Non Premium members / Gifts

I was trying to purchse an item as a gift for a friend in SL. When I entered her name, it said there was no such avatar. I checked and re-checked the spelling of her SL name. And she can be found in 'search'.

I have had no problems purchasing gifts for any of my other SL associates. The only difference in this case is that my new friend isn't a Premium member.

Is this the reason?

One of the things you need to be sure of is if there is a O or a 0 (The letter "O" versus the number "0" in the first name.

I verified the spelling more than once and also took into account the o vs 0 as well. (That scenario has caught me before) lol.

_How_ were you trying to buy a gift? Most systems will require that the person's key is on a name-to-key database somewhere, which means that they have been scanned or somebody has met them who has then uploaded their name-to-key list from their client... there are various ways but basically, newer accounts may well not be on these databases, so nothing can be delivered.

You might want to try IM'ing or sending a Notecard to the owner of the shop or vendor you were trying to purchase the gift from and ask them why your associate shows up in search, but you can't buy a gift for them.

Most owners are pretty helpful people.

I was trying to buy the gift through SLX as I have always done for others. I never heard of the, 'name-to-key' term before and really don't follow how this can be accomplished for this new person. Can you give an example??

Basically every avatar has, in addition to their name, a key, called a UUID. This is a Unique Universal IDentifier, it is this number rather than the name that is used in most (but not all) scripted objects.

There are numerous free objects inn SL that will tell you your UUID when you click on it. If you IM me in world I'll send you one.

When only the name of an avatar is known the UUID must be looked up from a database. I think the most used database is at w-hat.com or similar. I don't know how or how often this database is updated and it is quite possible that many avatars are not listed on it and in particular newer residents may well not have been added yet.

I know that some non-premium members are listed on the w-hat.com database and also that some premium members are not. I have no idea if there is any logic behind this situation.

Just ask her to sign up for SLex (and use/touch one of the ATMs) which should get her key added instantly.

Thanks Kitty!

You don't have to have an SLX account and you don't have to be premium for someone to buy a gift for you on SLX. However, if the av in question is very new she won't show up in the SLX database for a while.

used to be you had to "sign up" in slx in order for anyone to send you gifts.

this has changed?

I don't have an account with SLX but my friend sent me a Christmas present through them.

cool. good to know.

I believe that both SLX and OnRez can send a gift to any named avatar, so long as you get the spelling of their name exactly correct. I've sent things before to non-premium Players who hadnever used either service.

But a very new account might not appear in their database right away, since neither company is directly affilliated with Linden Lab, and they don't have direct access to the Linden Lab databases of user accounts.

I have certainly had a situation recently where I had a very new alt, and was trying to outfit them via SLX (being unable to give them money directly - I was unable to log in) and I wasn't able to until they went to an SLX terminal. I would be interested to find out how long it took for someone to get onto the lists without taking any particular action.

There are key loggers all over the place, you know... taking your keys... letting anyone, er, send you presents....