User:Andrew Linden/Office Hours/2007 12 18

Transcript of Andrew Linden's office hours:

[11:01]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I finally made it to a meeting
[11:01]	Sidewinder Linden:	hi ryozu
[11:02]	Chair: Press Page Up to move chair up, or Page Down to move chair down
[11:02]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Meant to be here thursday, but got distracted
[11:02]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Good morning gentlemen.
[11:02]	Squirrel Wood:	Soft Linden: (Saved Tue Dec 18 14:18:43 2007) The physics guys are trying to look at your roller coaster, but the asset ID has aged out. Could you possibly send a copy to Simon Linden, and remind him it's for DEV-1422 ? Thank youuuuuuuuuuuuuu!
[11:03]	Andrew Linden:	Hi everybody, thanks for showing up.
[11:03]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Thanks for having us ;)
[11:05]	Andrew Linden:	Squirrel, that quote about the roller coaster... care to elaborate on that?
[11:05]	Andrew Linden:	Simon needs a copy?
[11:05]	Squirrel Wood:	I gave him one
[11:05]	Andrew Linden:	oh ok, thanks
[11:06]	Andrew Linden:	Last week I offered a limited time bounty for finding new ways to crash Havok4 regions.
[11:06]	Andrew Linden:	The challenge expired Sunday at midnight
[11:07]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Oh, any takers? I think Redux managed to crash it
[11:07]	Andrew Linden:	I awarded two bounties
[11:07]	Andrew Linden:	I received a third submission, but the region and time were not included in the info
[11:08]	Andrew Linden:	and it looked like a duplicate of the second award at a casual glance
[11:08]	Andrew Linden:	I think Dan Linden sent me some chat transcripts and other info on some other crashes
[11:08]	Andrew Linden:	it wasn't clear to me if those were submissions for the bounty or not
[11:08]	Squirrel Wood:	I tried to find out how many script instructions per second the havok 4 sims would handle... we hold at about 4 million ips ^^
[11:09]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Can you tell if any old random crash on the beta grid is related to Havok4 or not?
[11:09]	Andrew Linden:	Squirrel, do you have a comparison of ips on Havok1? I'd imagine the host machine would influence such a benchmark.
[11:09]	Squirrel Wood:	the crash me sims on the main grid are on h4
[11:10]	Squirrel Wood:	a class 5 sim tends to max out at 4 million ips
[11:10]	Andrew Linden:	Gaius, I was checking the coredumps to find out if it was a Havok4 problem specifically.
[11:10]	Andrew Linden:	Both of the crash modes that received bounties were from running out of memory
[11:10]	Andrew Linden:	however they went about it two different ways
[11:10]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[11:11]	Andrew Linden:	Neither crash mode was something that I have time to fix in Havok4
[11:11]	Andrew Linden:	however I submitted reports to Don Linden
[11:11]	Andrew Linden:	who is in charge of the #blacklight studio, and is usually working on important bugs and critical issues.
[11:12]	Andrew Linden:	There hasn't been a lot of noteworthy bugs fixed, or development in Havok4 in the last week or two.
[11:13]	Andrew Linden:	Simon has been tweaking the Runtime Collision Control System and has checked in a few improvements.
[11:13]	Andrew Linden:	Over the last week or so I've been working on some mass-properties utilities
[11:13]	Wind Key 2 ~ GAMBIT: BAM~!
[11:13]	target-aim 0.3:	Hello, Avatar!
[11:13]	Andrew Linden:	the idea being... we should compute our own mass and inertia instead of asking Havok for that info
[11:13]	Seifert Surface:	why?
[11:13]	Andrew Linden:	such utilities will fix about three different bugs, and I'm almost finished
[11:14]	Andrew Linden:	just writing unit tests now and trying to find one last known bug in the utilities.
[11:14]	Andrew Linden:	Seifert, Havok's mass properties utilities have some problems.
[11:15]	Andrew Linden:	(1) the object must have a RigidBody in the phyics engine before we can query it for mass properties
[11:15]	Andrew Linden:	and attachments don't have RigidBody's any more, and yet the script-energy depends on the object's mass
[11:15]	Seifert Surface:	ah
[11:16]	Andrew Linden:	(2) the values we're getting from havok are just wrong... they use a surface mass distribution method, instead of a solid geometry system.
[11:16]	Andrew Linden:	(3) ... There is a third problem but I can't remember what it is atm
[11:16]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Will it ever be possible to programatically set the mass of an object, so say a bag of sand has more mass than a bag of helium?
[11:16]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Though I'd like to mention, attachments in Havok1 never seem to run out of energy
[11:17]	Andrew Linden:	oh right... (3) the mass properpties computations are somewhat expensive, and I'd like to cache some of them
[11:18]	Andrew Linden:	Gaius, it won't be possible to manually override the mass properties of objects until we have our own mass properties utilities
[11:18]	Andrew Linden:	so... our own utilities will enable:
[11:18]	Andrew Linden:	(4) manual overrides
[11:18]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[11:18]	Andrew Linden:	(5) per-prim density settings
[11:18]	Seifert Surface:	cool
[11:18]	Andrew Linden:	However, (4) and (5) would come sometime after Havok4 is actually done
[11:18]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Of course. First things first. :)
[11:19]	Andrew Linden:	So that is all of the "state of Havok" updates I've got.
[11:19]	Andrew Linden:	Sidewinder probably has some announcements..
[11:19]	Sidewinder Linden:	thanks... yes... we are going to reload the beta preview this afternoon, with a different region configuration
[11:20]	Sidewinder Linden:	this is based ont he chanes that we talked about at the last office hours
[11:20]	Sidewinder Linden:	i'll hand out a notecard iwth the proposed new "core configuration"
[11:20]	Andrew Linden:	specifically, you're talking about reducing the number of regions to some minimum
[11:20]	Andrew Linden:	to allow for more private estate trials on the preview
[11:20]	Sidewinder Linden gave you Proposed Beta Preview Configuration 2007-11-18.
[11:21]	Sidewinder Linden:	yes... this list is what i came up with for a "core configuration" - reginos that should be there on an ongoing basis for various specific reasons
[11:21]	Sidewinder Linden:	this leaves a lot of slots for rotating other regions from the main system into the preview so taht we can test completely assembled and operational regions easily
[11:21]	Seifert Surface:	seems like a sensible thing to do
[11:21]	Sidewinder Linden:	we also have put up a rack of class 5 servers - i think there are now going to be six class 5 hosts on the preview, which is 24 regions of class 5
[11:22]	Kitto Flora:	Wish didn't make it huh?
[11:22]	Sidewinder Linden:	should it be on the core, or the rotating set?
[11:22]	Sidewinder Linden:	i can add it if it should be...
[11:22]	Andrew Linden:	(hrm... I'm pretty sure the last bug in my mass properties stuff is floating point error, exacerbated by adding and subtracting large nearly equal numbers)
[11:22]	Sidewinder Linden:	btw one thing to know is that now putting new regions on to the preview will be very easy and can be scheduled
[11:22]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Can we do half core half rotating?
[11:23]	Sidewinder Linden:	that is actually *about* what this is
[11:23]	Sidewinder Linden:	i havnen't got a final count, but i believe that this is about half of the total region slots
[11:23]	Squirrel Wood:	furnation... those sims tend to get griefed a lot
[11:23]	Sidewinder Linden:	the plan is to set up so that regions on the beta preview will run on the same hardware that they use on the public system, so to some degree this will depends on the mappings of region to class of host
[11:23]	Seifert Surface:	will they get griefed in beta?
[11:23]	Sidewinder Linden:	yes... there is one furnation sim in the core list... do there need to be more?
[11:24]	Sidewinder Linden:	probably
[11:24]	Squirrel Wood:	if its one of the sandbox sims that should do the trick
[11:24]	Sidewinder Linden:	well i shouldn't say probably... wouldn't be surprising, however it would be handled in the same way as main system
[11:24]	Sidewinder Linden:	and with h4 hopefully it won't be as successful
[11:24]	Andrew Linden:	The estate owners can set their regions private if they want... it's just the Beta
[11:24]	Sidewinder Linden:	right
[11:24]	Sidewinder Linden:	oh good point andrew - when we copy a region to the beta, it will automatically pull all of its security settings
[11:25]	Sidewinder Linden:	so private regions will be private on beta
[11:25]	Sidewinder Linden:	unless the owner decides to openthem up
[11:25]	Sidewinder Linden:	does this look like a reasonable core list, with the idea that we can swap in other regions for a few days for specific testing easily?
[11:25]	Couples MultiAnimator v2e whispers: * Abranimations Couples Animator Ready...
[11:25]	Kitto Flora:	Seems like a vast quantity to me
[11:26]	Squirrel Wood:	looks good to me
[11:26]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Looks good tome
[11:26]	Sorraya Pera:	sissipoo
[11:27]	Sidewinder Linden:	kitto - too many in the core?
[11:27]	Sidewinder Linden:	easy to trim it :)
[11:27]	Kitto Flora:	Well any testing I could do there Ive already done. And it only needed 2 H4 sims and 1 H1 sim
[11:27]	Sidewinder Linden:	we were also thinking that with a lot of people on the beta preview folks will want enough space to spread out at times
[11:28]	Sidewinder Linden:	oh btw - the havok1 sims are not in this list, but would be maintained after the reconfig
[11:28]	Kitto Flora:	If one cannot set up large scale stuff on the sim, its pretty much useless for me now
[11:28]	Sidewinder Linden:	what does that mean kitto?
[11:28]	Sidewinder Linden:	in other words what would you need?
[11:28]	Kitto Flora:	Ability to keep stuff around for more than 30 mins
[11:28]	Kitto Flora:	or 60 mins.. whatever it is
[11:29]	Sidewinder Linden:	hmmm
[11:29]	Sidewinder Linden:	well if wish were on the preview you wouldn't have that problem, right?
[11:29]	Kitto Flora:	Right
[11:29]	Seifert Surface:	large amounts of the space generally up on beta seems to be no build (or at least has been in the past)
[11:29]	Sidewinder Linden:	actually i think i have it in the "resident regions list" to be deployed - just not in core
[11:29]	Kitto Flora:	Exactly Seifert
[11:29]	Kitto Flora:	All one can do in suchj places is play with whats there
[11:30]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Well, we need no build areas too, as well as no object entry, no script, etc.
[11:30]	Seifert Surface:	yes
[11:30]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[11:30]	Andrew Linden:	We usually pull the regions over as-is, so if they are no-build originally that is how they show up in the preview
[11:30]	Seifert Surface:	but not entire sims of it
[11:30]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	As it stands, there is a bug that affects no build areas
[11:30]	Kitto Flora:	And usually thats not physics critical stuff
[11:30]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok... so how about this... we start with this list, and then we can tune this to get cloer to "right"
[11:30]	Sidewinder Linden:	right... andrew's point is the reason for figuring out "the right core list"
[11:30]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Remember, "Physics" doesn't just affect prims with the physics checkbox checked
[11:30]	Sidewinder Linden:	the easy and maintainable solution is to pull over the regions that are already configured in the way that is useful
[11:31]	Redux Decosta:	right; theres an h1 crash that involves sitting inside or walking over natural toruses; its still a massive physics crash even though they're nonphysical
[11:31]	Kitto Flora:	Well the GSLR sims are one such - and you got them
[11:31]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok
[11:32]	Gaius Goodliffe:	If we have Blue, Mauve, and Lime, might I suggest Mocha? When you're flying around testing, being able to circle a "four corners" spot can be helpful.
[11:32]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok
[11:32]	Squirrel Wood:	h1... all you need is rez two physical tori that are stuck within each other... should cause an instant crash
[11:32]	Redux Decosta:	has there been any playing with havok4 on void sims yet?
[11:32]	Sidewinder Linden:	only marginally - that's why i added the sailing courses those are void sims
[11:33]	Sidewinder Linden:	and the sailing community is quite sensitive to dynamics (and have some pretty sophisticated sailboat scripting)
[11:33]	Sidewinder Linden:	so this will let them find problems and retune their boats
[11:34]	Kitto Flora:	Oh - I take that back. Looks like GSLR sims are not on the list either
[11:34]	Sidewinder Linden:	k well maybe i misunderstood - which sims in particular are you talking about?
[11:34]	Kitto Flora:	Well, guess I get Christmas off. Nothing to do.
[11:34]	Kitto Flora:	The Sims that the GSLR run throug
[11:35]	Kitto Flora:	Periwinkle...
[11:35]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Welcome Eata, grab a seat ;)
[11:35]	Sidewinder Linden:	ahh oops - i had periwinkle and purple on the resident list
[11:35]	Sidewinder Linden:	are those two the ones you meant?
[11:35]	Sidewinder Linden:	hi eata
[11:35]	Kitto Flora:	Yes
[11:35]	Kitto Flora:	purple
[11:35]	Kitto Flora:	maroon...
[11:35]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok i'll pu tthem in the core lst
[11:35]	Sidewinder Linden:	do we need all three for testing?
[11:35]	Kitto Flora:	two minimum
[11:35]	Eata Kitty:	Well I just attempted to try the new windlight but it keeps silently dying before the loading screen gets up
[11:35]	Kitto Flora:	Need to check boundary crossing
[11:36]	Sidewinder Linden:	right ... periwinkle and purple ok?
[11:36]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	</3 New login =P
[11:36]	Kitto Flora:	Yes, periwinkle and purple should be good
[11:36]	Sidewinder Linden:	"done" :)
[11:37]	Eata Kitty:	Havok 4?
[11:37]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok so otherwise this looks like a decent starting point?
[11:37]	Sidewinder Linden:	yes
[11:37]	Ryozu Yamamoto nods.
[11:37]	Sidewinder Linden:	all of the core regions would be set up with havok4
[11:37]	Sidewinder Linden:	and the existing havok1 regions would still be there
[11:37]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Will they still have the useful warning ground texture saying Havok1?
[11:37]	Sidewinder Linden:	yes
[11:37]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Excellent. :)
[11:37]	Sidewinder Linden:	oh - good point.... gaius... you may
[11:38]	Kitto Flora:	Anyone know if Garth Fairchang is still active?
[11:38]	Sidewinder Linden:	see over the next couple of weeks, some regions with other ground textures
[11:38]	Sidewinder Linden:	another of the projects may put a few regions on the beta preview, so just make sure to check the ground texture before assuming it's h4
[11:38]	Andrew Linden:	Havok4 has been sitting on the preview too long. Other projects need some time there.
[11:38]	Sidewinder Linden:	anything that is not h4 *should* have a ground texture explaining what it is
[11:39]	Squirrel Wood:	Mono ?
[11:39]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	May as well stick the H4 ground texture on H4 sims, heh
[11:39]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Just for the sake of clarity
[11:39]	Sidewinder Linden:	could be ;)
[11:39]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok... so last chance to hop up and down... any reason not to pull the trigger on this reconfiguration today?
[11:40]	Gaius Goodliffe:	My apologies for missing the last couple meetings, I may be behind the curve a tad: last time I'd been here, we hadn't moved on to vehicle bugs yet. Is that still the case, or are we looking at vehicle stuff now too?
[11:40]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok... so then when i can get things lined up we'll reload the region configuration. it probably makes sense to have the beta offline for an hour or so to make sure this went right, and i'llbring it back up asap after that
[11:41]	Sidewinder Linden:	we are getting to the point of digging in farther on vehicles - likely with some more vigor after the holidays
[11:41]	Andrew Linden:	We're not quite back working on vehicles yet. But that is next.
[11:41]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Before we run out of time, I wanted to ask about the avatar velocity caps
[11:41]	Sidewinder Linden:	go kitto
[11:41]	Kitto Flora:	where?
[11:41]	Andrew Linden:	Ah yes... avatar velocity caps...
[11:42]	Sidewinder Linden:	@kitto (to your point!) :)
[11:42]	Andrew Linden:	Ask the questions Ryozu.
[11:42]	Kitto Flora is lost
[11:42]	Sidewinder Linden:	/oops - wrong name sorry kitto - thought ryozu's question was yours...
[11:42]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I've played with them quite a bit, and honestly, I'm just not happy with them. In Current Havok1, velocity caps are nearly non-existent, and I have no qualms with putting caps into place
[11:42]	Kitto Flora:	:)
[11:43]	Andrew Linden:	Ryozu, you've tested the Havok4 caps recently? (In the last three weeks or so?)
[11:43]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Yes, specifically on the Crash me sims and on the beta grid
[11:44]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	In all cases on Havok4, the caps are about 64/128 Flying/not flying.
[11:44]	Eata Kitty:	This is to prevent griefing yes?
[11:44]	Andrew Linden:	Right, ok. Simon was looking at the avatar control code and thought "These caps just aren't tight enough."
[11:44]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	It also prevents utility.
[11:44]	Andrew Linden:	And so they've been lowered.
[11:44]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I have to ask Andrew
[11:44]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	By what measure is that decided?
[11:45]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	What's the logic? To prevent crashing? Greifing?
[11:45]	Andrew Linden:	I figured there would be some backlash. I've been waiting for it.
[11:45]	Eata Kitty:	Are they lowered enough so that whacking people with a very carefully shaped prim no longer instantly puts them beyond integer max on all three axis :P
[11:45]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Eata: That's a different problem, and fixed in H4
[11:45]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	That was fixed long before velocity caps were lowerd ;)
[11:45]	target-aim 0.3:	Hello, Avatar!
[11:45]	Squirrel Wood:	I prefer a flight assist with insane assist values... a.k.a. speed.
[11:45]	Redux Decosta:	i actually want to second that; i have some stuff that uses high velocity repositioning that's broken in h4, and i can't grasp the value in aritifically introducing lag to avatar movement
[11:46]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Yes, as Squirrel says, most do
[11:46]	Andrew Linden:	Eata, that boost mode has been fixed, I believe, and would only somewhat affected by avatar velocity caps.
[11:46]	Arawn Spitteler likes to recommend holding a red balloon, before standing.
[11:46]	Eata Kitty:	128M a second is too low?
[11:46]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	64m/sec is too slow
[11:46]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	128 is minimally tolerable
[11:46]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Any particular reason why limits are different depending on fly state?
[11:47]	Andrew Linden:	I'm not against expanded limits on avatar speeds. I'd like someone to bring it up with Simon, though.
[11:47]	Eata Kitty:	Having watched people with major flight assists I don't know why you really would want to go much faster than that, sim crossings are seriously painful at that speed
[11:47]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I'll do that then ;)
[11:47]	Redux Decosta:	i'd like to vote for 512/256 at least :)
[11:47]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	The mistake everyone makes is assuming speed caps at sustained speed
[11:47]	Squirrel Wood:	leave them in and you will hear the outcry of the community all the way down to the south pole
[11:47]	Andrew Linden:	Tell you what... if you have any objections to the current velocity caps... send IM's to Simon Linden, just so he gets the feedback.
[11:47]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	There are a LOT of utilities that use high velocity in short controlled bursts
[11:47]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	OmniPhaze being just one of MANY
[11:48]	Andrew Linden:	I'll also bring it up in our dev channel again after he hears some real SL resident complaints.
[11:48]	Arcangel Juran:	Script run-time error
[11:48]	Arcangel Juran:	Math Error
[11:48]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I think any time anyone even thinks about putting some kind of cap or limit in place, they need to be reminded that SL is platform for development, not just some game that needs arbitrary limitations
[11:48]	Seifert Surface:	would the velocity cap have an effect on sit teleporters btw?
[11:48]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I think some people forget that.
[11:48]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Seifert: I don't believe so
[11:49]	Andrew Linden:	I think Simon was thinking about long super-fast flights through lots of regions...
[11:49]	Andrew Linden:	the region crossing doesn't work well enough for really fast traversal
[11:49]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I understand that reasoning, don't get me wrong
[11:49]	Andrew Linden:	therefore... why have really fast speeds?
[11:49]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	It's just that it's not the only thing velocity is used for
[11:49]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Yeah, going that fast across regions doesn't work, but it's great for getting up to sky builds easily.
[11:49]	Seifert Surface:	tie it to energy somehow....
[11:50]	Andrew Linden:	I think that was his main reasoning.
[11:50]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Sky builds, fast controlled movement (TP To Camera, etc)
[11:50]	Redux Decosta:	if someone wants to ramp up their flight speed fast enough to crash their own client, why interfere? some teleporter devices that jump from 0 to 700 meters in a split second are extremely helpful
[11:50]	Kitto Flora:	One also needs to remember it si a *shared* platform, and some of these "capabilities" have detremental impact on many other users, and are therefore used for greifing.
[11:50]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	That's the thing Seifert, classically speaking, Avatars have unlimited energy
[11:50]	Squirrel Wood:	Sometimes I use high flight speeds to move up like 300m and then drop back down cause some avatars or other things would not load otherwise.
[11:50]	Seifert Surface:	hmm, yeah i dont really buy that reasoning either, there are plenty of things you can do in sl that dont work because of technical limitations
[11:50]	Redux Decosta:	likewise with inter-sim teleporting buggy, being able to zip across a sim in a controlled burst is very useful
[11:50]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[11:50]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	They also have uses to avoid greifing, like escaping a follower prim
[11:51]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	How about a comprimise?
[11:51]	Squirrel Wood:	the speed ensures I get out of visual range quick and back down quick too without having the voice chat break up
[11:51]	Redux Decosta:	or getting unstuck if you get trapped in a building with no doors
[11:51]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	When an avatar does a sim crossing, cap their speed temporarily
[11:51]	Andrew Linden:	Send him some IM's or notecards. I think we can re-tweak the avatar speed caps after some feedback.
[11:51]	Seifert Surface:	if it can be used to grief, then its a different issue, if it can only be used to crash your own client, whats the big deal?
[11:51]	Sidewinder Linden:	are there specific griefing modes here?
[11:51]	Squirrel Wood:	get within 5m of the sim border => instant cap
[11:51]	Sidewinder Linden:	with high speeds?
[11:52]	Kitto Flora:	Sidewinder: Yes, indirect push applied to vehicles
[11:52]	Seifert Surface:	perhaps one could set up a DOS attack with many bots flying back and forth through a region at high speed
[11:52]	Redux Decosta:	disabling something because of "grief potential" is silly anyway; why not disable all scripts entirely or llSay or llGiveInventory?
[11:52]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Even at 64/128, it can still be used to grief, it doesn't matter if it pushes you 1,000,000 meters or 1,000 you're still griefed. Besides, there's no greif modes in H4 I can think of on non-push land that can send you to max velocity anyways
[11:52]	Sidewinder Linden:	@redux... yes i realize that logic... just asking to understand the issues better and make sure we have them on the table
[11:53]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok we'll talk about this
[11:53]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Even the fastest vehicles hitting an avatar can't send them flying -that- fast
[11:53]	Kitto Flora:	Ryozu: There is still, unless the 'no push' rules have been changed.
[11:53]	Sidewinder Linden:	andrew... if we were to cap at 256 m/s would there be any reason that this would be aproblem?
[11:54]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Kitto: You know of a way to have a vehicle smack an avatar and send them flying at beyond 128m/sec?
[11:54]	Seifert Surface:	there is perhaps some argument that being able to zoom through walls at high speed is something we dont want to be possible, but there are too many ways to do it
[11:54]	Sidewinder Linden:	provide *some* limit but high enough to not cause the problems that are being talked about?
[11:54]	Eata Kitty:	Its usually main chained pushes in a push area, a high mass high energy prim colliding with an av, interpenetration with a large prim (But thats a very slow push), high rotation object (Variably can give a high physical push, unpredictable), bumping people with many small objects continously
[11:54]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	256m/sec would be reasonable
[11:54]	Redux Decosta:	incedentally, why are avatars still not given the ability to turn phantom like the lindens have?
[11:54]	Eata Kitty:	*many
[11:54]	Andrew Linden:	Sidewinder, I had previously had the cap at 256... sorta. It was kinda soft at the top so it was hard to actually get to 256.
[11:54]	Sidewinder Linden:	oh... ok
[11:54]	Eata Kitty:	Probably because the ability for abuse in any kind of controlled thing like roleplay sims/combat sims is massive
[11:55]	Andrew Linden:	The bug that drew renewed attention was that the jetpack speed wat too fast in Havok4... faster than it was in Havok1
[11:55]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Eata: Never heard of OmniPhaze?
[11:55]	Seifert Surface:	eata: but there are so many other ways to get through walls
[11:55]	Eata Kitty:	Isn't that just sitting on a prim :P
[11:55]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	No.
[11:55]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Heh
[11:55]	Sidewinder Linden:	so here is maybe another way to ask this question...
[11:55]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Actually, one idea would be to have the limit settable from the estate settings.
[11:55]	Eata Kitty:	Well the last time people made a phaser, it got bug fixed
[11:55]	Sidewinder Linden:	there are existing htings like the jetpack that are "way faster" on h4
[11:55]	Andrew Linden:	A way to solve the problem is to cap the speeds to something more like what the jetpack speed was in Havok1. And that also solves some unwanted modes of fast region crossing and other worrisom problems.
[11:55]	Eata Kitty:	So surely another phazer would get bugfixed
[11:55]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Eata: Orly?
[11:56]	Sidewinder Linden:	would it be better to just let those be "broken" in the sense that they are very fast, and not change the cap behavior?
[11:56]	Redux Decosta:	in a no-rez area the only way to get through a wall is to push through it. speed limitations prevent that
[11:56]	Andrew Linden:	However... it breaks content and makes Residents unhappy, which I warned about.
[11:56]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Sidewinder: I personally have never had a problem with it
[11:56]	Redux Decosta:	its really irritating to have to tp OFF a sim then back TO the sim because you cant find a door & because inter-sim teleporting is broken
[11:56]	Eata Kitty:	Um, won't havok 4 prevent pushing through things regardless? It's continous simulation no?
[11:56]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	But I think stopping an av at a sim crossing would be reasonable.
[11:56]	Andrew Linden:	LL Dev's sometimes need to experience the resident feedback for themselves. And the design around avatar speed caps is still open, I think.
[11:56]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Eata: Nope.
[11:57]	Squirrel Wood gave you FlightAssist.
[11:57]	Seifert Surface:	but there will come a physics engine at some point which is
[11:57]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Then I'll lobby for phantom avatar toggle
[11:57]	Eata Kitty:	It's still stepped? I thought the point past havok 1 was that the physical simulation was continous
[11:57]	Andrew Linden:	Eata, Havok4 doesn't have continuous collision detection enabled necessarily.
[11:57]	Eata Kitty:	I think a phantom toggle is a good idea. But it would have to have a parcel control
[11:57]	Andrew Linden:	It is an option that you can turn on... and we aren't enabling it -- it costs more CPU cycles to use it.
[11:57]	Eata Kitty:	Awww
[11:57]	Sidewinder Linden:	continuous would use a huge amount of computational resources... afaik havok does not yet do that for that reason
[11:58]	Redux Decosta:	potential for griefing a combat sim with phantom mode is probably very incedental compared to say.. orbiting or crashing the sim
[11:58]	Andrew Linden:	Phantom avatar on demand... a often requested feature
[11:58]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	OmniPhaze would be a million times better with that ;)
[11:59]	Eata Kitty:	You can't base an argument for one thing on the fact that other flaws exist!
[11:59]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Speaking of avatar movement, there's another topic
[11:59]	Andrew Linden:	there are some design issues around that... it breaks some content, and yet it helps others
[11:59]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Landing mode is still quite messy
[11:59]	Seifert Surface:	what content does it break andrew?
[11:59]	Sidewinder Linden:	just a reminder guys.. we're almost to the end of the hour... any other current havok4 issues?
[11:59]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Seifert: walls? =D
[11:59]	Sidewinder Linden:	@ryozu...?
[11:59]	Redux Decosta:	why isnt the goal of havok4 to replicate the behavior of havok1 as much as possible while adding stability? why change the way everything works arbitrarily?
[11:59]	Gaius Goodliffe:	heh
[11:59]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I get forced into hard landing mode by bumping my head on a ceiling
[12:00]	Eata Kitty:	I tried to replicate it but has running being fixed? It currently can get very strange when transferring between being on prims or not, especially at altitude
[12:00]	Sidewinder Linden:	@redux - we are not changing everything arbitrarily... some behaviors are different becauseof evolution of the havok physics engine
[12:00]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Hard landing mode is also troublesome when physics cannot affect you
[12:00]	Sidewinder Linden:	some old behaviors are not really as well done as new ones
[12:00]	Eata Kitty:	You go more like low friction and slide across a surface or suddenly get a lot more velocity
[12:00]	Sidewinder Linden:	so there will be some differences and some similarities
[12:00]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	You hit the ground at a 45 degree angle and you suddenly find yourself ramping away uncontrollably
[12:00]	Sidewinder Linden:	we are trying to make things "reasonably like" havok1 wherever possible
[12:01]	Andrew Linden:	Seifert, phantom avatars break some shoot-em-up games, maybe also some buildings with walls designed to keep avatars out or in
[12:01]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Shooting games, that's true. Though perhaps collision detection could ignore phantom
[12:01]	Redux Decosta:	@sidewinder: thats only partly true... saying something like "oh hey lets introduce a speed limitation on avatars and make it very low" doesnt fall into the category of "replicating as closely as possible"
[12:01]	Seifert Surface:	andrew: easy to get around if its detectable by script, its just another form of cheating
[12:02]	Eata Kitty:	I think making it a parcel toggle would avoid all the problems
[12:02]	Sidewinder Linden:	@redux - it was in the context of not breaking existing content that relied on h1 behaviors...
[12:02]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[12:02]	Seifert Surface:	eata: yes, sounds sensible
[12:02]	Andrew Linden:	Eata, that's what I think... it should probably be a parcel or estate option to allow phantom avatars
[12:02]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Making all of this configurable by parcel/estate owners is eventually necessary if SL is to be able to host any kind of content residents wish to create.
[12:02]	Eata Kitty:	Although at this rate the land controls will have everything and the kitchen sink as an option... which may or may not be a bad thing
[12:02]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Though I think simply having it as a detectable (llGetObjectDetails?) mode would be more graceful
[12:03]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Heh
[12:03]	Redux Decosta:	so phantom avatars & fewer collisons actually causes MORE cpu cycles? i would think in crowded areas that it would greatly reduce them
[12:03]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	More versatile anyways
[12:03]	Eata Kitty:	ryozu: Returning something like AGENT_PHANTOM from llgetagentinfo?
[12:03]	Sidewinder Linden:	ok.... guys... we are quickly descending into a new features discussion, and that's really not the focus of the havok4 project right now... we are trying to get to releasable for large scale use as soon as possible, and that really means focusing on "what's broken still that needs fixing" and getting us to bea ble to roll this out...
[12:03]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Eata: Yeah, that would be ideal
[12:03]	Sidewinder Linden:	can we table the futures discussions for a bit...?
[12:03]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Hard landing mode: broken But I'll leave it at that
[12:03]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Eata: It's a necessary thing in the long run. Although different versions of the server software may be another way to solve that problem. Here's your PhysicsSIm vs. ShoppingSim vs. FlightSim. ;)
[12:04]	Andrew Linden:	Ah yes... LSL queries into the state of the simulator. How important do you think it will be to be able to ask the simualtor if it is using a Havok4 or Havok1 physics engine during the transition period?
[12:04]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Not that important
[12:04]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	But
[12:04]	Redux Decosta:	oh actually thats why i'm here. i took crashme 2 and 3 offline for about 2 hours this morning & i was wondering if the exploit was being addressed and whether or not it qualified as a memory issue
[12:04]	Sidewinder Linden:	in other words so taht you can tune behavior to "work" correctly on h1 and h4 while we have both regions on the grid
[12:04]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	How about the idea of having some kind of general purpose Sim info gathering method?
[12:04]	Sidewinder Linden:	*simulators
[12:04]	Eata Kitty:	I think thats too early to say... people need to find out what exactly IS different
[12:05]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	It could return many different things, including physics version
[12:05]	Eata Kitty:	It might be for vehicles
[12:05]	Kitto Flora:	x/me agrees with Eta
[12:05]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	But I wouldn't limit it to just that
[12:05]	Gaius Goodliffe:	If the mass calculations have changed, llGetMass will provide a quick and dirty solution.
[12:05]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Gaius: They haven't
[12:05]	Arawn Spitteler has advised Gypsy Paz of an operation difference of his swim balls, in Crash Me, but it's a noisy place to test.
[12:05]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Mass calculations are very specifically tuned to return the same across versions
[12:06]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Arawn: Check out the beta grid ;
[12:06]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	;)
[12:06]	Andrew Linden:	Uh... I'm working on changing the mass calculations right now.
[12:06]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[12:06]	Kitto Flora:	The only h1/h4 diffs I have at the moment are that tre train leans a lot on helical tracks, and sim crossing *may* be much slower.
[12:06]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Andrew: At least that was the impression I had is all =)
[12:06]	Kitto Flora:	The lean is only an appearance problem
[12:06]	Andrew Linden:	One of the problems with Havok4 is that it returns the wrong mass properties
[12:07]	Kitto Flora:	I dont use mass properties for anything :)
[12:07]	Andrew Linden:	for instance, a 95% hollow sphere has more mass than a 20% hollow one, and a large inertia tensor
[12:07]	Sidewinder Linden:	the core question is, i think, are you planning to build new versions of vehicles and such that will need to work across both h1 and h4, and if we have both on the system for lets say (complete guess) 30-60 days would you want to have the ability to "retweak" things when the product switches from a havok1 to a havok4 sim and vice versa
[12:07]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Doh.
[12:07]	Eata Kitty:	I haven't noticed any difference in physics related to weapons so it doesn't cause ME a problem :P
[12:07]	Sidewinder Linden:	kk eata
[12:07]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	=P
[12:08]	Eata Kitty:	I wished it was continous though!
[12:08]	Andrew Linden:	sigh... I'm sure it will cause someone problems
[12:08]	Eata Kitty:	I have to have a 2M long bullet so it doesnt go through walls as it travels at 100M+
[12:08]	Kitto Flora:	It would take longer to update 900+ trains thand to convert all the sims to H4, manually
[12:08]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Sidewinder: I'd say yes
[12:08]	Andrew Linden:	however... this is a problem we have to deal with now... or later
[12:08]	Andrew Linden:	if the mass properties are very dependent on the physics engine in use then the problem will resurface whenever we try to use a new engine
[12:09]	Andrew Linden:	however, if we write our own mass properties utilities then we can finally settle down on something more stable
[12:09]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I still favor my suggestion: A general puprose sim info function, that can return not only simulator version number, physics engine details, but as much other data as could be useful
[12:09]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[12:09]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	And more data returns could be added later
[12:09]	Andrew Linden:	Glad you brought that up Ryozu. We've been kicking that idea around the lab recently.
[12:09]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	That would solve detecting a cross between h1 to h4 quite nicely
[12:10]	Andrew Linden:	And I'm curious to know whether you guys think it is neat, Important, or IMPORTANT.
[12:10]	Sidewinder Linden:	yup
[12:10]	Kitto Flora:	For this Mass promlem: Seems to me you need to find some content that uses mass calc critically, and test that stuff.
[12:10]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Important
[12:10]	Sidewinder Linden:	would it make sense to do a simple function first that is supplanted by a more comprehensive design later?
[12:10]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	The more Hetgrid comes into play, it may become IMORTANT
[12:10]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	;)
[12:10]	Gaius Goodliffe nods.
[12:10]	Andrew Linden:	Kitto, there are undoubtedly some script content that s carefully tuned to the mass of the object
[12:10]	Sidewinder Linden:	since we probably don't have enough time to get the long term design right in time for h4's rollout?
[12:10]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Sidewinder: Backwards compat, return a list
[12:10]	Eata Kitty:	Speaking of sim info... could the info readout be made far more useful? Sorry but "this is a different version" is rubbish. It needs to be far more precise. It should list module differences really.
[12:10]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Almost guarenteed to become IMPORTANT in the future.
[12:10]	Andrew Linden:	It is bad coding style, but I'm sure it is done all over the place.
[12:11]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Look at llGetObjectDetails, that's a good one
[12:11]	Sidewinder Linden:	yes eata, and that is the difference between a simple "single key/value" kind of design and maybe something more comprehensive
[12:11]	Squirrel Wood:	llTellMeEverything() ?
[12:11]	Andrew Linden:	Well, I'm going to have to go soon.
[12:11]	Sidewinder Linden:	rofl squirrel
[12:11]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Heh
[12:11]	Andrew Linden:	But the discussions can continue. This table is about to re autoreturned.
[12:11]	Redux Decosta:	i've had issues with llGetMass returning bogus data & needed to hard code mass into scripts for some stuff that does finely tuned mass functions
[12:11]	Kitto Flora:	Only time I've tried using llGetMass() is for tuning force and damping in llMoveTo..() stuff. It never worked as described. I abandoned it.
[12:12]	Andrew Linden:	Redux, is that for attachments?
[12:12]	Redux Decosta:	yes, those ;)
[12:12]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	Attachments return the mass of the avatar =P
[12:12]	Andrew Linden:	yes, there are some "bogus mass" problems with attachments
[12:12]	Redux Decosta:	i have something i wear that uses pushes to attach an avatar to your camera. it's very useful for giving tours, etc
[12:12]	Seifert Surface:	i use llgetmass in conjunction with llpushobject
[12:12]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	I'd pray that doesn't change
[12:12]	Andrew Linden:	that is one of the problems I'm trying to solve
[12:12]	Seifert Surface:	its accurate
[12:13]	Redux Decosta:	sometimes when i need to give noob corporate clients tours (ones who cant fly), i use a script to tie them to my camera so they dont get lost
[12:13]	Gaius Goodliffe:	I use llGetMass with llApplyImpulse in my two actual airplanes, it works fine there too.
[12:13]	Squirrel Wood:	my roller coaster does use llGetMass() in conjunction with its "engine" to calculate acceleration and decelleration
[12:13]	Kitto Flora:	I gtg - holliday party and fancy restaurant! I'll check for the new Beat Grid later! Bye all :)
[12:14]	Redux Decosta:	OH
[12:14]	Redux Decosta:	i dont know if this has been brought up; i've had a lot of weird issues with content loss on h4 sims following crashes
[12:15]	Sidewinder Linden:	oh?
[12:15]	Redux Decosta:	scripts & attachemnets being lost, stuff recently made vanishing from inventory, etc
[12:15]	Redux Decosta:	was wondering if anyoen else had experienced this or if it was just an anomaly because of the current implementation
[12:15]	Sidewinder Linden:	this is not content that was out on the sim?
[12:15]	Ryozu Yamamoto:	uh oh
[12:15]	Sidewinder Linden:	it was content that was "just sitting in inventory"?
[12:16]	Redux Decosta:	i've had situaitons where i've created an object, written a script in it, picked it up, and crashed the sim
[12:16]	Redux Decosta:	it either vanishes from my inventroy or the script reverts, etc
[12:16]	Redux Decosta:	i havent pinpointed it; i thougth it was just sleep deprivation but someone was talking about me with it this morning
[12:16]	Gaius Goodliffe:	Yeah sim crashes often take the most very recent changes with them.
[12:16]	Andrew Linden:	Hrm... shoulda been here last thursday. I offered a bounty for new ways to crash Havok4 simulators.
[12:16]	Sidewinder Linden:	i *think* but am not 100% sure, that if there was less than about 10 seconds between the pickup and the crash it could be in some not-fully-stored state
[12:16]	Redux Decosta:	yeah i missed it
[12:17]	Redux Decosta:	i'm not all that interested in a bounty through, frankly, i'd like to see everything get working smoothly though
[12:17]	Redux Decosta:	i've been working with Dan Linden on it all week :)
[12:17]	Sidewinder Linden:	are these things that you pulled into inventory and waited bit and then crashed the sim, or crash right after
[12:17]	Sidewinder Linden:	kk
[12:17]	Sidewinder Linden:	great
[12:17]	Redux Decosta:	pick up, check for existence in inventory, crash sim
[12:17]	Sidewinder Linden:	so very fast cycle... hmmm
[12:17]	Redux Decosta:	same with attachments obviously, which also happens in havok1
[12:17]	Redux Decosta:	like i'll rez something & wear it, then TP to a havok4 sim & crash the sim & all the changes get lost
[12:17]	Sidewinder Linden:	welel when you're working with dan, make sure he knows about that tidbit as a possible trigger ok?