How safe are our inventories?

The other day, a friend of mine who is an extremely successful (top 10 leader board for net worth) long time SL resident told me that since the last update, his entire inventory is missing. All of it. All of his textures, scripts, objects, animations, etc. Gone. Repeated support requests have gone unanswered and he still does not have his inventory back.

This is now the second person I know this has happened to. The previous person lost most of his inventory, and Linden Lab was never able to recover it. He had to jump through a lot of hoops and beg and plead and go through subpar tech support, and still no luck. The jury is still out on the current situation, but if you can't get anyone to help you in a timely manner, then not a lot of hope there. If he is not able to get his inventory back, he will give up and leave SL. Who can blame him?


I have suffered data loss myself, though thankfully not directly with my inventory. Once, all of the scripted items on my land in Federal just disappeared. Not in my inventory, not in lost in found, they were just gone. Doors, elevators, vending machines, bridges, everything that I had ever put a script in or bought with a script in it was just gone. Some of the items I had backups in my inventory of, some I did not, as I had purchased them. Regardless, I received no support from LL, just a big shrug and useless technical support.

During a recent update (in the past 2 months or so), a waterfall on my land in Mavericks had a signficant chunk of it missing when the server came back up. Repeated requests for help never did get the thing recovered - the items again were just gone.

So the question becomes, how safe is our inventory, and our builds? I see a post in the hotline forum right now with someone else who has items in their inventory that can't be located in the database after the move to a new server. I hear all the time from people who say this item or that item is missing from their inventory - often they don't realize it until they go to search for it. I would be devastated if I lost any portion of my inventory, let alone the entire thing. Anyone would be. Yet apparently, it could happen to any of us. It happening to two people I know is two too many. How many other people has it happened to?

What can be done to help ensure the safety of our items? Linden Lab has an obiligation to provide backups of this data that is recoverable in the event of a disaster. We have no ability to back up a lot of it ourselves. Yes, we can save our own textures, scripts we write, etc. What we cannot back up are the items we buy or are given from others. Even though there is no monetary value to any of the items when it is convenient to say so to not have to pay up in a data loss, Linden Lab constantly pushes the financial angle of SL. People are spending real money on these items. How can you be a service provider and not provide solid disaster recovery protection?

I am very supportive of Linden Lab, but I have to admit, this is one area I think they fail miserably in. The response thus far to my friend, and my own experiences with technical support give me no faith that the situation has gotten better. I'm afraid it is getting worse.

Quick answer: Probably not that safe.

I'd like to see some way to backup our inventories localy, not even to be able to modify them, but just to have a dump of them on our own local drives. What about no mod/no transfer/no copy? Lets say at any time you can upload your dump, or selective files from it, however if the dump finds that a backed up no-perm object is already in your inventory under the same name and size of the dump, it doesn't upload it, so you effectively have to delete your copy (or have it wiped out by the server) to upload anything no-permed.

I'm using no mod/no transfer/no copy as an example, most likely it'd just be ONE of them that specifies it can't be re-uploaded (probably no-copy) unless its twin is deleted.

People have been asking for a way to do this for a very long time.

Agreed.

I was bitten by the lost inventory bug, it is disheartening. Funny part is, it wasn't the monetary value that stung the worst, it was the sentimental items that were lost.

I know of at least 5 people that have lost portions of their inventory. LL needs to seriously step up response time, and find a fix to this most serious issue.

If we want virtual goods to hold RL value, there MUST be a way to safeguard against accidental loss.

I've been talking about backup since v1.1. Even an encrypted file that would ONLY be of use of replenishing our inventories, would do the job.

The attitude among most people I meet, and I assume, LL, - "Backups? Who does backups anymore? Hard drives and servers, they last forever!"

Even some of the really smart folks I know and like, laugh at me when I say, "Nothing stays on my computer, it just goes through it, eventually burned to DVD or backed up to AIT tape."

With these losses and the difficulties LL has of recovering inventories, I can only assume that LL "puts their life on it" (their drives), too. Presumably backing up to DLT/AIT-3/LTO isn't 'cost effective' for LL.

So, the alternative would be to allow us to back up our stuff individually. I guess that the long term concern is that these backup files could be 'hacked', but, there are a LOT of things, including the cache, that also could be -hacked-.

My poll is probably still out there - Back when I offered this up, BEFORE any loss had ever happened, I was pretty much ridiculed about it; "Develop new features first!" I was told; data loss isn't gonna happen.

Well, it is happening now. If one of Luskwood's members lost all of their inventory, I have a feeling that we wouldn't exactly be up to 'picking ourselves up by the bootstraps' and starting again.

Backup needs to happen, some form of export where we can archive our own stuff, open or encrypted I don't care - but it needs to be done, and LL has to start paying attention to this.

I've been talking about, no, begging for, backup since v1.1. Even an encrypted file that would ONLY be of use of replenishing our inventories, would do the job.

The attitude among most people I meet, and I assume, LL, - "Backups? Who does backups anymore? Hard drives and servers, they last forever!"

Even some of the really smart folks I know and like, laugh at me when I say, "Nothing stays on my computer, it just goes through it, eventually burned to DVD or backed up to AIT tape."

With these losses and the difficulties LL has of recovering inventories, I can only assume that LL "puts their life on it" (their drives), too. Presumably backing up to DLT/AIT-3/LTO isn't 'cost effective' for LL.

So, the alternative would be to allow us to back up our stuff individually. I guess that the long term concern is that these backup files could be 'hacked', but, there are a LOT of things, including the cache, that also could be -hacked-.

My poll is probably still out there - Back when I offered this up, BEFORE any loss had ever happened, I was pretty much ridiculed about it; "Develop new features first!" I was told; data loss isn't gonna happen.

Well, it is happening now. If one of Luskwood's members lost all of their inventory, I have a feeling that we wouldn't exactly be up to 'picking ourselves up by the bootstraps' and starting again.

Backup needs to happen, some form of export where we can archive our own stuff, open or encrypted I don't care - but it needs to be done, and LL has to start paying attention to this.

Ouch. This is a serious concern for me, and one I hope Linden Labs will take some time to consider and address. Backups are a business standard and there certainly is an expectation that the things you spend money and time creating or acquiring are secure.

I was bit by inventory corruption once also. It knocked me out of the SL for about 4 months. Short of a LL backup solution, I have often thought that somebody could make a buck by dedicating a sim (or part of one) to backups. I, as a customer, would have a room to rez my objects and leave them there. If anything happens directly to the object in inventory, I can come back to my in-world backup and restore my inventory (take a copy). Not a perfect solution, but a possible band-aid for some situations.

I can rez copies of stuff I've built and leave it inworld, or give copies to an alt, but I've heard tales of objects disappearing from the database so that no one can recall them. There are some folks here doing RL work under RL contract for RL money . . . and this sort of instability is scary as hell for us.

Not safe at all.

Linden Lab steadfastly declines to allow object export and contractually has no obligation to the preservation of their (i.e. what you consider "your" stuff. The lawyerly Terms of Service is quite explicit, even using all caps:It is very much not in their interest to allow object export so that you may provide backups because they don't. They could also allow a dump of your inventory meta-data so you could see what you used to "have" before they lost it. but they don't. And their typically overloaded, under-staffed support team has neither the tools, ability, or inclination to help in these cases. This has been a problem since at least v1.1, is only getting worse, and can be expected to worsen still. But at least you have video on the welcome area on the SL homepage.

When asked about the issue, there has been handwaving about "but we have terabytes of data to back up" or "but we might unwittingly allow you to backup something that you don't have permissions to" when the actual reason - so I surmise - is they've snookered thousands of unpaid content developers into building Lindenworld for them and would be fools to let their future competitor make use of that player investment.

Aside from the forgoing, your data is very safe, that is if you mean "stuff you keep on your own machine and actually back-up instead of hoping that the LL RAID server will protect it except for when it fails".

i take some solace in the fact that i can give objects to an alt and have copies of for-sale objects in vendor prims, but you are right, this is an important issue.

if LL wants to see big projects and big investments of creative talent, this is yet another thing they need to resolve before the technology is fully baked enough to deserve such expenditures of time and money.

they haven't "snookered" anyone. we're all in here with our eyes wide open.

If and when Jeffry Gomez finishes his offline building tool, then we'll likely have a way to save at least our own (new) creations locally. Just create it first in Jeffry's thingy, and then upload it into SL. I'm really hoping he'll impliment a reverse process as well where you could, say, drop a script into an object you've made inworld, have it spit out all the prim perameters to a notecard or a web page, and then the offline builder would be able to reporduce it. That's the closest thing to a backup we're likely to get.

I would be very, very comforted by a local backup option. Even a remote, Linden-managed, pay-per-megabyte backup to keep everything kosher. Some greater means of preserving our hard work would be very helpful.

Your local backup is called llGetPrimitiveParams, for crying out loud.
Here's an exporter script I made for OSMP, feel free to modify it to suit your needs.

http://manageddreams.com/osmpbb/viewtopic.php?t=278

Unfortunately, it does nothing to help with inventory items lost that you did not create, but purchased.

For your own creations (surely the mosy important) and for your copyable items there is a backup system you can buy for $9.95. It has been touched on here, and is called an "alt".

Keep this invaluable creature away from your player character, and every time you
buy/create an object/script send a copy to him through his profile. If you created it, make sure what you send is mod/copy/tsfer so the alt can work on it if you wish, and can give it back to you with full permissions when required.

Does that work with clothing, textures, snapshots and things we've purchased from others, too?

Word 'round the campfire is LL uses MySQL for their DB backend. It seems rather strange that they dont have a network of replication set up for their databases considering how easy & reliable such a setup is with that particular software.

Curioser & curioser said Alice. I know who this person is ... and if their inventory can't be recovered, it should make a lot of us paranoid about our own stuff.

LL current marketing is "come to SL, start a business, make RL CASH". Yet, the TOS says, “ehh, your inventory has no value and is only temporary”. That message says, don't invest in SL because SL isn't willing to invest in you. Customers shouldn't pay thousands for land and monthly fees, only to have the whole process halted because an Engineer went on vacation. What if said Engineer was hit by a bus on the way to work? The whole show stops for one person? What sort of plan is that? This ISP outages LL experienced a couple months ago is another example of the lack of disaster preparedness within the company. The current marketing plan, and the lack of support from Linden Lab is going to be the undoing of SL if it is not specifically addressed.


It is hard to be enthusiastic and support a company that doesn't seem interested in supporting you. These aren’t isolated incidents, it is a pattern.

It does seem possible to restore unless the backups no longer exist. After all, didn't the poker tables disappear after the 1.6 and they were restored?

It's not at all safe...not at all...not at all...

I have it easy businesswise. Tree textures are uploaded so I have copies on my local drives and all my scripts are pasted into notepad. I also cash most of my lindens into GOM each month. I don't spend the money on anything but annual and tier fees; but it's not inworld where it might just disappear.

The rest of inventory I consider a luxury. LL explicitly state that they do not guarantee its maintenance. For that matter, they don't guarantee that my account will exist tomorrow. It may be cancelled at any time accidentally or intentionally and for no particular reason.

Faced with that kind of verbiage, I have no choice but to consider inworld items expendable.

I collect avatars, and this last update ate various parts of various avatars. Not cool. I'm in the process of getting replacements from the creators.

Why does this happen *every* major update?

How is it that it just *looses* data?

I'd like to be able to backup my entire inventory without having to do some hack.

we seem to have a nastier bug than jsut opening your inventory and POOF it's gone. I was building today in Morris's Building area and i got the nagging 5 minute deletion notice pop up. I figured that's fine, i'll jsut scoop my build up and finish it later, but NOOOO, the items (objects) was atomatically returned to my invenventory but all dismantaled in seperate pieces (back to the drawing board I thought.

I log off, and come back hours later ready to tackle the build again one by one. Nope! it was no longer in my lost and found folder where it had been returned by the hasty deletion system. nowhere to be found in my inventory


so not only does stuff come up missing, The database seems to like to play a nasty game of cat and mouse.

I talked to the person in question and I am not optimistic. We'll see what happens but consider this from my point of view:

This person, like me, has assets in the form of scripts. These form the 95% of the foundation for everything they do (also like me). Yes, these can be copy & pasted to a text file locally and stored in CVS. However, I am willing to bet that most of us scripters dont do that (I only do it periodically).

Think about that. We pour hours of work into something and then *poof* it might disappear. Certainally it's not the norm ... but what if I (or you!) was the (un)lucky person to draw that lot?

Sure, these things happen. We all like to think that the Lindens do have a backup system and are technologically advanced enough to have the capability to restore. Now is our chance to learn what to expect when the catastrophic happens.

Watch this thread carefully ... for the outcome of this situation will be a harbinger of things to come, at least for some of us IMO.

-AP

As someone else said, this doesn't help for things you have purchased from others.

As a paying customer, one should have a reasonable expectation of the security of one's items, without having to pay additioanal fees to create secondary accounts to hold them, or managing one's own asset database offline.

The issue is not that you can finagle a way yourself, it is that it should not be happening at all and, in the event it does, there should be something in place for restoration.

This is not some unreasonable expectation.

I too, will be watching this very closely.