Deformer

The Deformer project remains pretty much on hold. The JIRA thread STORM-1716 has turned  in to a massive discussion where the uninformed and technically illiterate rant about what should be done. It is now a useless JIRA report too long to read with good technical information buried in thousands of words of useless rhetoric. The purpose that report best serves is to demonstrate why the JIRA was closed.

So… until Oz Linden can convince Linden management to assign people to the Deformer/Avatar project I see it remaining on hold and the JIRA item having devolved into a waste of time.

With In-Worldz deciding to adopt the Deformer, we are likely to see it added to viewers that support non-Second Life grids. But, for those viewers to be used in SL, they have to be classed as experimental viewers. That likely means little use by residents and lagging support. But, it might increase the Lab’s priority for the Deformer… might…

But, there is a need now and an annoying problem with Mesh Clothes.

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Well, it has finally happened. Another grid, In-Worldz, is going ahead with the Mesh Deformer. They contacted Karl Stiefvater (Qarl Fizz) and paid him to make changes to improve the Deformer’s performance.

Karl is estimating that the new version is 21 times faster. I don’t know that anything else has changed in the Deformer. Is it faster because the process of deforming changed? I don’t know. I doubt it. But, may be.

Henri Beauchamp posted in STORM-1716, the Deformer JIRA, that speed really hasn’t been the problem some think it is. But, there is a problem with how the viewer is handling the item’s LoD. That problem delays the deformer kicking in. So, this change may not resolve the ‘time’ problem in SL Viewers.

Henri says he will support this new Deformer code in Cool VL Viewer in his three branches of the viewer. The code is already in his viewers. BUT… only when connected to OpenSim grids. Only his experimental viewer will support the Deformer in the SL Grid. Linden Lab’s Viewer Policy requires any viewer that changes the ‘shared’ experience to be an experimental viewer until the feature is officially released by the Lab.

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There really isn’t any new news. Oz Linden and Lab are involved in other projects. Oz says he is continuing to pester management for people to work on the avatar and Deformer. But, people, users, are poking around trying to find out what is happening with the Deformer. That is leading to more drama and fussing in the JIRA.

I Won’t Buy Mesh

Yeah, yeah, whatever… I understand the sentiment. I don’t by mesh clothes. I do like some mesh hair and have bought some. But, posting in the JIRA that you won’t buy mesh is of no help to the development process. Duh! Nor do the Lindens care that much about what we do or don’t buy. There is plenty of buying going on from the Linden viewpoint.

I follow some fashion blogs. There is a lot of mesh clothing out there. People seem to be buying it. I have no way to know if the hold outs not buying mesh outnumber those that are buying mesh. Whatever the case, I doubt the Lab is concerned one way or the other. 

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If you didn’t read through my index of or listen to the Metareality podcast What is the Problem?!?, you missed Karl Stiefvater’s comments on the mesh deformer. Karl was addressing a point that has come up in JIRA 1716.

In some version of the Mesh Deformer Project Viewer there was a significant delay between the time a mesh garment was worn (rezzed) and the Deformer started deforming it. In some cases on some computers that was 2 to 4 minutes.

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There is a new video on YouTube showing the Mesh Deformer in action. 6 minutes. Notice that Enhanced Avatar Physics are enabled. That apparently surprised some of the people commenting in an SL forum thread.

[youtube TJ0JJXmOBwc]

Check out the Forum thread: MESH DEFORMER PROJECT NEEDS YOUR VOICE. WhiteRabbit0 posted.

While I understand the frustration, there is so much wrong with that post I’m not sure where to start.

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