I finally figured out how to get rid of …

I finally figured out how to get rid of the black bars in the current SL or Hippo viewer when first connecting to an OpenSim. The clue the tipped me off was that when first connecting to my desktop sim the “Uploaded asset data for transaction …” would scroll across implying that something cached or available in the viewer was being uploaded as the default skin or shape. If I used a viewer that did not have the info cached for some reason it would upload a corrupted shape or skin and that would become the new default. So here’s what I did.

1. Drop the desktop db
2. Restart OpenSim
3. Delete the Application Data/Second Life directory entirely
4. Startup SL browser pointing to SL itself
5. Load the Test Avatar from the Character menu under Advanced
6. Strip
7. Create a new skin and shape in inventory
8. Wear them from inventory.
9. Log out of SL
10. Log into desktop OS using same viewer
11. Watch for the “Uploaded asset data for transaction …”
12. Notice bars gone now

Rough, but that seems to have done the trick.

Finished adding ’set sittarget’ to the …

Finished adding ’set sittarget’ to the offset finder and a new sittarget finder tool that can be placed into cushions and other prims directly (rather than in a poseball) to get and set values for llSitTarget(). It turns out the actual avatar position is off from the position as reported with llGetPos() even after adjustment for the sit target. It has to be further adjusted <0,0,0.196>/llGetRot() – <0,0,0.4>, very annoying but made me feel better after I thought I was going mad messing with the positional and rotational math without it lining up.

I also spent quite a lot of time helping friends and a few customers including a new quick video tutorial about how not to be a sim hog. I did that after realizing that your overall CPU cost is added to the cost cost of ‘top offender’ scripts reported from the Estate Tools. This makes a huge difference when sitting on a scripted object since it immediately jumps to the top of the list if you have a lot of scripted stuff on. Take it all off, and you see the true performance cost of the scripted object while sat upon.

Office hours on Fridays at 8-9 SL time are turning out to be a great way to consolidate all the technical help conversations and I learn a lot there as well.

Although I was on a mountain unable to attend, I heard good things about the Tribe Big Bounce event.

Oh, and boxed up a couple free avatars, Haley and Paul for our OpenSim grid that have been rendered ‘corporate friendly.’ I will need to get those into OpenLife grid as well but I might wait until I can outfit them a little better and make some prim hair.

While I was working on the skins, and having recently done a lot (for me) of UV work in Blender it occurred to me that I could import the OBJ standard avatar meshes and create my own UV maps with seams down the sides instead of directly through waist. Then, I could use the ‘Bake Render Textures’ against the official UV map to get perfectly matching clothing and skins at the normally troublesome front and back waist areas. I also cannot forget to try to pull in a GLintercepted mesh of a shaped avatar to attempt similar skinning approaches on avatars of specific dimensions, not just the defaults.

So I think although I am not blogging it until now, I have earned a programming (lsl), mentoring, and skinning block last week.