Winter Seale » Uncategorized

What’s wrong with SecondLife Viewer 2.0?

Winter — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 20:46:54 +0000

Kitty Barnett, over at the Catznip blog, posted a question a little while back, asking for, in concrete terms, what people don’t like in 2.0.

As an aside: every now and then I’ll poke someone I know to ask what little things they didn’t/don’t like about 2.0 or what feature(s) they’re missing from 1.23 but surprisingly very few ever seem to really have usuable feedback so since I can’t release I’ll open the door for suggestions on what to do while I/we wait for a stable 2.1 to release

So I sat down and thought about this some…

The biggest thing that I really find distressing about 2.0 is the sidebar. I hated them when web browsers did them, and I hate them in 2.0. It’s just not enough space for many of the panels they try to cram into it. And it only lets you look at one thing at a time, which for much of that information is just completely unacceptable. I’m not opposed to having it in the viewer, I just want it optional, like say, Firefox and it’s sidebar.

And by optional, I mean, everything in the sidebar can also be viewed as separate windows… not a floating window that contains what’s in the sidebar, but actual separate windows for each type of thing it encapsulates. I want multiple profile windows open at once, for instance.

I’m also not too fond of not being able to dock local chat in with my IMs. And the local chat text entry box is way too small (though that wouldn’t matter if I could dock chat with my IM window).

Still, as irritating as I find the sidebar, I’d use 2.0 for Shared Media in spite of it, if it weren’t for the the features from third party viewers that I’ve come to rely on, the biggest being “always rez in land group,” followed up by lesser things like double-click-to-top and client side radar (that can feed in world objects). And less so, ground-sit anywhere, no tp-progress screens (though really I’d like to have this only be for in-sim tps) and shadows.

Without “always rez in the land group” as an option, I’m not gonna be using a viewer for real work. That one is non-negotiable. The other stuff is mostly about helping the viewer get out of your way and fade into the background.

PS Summer correctly points out that temporary textures are pretty critical to building. And bulk temporary textures would be a huge win for sculpty makers like her.

Kitty followed up in SecondLife on Fri Jun 25 2010:

[6:22:26] Kitty Barnett waves.. just wanted to say thankies for your comment :) the sidebar is kind of a huge thing to get rid off though so nothing I can take on and maintain in addition to everything else :| I’ve tried some things like specifying which tabs should auto-hide when the mouse isn’t over it, etc but that doesn’t involve doing a complete UI rewrite :|
[6:22:27] Kitty Barnett: double-click tp and “ground sit anywhere” are Snowglobe features now so any viewer based off of snowglobe will always have it btw :)

And I replied:

[9:24:09] Winter Seale: Hi hi =) Yeah, the sidebar is a huge huge task, and I’m sure will be the focus of many a third party viewer mod (Kirstin’s is already going down that road), so I don’t blame you at all for not tackling that. If you added rez-as-land-group though, I’d love you forever. =)
[9:32:33] Winter Seale: oh lol, and Summer reminds me, Temp Textures are critical too, and if you were to add Temp Texture support to batch upload then she would love you forver too, lol.

Pics from inworld

Winter — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 00:01:11 +0000

One of my biggest wishlist items would be the ability for scripts to have some control over the screenshot controls. Obviously this has lots of security implications, but it’d still be a nice thing to have scriptable. I developed something that for me, is the next best thing. Like all those SL blogging services, I setup a little email gateway that takes pics from in world and puts it on a webserver. It’s still sitting at around the proof of concept stage, but I do intend to add a gallery view to it at some point. For now, you can see the most recent picture from my feed below:

Winter’s Labnotes– What I’m doing in Second Life

Winter — Fri, 28 May 2010 06:45:22 +0000

So I’ve started tweeting in detail what I’m doing in SL, as far as scripting and product development go. (I’m not much of a life blogger, so don’t expect to hear too much about my personal life. Complicated as it is, I’m just not the type to share it with the world.)

You can see it here: Twitter- winterseale #labnotes

Anyway, it’s part of my larger goal of trying to make scripting in the virtual world more transparent, like non-sculpty building has always been. And maybe so I look a bit less like I’m just sitting around quietly for hours on end. =p I went and picked up Twitter Wall, which was a bit pricey but did exactly what I wanted. So now I have my latest labnotes on on a prim in my devel platform.

The plan for the future is to build out a clockpunk/steampunk type laboratory to keep all the stuff I’m working on there. So that’s kinda where the labnotes name comes from. It’ll all be semi-public and part of the sim that people visiting our store can explore. I’ll post a slurl once something’s ready.

Editing Animations on OSX

Winter — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 14:12:07 +0000

I use QAvimator to make animations (well really, I make poses, animations, thus far, are beyond me). I also use OSX as my primary platform. If you visit the QAvimator site you’ll see that you can only download a PPC only version (from 2007). I compiled up a Universal version at the end of 2008 and put it online. I posted it to their forums, offering it as a replacement for the out of date, PPC only version they’re currently linking too (and I haven’t been the only one). Anyway, I thought I should mention it here, it case anyone else needs it.

New Product: Abduct and Control Hair Addon

Winter — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 06:50:09 +0000

Let people:

Have quick access to your #RLV (Shared Root) restraints*

Strip you*

Drag you by your hair

Knock you unconscious

Abduct you*

Get a notecard with your RP info, limits, etc

Do:

Have full control over how much or little people can do to you

Advertise your vulnerability or play it coy

Quickly turn the whole thing on or off

Wear as an attachment or add directly to your hair

These actions require an RLV capable viewer to function and will be disabled if you are not in an RLV capable viewer. Other actions are enhanced with RLV, but will continue to function without it.

Now only L$450, get it today! In world at Summer/54/32/1001, in the naughty section. Or on Xstreet under Hair Accessories.

Posted to the forums here.

You’re doing it wrong: The Adultification of Second Life

Winter — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 04:41:39 +0000

Even now that the September 15th deadline for rating land as Adult in Second Life has passed, people are still confused. Mostly this comes from people confusing “age-verified” with “adult-verified”. This is Linden Labs fault for using confusingly similar terms. And what’s worse, there are still documents hanging around from the first failed attempt at requiring age-verification that talk about how you’ll need it to enter Mature rated regions. Further more, documents describing restricting access to age-verified residents sometimes refer to them as residents who have “verified their adult status”.

First we’ll define the terms and talk a bit about them.

Ratings: PG / Mature / Adult

These are set region wide. It is set by going to World->Region/Estate->Region->Rating and selecting from a drop down box. You can not set these on a per parcel basis. These are intended as a tool for the general population, not land owners. They’re intended to be used to ensure informed consent to the sorts of activities they’re likely to encounter when entering an unknown region. That is, it is intended to protect residents. They allow for a more predictable and consistent Second Life experience. While there are restrictions on who can enter an Adult region, that is not it’s primary purpose.

Adult regions can only be entered by avatars that either have given payment information to LL, or have gone successfully gone through the age verification process.

Parcel Restrictions: Age Verified / Payment Info on Record

These are set on a per-parcel or per-estate basis by going to World->About Land->Access->Block Access By or World->Region/Estate->Estate->Restrict Access To and checking either Residents who have not given payment info to Linden Lab or Residents who are not age verified adults. These are intended to allow the parcel owner to keep out people they view as undesirable. These exist to protect land owners, not residents. There are no circumstances under which either of these ever must be set. They are entirely optional. If you use either of these, you will be cutting off a significant percentage of the SL population.

Land Options: Mature Content

And to add to the confusion there’s also a “Mature Content” land option, that’s independent of all of these. It’s in World->About Land->Options->Land Options->Mature Content. The wiki has this to say about it: One of the region maturity ratings is “Mature”, but parcels are not required to have mature content on Mature rated land. This item is intended to indicate that there is mature content on the parcel. Further, the knowledge base has this to say: If your Region is listed as Mature and you would like to show mature objects in search, check the Mature Content box in the About Land window’s Options tab.

LAND OWNER FAQ

Q. My region is rated Mature but my parcel has Adult content. Can my parcel be rated as Adult without effecting the rest of the region?
A. No. You’ll either have to get the region’s rated as Adult, or you’ll have to move to a different region (or the new Adult mainland, Zindra). (Or of course, you can drop your Adult content.)

Q. My parcel is on a Mature island but has Adult content, but that’s ok if I restrict the parcel to age-verified only right?

A. No, that’s wrong. Adult content can only be on land that is rated as Adult not Mature. This means either the entire island is Adult, or you’re on Zindra, the Adult mainland. Simply restricting access to your parcel does not meet the Linden Labs requirements.

Q. My region is marked as Adult, I also have to flag my parcel as age-verified if I want to allow explicit sexual activity on it, right?

A. No, you are never required to restrict your parcel to requiring either age verification or payment info. Those are entirely optional and left to your own discretion. They’re intended to allow you to exclude people you view as undesirable. Remember that many people outside the US (and even inside the US) can’t use the age verification services as they either don’t work with international credentials or are incomplete or incorrect regarding even US credentials.

Q. My parcel sells primarily non-adult items, but does sell some adult items as well. Am I required to be in an Adult region?

A. No, you are only required to not have any Adult search terms in your parcel descriptions, or the items flagged as showing up in search (or in your classifieds). If you’ve received a “your land has Adult keywords” mail from LL, look for objects that are set to be indexed by the search engine. It’s easy miss some of these.

Q. My home is on Mature land but I have a sex bed inside, do I have to move to Adult land?

A. No, you only have to move to Adult land if your activities are in public or are publicly promoted. What you do privately with someone (or someones) close to you is your own business (unless you make your walls transparent =p).

RESIDENT FAQ

Q. How do I become “adult verified” and gain access to regions that are rated Adult?

A. If it works for you, the easiest way is to age verify. However, a significant minority in the US and many many people in other countries can not use this method due to the service provider’s database being incomplete or incorrect. The other option is to add payment information to your account. Please note that there is no need to actually spend any money. Either you can add a debit or credit card to your account. Or, if you have a verified PayPal account (this means you’ve associated a bank account or a credit card with the paypal account), you can use that as well. I suggest you read the LL Article on this.

Q. I’ve been told that if I don’t become age verified that I won’t be able to access Adult rated content, is that true?

A. No, you only need to have payment information on file. Some parcels do restrict access to people who aren’t age verified, but this has nothing to do with the mandatory Adult rating and has nothing to do with LL’s policies. This is a restriction that is entirely the doing of the land owner. The land owner may believe they had to, in which case I encourage you to point them at this FAQ.

Q. I can’t age verify or put payment info on file, what about me?

A. You’ll be stuck to Mature and PG regions then. This certainly isn’t much of an excuse for anyone in the US, as age verification works for most people, and it’s hard to imagine a Second Life user who doesn’t have at least a bank account. You may not feel comfortable giving your info to PayPal or Linden Labs, but that’s a “won’t” not a “can’t” issue. You’ll have to balance your desire to have access to Adult regions against your distrust of these institutions.

[Edit: The Second Life Wiki has a good article with further details. Help save more people the same confusion, vote for the jira ticket to remove the age-verified restriction on access. I also posted this to the official forums. Added discussion of the Mature Content flag. Put September 15th in the past.]

Got a logo now…

Winter — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 03:01:50 +0000

Thanks to the tireless work of Summer (<3), I’ve got a logo now. Thank’s for puttin’ up with me as we worked through the many variations sis. =)

Adding texture change to a scaler script…

Winter — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 02:42:55 +0000

So the other day Summer asked me to add a texture change feature to the scaler script she’d been using for the no-mod clothing and accessories. The script she gave me was on notecards, with a Creative Commons license. So I’m posting what I did here. =)

I did a bunch of general cleanup and the scaler script is still usable stand alone to just scale stuff. I got rid of all the magic numbers and made it stop creating/destroying listens all the time, making it instead use llListenControl to turn them on and off. I also moved some repeated code into functions. Also moved the braces around a little to be more comfortable to me <.< (yes, I’m a little embaressed to have done that. =p) And finally, I changed it to support having the optional color change script.

The core script is here, drop that in whatever it is you want resized. The child script is here and should go in every prim you want resized.

The texture changer I wrote from scratch. You can add it to any script that already has the core resizer and it’ll automatically show up on the menu. Just edit the list of textures at the top of the script to have whatever you want and drop the child script in the prims you want to change textures.

Both scripts are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. People before me in the credits of the script are:

eSimple srl 2008 – www.esimple.it – www.virtuy.com
Ploreho design 2008 – www.ploreho.com

Project Ideas

Winter — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 04:50:25 +0000

Running around SL often I’ll hear a complaint or see something that tickles my fancy and that’s when I jot it down in my ideas folder. I’ve got a bunch and I’d thought I’d share. Kinda forces me to flesh them out a bit anyway, since to put them up here I hafta write about them such that someone else knows what the heck I’m talking about. =p

These are still very very rough… I’ll be revisiting them to make them more coherent as time goes on.

In no particular order…

RLV drop in for poseballs that allow RLV enabled AVs to be captured and locked down on poseballs. Intended as a way of giving RLV add-on support for store owners who don’t want to have to write it themselves and/or for people buying generic poseballs to get these features added.
RLV drop in’er that takes the script from above, scans for nearby poseballs matching some criteria (eg, “created by store owner but not owned by them”) and offers owner via dialog to add the script.Script should have auto-update code– eg, delete itself if something newer is found and dup-named scripts (eg, xxx 1) should just kill themselves.
An RLV based outfit system, to let you put together a set of clothes and/or attachments and then save them and restore them later. (RLV based ’cause you can only get this info and control clothes via RLV… the regular API doesn’t allow this.) This still would kinda suck due to RLV having limited outfit info even on stuff in #RLV.
Make generic “tear off” type script that uses RLV to let anything be torn off
Make generic prim sizer script
12/28 Framework necessary for supporting “Shareware Prim Items” on second life.
12/29 Write framework for doing automatic script upgrades, key is llRemoteLoadScriptPin
Fix up “tear off” scripts for attachments
Hamster ball: Make it able to eject youMake it so it can RLV lock people in it
Capture people

Control RLV options via notecard and/or menu
D/s triggers: Top sets triggers that happen when a phrase, location or person is near thatIMs the bottom with instructions (and adds this to a list of things the
bottom needs to do. The bottom can mark thins as complete to remove them

from the list.)

Eventually: Allow for complex trigger chains where one trigger will

conditionally trigger another if it is or is not completed after a specified

amount of time.

Triggers could also trigger anims and/or RLV locks.
Gallery Loader:Drop in images, uploads meta data to website along with UUID.
Gives back no-copy images.

Lets you change metadata via typed commands or via web, includes

tagging.

Lets you set the aspect ratio, with presets for the major

Gallery Viewer:

Basic controls setup via notecard (or better, config script).

Image set selected based on criteria in config

(eg tags, matching words etc)

Slideshow and manual mode

Slideshow cycles through images (with optional indicator for how long

till next image)

Manual gives next and previous arrows

Next and previous images

Viewer can be rezed or attached. When attached it locks you into a non-moving AO.
Hamster ball track, rails guiding it around, with beacon points for accelerated movement.
Hamster ball rollercoaster/amusement park rides, with beacons spread around the air that can toss you from one to the next to the next.
Some sorta sport with someone in the ball and others outside trying to push it around to a goal.
Something that scans chat for normal emoticons and makes your AV act them out. Also perhaps basic emote support, eg, /me smiles, /me giggles, /me grins, /me laughs, lol, etc. Downside: Creepy as hell and quickly gets obnoxious. Essentially minimal gestures. Can probably be implemented using the gesture system. Also I would never ever use it myself. =p
Object you wear/sit on that let’s you walk on the ceiling:
Shoots a prim up and to figure out where the ceiling is. Uses animation to flip you upside down. Becomes a vehicle (takes over your controls), use move-to to move you around.