A way to export objects locally, PLEASE read!

The good ol' scary part of the TOS:

4.3 All Data Is Temporary. When using the Service, you may accumulate treasure, experience points, equipment, or other value or status indicators and contribute to the environment ("Accumulated Status". THIS DATA, AND ANY OTHER DATA RESIDING ON LINDEN'S SERVERS, MAY BE RESET AT ANY TIME FOR ANY OR NO REASON.


... I've proposed this before, but I really want to get Linden input into the viability and actual possibility of this.

If we could EXPORT (not IMPORT) objects to say, .obj, or Maya Binary, or something like that, so that we could import them into our own 3D programs -- just to keep what we have created -- that would allow me to sleep so much easier at night.

I realize that IMPORTING of this data would be an absolute nightmare. But -export only- would be useful. Some of us have created some VERY intricate geometry here, and the equivalent of a "3d screenshot" (dump to .obj, .ma, or .mb) would be a dream come true.

I do fear that someday the servers will be reset, or there'll be a crash, or , god forbid, LL will shut down -- and we will have lost all the work we've put into our avatars.

I'm not even worried about exporting the av body - just the attachments - I can import from Poser to make an equivalent for the body.

Please, LL, I beg of you to consider this. Otherwise, I'm going to have to 'archive' my avatar by punching in numbers in Maya, and with 350 prims, that's going to be a nightmare.

I'm sure that there are many other things folks would like to 'save off' too.

I understand that the format is streaming, but there HAS to be a way to translate geometry to another format.


What I ask is this:

1) If you are a SL user, and you support this feature, PLEASE show this support in this thread.

2) LINDENS! PLEASE! If there is a POLICY reason why this cannot be done, please let me know. If it is a TECHNICAL reason, please differentiate. - I do want to know if the reason this has not occured yet is TECHNICAL or LEGAL/POLICY.

I'm hoping it's just technical, and I hope to get the Linden's attention and support.

Maybe it's just me, but this is more than a little bit biased

Darwin, would you like an "I don't care" option?

How is it biased? Biased towards people who have done a lot of geometry work in game?

I also don't see the harm in it for those who would never use it.

It would be the equivalent of a screenshot, just in 3d. We already have screenshots, and I have yet to see anyone protesting that feature.

I think its a good idea.

Darwin, what about people who have built cars, houses, space ships, the giant tree of Luskwood, a sculpture, an animal. Maxx Monde built a building overhang that I'd like to be able to ask him for a CG video I'm working on in Maya.

This isn't just about avitars, this is about the creative work we have put so much effort in and that doesn't have any guarantee (TOS states LL is not responsible for data loss). I can think of countless things I want to export because they where a pain to make, my avitar's actually quite low on the list.

Biased towards people who use Maya/3DS/Lightwave.

I'd much prefer to be able to export prim definitions in a plain text format that simply defines prim geometry. Either ignoring textures completely or recording their UUIDs.

At least from that I could re-create the object from the file, even without an import feature.

Or I could write a rezzer that could read a notecard containing this data, and rebuild the object.

But as you have it worded, it's a "feature" that does absolutely nothing for SL!

No no no, it was the way she worded the "no" response that I found funny I'd love to be able to save everything to different formats, it would be a dream come true!

Agreed. I'd be using it for a lot more than my av, including the Sonica gun, the walkway builds I made, XA-777ES cd player, Flux Capacitor, you name it.

And yes, Maxx builds some amazing stuff that would look *great* raytraced in Maya. This is absolutely NOT only an avatar issue.

Well, she's being honest c.c

Grimm, two explanations on this:

1) The question field is limited, and I couldn't fit Maya/3DS/Lightwave/GL/Ascii vertex/OBJ/UV map ... I don't care what format it's in, as long as it's in some format. If I could have fit the "i" and the "e", I would have said "i.e. Maya/3DS/Lightwave". This was simply a matter of question length and I can't fit it, now.

2) The reason I didn't include import, or restore or re-create, is because I feel this may cause the Lindens to shelve the feature idea for a very long time, due to its difficulty. I feel that getting the data OUT is the most important step: Once the data is archived, we can always figure out down the line how to restore it. .ma format could be parsed to the list you're talking about, or the list you're talking about could be converted to .ma. Whatever on that. But once the data is gone, we can't archive it, because it's gone. This is why I feel that export is more important than export-import.


3) Darwin: Maybe a neutral vote would have been apropos, but I can't edit the question now.

Ohhh yes.

Seems completely reasonable, especially in light of the supposed IP rights we have concerning in-world creations.

Oh, well. In that case, I vote yes!

(Note that previously I didn't vote, because neither of the options as listed appealed to me.)

Well, it seems that the biggest reason why LL would not do this - is that it isn't really furthering SL or the world itself, but individuals. And it's an issue of dev man-hours. However, I still want to see if we can demonstrate want for such a feature.

I realize LL has a lot on their plate and at the same time, wants to commit to features that further their interest. But perhaps we can get some Linden input on the matter.

I guess they could alwyas have like a per-prim export fee for objects. That would make the man-hours worth while.

Yeah, yeah, stone me for saying it, but hell, folks, that's what'll get the feature implimented.

I'd pay it.

As would I.

I answered Yes.

I would pay depending on the rate, if its too expensive I won't pay it.

10L$ per export may be good, 10$L to upload, 10L$ to export.

I'd pay a few RL $ to export each object, if that's what it would take.

I support the initial concept.

I also support this idea. The only issue that i see is that it would be easy to hack the client to ignore permisions and let you export anything.

Not to get off topic but i would like to see some functionality in the other direction: the ability to import objects. (an offline editor with no physics would be great)

currently one of my side projects is to build an import tool of sorts for SL, most of the ugly work is finished. I've already developed a working rezzer that uses this function just need to add a notecard reader to it.

Why would there need to be an export fee? The only reason we have 10L$ to upload is because textures, animations, and sounds use up valuable hard drive space.

a) To provide a money sink for economic reasons, of course!

b) So that people will only be tempted to use bandwidth for backing up things they really think are worth backing up.

Also, there's NO reason for the Lindens to make this feature if it's not doing anything for the world...

It's probably not a big deal, but have you thought about people exporting "stuff" that other people have made and effectively "stealing" the creators IP?