Graphics, HUDs, Dance Animations

First, I wrote last weekend about not getting delivery on a product, aand manifested some nasty toward the business. Man did I ever get a good earful. I learned that it's not the businesses, its the "supporting" services supplied. When I contacted the business politely I couldn't have received better attention. Thanks for filling a newbie in on the reality of SL.

2nd. Can you give me a website or something were I can learn about HUDs? I have 3 books on SL, and the Official Guide doesn't even have an entry "HUD" in the index.

3rd. I have about 75 dance animations from "NCI Dance Animations". When I double click on one a little window appears to control public or private, and stopping. How can I get direct access to the animations for inclusion in a more complex dance animation?

4th. Running SL in Leopard I am told I need to set some "Graphics Tab Setting Recommendations". These include:
Graphics > Performance Options:
Graphics > Avataar Rendering:
Graphics > Terrain Detail:
and a few others, and then

Advanced Graphics Tab Settings Recommendations
A slew of these

When I cntrl-P I get a preferences window but it doesn't have anything like "Graphics Tab Setting Recommendaations", nor Advanced such. All I see are a few things like: Run Second Life in a window, window size, quality of performance, etc. Where will I find the Preferences that I need to set? Please don't tell me to get rid of my Mac. I wouldn't dream of it. That's like telling me to get rid of my Steinway.

I have hundreds more questions but these will do for now. Some day I will write an epic poem praising the Second Life Forums.

To do a more complex dance sequence you are probably going to want to add your dances to a HUD. I myself am not to comfortable with HUDS even after some years in SL. I just finally managed to start using one myself, so I am not going to advice on them.

I can tell you where to find those graphic options. Go to the top bar inwolrd choose file, then choose edit preferences. On the window that pops up choose the graphics tab. You may have to check the box that says custom settings to get more options.

Welcome and glad you were able to get things sorted. It's not just SL, in RL you can catch more bees with honey than with vinegar as well.

#2: A little info on HUDs is in the SL Wiki and also Torley's video tutorials (search on HUD). The videos are also in the Support/Knowledge Base section of this website.
http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/HUD
http://secondlife.com/showcase/tutorials/

#3: If what you are looking to do with dances is to play more than one dance animation in a row, you can use either a HUD or a chimera to put them in. A chimera is basically an invisible dance ball that you wear (with most of them others can click on your chimera to dance too). There are some free or inexpensive danceballs and chimeras free on Xstreet SL.

I have 3 or 4 DUO Dancer bracelets that basically are the same as those invisible dance balls.

They work on the same principle.....you can load several dances into the item......and the wear it......Once worn you type a command in chat that starts the animations rolling. For most I've seen it's; /99 start.

I use my DUO bracelts exclusively....I never saw any reason to make it any more complicated then that. Plus...I can change the textures and styles of the bracelets and wear them as any kind of jewlery....so it really doesn't matter in the least WHAT the item is that's worn....as long as it has the script in it that makes the dance animations work.
I've even seen prim shoes with dance commands scripted in.