[sldev] Physics Modularity (was: AWG - Scope (Future SL Architecture versus Multiworld Interoperability))

[Argent Stonecutter]

On 27-Oct-2007, at 04:44, Andre Roche wrote:
> If LL is ever going to open up the sim server code, there's going to
> at least need to be some kind of physics engine interface to plug in
> any physics engine a user wants to use.  They're not exactly allowed
> to release the Havok code, I don't think.

That doesn't imply using a high latency interface between the physics  
engine and other components. Low latency plugins generally use shared  
libraries.

> Sims with different sizes than 256 probably won't come about until
> after the sim code is released.  From what I hear, 256 is scattered
> around the code too much.

The biggest problem with different sized sims are user scripts that  
have 256 hardcoded into them.

They've also objected to my parcel basement idea for similar reasons:  
scripts that will freak out over negative offsets. The solution to  
THAT would be to adjust the Z of llRegionOffset by a constant (say,  
-1024) and the local Z by the corresponding offset (+1024).

> Would be pretty nice though.  Ideally, if region crossings could
> become seamless, anything that relies on being in a particular region
> could instead be changed into range based, region size wouldn't be
> nearly as much of an issue.  Personally, I think LL should stray away
> from selling real estate by the square meter and instead sell by the
> prim.

They do. That's what you buy when you buy land, you buy a fraction of  
the prim allocation of the server. They originally had them  
completely decoupled but that led to prim hoarding.