Toysoldier Thor

SLM advanced reporting (i.e. any form or reporting beyond the bare bones dump of data SLM currently offers) and more importantly the extension of the transaction reporting period beyond the HORRID 30 DAYS MAX has been asked for countless times in many ways to the LL team. Response from Brooke's team... the common canned empty response "maybe sometime in the future".... which most of us verteran SL Merchants translates to "when hell freezes over and we are bored out of our treee - we will consider it". Improved SLM reporting and expansion of the reporting windows is in the same bottom of the barrel LL development plans with improved SLM site traffic reporting (i.e. even something as simple as a Google Analytics Plugin to our SLM store/items). I seriously doubt we will ever see SLM functionality improved in these areas. LL is too busy putting in LL Teen Filters and functions/restrictions that reduce / hurt traffic or putting in little features that pretty much most of the Merchant or Customer community doesnt even care about. I dread the end-of-month in SL because its the time to extract the SLM and InWorld transactions and transform it into my internal annual sales spreadsheet. I dont see inworld vs SLM transaction inputs to be one worse than the other - but it sure is a pain that LL didnt at least think about making both transaction histories in the same common format of fields. What I like about the inworld transaction history is that if I am late by a few days - I DONT MISS TRANSACTION!! It is so so so so frustrating that SLM transaction history is limited to 30 days. But I wont say what I want is for LL's Wishlist - I gave up on LL ever actioning any of my wishlist of Merchant Managing functions. LL doesnt care about adding SLM functionalty that helps the merchants.

Sassy Romano wrote: Pretty much yes. There's a lot of bitching and complaining that goes on and as I said, I've had my arguments but i'd much rather have a battle of wits with an opponent than none at all. I've felt an increased presence from Dakota and while a degree of maintaining the company stance is inevitable, the responses have also been helpful and explanatory. My personal experience of support resolving non deliervies has been good and I felt that an impromptu thank you was well earned. Feel free to add yours anytime Toy Sassy, Although it is good to actually see the RARE posting in the Merchants forum from ANY Linden. Since Brooke's number of postings in this forum has evolved to a rare 1 or 2 posts a month (if that) from her early days of wanting to be actively involved - just like all her predicessors, it seems that Dakota is the only one that tries to post. That being said, as much as I agree with you that I would rather have a good healthy and even spirited disagreeing exchange with a LINDEN on topics of interest to us than none at all, I really do not have anything personally to thank Dakota for. Her exchanges with me have been in the line of defending the secret stance that Brooke and comany has taken and scolding me for speculating what Brooke's team MIGHT BE DOING since Brooke refuses to be transparent. I could hunt down Dakota's last posting exchange with me if you dont believe me. I stand again with Darrius on Dakota's true value of her posts in these forums for the topics that are of interest to me. In these topics - Dakota does exactly what Darrius said... she doesnt lie but she posts defensive postures and empty value content and re-statements of scripted LL company lines. No value to me Sassy. If there is one aspect of Dakota that I do find of value to her ocassionally showing up in the forum.... if you push her hard enough, her emotions tend to get her to say things in postings that most other Lindens would not post. I have learned more from Dakota when I pushed her buttons and shes ranting at me then I could ever get from Brooke's new SECRET STANCE communications. So thank you Dalota for that. It is not the end of June - two months after Brooke promised at the last Open Office that she would reveal much more details on the Direct Delivery. Other than one post of a few cryptic hints of how it might work - which was revealing evidence that we now have a strong guess how it will work - she still has not delivered on this promise.

Hmmmmm normally when a bunch of forum posts and topic is about appreciating a Linden it normally means the Linden has left the company. My offline email notices on these forum posts "Thanks Dakota" made me think she left. Was this just an impromptu thank you to Dakota?

Darrius Gothly wrote: Time for me to weigh in .. once again .. with another of my diatribes on the "Meta Issue" this release spotlights. Brooke, some time back you cancelled Office Hours. I'm pretty sure most folks realized at the time why, but I'm afraid once again the baby got tossed with the bath water .. and this release is a perfect example. What happened this time is (with all best intentions) you reviewed the suggestions and comments from the past, selected a feature that had been requested many times then turned your staff loose and cooked something up. Again I must point out, you meant the very best from your actions. But ... When those original comments were sent along to you (via the many methods available to the contributors) they were at best blue sky conceptual desires. They lacked any real guts, no real definition, nothing solid enough to actually understand why the ideas were suggested. They were like the numbered dots in a Connect-the-Dots book .. but without the numbers; they gave you the general idea but not enough of a solid definition to really follow the path to get the right picture. Lacking the numbers, your staff did their best to come up with a "picture" that made sense. But as has been demonstrated many times by MANY companies (not just LL) .. the development staff often does not really understand WHY the feature is needed. They do not get how it will be used or what is intended for it. They see it as an IT solution and thus implement it with a stock IT device. What should have happened? When you realized that it was time to implement this feature (In-Store Sorting), you should have convened an Office Hour. Posted the Topic as "Brainstorming Session on In-Store Sorting" and made it plainly clear anyone hijacking the topic at the OH would be muted or orbited. (And then provided a couple lackeys to field the off-topic contributions that would come up anyway.) The OH could have been done over three days at three separate time zones so as to garner the widest range of Why, How, and What out there. Of course your dev staff would have been present for all three as well. (Yes, the REAL Dev Staff .. it's important the people slinging code hear the real voices of the customer.) It is also important that these OH's be done BEFORE your Dev Staff formulates their own "solution". In other words, hold the OH before you tell the Dev Staff which feature they are coding next. The net result of this method would have been a wider array of solutions possible, a clearer understanding of the customer's needs by your Dev Staff, and a final solution that had real meat to it ... customer contributed meat and not stock off-the-shelf IT meat substitute. In the final analysis, the excellent ideas we see posted above would have been realized in code and not just in forum posts .. and your customer base would begin rebuilding confidence in LL's ability to develop solutions for their problems. Kyle's quick response to my problem yesterday tells me this, your Dev Staff really DOES want to make this right by your customers .. but they need more to work with. They need the meat only your customers can provide, and it's up to you as their Manager to provide the resources (in the form of Office Hours and other techniques) to provide that. So .. for the next feature .. can we give this method a try please? YUP.... once Again.... What Darrius said and recommended. That is what I what I was trying to say. Brooke, I will totally agree with Darrius and others that I know your intentions were honorable and your spirit behind "trying" to deliver what your teams thoughts are on what is important to your customers - the Merchant Community. I do give you credit on wanting to improve SLM. Where you and your team are failing on is a poor implementation on EFFECTIVE TWO-WAY & TRANSPARENT COMMUNICATION. I know you have tried to improve communications early on - but like your predesessors - you seem to have given up after your first attempts failed. inworld Office Hours failed (and we all agree that it should have been shut down based on how you were running it). But if you and your team were to openly and fairly have continued to created open transparent WORKING GROUPS with your staff and willing participants from the Merchant community (tons of willing participants that you have historically ignored), then we could have worked with your team to flesh out the detailed requirements and go-forward strategy on a new feature like INSTORE SORT and Direct Delivery. Sadly, as Darrius said... you threw out the baby with the bathwater... and once again your team got a good idea wrong. This is the message I have been poking at Rodvik on and hope in his busy schedule he will start focusing on the oranization, process, methods that his LL Development and Commerce Team has been failing on and how its impacting LL's overall success and revenue.

The first this to me is that Brooke is calling it SORT BY RELEVANCE. You cant SORT by "relevance" unles the sort is tied to a function of "SEARCH". If there is no search trigger or seed, then WHAT IS RELEVANT? To what? If Brooke's team would have possible asked more questions to the Merchants on what "we wanted" with in store sorting, the LL development would not have gone and blindly develop their impressions / guesses of what Merchants wanted. The instore sort should have been tied to a small set of SORT METHODS that each merchant could select - like radio buttons. ie. Dear Merchant, would you like your items in your sort to be based on: 1) date item was put into SLM (ascending or descending) 2) price (ascending descending) 3) most viewed 3) most sold Then LL Development and SLM team... KISS (Keep it simple xxx)... Dont even deploy the silly and overly ocmplex solution you came up with that allows each item to be tagged with its own location in the order. FINALLY.... Once again, the LL Commerce Team deploys a new function/service/ feature onto the entire Merchant SLM system BEFORE even warning them that they were going to shuffle all the Merchants store items. Most Merchants were not even aware that Brooke's team had just churned up their store without notice and likely in many cases disrupted their store's order. Brooke... let me give your team a little advice from your Customers and from someone that has worked in enterprise I.T. organizations where our smallest actions can impact a huge swath of our customers... IMPROVE COMMUNICATIONS WITH YOUR CUSTOMERS (i.e. this includes "listening" not just "hearing" them) - System Change pre-deployment notifications to the customers ("next week we will be doing this.... this is the impact") - Proper requirements gather (dont take 1 line of a customers wish list and develop your idea of a solution from it) - Never "ASSUME" you understand the customers requirements... Communicate with them and ask questions to clarify exactly what they want. - And how about proper QA and testing of a new feature? Once again LL has thrown a poorly developed and tested new feature upon their customers, disrupted them and and expects once again for us to be their testers (regardless of the risks of how it impacts us). The SAME OLD LL! As I have said countless times... LL's Development team has always had and continues to demonstrate how immature their systems development practices are. Still the "start up" "shoot from the hip" development methodology and culture. And to those FIC and cheerleaders that still say Brooke has a great communicator - you know who you are - this is more evidence that YOU ARE WRONG and I am right.

So I am thinking that based on zero response the theory on exactly how the DD Internals actually works - from several fellow Merchants that I normally would have fully expected to agree, expand upon, amend, or utter disagree with - that we can figure out who of our fellow merchants are participating in this DD ALPHA BETA and have signed NDAs which would force them not to hint to the rest of the Merchant community the secrets that LL has already passed on to them. But since no one - not even LL - has denied the DD design does not operate this way... seems I am pretty close to the actual way that the new DD will work. Cool!

Georg Stonewall wrote: Toysoldier Thor wrote: I wasnt asking for continued help - although it was nice that tatiana provided me the link the basic limited Beta web site to the new search and I i tried the limited features that it had. But without the V2 it seems the beta site is limited to GENERAL so that pretty much ended my quick look. I wasnt looking for help - I just was making a statement that since LL was "trying" to fix the long standing disaster of inworld search for only V2 viewers... I have little interest in how well the new search will work for ME. As long as when some time in the future a better version of inworld search for ALL VIEWERS will make it easier for my customers to find my store and products and shift their buying habbits to buy more from inworld than my SLM. From the little I saw, I dont think this new search will help but moreso because most SL residents that are shopping for products have long since given up finding products via inworld search. And that the new search does not even have a major search category of SEARCH FOR INWORLD MARKETPLACE ITEMS is a telling sign that this will continue to make inworld search a poor alternative to SLM Search when looking for products inworld. I wonder where you get your knowledge from. We do surveys from time to time and many people are coming to our shop over the inworld search. And beside that you should read the other posts, I told you I found your shop without problems in the beta search. 1) I am glad your survey of your customers happen to find YOUR store via inworld search. I guess that means the only knowledge that is valid is YOUR survey? My customers mostly find MY inworld store via SLM Search. Also, most of my sales are from SLM. 2) I read your post. I dont know what you used to find my store on the new beta search (if you were using it via the V2 viewer). I tested via the Beta Website that Tatiana pointed out. I will actually even provide the actual link where I tested searches to try to find my inworld store... http://search-beta.secondlife.com/ In the current production inworld search, I can find my store as a result if I use search terms like "landscape sculpty" etc. More importantly, my classified would show up on the sidebar of the search results. In this new BETA search, which I will say again I can only search "G" type results, my store did not show up when I typed "Landscape Sculpties" "Toys Tickle Trunk" "toys landscape store"... These last two queries are pretty much the name of my store exactly. ZERO RESULTS. So yes Georg... I read your post.... both had no relevance. Your survey means nothing to my operation and your search results did not work when I tested them.

I wasnt asking for continued help - although it was nice that tatiana provided me the link the basic limited Beta web site to the new search and I i tried the limited features that it had. But without the V2 it seems the beta site is limited to GENERAL so that pretty much ended my quick look. I wasnt looking for help - I just was making a statement that since LL was "trying" to fix the long standing disaster of inworld search for only V2 viewers... I have little interest in how well the new search will work for ME. As long as when some time in the future a better version of inworld search for ALL VIEWERS will make it easier for my customers to find my store and products and shift their buying habbits to buy more from inworld than my SLM. From the little I saw, I dont think this new search will help but moreso because most SL residents that are shopping for products have long since given up finding products via inworld search. And that the new search does not even have a major search category of SEARCH FOR INWORLD MARKETPLACE ITEMS is a telling sign that this will continue to make inworld search a poor alternative to SLM Search when looking for products inworld.

Ai Velde wrote: Phil Deakins wrote: Ai Velde wrote: I'd understand if V2 holds a knife to your throat and threatens to decapitate your mother, but why can't you test it out? I know some of you are very hard to please but it wouldn't hurt you to at least give it a shot I have tried it out (V2) - more than once - and, by comparison to the V1, it's crap. Have they fixed the camera controls display yet? The last I heard, they hadn't done it, and I don't think they ever will - because they don't give a damn about users. Um...? Okay? But I wasn't starting a discussion anywhere relating to the userfriendly or unuserfriendly interface of V2? I was saying how it won't slit your mothers' throat and threaten to eat your dog if you use it for 5 minutes to try the new search. lol. wth No it wont hurt my mom nor eat a dog i do not have. But I am not going spend 10 minutes installing LL SL V2 to test a search feature on a viewer have no intention to use anyway. It will take me about 15 minutes to 1/2 hour to re-orient myself to where the heck all the V2 features, buttons, dashboard, etc. are on V2. ... all this just to see how new search will work for those that are V2 users? ?? uhmmm? Ok??? How bout NO. Waste of my time and even if I didnt like it... LL wont listen or make changes based on my opinions. lol... they rarely have and unless you are a FIC / CheerLeader of LL who LL will listen to... waste of time. Again... call me when current or new Phoenix decides to incorporate new Search. The bugs will likely be worked out by then.

Phil Deakins wrote: Ciaran Laval wrote: Phil Deakins wrote: I have tried it out (V2) - more than once - and, by comparison to the V1, it's crap. Have they fixed the camera controls display yet? The last I heard, they hadn't done it, and I don't think they ever will - because they don't give a damn about users. Pan and orbit are on different tabs and the controls are much better than when it was first released. It's the large size of the cam control's display that was always too big, PLUS, and this is very important, it's the lack of semi-transparency when not in focus too. Many people, including me, use the cam controls extensively, and we have them permanently on display. The V1 controls never got in the way because they were designed with users in mind - small and unobtrusive - but the V2 controls were designed for their looks and not for users. Has there been any progress along those lines? From what you said, it sounds like it's got worse instead of better. Thats funny Phil that you mention the horrid V2 Cam controls. It was one of the top reasons I abandoned V2 when I first gave it a try... and from what Ciaran just said... they have not fixed it. When they separated the PAN and ANGLE Zoom... that was pretty much a show stopper. It made what was a great control into an utterly useless function. AND I use PAN ZOOM ANGLE ... ALLLL THEEE TIME!!! So I will never return.

Georg Stonewall wrote: Ai Velde wrote: Some of these posts already, I can't even believe. lol. At this point after begging for something, anything to be changed with search, we should shut up and sit down. I'm not an LL cheerleader, but ANY improvements on search, or any ATTEMPTS to improve search should at least be looked into rather than being blown off by saying call me when you support it for my viewer. 3rd party viewers can support the new search once it's rolled out if they choose to, it's not up to LL. You guys know better. Where's the big obnoxious eyerolling smiley for me to use? I'd understand if V2 holds a knife to your throat and threatens to decapitate your mother, but why can't you test it out? I don't enjoy using V2 but I'm still playing with the new search stuff. So far V2 has not decapitated my mother. I know some of you are very hard to please but it wouldn't hurt you to at least give it a shot, especially if you've been one of the people screaming till you're blue in the face for something, anything towards improving search. After years of being cheesed off, at least go "Hey, thanks for trying!" even if it's not exactly what you want, and then offer suggestions for things it may be lacking. Easy! lol. -- To set example, thank you LL for trying to improve search even if it still doesn't suit some peoples' needs. I like to think we all understand that this is still in beta and you may be accepting intelligent and thoughtful suggestions for improvements. Personally, I think the new search is looking fantastic with amazing potential to lessen the stress and burden amongst the members, and I'm very excited for when it comes out of beta. Wow! I didn't spontaneously combust for realizing someone is trying to improve search. The world is still intact too! Newton's Linden Acknowledgement Theory, eat your heart out. The first meaningfull post in this thread and I'm afraid it will stay this way. I think LL is on a good way, this beta is already much better then the previous version @Toysoldier If you wish your Phoenix viewer supports the new search then don't ask LL ask the Phoenix team. Also you don't need to login in any viewer to find mature stuff in the web search, you only need to login into your dashboard and that has nothing to do with the beta version of the search. In the WEB BETA search - the link i was shown.... there is only GENERAL... and I could not set it to MATURE. So for the beta...only GENERAL works... and since my store is in a mature sim... the Beta shows none of my store or products. And I wont be asking Phoenix anything. Search has sucked in SL for so long and if LL built a new Search that only works with new LL Viewer.... no big loss anymore for me. Just that as has been the case for FAR TOO LONG... those that do not have LL V2 will still not find my stuff.

TatianaDokuchic Varriale wrote: @Toy If you want to try it out without using the viewer: http://search-beta.secondlife.com/ Thanks... Gave it a try. Needs work. Could not change it away from "G" only. Tons missing. My items in my store are all G stuff and a G store... just happens to be on a Mature sim. So the beta search didnt let me find any of my stuff. No search category for COMMERCIAL or INWORLD MARKET - u just gotta search for everything or places. When I found my profile - couldnt get details in my profile without needing to log into the viewer (which I guess was a V2 - so i didnt). My Classified Ads were not found or displayed on the sides of any relevant searches - but again... likely because the beta only searches for G rated anything. THERE - I tried it. lots of work needed on that still. YES i did leave a comment on the things broken.

Ai Velde wrote: Some of these posts already, I can't even believe. lol. At this point after begging for something, anything to be changed with search, we should shut up and sit down. I'm not an LL cheerleader, but ANY improvements on search, or any ATTEMPTS to improve search should at least be looked into rather than being blown off by saying call me when you support it for my viewer. 3rd party viewers can support the new search once it's rolled out if they choose to, it's not up to LL. You guys know better. Where's the big obnoxious eyerolling smiley for me to use? I'd understand if V2 holds a knife to your throat and threatens to decapitate your mother, but why can't you test it out? I don't enjoy using V2 but I'm still playing with the new search stuff. So far V2 has not decapitated my mother. I know some of you are very hard to please but it wouldn't hurt you to at least give it a shot, especially if you've been one of the people screaming till you're blue in the face for something, anything towards improving search. After years of being cheesed off, at least go "Hey, thanks for trying!" even if it's not exactly what you want, and then offer suggestions for things it may be lacking. Easy! lol. -- To set example, thank you LL for trying to improve search even if it still doesn't suit some peoples' needs. I like to think we all understand that this is still in beta and you may be accepting intelligent and thoughtful suggestions for improvements. Personally, I think the new search is looking fantastic with amazing potential to lessen the stress and burden amongst the members, and I'm very excited for when it comes out of beta. Wow! I didn't spontaneously combust for realizing someone is trying to improve search. The world is still intact too! Newton's Linden Acknowledgement Theory, eat your heart out. OK... Thanks LL for trying to fix inworld search even though you developed a solution only currently supported by your own V2 viewer. Maybe some of this population of users might find this new V2 inworld serch useful. Now... Call me when LL knows it support the majority of the SL Grid's viewers - not just V2. PS - i cant test until it support Phoenix. No I will not install LL V2 just to test out inworld search. I have personally given up on an effective inworld search for product/store search and have learned to use SLM. If this new search eventually helps the total population of SL Users/Viewers find my products and store as effectively as them using SLM - great)

Ziggy21 Slade wrote: Three perfectly ordinary words, but put them together and they form a phrase bound to strike pure terror into the heart of even the most experienced merchant. New Inworld Search !!!!!Shudders!!!!! LOL.... and wont work effectively with LL SL Viewer 1.x nor all the other 3PV's until they decide to incorporate it. So a tool best used only with SL V2. Call me when 3PV vendors support it.

Mickey Vandeverre wrote: hmmm....hopefully those dreams will be translated to Non-Geek Speak. I cleaned up my main posting here and created a new BLOG in my Blog site that hopefully better explains the potential of the Federated Inventories. Take a peek in my blog in hopes its more clear there. Toy http://ToyTalks.weebly.com

Josh Susanto wrote: OK, I can get behind the idea of separate inventories, in principle. Thank you. I would say the same thing too "IN PRINCIPLE". This whole concept also introduces several technical issues that would have to be dealt with (as my blog post hinted) like Security permissions and sharing of bought items and issues with synchronization processes. The other fear behind it is LL's Develpment Teams have a history of not fully thinking through most new solutions. They seem to half bake it and throw it into production and let their customer find the bugs - which they tend to fix (but not before it causes a lot of grief). But... assuming this is how LL plans to deploy the DD solution for SLM, we can start thinking what the potential issues could be for the up coming DD. So to recap on the extrapolated theory, this is how the new DD Service will possibly work when its deployed.... Shoppers/Buyers of the SLM will not require a viewer with this API since the new DD service will deposit the purchased items directly into a newly created LL System Folder in the Buyer's personal inventory. This SLM-INGOING folder will be where the SLM DD will deposit this item(s) as part of a server based transaction (SQL transaction) between Asset DBs/tables. (as such - the buyer does not have to be logged into SL to immediately receive the item bought). Merchants will REQUIRE a viewer (LL or 3PV) that has this yet-released API. The API is required only for Merchants that are pushing SLM Items (folders of items) into this newly created MARKETPLACE INVENTORY. Since the API is needed for Merchants to use the new DD, one must assume that MagicBoxes will not be banned by LL and DD will not be forced upon us until all 3PV creators like Phoenix have fully deployed this API. They have too much market presence for LL to go forward without these 3PV Vendors on-board. As part of DD deploy, Merchants will each get created this new SLM OUTGOING "Special" System folder. It is not like any of the other System Folders because this folder has interactions with the new "Federated Inventory" API. LL will be creating a completely new MARKETPLACE INVENTORY that will be the new source of all SLM items being sold on the SLM. I would hope this would be an inventory on a completely new ASSET DB or even ASSET Server. Merchants will also likely have to somehow register into the new DD service. Why? Because this new Marketplace Inventory will require each Merchant to have an account or presence in it. Unlike the main asset server which creates an SL account presence when you create your account in SL - every SL account has a presence.... For this Marketplace Inventory it will likely only have accounts of those SL Residents that are Merchants of SLM. It will likely be permission tied to your Main account. BUT, from Brooke hinted that No-Copy items cannot be copied over because their permissions, this tells me this new inventory is not just an extension of our main account. Its like a special SLM Alt form of relationship with our main SL account. Once everything is setup for a Merchant, basically if you drop an Item that you want to sell in SLM (or even a folder of unboxed items), you simply copy and paste the item from either your main inventory or your current magicbox into this new SLM OUTGOING folder. What happens next? ... see next point Any new or changed item in this new SLM OUTGOING folder in your main inventory is COPIED (actually 1-way synched is the better term) via background SQL transactions on the servers to this new Marketplace Inventory - under your new receiving SLM Merchant folder (for you). The SLM system will now interact directly with this Marketplace Inventory copy of your items... NOT your items in your main personal inventory or anything in the SLM OUTGOING folder. This copying is actuall a SYNCH process because if you want to remove an item from your Marketplace Inventory, you would simply delete it from your OUTGOING folder and the API would delete the corresponding item in your Marketplace Inventory. The API keeps the Marketplace Inventory synchronized with your SLM Outgoing folder. Its the Master. So... based on this, we Merchants outside the DD NDA Beta program can start speculating what the implications are with this model.

Not really Josh. As far as the shopper will know... if they buy it inworld - your inworld rezzed vendors will service them. If they buy in from your SLM store, from the hints that Brooke gave in the FAQ, the item will be delivered from a brand new separate SLM MARKETPLACE Inventory as a DB transfer from this NEW Inventory DB fo the Buyer's personal Inventory located on the main ASSET SERVER DB. What I think Brooke hinted at in the FAQ is a much bigger and revolutionary change to all of our AVATAR's Inventories that goes far beyond DD.... Brooke has let slip that LL is going to release the first edition of what is called FEDERATED INVENTORIES. This has some potentially huge advantages... (and some related new concerns). I posted in these forums about it but I cleaned up my posting and created a blog about it... http://toytalks.weebly.com/1/post/2011/05/slm-direct-delivery-faq-hints-new-sl-federated-inventories.html

OK Merchant folks... so reading and analyzing every one of the FEW FAQ HINTS that Brooke finally released about the up coming SLM Direct Delivery service, those of us that are not in the LL inner circle of being able to know all the details of LL's development effort can now start making some further educated guesses. The great part for me and others like Darrius that did not take part in the LL DD Beta (where we would have to sign an NDA that would have muzzled us, we are free to speculate and predict how DD will work and what that means. Following is the link to Brooke's recent Blog post on the new DD FAQ that we can predict from... http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/SL_Marketplace:Direct_Delivery_FAQ There are TWO key points that she said that would possibly excite some of us that can extrapolate what it means... "Outgoing Items Folder: Items you list on the Marketplace will be retrieved from a special outgoing folder in your inventory and copied to your Marketplace Inventory. Note that outgoing items will be COPIED from your inventory except in the case of no-copy items." "If Third-Party Viewers choose to support listing items on the Marketplace, they may use the API that will be provided to allow this. " So, what these two invaluable bit of info tell me is that the newly created "special" SLM-OUTGOING folder will be part of some form of a potentially cool new revolutionary Inventory Feature/Service. I will convert this to a Technical Label for this new service called: PROXIED / FEDERATED INVENTORIES. Knowing LL's history, they might be deploying this design simply to address a very tactical problem with SLM delivery to replace their perception of the evil "magicboxes". BUT, this design could / would have some HUGE potential new capabilities in the future of SL Inventory handling and management. So, what am I talking about you ask? Why does this possibly excite me??? Let me theorize what I think LL Development is doing with the new DD design. The fact that Brooke said all the supporting 3PV Viewers that want to offer SLM Item Listing delivery to their Viewer Users must incorporate this new API, tells me that the DD design will be adding a new - yet not available - inventory management function. I am predicting this is a set of functions that will allow for an Avatar's inventory to include new "SPECIAL FOLDERS" that are not actually part of the main singular structure of the rest of the Avatar's inventory. i.e. this folder is not like the other folders which are just sub-folders of the main folder (like Clothing, Notecards, Objects). What I suspect the LL Development Team is introducing is the concept of a FEDERATED INVENTORY. Whats that? Well basically it means that your Avatar's Inventory could now actually be made up of multiple inventories but it looks to you as if it is only One inventory. This new "Special" folder would simply be a form of a "portal" that transfers or interfaces with the other Inventory. As such, what ever content you drop into this folder, would be automatically transferred to this other inventory (that you obviously have some rights or affinity to as well). How does this transfer happen? Well that easy, the new API handles all the logistics on this transfer of content either TO and/or FROM this special folder. It could be a blind 1-way transfer, or a full 2-way synch between this special folder and the corresponding special folder in the other independent inventory. This could also imply that LL is introducing a new concept of a PROXIED INVENTORY design. This is a little different in how the pure federated inventory works (where content is copied/synchronized to each other). With a PROXIED Folder, this Special Folder would only present you a VIEW of the contents in the folder of the other inventory. If you drag any item from this special folder, to another folder or to even rez inworld, the content would actually come from the other inventory thru this proxied special folder. Now... although this new API might have beed designed to offer both capabilities, I suspect the new DD will actually be deploying the first function of a FEDERATED Synched multi-inventory system. Why? Because Brooke said the items placed in this new outgoing special folder will be COPIED to the "MARKETPLACE INVENTORY". That implies that there will be a boxed SLM item (or any item for that matter) in your special outgoing folder and the API will COPY it from your inventory to the new independant MARKETPLACE inventory. I suspect it will be what is called a "ONE WAY SYNCH" where the master folder is the one in your main inventory and the SLAVE is the corresponding folder in this newly created MARKETPLACE INVENTORY. There would be no transfer or movement of data back toward your main inventory. Since it is a Synch, if you add an item, its copied over. If you change the item's permission, the API should see the change of the item and copy it again to update the Marketplace inventory. If you delete an item from your folder, the corresponding item will be deleted in the MARKETPLACE inventory. To 99% confirm my theory is right, Brooke even let it slip by naming this new independent federated inventory... LL will be calling it the MARKETPLACE INVENTORY. This new inventory could be inside the same Asset DB or even possibly created inside a completely different and new ASSET DB (and server). That would be nice. BUT FOLKS... lets dream on a bit more - much further then I suspect LL has even thought of with this concept of Multiple Federated / Proxied Inventories. Some cool things that could now be done in the future: Several new and independent inventories could be created and presented to you as a single inventory. You could now have a BACKUP Folder (which is truly a backup since the content is copied to a different asset server). You could create and link in folder to other inventories for other specific purposes.Here is a really cool idea... imagine a federated / proxied folder in your inventory that is actually linked to an inworld rezzed prim (like a magicbox, or inworld vendors, etc.). Now, as long as you are logged into SL, you can transfer / manage the contents of items within the content of prims that are rezzed anywhere inworld.Lets dream on even furhter. Lets say LL some day wants to partner with other grid and even other grids from other competing worlds like IW). A Federated folder could actually be a portal to other grids... allowing content transfer between grids being as easy as dropping the content into this folder.Lets dream more... FEDERATION to SHARED INVENTORIES. So now your special folder is linked and synchronized with a SL business partner's inventory. You can share content with this trusted partner. Or you both could rez a special inworld prim that many of you avatars could all link to and share content with.I could keep going, but you can continue dreaming on the possibilites with FEDERATED PROXIED INVENTORIES. This could be a huge next generation of the largely outdated inventories that SL now has available. Darrius... you can post more thoughts on this - because I know you have more to add to this. :) BUT... welcome to SLM DD that will use FEDERATED INVENTORIES. If this is true... the risks and concerns I initially brought up about how DD would be deployed are largely dismissed. There could be many other new technical issues with this new approach - BUT - this is a huge and powerful new feature for SL... if they are doing this. (I think I am going to blog this posting :) Toy http://ToyTalks.weebly.com

Peewee Musytari wrote: I assume if deliveries work when we are offline, that they are sent from the database and not actually dependant on how much of our inventory decides to load that day. At least I hope so lol Yes - Magicboxs or any form of DD model will all still allow SLM sales to happen if you are logged in or not. The question would be ... what happens to your SLM sales in the DD model "IF" LL decides to lock or disable your account for what ever AR reason? Currently iIn this situation - even though your Avatar account is blocked or temporarily banned - your inworld sales will continue as well as your SLM sales (since the Magicbox operates independantly from your account even being enabled). As long as the objects stay rezzed - sales continue to happen. But I would have to assume that if FOR WHATEVER REASON your account is blocked or disabled or banned, then your SLM sales could stop dead (not your inworld sales). Now... the big question is how this new independent Merchant Associated SLM Inventory concept (if this is how I understand the new DD API will work and that the SLM system folders in a Merchant's inventory are just Proxy Links to this other SLM inventory) would work. These new sets of inventories will require some affinity to the Merchant's main account but would this new blob of SLM Inventory be impacted if the Merchant's account is impacted? On the positive side - IF this is how the new DD model will work and the SLM inventory is simply a proxied folder to our main inventory folder... this has some potential benefits (if LL designed this right or even thought of it). Since it would be an independent SLM Merchant Folder... there is the possibility that multiple SL accounts could link to this SLM folder in the same simultaneous way as the main merchant. Your main and your ALT accounts could possibly have the same proxied links to this SLM inventory (with the right permissions). Your account and your SL Business partners could all have access to this SLM inventory. But as Dakota mentioned clearly to me this week - all I can do is speculate based on the small crumbs of information that Brooke is reluctantly willing to provide us. Thing is, it doesnt take much info from her to start calculating & reverse engineering what the LL Development Team is secretly creating. The announcement from Brooke about this new API and that DD will not / cannot be forced upon the Merchants until the API is fully incorporated by all 3PV players... that was a HUGE GEM of design knowledge released. It tell us that are on the outside of this secret DD development - what the LL DD team is possibly doing.

Madeliefste Oh wrote: Hi Brooke, How will be dealed with inventory loss? Inventory loss is my biggest concern when it comes to Direct Delivery. Once it happened to me, that I lost about 6000 items from my inventory. Clearing cache, installing new viewer, working on a different computer, nothing helped to get the lost items back into my inventory. So I completed my inventory again by buying my own products from my inworld store. Then suddenly about three weeks later, my inventory started loading fully again and my lost items came back. Among those items was some of my merchandise. At the time this happened the inventory loss had no influence on my sales, because I did not loose any items rezzed in world or items from my magic box. But in this new system, a loss of merchandise for three weeks from my inventory would have cost me money. How are you going to prevend that merchants will suffer from inventory loss? This is one of the MAIN REASONS (among countless other reasons that have already been posted in these forums - but that Dakota says were basically ignored because none of us were / are Beta Testers) why I have MAJOR concerns about the architecture of the current DD solution. It may sound so cool and perfect and clean as a design until you dig deeper and see the potential risks of the DD creating a NEW SOURCE of SLM content that is tied to your personal inventory. Now Brooke has hinted (because of revealing a new API will be needed by all viewers) that the new DD design will be using an SLM specific independant DD IN and OUT folder that is not just a system folder of the Merchant's actual inventory. I suspect this API will allow for some form of PROXY FOLDER to a corresponding SLM account of the Merchant. As such, I am guessing this Merchant SLM IN/OUT inventory will be completely empty until we start migrating our content from the magic boxes to this SLM DD folder. This would explain why the DD cannot be deployed until all viewers (LL's and all the 3PVs) have incorporated this API. Without the API, the Aavatar's account inventory does not have this new PROXIED INVENTORY FOLDERS functionality that can point to another inventory (like the new SLM DD in/out folders). hmmmmmm - I must ponder the pros and cons to this.

Arwen Serpente wrote: Thanks Brooke for the FAQ link. I have some of the same questions as the others, particularly Ai Velde's question about whether this is a choice of DD OR Magic Box (meaning if we want to keep our Magic Boxes we can) - because that's how the FAQ sounds to me (and that's new information). Further questions on my mind include: 1) Why do the folder option at all? The potential for pieces to be "missing" and the Merchant to have to answer additional customer service requests would defeat the objective of insuring delivery. At least when a resident receives a box and rezes it to load contents to inventory, if it doesn't load completely, they can always reopen the box and try again (as long as the items are no transfer). Further, it makes no sense to me to unbox products and create thousands of new items in inventory (if I did that with mine, I'd be adding over 7000 items to my inventory). I don't intend to sell my items "unboxed", but as a consumer, I don't want to receive them that way either. Sometimes I buy things with tons of pieces and I don't even load the entire contents, I just pull the item I need into inventory at the time I need it. Edited to add: If the folder option is a real option, please include a field where the Merchant can indicate "This item is delivered as - a folder or - boxed". And it means the Merchant needs to indicate in their description every single piece that would be in that folder so the customer can check to be sure they have received everything. Right now, some do list all pieces, but many don't. 2) If "New Folders" are created in our inventory, then it sounds like a viewer update would be necessary for all viewers, LL and TP. Do TP viewer developers have access to the info they need to start working on that change? Further to that, can we still work on a viewer that does not for some reason have these new folders - then log into a viewer that does have them to move finished product to the folder? May sound crazy, but at least for me, that would help me be sure that I am not "disturbing" the "Outgoing" folder by accident as I work. 3) If a Merchant pulls an item out of the "Outgoing Folder" to replace it with an update, is it automatically resynced with Marketplace (I think that was asked above)? Watching this thread closely to see what other Merchants ask, and looking forward to the response. Thanks again! I suspect that unfortunately Merchants will be forced (sooner or later) to not use the MagicBoxes. My guess that the main reason LL will not ram it down our throats faster will be because they will be restricted by how fast all the 3PV integrate any required DD updates to the 3PV viewer code to support these new inventory system folders. History will also suggest that LL will not consider keeping MagicBox functionality available even if there was a huge Merchant request / demand to keep them an option. As for Brooke bragging and promoting how unboxed sellable SLM inventory is such a big new benefit for this new DD, this topic was already talked about in the Merchant forums (the forums that Dakota implied LL does not read nor take note of when developing) and yoru logic and concerns are completely legit and obviously not thought about by the LL Development team. LL's idea that unboxed sellable inventory for delivery is so good clearly comes from either LL staff that have not been an active Merchant or from some of the Merchants that have special access to Brooke and team to convince them this would be so cool for him to have. Just one of my Boxed sculpty landscape packs - with all the sculpy maps, shadow maps, license notecards, info notecards, demo photos, scripts, and demo prims can have almost a 100 objects. When Boxed this makes up 1 prim object filled with content. So lets say I only sell 10 packs... that fills my inventory with an additional 1000 objects. But Brooke is promoting that its much better for Merchants to new unbox all our boxed items and fill up our already huge account inventory. Why? Because supposedly to some LL insider that help LL create their requirements for DD - Customers are so hugely inconvenienced not rezzing what they bought on the Merchants store. I didnt know this was such a hugely critical problem in the years I have been buying and selling. Also, as you mentioned Arwen, the benefit of selling a BOXED SELLING Item is that any time in the future, the customer could re-populate the contents of the boxed item in the future. Many of my customer keep my boxed item and copy the contents into their inventory when working on projects then delete the folder to reduce inventory. Boxed Items are clean, organized, and convenient for future use. BUT I guess the LL DD team is looking for excuses why DD is using our personal inventory as a place to source our SLM items. Its also clear from what was stated in the FAQ that Brooke and the DD team did not read ANY of the several paged Commerce Forum thread about DD and it sourcing from our inventory (with all its risks) as well as the benefits of much more efficient alternatives like DD sourcing from a dumbed down Magic Box. This would have all but eliminated any of the huge migration pains all of Merchants will be forced to go through when we need to transfer our Magicbox SLM inventory to this new DD folder. No mention as to how LL forcing all Merchants to further fill up our account inventory with 1000's more items (or even 10's of thousands if Merchants unbox their contents) will impact stability of the Merchant's account. What if a Merchant already has 60,000 or more items in their inventory and needs to stuff another 20,000 SLM items into their inventory? It was also said in the FAQ that this thread is only here to directly answer FAQ facts. We will clearly not be allowed to point out risks or alternatives or features unless we are in the Beta. They do not read Forum discussions - we saw that when there was NO mention from Brooke about the biggest public DD topic discussed in the forums. So just pucker up and wait for whats coming.

Hello Toysolider, Again, you are speculating about things to which you have zero direct knowledge. Since you are so quick to judge Linden Lab in unfavorable light, I suppose it was too much for you to consider that there were unforseeable delays that occurred because of outside issues? .... Regards, Dakota Linden -- Linden Lab SL Marketplace Customer Support https://marketplace.secondlife.com/ http://www.secondlife.com Yes - in these statements you are 100% correct. I have near zero knowledge of LL's internal politics and staffing issues and secret plans and designs. Why? Because until you mention these issues in posts like you just have... how would I know? QUICK TO JUDGE LL NEGATIVELY? And you think this was a quick judgement? I have 2+ years of history of watching and experiencing how LL has time and time again almost completely ignored our requirements, blindly pushed painful damaging initiatives upon us (like the teenification of the grid, the maturity filters, the horrible SLM migration, etc...), and utter silence from your teams when we scream for attention. It was not a quick judgement. This aniticipation of how DD has already been designed (with NO input from the Merchant community) and will be deployed with no regard to what clear concerns and ideas we have posted publicly in the forums (which Brooke herself even asked me why I had concerns in the forums) is based on an extremely strong history of how LL develops and operates and does not listen to their customers. External business survey sites whom have interviewed LL current and past staff have already proven that even LL staff know this is the case when they were asked to be candid about LL as a company. The #1 complaint recorded from LL staff about their company was: LL does not listen to the great ideas and concerns coming from their customers. So... dont stand there and tell me that I have made QUICK NEGATIVE JUDGEMENTS. Its been far from quick.

And as fro speculating on what LL is doing based on the limited information LL is providing the general SLM public. I will continue to do this until LL decides to not develop and deploy services and functions and policies in secret until they spring it upon us. Do you want me to stop coming up with speculation and theories and educated guesses on what LL MIGHT be secretly doing that will affect the Merchant community? Start being more transparent and communicating out in public and not to the secret community. SLM has no competition.... why the NDA? What is LL afraid of in openly communicating the design and progress of the DD service that will affect so many of us and that you trust only a few Merchants will know enough about to address all our concerns.?

Dakota Linden wrote: Toysoldier Thor wrote: BTW... since Dakota is the only Linden to talk about DD... Dakota... how will LL address the issue that Avatars already are facing inventory size limits and issues with these limits - yet DD will force all our inventories to grow anyway? I feel sorry for the Merchants with 1000's of items in SLM that will now have to be transitioned to and managed in their inventories. Thanks Dakota for at least providing some hints where LL is going with DD. BAD as I suspected. LL was not listening.... AS PER NORMAL! Greetings Toysoldier, As you are aware, we extended an invitation to users asking for those who wish to participate in the Direct Delivery alpha and beta testing. Since you clearly believe that you have many ideas that Linden Lab should have considered, and seem to believe that you understand how that system will work, even without any information being released, I am dissapointed to see that you are not part of the assembled group. As you are also aware of, all members of Linden Lab, and the users who are members of the group, are bound by an NDA. Since you have chosen not to participate in the User Group, I would recommend that you not attempt to speculate about how the system will or will not work, since you obviously are not privy to the details. Regards, Dakota Linden -- Linden Lab SL Marketplace Customer Support https://marketplace.secondlife.com/ http://www.secondlife.com So Dakota, you are confirming that Brooke is pulling back on her word from the last April's last open office meeting (do you want me to pull out and quote her statement in the transcripts) where she clearly stated that before the end of April she would blog more details on what the DD is and how it works. This was clearly understood by the Merchants that this was a public posting from Brooke to the community. Many of us suspected this would be the cast when we read the recent DD ALPHA invite where Brooke changed her story and said basically for those Merchant's brave enough to risk there SLM items and inventory to the new mystery DD service, LL will reveal these deep secrets. So ... why has Brooke pull back on her word to inform the general community on how LL plans to deploy DD? As for why I didnt participate in the LL NDA'ed DD Alpha testing, since you nor the rest of LL staff actually read any of the Merchant forums where this topic was already discussed why some of us refused to participate... I will not risk my SLM Items, store operations, and revenue on LL's risky DD Alpha / Beta testing Moreso, the arrogance of LL to invite and ask their customers to risk their operations testing LL code with ZERO details from LL before hand on what we would be getting ourselves into??? So its a "we cant tell you anything but since up and trust us ... once you sign up.. we will tell you how deep and dangerous the DD service will actually be" Try being honest and open with the community for once... Are you telling me that LL's DD code would make any fundamental changes to the DD code that myself would suggest if I even were to join the DD??? Make me laugh. NONE of the DD testers will have any say on changing the DD design... they are only there to find the bugs in the already designed and developed DD code. My input would have fallen on just as deaf ears as they have here in the public forums. So Dakota, you are saying ALL the discussions ... longgg detailed incredible discussions between the merchants on our concerns about DD and the Merchant's inventory as a source and the options we presented and talked about... they all were not listened to by any Lindens??? There you go fellow SLM Merchants.... you heard it live. I am not going to waste my time joining a secret LL NDA club for DD development where I know 100% full well no LL developers or Commerce staff would have totally dismissed. You know it too. But I give you credit Dakota... at least you are willing to openly post in the forums. Brooke has quickly taken the same approach and communications strategy that Pink Linden evolved to in the later half of her short career at LL. "Stop being transparent and only work secretly with the SL Merchants you like"

Dakota Linden wrote: Greetings! It is not possible to add the code to the Magic Box. Even if the code was added to the Magic Box, every resident who has a Magic Box would need to download the new version and change out all of their Magic Boxes in world. By the time everyone updated their Magic Box, Direct Delivery will be live and the Magic Boxes would be obsolete. Regards, Dakota Linden -- Linden Lab SL Marketplace Customer Support https://marketplace.secondlife.com/ http://www.secondlife.com Sadly Dakota has said more about what is happening with Direct Delivery and what the LL Development has and has not listened to about our concerns than the promises Brooke has given to the Merchant community in early April when she promised by the end of April she would Blog the details of the up coming Direct Delivery. So Dakota has stated that the LL Development Team will not provide the DD function that leverages the MagicBoxes as a Source of SLM items. They are still on their single-minded track to force ALL MERCHANTS to migrate all their content from all their magic boxes and into their own PERSONAL MERCHANT INVENTORIES. So..... a million plus SLM items will be transferred into our Avatar's inventories instead of just leaving them all where they are and making the transition to DD safer and with near zero disruption. The laughable part about Dakota's point is.... "in order to allow for the Magicboxes to properly managed failed deliveries - Merchants would be forced to upgrade all their magicboxes - and that is sooo terrible" but.... what she implies but doesnt say is that DD will force all us Merchants to migrate ALL our items from the Magicboxes to our own inventories and this aparently is acceptable?? BTW... since Dakota is the only Linden to talk about DD... Dakota... how will LL address the issue that Avatars already are facing inventory size limits and issues with these limits - yet DD will force all our inventories to grow anyway? I feel sorry for the Merchants with 1000's of items in SLM that will now have to be transitioned to and managed in their inventories. Thanks Dakota for at least providing some hints where LL is going with DD. BAD as I suspected. LL was not listening.... AS PER NORMAL!