Newbie's view of appearance and questions

The following is part newcomer rant and part plea for help. I hope you read it in the spirit of constructive criticism rather than a slam at SL.

I just joined and have to say the basic orientation for appearance is terrible. I spent an hour customizing my avatar's appearance only to lose it all the second I tried out items from the sample outfit.

When I first logged in I followed the signs and played with the sliders to set up my bodytype. In most software hitting Save As creates a copy of your work for future reference, so I hit Save As, naming it 'Ao Default', thinking that would create a file reference I could always come back to. Whenever I altered something I hit Save to update my 'Ao Default' (if I liked the change). Eventually I came up with how I wanted my body and hair color, etc. I figured that I would then try on various items from the outfit. I expected that some might change things like hair style but I figured I could always revert to my 'Ao Default'.

Suddenly the outfit bits were changing my body shape, face, etc. which I didn't want, however, I couldn't seem to do anything except remove all my clothing which still left my body changed. This was very annoying. I tried to find my Ao Default or a default appearance button. I searched for a folder, anything, to no avail. Then I thought "Well I'll just delete that Outfit 3 folder deal and the system will probably reset me." Well the delete option is always grayed out (for items or folder).

So then I started searching the help and I discover that only if you Make an Outfit does it save your entire appearance (body shapes and clothes). What sorts of inconsistent terminology is that? Using Outfit the way SL does is totally unintuitive for those just joining and it isn't explained well AT ALL during the orientation. And where does Save As go then? Why not have Phenotype (shapes, basic skin color, etc.) and Clothing be separate? Match the real world by having Outfit all the stuff you put on your body and Phenotype be all the stuff that is your body. Then Appearances would be folders that has stuff for each. It could be handled better and more clearly in line with people's expectations from the real world.

So anyway,

Is there anyway to reset your entire appearance to the default (from when you join SL)?

Is there a way to delete Outfit folders I don't want?

Is there a point to having Save As if you can't find the file, or settings or whatever it saves, in order to restore to it?

I would suggest Linden put some serious effort into re-engineering the basic orientation they give new folks. Most people are used to the Save As metaphor saving a copy of whatever they are working on. Asking them to deduce that Make Outfit is what they want instead is dumb, since most people associate outfits with groups of just clothing (and maybe make-up and hair), not with body shapes, etc. There should also be a very clear default that is easy to get back to until people have learned the intricacies of the system (even if that default was a randomly generated one for that person to begin with).

It is very frustrating to put a lot of customizing into something only to lose the work because a developer didn't make clear what saving those customizations really entails. The fact that things can easily be changed isn't an excuse because no one is going to remember all those settings. Further there are too many combos, making trying to figure it all out again a pain. Odds are you'll not even hit exactly the same settings.

Second Life is cool but please take some time to polish the experience for newcomers. I get the feeling veteran SL'ers don't see these problems because they adapted to the awkward systems long ago and thus don't see them that way anymore. I also fear that I will find other systems explained with the same sort of "eventually you'll figure it out" laziness. The more inefficient explanations are on the upfront stuff, the longer it will take people to really get into SL.

Now I must go back in and try to figure out how to get my avatar back the way I want. See you in SL.

I am new too and there is way to save your body, clothing and textures on it but it doesn't always work.
I lost my orignal clothing because I forgot about copy and had to go back to just get another pair of jeans.
There is lot of freebies to get too as far as outfits that you can modify but remember to copy, save as something with new copy of item but from experience there no experience that item will appear anything but white or grey when you take it out of your inventory.
Someone did tell me about ctrl alt D which opens your client and select character then rebake.
It doesn't seem to do anything at first yet the textures seem to appear and last longer before going white.
It seem to work at first but my textures don't disappear as much but the old outfits still are white.
It is very frusterating as new citzen to start out here I relate it is a challenge just to get right views and walk around too or just get orientated. It often feels walking around in Second Life you're in ghost town and even in new citzen area people tend to not be very friendly.
Joining groups or going to live help sometimes to figure out things is really hit and miss.
Help pages and knowledge base can be bit overwhelming and confusing if you're trying to find specific information about specific thing and even if you do find something at least on my end I read it and half of time do not comprehend especially around LSL.

Another newbie chiming in...

When editing your character you can also use the "save as" selection which was not working when I first signed on, (but started working recently) to save changes as a completely new avatar. Your old avatar will still be there in one of the inventory folders. When you find an avatar in your inventory, simply dragging the avatar's folder from inventory to your character will change it over. So it's very easy to have multiple avatars stored in inventory and very fast to change from one to another. I'm experimenting and currently have both a male and female avatar.

I noticed my first avatar's folder was stored under clothing so it can be confusing. How do you find your current avatar's folder? When you open the folder, most/all of the items in it will be labeled as being "worn". Skin and clothing are both items.

Any piece of clothing can be dragged from anywhere in your inventory to your avatar and he/she will start wearing it. But for organizational purposes, it's easier to open a folder, select the item and in the file menu select copy. Then go to the avatar where you want this clothing to be, open it's folder and paste. Then drag it to your avatar so they will immediately be wearing it.

Note, the SL system seems to be very slow at times meaning you can drag stuff to your avatar and it can take up to 10 minutes for it to be displayer properly.

I'd also like to mention "hair". The default controls in SL turn out pretty crappy hair. There are many places that sell custom hair, hair that you can't make using SL basic controls. The difference really shows and makes for a more polished appearance. Do a search on hair. Using the file system- "Search" you can search on "free skins", "free hair" and go check out "Gurl 6", a hair store. When you buy custom hair it should also include a free bald scalp to put on. This will replace the default hair on your avatar. The new hair is an object which is worn like a wig.