Can't Link Too Far Apart?

I find myself wondering exactly what the linking limits are.

The building I just finished has a 20mX20m foot print and is about 15m tall. I went to link it but it complained that things were too far apart. I ended up linking it into two objects (I'll have to script it to get it to stick together) and find this mildly annoying.

But, yeah...just how far apart can prims be before they can't be linked?

Yes sometimes the "scale" of objects wrecks things.. I have had this happen with small hot tub air jets, that are obviously less than 10m apart and yet won't link with the same message "Too far apart".

However, I don't udnerstand why you would need to 'script" them to stay together if it's just a building. If it were a vehicle or something that moved, yes I could understand that but if ti's just a building, there's no ened to script them.

Here's a tip for all those builds that are genuinely, or through SL bugs, are not linkable:

1. Link it into as few parts as you can.
2. Name one of the parts what you want the object in your inventory to be called.
3. Select all the parts making sure to select the one you named last.
4. Right-click on all the selected parts and select Take. Alternatively you can Take Copy instead of Take, to make sure you have all the pieces.

Now you have a single object (called whatever the last object you selected was named) in your inventory which is a "grouped" object. When you drag this object on to the ground again, it will keep all of the positioning and rotation it had when you picked it up. You can even use this grouped object in a llRezObjet() command from a script.

This technique is especially useful for massive builds but can be sued for situations like this aswell.

Those are helpful tips, Gaz.

Additionally, if your build consists of at least a few hundred prims, I'd rez it in different places just to make sure ALL the pieces come out. I did a test with a 2000-prim series of linksets and parts didn't come back out when rezzed. Packet loss may be a factor too. It was quite a rude awakening to see holes without warning.

And there's another trick, for the price of a few extra prims—set them up in the middle of other parts you're planning to link, make them relatively large, and then use an alpha texture so they're effectively invisible. You can sometimes use this to join thin prims a fair distance (under 30 m) away.

Niftiness...I'll definately try some of those things. Thanks.

As for scripting things to hold together, I'm still newb-ish when it comes to scripting. Figured that might come in handy.

What I wanted to do, at first, was put the building in parts, in case there wasn't another way to do it, and have the parts line themselves up as needed. Basically, when the main part moves, the other part alighns itself appropriately. Since I want to, eventually, do modular structures, that will definately come in handy anyway.

It's still not 100% perfect, but hey...I'm still relatively new to this stuff.

Just remember that when you are positioning things with scripts, the llSetPos() function will set the parent prim's position, not the centre of the linked object. When rezzing an object from another object, the centre of the linked object is used but if that object you rezzed, rezzes another object, it will rez from the parent prim of the rezzed object. So take all these things into account when scripting.



Yes this does work, however, the prim will still be able to be clicked on in "some" circumstances, so make sure if you do use this, that the invisible prim is not going to be blocking "clickable areas".

Heh...yeah, I found that out the hard way. Helpful to know, though.


Problem is, I tried just Taking the whole thing and, when I rezed it, it wasn't linked. Just a bunch of prims. I'd rather it just be as few objects as possible.

Yes.. that's what I meant by step 1. Link as much as you can. Like in your first post you said you were able to link together the house into two large "pieces". So do that, then select the 2 pieces and take them. When you place it back on the ground again it will be those 2 linked objects.

My... that was clever!!... alpha (pls tell me whats that is pls!) plus phantom then or??? or you take that part away when you have put the building out again...

Yes I am still learning and I hope I will do that al lifeeeeeeee

Ah, right. I was a bit confused as to what you meant.

Either way, I scripted things to stick together anyway. It's a nifty toy to play with if nothing else.