Frustrated with haters

So if the vast majority of us are unable to 'fully grasp' the 'benefits' ... what actually *are* the benefits?



What is that promise? Not having to alt/tab?

Lewis

I really would think twice before sticking a post-it in my wife if I was him...

Might break the permissions

Have you tried building lately?

Wow, Lewis, spokesperson for the vast majority, eh? A lot of times, the benefits of new technology are not always apparent at first. In this case, however, the benefits are very apparent, though I know people will also create things I could not have predicted. SL is a connected world, and yet is inside this walled off garden with only limited ways of communicating in and out, and that is limiting what it can be.

It's not about being able to view web pages in SL, for that you can use any web browser and there is nothing revolutionary about that. It is about being able to use the vast resources of the web to enhance the capabilities of what we can do in SL - the types of products we can make, the type of information we have access to, and the ways in which we can communicate with each other. It is a dramatic step forward in improving SL for the better.

Anito, you are very articulate on this matter and I thank you for saying it so clearly.

The crux of this issue is exactly as you describe it: the web's vast resources. Second Life is an incredibly ponderous and limited development environment when compared to the awesome power that the world of web development has achieved since the 90's.

Having an integrated window into that flexible environment that we can map onto a primitive surface just like any other visual asset in SL will have staggering implications for entertainment and commerce within Second Life. The 2D browser recently released is only the first tentative step into a potential world of integration whose benefits and extensibility dwarf the limited abilities of LSL.

But I wouldn't expect you to understand any of that, Lewis.

Okay, if that's your opinion, I have to ask:

What's it like to be a surgeon-astronaut-barber-millionaire-biologist-programmer-psychologist-immunologist-chemist-physicist-mathematician-cryptographer-artist-soldier-president-stockbroker-economist-pediatrist-veterinarian-detective-mechanical engineer? I've never fully grasped the benefits of anti-bacterial soaps, zero-gravity science experiments, transmissions, oil-eating bacteria, LISP dialects, regressive memory therapy, and calculus; could you please explain those to me, since you intimate a complete understanding of them?

It's a terrifying day when I'm in agreement with Jarod.

How do you think I feel? I'm actually happy with something Linden Lab has done. I keep checking the windows in case it starts raining frogs or something...

That's all fine and good but what if your daughter dated an inclient browser, what then?

So .... 3 or 4 people attempt to explain the 'benefits' of integrated browsing, yet fail to cite one actual example beyond "people will discover things" and "the possibilities are endless".

Sounds just like looking at a child's painting...... "That's really good... but what is it?"

Lewis

This discussion is going nowhere Lewis. You should go answer my question in this thread. It'll be a much more interesting conversation.

Dear vast majority,

(1) 1-prim unified web based vendor by putting your SLBoutique store on a prim; for sellers, one central spot to update, put images, descriptions, prices, and so forth. (http://SLBoutique.com/FlipperPA_Peregrine/?nh=1 on a prim, if you need a visual aid)

(2) Every graphic on a web server is a potential texture to use.

(3) Shared browsing of web sites instead of having to pay L$10 per slide to upload and integrate using textures

(4) Eventual customized and replacement of the Second Life "Find" system, which is grossly outdated and hasn't scaled well (IE: events list)

(5) Ability to use SL's amazing collaboritive environment to work on web sites as a team.

(6) Easy ability to see your detailed transaction history on the web without having to fidget with a separate browser.

(7) Building in-world tutorials with rich media will be incredibly easy with HTML.

( Instant manual access to the BadGeometry LSL scripting wiki.

(9) Ease to change Second Life HELP section with rich media instead of just text that is tied to a client version; HELP section can be updated constantly without a new build or client download.

(10) zOMG pr0n! Yes, some of us enjoy sex and aren't ashamed to be human.

And that's just off the top of my head. BTW... I think this is the first time Jarod, Cristiano, Enabran, Linden Lab and myself all agree on something being fantastic. Its only the most important feature added since v1.4.

Regards,

-Flip

I'm not against new and fancy things but I am frustrated in seeing so many people have problems and new things being added before other things are fixed. I like some of the new features and it's nice to be able to have shiny and local lighting on when I couldn't before. I still have some issues as do alot of people from what I see. I crashed no less than 10 times last night and had turned all my settings to the bare minimum, I know it's odd after an update and things are catching up but I have never crashed so much ever. We'll see how it goes tonite and hopefully things will even out. The first update I had barely any problems and was pleasantly surprised. Not sure what happened with the last 2.

Starax mentioned building as being an issue and in a world where we are encouraged to build, this should be looked at because it is pretty frustrating. I'm tired of my prims disappearing among other things. LL can bring out all the fancy web browsing and whatever they want to appease a few people, but other things need to be fixed as well that is beneficial to everyone. I have my own browser, I don't need another one.

It would be like taking your car in to get fixed and the mechanic saying, welp...I dunno what is wrong with your car but we went ahead and decided to tint your windows...here's your bill.

Its been explained many times but to re-iterate:

LL has different teams to do different tasks. Not everyone is on bug fixing, but there is a team assigned to that. There are other teams with DIFFERENT SKILL SETS that are assigned to projects like the Mozilla integration. The skill sets may have some overlap, but the ridiculous assertation that has been made by others that even people in MARKETING should be on bug fixing is ludicrous. Within a tech team as big as LL's, there are many subsets of skills to consider; only some people have the skills necessary for bug fixing. Others have the talent that lies with developing new features, especially in this case if you read up on Callum's background. Another good example in Mono, where it fits Babbage Linden's skillset perfectly. He simply doesn't have the background to be doing bug fixing.

Bugs ARE being fixed, and everyone who's pro-Mozilla is also pro-bug fix. Its not a question of one or the other being done, but many people consistently ignore this fact. The Mozilla integration is finally nearing completion and being launched in steps. Would you rather they simply didn't launch it and sat on code that was complete? Would it make y'all happy just 'cause those of us looking forward to this feature are pissed? I guess misery might love company.

Asking someone working on Mozilla integration to fix bugs in thing like the building tools is like asking a customer service representative to taking over the CFO's job costing duties; it makes no sense and would most likely be an utter disaster. Not everyone understands the many different skillsets within a technology team; the term "tech guy" isn't specific enough.

Just my two cents!

Regards,

-Flip

I prefer not to use third party trading sites, and would rather buy in-game.



Right click, save, upload. Doesn't that kill a sink, one thing so many people are screaming for?



See 2.



I'm sure that it would have been easier to reprogram the find system and police the events calendar properly with volunteers.



I'm sure that it still won't be as good as actual face to face conversations.



Alt tab is no bother. Most people aren't so overwhelmedly busy to not be able to.



... which people will print off and read, just like they would in an external browser.



I've never heard of that but I'm sure that alt tab would work just as well. You have heard of Window mode, I assume?



Or you can just to to the official website instead. Good old alt-tab.



Why is it considered bad to not be interested in that kind of thing? I'm an adult too, and I get by perfectly well in SL without being bothered with that kind of thing.



I remain unconvinced.

Lewis

I do so agree. Corsetry isn't what it was.

Oh, hovertips ....

Thankfully, LL is convinced of the importance and is moving ahead with it, and I could not be happier about it. The fact that it seems to irk you so much is just a bonus.

As long as we have the option to TURN OFF this 'feature' then I shall tolerate its presence. Like many other things that irritate me, as long as I don't have to use it, then it won't affect me in the end.

If people insist on using it to connect to third party sites to sell their goods, then I guess I'll just have to find another store.

After all, if SL was so wonderful, all singing and dancing... why do we need third party add-ons to replace a simple 'buy' function anyway?

Lewis

I wouldn't say that those of us who don't understand the possibilities of these features don't appreciate it. I appreciate it. And I look forward to what the scriptors will make of it.

So, uh yeah, tackle the bugs but keep on evolving.

Please, don't give the option to turn this feature off, then perhaps Lewis will find a game to play instead of trying to kluge his views into a platform he clearly doesn't understand. With views like yours, Lewis, we'd all still be use DOS 1.0 and playing the original Zork.

Some people just can't stand change, and your myopic views come screaming through in your attempted - and failed - rebuttal. We're all quite fortunate you're not in charge of SL. If you're so in search of a game, why not stick with your beloved TSO? Let me guess: because it got boring because they didn't keep innovating and adding new features, which you always seem to be opposed to here.

Regards,

-Tim

I think the general assumption is that we're dealing with individuals with a modicum of intelligence who can fill in the blanks when presented with a framework of such scope. It's like you're telling me that because I refuse to tell you what every single person in the world will one day do with clay, the material is useless and should be abandoned.

Grow an imagination sometime.

The same way we do with you!

I'm not going to address every issue...

Bah! That would still have required a lot of man-power and programmer-hours, and then people would still, likely, be complaining that it could have been solved eaier and more efeciently with an in-world browser.

And neither is Second Life, what is your point exactly?

Alt+Tab is an extravagant waste. Microsoft should have spent more time shoring up security in MS-DOS and bypassed that crazy "Windows" thing. It was easy enough to stop a program, run another program, stop it, and restart the first one; DOSSHELL.EXE was good enough!!!

Window, Window, Window. Gah. Your magical Alt+Tab isn't stopping people from breaking into my server, is it? No. It's a pointless little toy, and I'm unconvinced it's better than anything a batch menu script could provide.

You just won't shut up about that... You know, in my day, we had COMIT and we dialed up BBS's for documents. Your cutsey browsers are a mockery of truly efficient computing models.

Yeah, well, I'm still not hep to this GUI things. Your Alt+Tab-erry is a waste. Progress should have stopped at DOSSHELL.EXE, because quite frankly, who needs to run two applications at the same time? You only have one pair of eyes.

Nice post, Flip, nice to see an actual answer to the question of what good inworld Mozilla is. Not that I needed a list, but for those who need to get convinced, specifics are better than the abstractions and insults others have produced.

I just installed a webserver and PHP in the last day or so, and I have some text generated by a php program on my hard drive showing up in the SL help browser. All it says at this point is "Hello World", but if someone with one day of experience in server type programming can do that, people who know what they are doing in this regard are bound to be able to do some truly good things once it gets more fully implemented.

Once they get this firefox - it is actually a firefox variant we are using, right? not a more vanilla mozilla - to fit on a prim, we should, in addition to many fancier things like you listed, be able to get some numeric data entry on a prim - to use in such things as control panels for particle generators, for one example. The absence of text and numeric entry inworld is a bummer, requiring one to type commands like DOS commands in the chat text entry field. And some simple text labels that can be generated on the fly, based, say, on an object's inventory, text labels that respond to touch, i.e, buttons, don't take a prim each, and can have text in different fonts and colors.

I would strongly suspect that an interactive browser on a prim that's able to respond when you click on it would be able to provide some information about where you touched it, wouldn't it?

If Tangleword (a Boggle variant) would run on any browser other than Internet Explorer I would finally be able to play Tangleword in Second Life. Oh well, can't win 'em all.

I hope they don't make us wait to get all the details of getting it on a prim and making everything like Flash and such work to give us proper access to a floating browser window like the one in the help display. Programmers should get as much access to the existing browser functionality, despite it's flaws and limitations, as soon as possible. Perhaps they should open a preview grid with the next step of browser access as soon as possible. Later this evening would be nice.