A few questions from 5 week oldie

Hi People

There's a few things I would like answers to about SL and having read the previous 23 pages I don't think they have been covered!?

1. I hate it when you select a seat or ball on something and then when your avvy takes their place the viewpoint is suddenly the other side of a wall or something... is there a setting somewhere that will stop this happening?

2. I have done 3 building classes in SL and can't believe theres no 'snap' on the prims - you know, like when you move a window in some progs and it just snaps into place at an edge or next to another window... any placing of prims seems to have to be 'by eye' or as a result of xyz calculations... anybody have experience of the Primz program (that does have sensible features like 'snap')? Is it worth getting?

3. I have got millions (well quite a few) textures - is there a viewer of some kind, a script or whatever, that will let me view these as thumbnails (more than one at a time of course) - like I would with pics in an explorer window?

Thats it... (for now, I'm sure there's a few other things bothering me, must make notes) - I am in eager anticipation of your wise and thoughtful replies

One thought - does anybody do a sort of newbie mentor service? I would be happy to take someone round, show them some cool places, explain the interface, demonstrate basic building, give them a primer in getting land (I gave up on 'First Land' and bought a nice little Islet) - all that kind of stuff for a reasonable fee...

Cat Fratica x

1. I hate it when you select a seat or ball on something and then when your avvy takes their place the viewpoint is suddenly the other side of a wall or something... is there a setting somewhere that will stop this happening?
I don't think there is a way to prevent this - sitting on something doesn't change the PoV of your camera - but you can always swing the camera around for a better view, or go into mouselook.

2. I have done 3 building classes in SL and can't believe theres no 'snap' on the prims - you know, like when you move a window in some progs and it just snaps into place at an edge or next to another window... any placing of prims seems to have to be 'by eye' or as a result of xyz calculations... anybody have experience of the Primz program (that does have sensible features like 'snap')? Is it worth getting?
I can vouch for skidz Primz, and skidz Tweak.. one of the most useful building tools ever devised, and extremely simple to use. For what you get out of the product, and the incredible level of support skidz provides, it is worth every $L in its price tag.

3. I have got millions (well quite a few) textures - is there a viewer of some kind, a script or whatever, that will let me view these as thumbnails (more than one at a time of course) - like I would with pics in an explorer window?
There is currently no way to do this in the client viewer itself, although it is being actively discussed as a feature suggestion. Right now, to do this, you need to get 'hold of a texture organizer.. I *think* there are free ones out in-world, and the better ones are going to cost you some $L, and can be found on slexchange.com, slboutique.com, and various retail locations in-world. Sorry I don't know specifically where to pick one up, but the certainly do exist

There are many experienced residents who provide mentorship either informally when they see the need or more formally through newbie help organizations (like NCI) or for Linden.

The service they provide is, as far an I'm aware, a volunteer effort, offered free of charge as a way to help newcomers. Just as you're getting free help here on this Resident Answers forum w/o having to pay a fee, reasonable or otherwise.

If you select multiple textures and right click, Open, they will all open in one window with tabs.

Only trick I know of is leaving a reasonable amount of space between the furniture and the wall, so the camera doesn't end up behind the wall, but rather in front of it.



If you look at the Create menu, there's a setting, "copy selection". If you take a prim into edit mode, select "copy selection" and click on the side of the prim, it'll create a copy perfectly lined up with the original. While this is not quite as extensive as what you're looking for, I find this feature rather helpfull when building.



Yes, there's quite a few of them around, search for "Texture viewer" or "texture organizer" - ThinC sells one for instance, and I believe there's one for sale at K.R. Engineering too. No specific recommendations as I'm not using either, but I've been happy with other products I bought at the aforementioned places.

I'm not sure what you mean by "takes their place". Do you mean sitting? If so, you can always script a chair to set whatever camera positioning you want, or if it's unscripted object, you can always move the camera any way you want at any time. Hold down alt, click and drag the mouse, and whatever you click on becomes the camera's focal point. Dragging the mouse will swing the camera around, and zoom it in and out. Alt-dragging along with ctrl or ctrl+shift will allow you further dynamic zooming, tumbling, and panning options. Give it a whirl.

Learning to control the camera with confidence is probably the most important aspect of getting comfortable any 3D environment, including SL, so spend a little time on it. After a day or two, it becomes second nature.


I don't know anything about the Primz program, but snapping in the standard editing tools does absolutely exist. Just make sure "Use Grid" is turn on in your editor. Then, when you drag or rotate a prim, simply move your cursor outside the ruler, and you'll snap right to the grid units.

You can make the grid any size you want, so there's lots of room for precision, and you can switch the orientation from local to global at any time. There's also a reference grid, which is extremely handy for aligning objects to each other, but it's currently a little broken. Until they get it fixed, use the local and global grids. They work great.

In addition, there are lots of other tricks you can do for making prims align flush with each other. For example "Copy Selection" is great. Just select an object, go to the build tool, hit "Copy Selection", make sure "Center Copy" is also turned on (should be by default), and then click on a surface of your selected object. You'll get an exact copy, perfectly aligned with the original, already snapped flush to the surface you clicked on.


Unfortunately, no. Keep waiting though. It's such a popular request, I'm sure the open source community must be on it by now, so stay tuned.


There is a Mentors group. Ask Live Help to get you in touch with someone, or search for "Mentors" in the search tool.

Zaphod/Chosen - your avatar taking its place (I said that rather than sitting because it's place might be laying, dancing, whatever the position is..) it does absolutely change the camera view! - just sat on a sofa in my house and now i can just see myself through the window from outside (camera view turned 180 degrees) - sat on another chair and ok - sat on another and staring at a brick wall - I am pretty expert at manipulating the camera but its a pain having to do it every move I make (sexgen beds are the worst for that!!!).

Jackal - sure its less of a problem on your own stuff if yer house is very big and has several metres space round all furniture - not very likely tho... mainly thinking of more public space anyway. Will look out for those texture viewers, sounds like it might be the answer...

Regan - the mentorship thing - bit different to you (kindly) helping me out with a post in a forum (couple of mins typing) - I am talking about spending an hour or so with someone. I help lots of people out, will spend as long as is necessary answering questions from anybody who asks, but would appreciate some recompence for giving up my whole session on a regular basis and I would willingly have paid to learn more quickly and in a more organised fashion.

Christalle - just tried that, thanks, still one at a time tho and its easier to make a quick prim and then go down the texture list seeing them change on the prim (if you know what I mean) - your way will be useful for looking through them in public (no build) areas - thanx.

Chosen - that Grid thing sounds pretty much what I want! I did experiment briefly with that - but obviously not correctly if it will do as you say - I will be trying that immediately after finishing this post!!! I am aware of the copy (clone) facility but from what you say I should be able to make even better use of that too - Thanks. I would be interested in your opinion of Skidz Prims if you wanna check it out - I did an intro class and it does seem streets ahead of the basic Linden prim stuff... And yes, open source may well bring some great contributions to some of the weaker areas of SL.

Whew - time to go back to playing I think - thanks again to all you nice people who have taken the time to reply to my post - I know there's a few dickheads (griefers) in SL but generally my experience has been excellent... my first dip into this forum included

Cat x

About the "sitting" thing - I always have the camera controls pop-up in the corner of my screen and it's simple to click the arrows to rotate the camera back.
This used to annoy me greatly when I first joined SL, now I scarcely notice it *grin*

I do that as well. Not too long ago I spent several hours w/ a newbie who blown out of Orientation Island by a sim crash. I regularly spend time with other friends who are just starting out in SL and need some one-on-one time to get a better understanding of how to better enjoy SL. It's how I pay back the help that I was given when I was a newbie who could barely walk a straight line.

There is a long tradition of helping other people get into the game and I have to confess that turning that help into a paid service rubs me the wrong way. But given the exponential growth of new residents, what you're suggesting may well be a necessary adjunct to an overstrained volunteer system.

So there you have your new own business idea for SL! I suggest putting up a website to target people on the internet, before they get inworld. Set up a tier of package deals involving different amounts of time for instruction, plus some guided tours. As interest in SL grows, so does an opportunity like this one.

Naaah - Yer right Regan - it's fun to show someone new the ropes - I have visions of those awful guided coach tours... and I did enjoy the gradual learning process. Was quite funny just now in a building class - newbie wanders across between teacher and class and when challenged says; "where's the free cocks?"

Dunno what you mean??? Which corner?

Cat x

When you walk into a room and select to sit on a poseball, the camera will follow behind you. Just like when you're walking, the camera follows, and when you position your av over the other side of the room facing the other way, the camera *stays* behind you.

You need to take your camera focus off yourself before you sit down, so it doesn't follow - hold ctrl+alt and click on an object to focus the camera on it (for example the thing you're going to sit on, it you want to be looking at that), and then providing your next step is to sit (not walk, which will snap the camera back behind you) then it'll remain on that object and not the back of your head, leaving you with a nice view of the outside wall.

Most of the seats in my house are against walls or curtains, so when I go to take a seat, I'll focus the camera in the middle of the seating area (so I can see everyone) and then click a poseball, to save having to cam back into the room. It's not a bug so much - it's just that when you move, the camera likes to follow your ass

LOL! Reminds me of my first day on Help Island when some hapless newbie walked through the Plaza fully clothed but with a fully erect penis attachment. He had't noticed he was wearing it... or so he said.... <grin>

Just tried that - refocussing the 'camera' - works a treat, exactly what I wanted! I would prefer it to happen that way by default but will adapt to use this method. I constantly use the ctrl, alt, shift keys but had missed that little trick... thanks!

Cat x