[sldev] A patch to allow creation of megaprims from within theviewer

[Dale Mahalko]

Able, after trying out your UI modifications, I am of the opinion that
it points the direction the viewer object editing UI should be going.

It does not make sense to construct extremely large primitives
directly in-world, since the editing process may disrupt and annoy
people surrounding your land as the large object swings and moves
around during the design and editing phase.

It would be much better for a new large primitive to be edited
client-side only, shown in-world but perhaps with a crawling marquee
edge (as for a selection in a paint program) to indicate it is a
local-only edit.

Then once the object has been moved, rotated, cut, and shaped, you hit
the "Commit" button and it is stamped into the world as a fully
completed object, with any warnings sent back by the server if the
object placement fails.


Also, it would be extremely useful to be able to specify exactly where
in world a new object or even an object pulled from inventory will
rez. It is amazingly frustrating for me to put an object assembly into
my inventory, and then pull it out and work on it later, because I
usually align the objects on a common dimensional edge, like 120.000 x
220.000 x 78.000 so I can use the world alignment grid...

After putting the objects away and pulling them out later, they always
end up on some random dimensional position like 121.536 x 225.731 x
77.057 and it is extremely hard to pick up the assembly and get it
precisely back where it was originally so I can continue work on it. I
would much rather drag an object into the world from my inventory and
have a UI window pop up that says "Where do you want this placed?" and
also "Place this back exactly where it was before?"

- Scalar Tardis / Dale Mahalko


On Mon, May 12, 2008 at 1:19 PM, Able Whitman <able.whitman at gmail.com> wrote:
> In response to requests for a pre-built viewer, there are a couple of
> options now:
>
> 1. Nicholaz was awesome enough put my patch in his Eye Candy EC-f release
> (minus my UI changes):
> http://nicholaz-beresford.blogspot.com/2008/05/release-eye-candy-ec-f.html
>
> Nick's viewer is fantastic, and he's got a great group of users who have
> repeatedly demonstrated that he produces excellent, high-quality builds.
>
> 2. I've made my own pre-built executable, along with the UI xml changes,
> available:
> http://ablewhitman.org/blog/index.php/2008/05/12/able-edition-release-1/
>
> My viewer only has my two patches, has only been tested by me on my system,
> and might cause yours to explode (due to no fault of my own, of course). But
> it has my UI changes, if that's your thing.
>
> Cheers,
> --Able
>
>
> On Mon, May 12, 2008 at 12:40 PM, Sylvio Deutsch <overtake at keynet.com.br>
> wrote:
>>
>> Voted already.
>> Am now getting the people from the house to vote also... today they can
>> only use my computer after voting on both your JIRAs (((:
>>
>>
>> {}Overtake
>>
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: Able Whitman
>> To: Sylvio Deutsch
>> Cc: sldev at lists.secondlife.com
>> Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 1:29 PM
>> Subject: Re: [sldev] A patch to allow creation of megaprims from within
>> theviewer
>> Thanks everyone for all the feedback! This has encouraged me enough that
>> I've posted both my patch and Jacek's 1.20 RC5 patch with a new JIRA issue:
>>
>> VWR-7192:Hack to allow creating arbitrarily-sized prims in the viewer
>> http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-7192
>>
>> There are a few different issues already open that discuss various aspects
>> of megaprims, but I created a new issue to specifically discuss this hack /
>> feature, and to provide a central place for people to get the patches.
>>
>> I currently don't have a downloadable version available, but since there
>> seems to be some interest, I'll see if I can put something together later
>> today. It won't be a simple drop-in EXE, since you need a new
>> floater_tools.xml file as well.
>>
>> Of course I'm currently only building from the 1.19 source; if you want
>> 1.20 you'll have to look elsewhere. :)
>>
>> Cheers,
>> --Able
>>
>> On Mon, May 12, 2008 at 11:56 AM, Sylvio Deutsch <overtake at keynet.com.br>
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Able
>>>
>>> From my side, even having been on the receiving end of mega prims
>>> griefing, I´m all for having them around, their usefulness is much greater
>>> than the problems they can cause.
>>>
>>> So my vote is for you to start the JIRA for it.
>>>
>>>
>>> And... there is any viewer compiled with your patch? I never tried to
>>> compile a viewer and it would take a LONG time for me to learn...
>>>
>>>
>>> {}Overtake
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: Able Whitman
>>> To: sldev at lists.secondlife.com
>>> Sent: Sunday, May 11, 2008 5:37 PM
>>> Subject: [sldev] A patch to allow creation of megaprims from within
>>> theviewer
>>> Howdy,
>>>
>>> This is the second small feature I've been working on lately. Apparently
>>> at some time in the recent past, an LL server update re-enabled the ability
>>> to create prims with dimensions larger than 10m on a side. There are already
>>> lots of new megaprims available, mostly for free (like here on SLExchange:
>>> http://slexchange.com/modules.php?name=Marketplace&file=item&ItemID=685589).
>>> I'm pretty sure most of these prims have been created using LibSL-derived
>>> tools.
>>>
>>> I don't know if this new-again ability is intentional or not, although I
>>> certainly hope it is because megaprims are incredibly useful. Either way, I
>>> wanted to be able to create large prims directly in the viewer. My biggest
>>> reason for wanting this ability is so that any builds I produce using these
>>> prims will then list me as the creator, instead of the creator of the prims
>>> that come from megaprim collections. Being able to create them myself also
>>> gives me the flexibility to have large prims in whatever size I need,
>>> regardless of whether someone thought to create one in advance or not.
>>>
>>> For the moment, I haven't posted this patch in JIRA, for a few reasons.
>>> 1. As above, I'm not sure if the ability to create these large prims is
>>> intentional or not
>>> 2. The patch, as it stands, isn't as good or as polished as I'd like for
>>> a JIRA submission
>>> 3. The creation and handling of large prims in the viewer is quirky
>>> 4. The use of megaprims always seems to be somewhat controversial
>>>
>>> With regards to "quirky", these large prims are subject to a couple of
>>> constraints:
>>> a. Prims with dimensions greater than 10m can only be *created*, they
>>> cannot be resized again later
>>> b. Attempts to resize any dimension of a large prim results in all
>>> dimensions of the prim being re-clamped to a 10m maximum
>>>
>>> With regards to controversy over the use of megaprims, I certainly
>>> understand that they can be used as a greifing tool (and I myself have been
>>> on the grief-receiving end of this). However, I feel that the incredible
>>> usefulness of such large prims greatly overweighs the detriments. Some
>>> people seem to disagree vehemently, though, so I thought a discussion here
>>> might be fruitful.
>>>
>>> That said, the patch itself is actually fairly straightforward. Part of
>>> the patch simply enables the Build tools to display and edit scale values
>>> larger than 10.0.
>>>
>>> Since large prims can only be oversized on creation, I've replaced the
>>> viewer's hard-coded new prim size of <0.5, 0.5, 0.5> with configurable
>>> settings. Then I've exposed these settings on the Create tool panel of the
>>> Build tools floater.
>>>
>>> Put together, these changes make it pretty simple to create prims of
>>> whatever dimensions you'd like.
>>>
>>> I've attached my patch (which is against 1.19.1.4, the most recent
>>> official release viewer), as well as a screenshot demonstrating the patch in
>>> action.
>>>
>>> Please let me know if you have any questions, thoughts, or concerns.
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> --Able
>>>
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