.x.

Please forgive me if my words sound wrong, english is just not my native language and I often have to settle for other words than I actually want to use, but: I read the backlog. It is a first step, I agree. But by no means does it radiate a sense of "confidence". It is missing a lot of input that has been given and asked for in the past, but much more important: It doesn't show us anything. Please, please, please. Tell and show us BEFORE you make a desicion and start coding. Show us how the changes in the UI will look and work so we can give you constructive input instead of having to complain about it afterwards. I cannot emphasise this enough, the UI is the most important first step. Give us a that, and your promise to implement the most asked for features after that and we will be happy. But (and I am sory for this) because of all the trouble over the last times, it would really help if you gave us visual input, clear timelines and a voice in it before making a move. It is about regaining trust as much as about a good viewer.

Some have explained much better than I could what the problem is Q. Basically users feel ignored. They have been talking and giving feedback for years. In fact they are showing you what they want through TPVs. If you (and LL) want to take one BIG step towards gaining trust, continuity and respect I would suggest you do the following: 1) Download all TPVs and make a list of the features they have. 2) Extract all viewer related jiras. 3) Make from this a list on which everything from the above is mentioned (save the impossible ones). 4) Let users vote for each feature to prioritize the list. 5) Then tell us that you put everything in the viewer even though it will take some time. 6) Explain choices you make in depth, we are not stupid. You can trust most of us to have some technical insight or background, and if not we are always happy to help explain things to each other. Last, but not least. The changes that are happening lately are affecting users at an emotional level. Keep that in mind. The only way to regain good relationships between LL and the users is by not only listening to us, but also to act on our words. But I can also understand that your job isn't easy. You probably have been given a limited amount of resources with which to work. I know we are barking at you while we should be barking at someone at a higher level. You are in the same boat we are in, trying to make the best of the legacy left to us from the past 2 years or so. In that respect LL is like a "black box" to us. The users are only confronted with what comes out of the box, and based on that we must guess at how it works inside. In no way can we act on something before it exists, and at that time it is usually too late since the desicions have been made and the budgets have been distributed. Look Q, I am sure you are a nice person, I am sure you love your job and I am sure you want to do the best you can. But face it, as long as your boss doesn't give you permission to give the users what they want, you can only deliver something good to your boss but never to us. I am all for transparency, but if it means you just tell us what you do and don't do, and not act on our words, then why throw away the money? I am sure LL will be happy with the viewer when it is ready, but will it matter if the users don't like it? Oh sure, at some point we will stop whining about it. Not because we have grown to like it, but because we start to realize that whining doesn't bring us anything. You know, a good start would be to promise us here and now that you will give us a better interface. Since that seems to be the biggest hurdle to get the code base accepted. Don't just do it by saying it, but give us visual ideas, compositions, sketches, whatever. And show us in those sketches that you read all our input (which is a lot!) Give us a timeframe. Then, consider my earlier proposal of making a list of all other features. It's a simple idea, and although I understand it is a lot of work, I truely believe it is the only way you can get us to take LL seriously again.

Say what? Interface design is a course one can follow in many schools and universities. I had to attend two in the past for my job. It covers many aspects of UI, including design and psychology and even though I am no expert, I am at a loss for words at what you are saying here, all I can ask is: are they teaching this now since the last time I was there? One thing I do remember in respect to this topic is when they told us: "Options can be overwhelming, BUT if presented in the right way they actually give the user the feeling that they have freedom and are in control. People are easilly frustrated by searching for an option that doesn't exist when they WANT it and feel more confident and satisfied when they found out how to set an option that was "hidden" to them before." Now for the argument that more options also means more complexity in the code, this I can understand, but it seems a bit unfair to me to turn this on the users. Besides, what is the use of pumping money and time into a viewer that never becomes popular? I know times are hard, but better to do a good job or no job at all. I never understood why not employ the use of TPV developers directly to snowstorm? Simply fork it now and wait for the one to come out shining and adopt that one. Spread the knowledge, time and funds. It would cost LL less money and less time. gives the users actual say in the matter (TPVs listen better than LL does, sorry) and the process would greatly accelerate. Everyone is a winner.