2008.12.19 01:00 - Beauty is so boring

Wol Euler was guardian and commenter for this session. She apologises for choosing one of her own lines as the log's title.

Fael Illyar: Hello Wol :)
Wol Euler: 'morning fael
Fael Illyar almost jumped in here with her work in progress ... umm ... tattoos.
Wol Euler smiles
Wol Euler: tattoos are good.
Fael Illyar: I took some snapshots yesterday, I'll give you links in IM :)
Wol Euler: ty
Wol Euler: wow
Fael Illyar smiles 'Thank you.

I crashed out briefly and returned, to find that Crusty had arrived in my absence.

Fael Illyar: wb Wol :)
Wol Euler: ty
Wol Euler: hello crusty
Crusty Goldshark: hi Fael, Wol
Crusty Goldshark: :)
Wol Euler: how's the meditation going?
Crusty Goldshark: well - yesterday I fell asleep duing a P&B sitting and suddenly it says meditator above my head - so must be doing something right . . .
Crusty Goldshark: how about you?
Fael Illyar has been forgetting everything for several hours per day working on a tattoo, sort of.
Wol Euler: middling. Too much to do, the whole world waits until the fortnight before Christmas to say things that they could have said three months ago
Fael Illyar: SL tattoo that is
Fael Illyar: SL thinks it's shirt and pants though
Wol Euler: :)
Crusty Goldshark: OK never had a ttoo in rel life or SL - I once was persuaded to wear an ear ring by someone of a pesuasive female disposition . .
Fael Illyar: although, I think bodypaint describes it better than tattoo. Most people just seem to call it tattoo
Crusty Goldshark: sorry keep getting itterrupted by people at the door - gas and postal
Wol Euler: no worries
Wol Euler: the SL difference might be slight
Wol Euler: and in any case normal clothes are "painted on" ...
Fael Illyar is wondering if she'll dare to show some pictures of the work in progress version.
Crusty Goldshark: Yes I realize that - thought I might have got away with it
Crusty Goldshark: - just like yesterday when I thought I could get away with a crafty snooze . . .
Fael Illyar: I suppose I better dare if I'm going to use it :P
Crusty Goldshark: OK let's see it?

Fael gives us the images.

Crusty Goldshark: Nice
Crusty Goldshark: good gracious people take their avatars very personally
Wol Euler: indeed. And rightly so IMHO
Wol Euler: for those who take SL seriously
Fael Illyar: Mine is pretty much something I've spend way too much time creating :)
Crusty Goldshark: m m m . . . is appearance important to you in RL too?
Fael Illyar: no
Wol Euler: not to the same extent :)
Crusty Goldshark: LOL
Fael Illyar: well, yes, not to the same extent :)
Crusty Goldshark: so alter ego?
Wol Euler: Wol dresses both better and differently than RL me
Fael Illyar: kind of :)
Fael Illyar: but ... well, it's a cultural difference.

The subject of fat (some might call them "realistic") avatars comes up.

Crusty Goldshark: Why do people buy fat?
Fael Illyar: you can get away with things here you couldn't in RL ;)
Wol Euler: pretty much an alter ego, yes: a previously unknown alternative me.
Wol Euler: crusty, could you explain that?
Crusty Goldshark: Well I went to the Ivory tower or some such place - maybe a mall and people were buying fat bodies . . .
Wol Euler: ah
Wol Euler: several of my friends do wear fat bodies
Crusty Goldshark: yes - why?
Fael Illyar: people want good looking fat bodies, of course :P
Wol Euler: either they want to look more like their RL selves
Wol Euler: or they want to look different to the run-of-the-mill standard-metric-unit beauty here
Wol Euler: SL beauty is so boring!
Wol Euler: don't you miss the variety of RL shapes here?
Wol Euler: don't you miss "age" here?
Crusty Goldshark: no
Wol Euler: (IMHO, YMMV, artist's impression)
Fael Illyar: No reason for SL to bring in everything from RL ;)
Wol Euler: I would say that it depends on what the wearer wants to get out of SL
Fael Illyar: (but no reason not to, either)

Express yourself.

Crusty Goldshark: I quite like seeing people in different forms that are an expression - and if someone wants to appear as a pin cusion (from some horror movie) as I recently saw - why not
Wol Euler: what does "forms that are an expression" mean?
Crusty Goldshark: forms are an expression of their being
Wol Euler: what does that mean?
Fael Illyar: Everything, really. Just, might be difficult to interpret :)
Wol Euler: phone ...
Crusty Goldshark: It means you wear a hat because it is your choice to express something from yourself that it expresses - is that nay clearere? :)
Crusty Goldshark: any
Fael Illyar: Of course, everything is pretty much a choice to express something :)
Fael Illyar: especially so in SL.
Wol Euler: back
Crusty Goldshark: I have yet to understand SL - I enjoy being here and I enjoy the chats - I enjoy exploring but have not done much else - I tried to simplify my avatar back to the first one I had as I thought the default might be faster . . .
Wol Euler: faster isn't always better :)
Wol Euler: food and sex, for instance
Crusty Goldshark: In my case it is quite important as my FPS is still often in the red on time lag - occasionally in yellow - below 10FPS is common
Fael Illyar: :)
Wol Euler: mine is usually around 6 or 7
Fael Illyar: your own AV doesn't affect it that much.
Crusty Goldshark: yes I am beginning to understand what does . . .
Fael Illyar: well, unless you go way overblown with it
Fael Illyar blinks ... is this hair pushing my ARC to 2k?
Wol Euler: I used to get 1.4 to 2 fps on the first computer I used for SL.
Wol Euler: very likely, fael.
Fael Illyar: ok, not the hair
Fael Illyar: ah, it's the jewelry
Wol Euler: the question here as in RL is "is it worth it?"
Fael Illyar: 800 ARC for the jewelry, 500 for the hair ... that's still rather high
Crusty Goldshark: what is ARC?
Wol Euler: "does the [hair|jewelry|clothing] express me so significantly that I am willing to pay the price in performance?"
Crusty Goldshark: Alchemical Research Company?
Fael Illyar: Avatar Rendering Cost estimate
Crusty Goldshark: OK
Wol Euler: how hard the system has to work to present your av
Fael Illyar: you can activate it from the advanced menu
Crusty Goldshark: yep I tried playing a bit withthat advanced menu
Crusty Goldshark: Well my hat and cloack were free - so not gonna buy stuff
Fael Illyar: if you go to advanced -> rendering -> info displays, you can activate the avatar rendering cost display ther
Crusty Goldshark: OK
Fael Illyar: It's entirely possible to not pay for things :)
Wol Euler: sure, plenty of freebies in SL
Fael Illyar: if you settle with freebies and things you make yourself
Wol Euler: and many stores give away stuff to group members
Fael Illyar: yes, that too.
Fael Illyar: but getting things for free doesn't let you decide what you get and when :)
Wol Euler: nor does it let you be very expressive...
Wol Euler: or perhaps it does express something :)
Fael Illyar: depends on what you get :)
Crusty Goldshark: well I am not interested in appearance enough to spend money on it
Wol Euler: no, fael, it depends on what you CAN get.
Fael Illyar: but it does limit you a bit :)
Wol Euler: fair enough, crusty.
Wol Euler: just as in RL, actually :)
Crusty Goldshark: just as in RL
Fael Illyar: But then again, I didn't put RL money in SL for ... well, I forget how many months but at least 8.
Fael Illyar: (there are ways to get money in SL from other users)
Fael Illyar: just persuade someone to give you some :)
Crusty Goldshark: yep - I am sure things can change - for example I am thinking of getting a santa hat in RL
Wol Euler: that is called "backformation", where SL affects RL
Crusty Goldshark: OK
Fael Illyar smiles.
Fael Illyar: Well, SL is kind of like a place you can use to test things out :)

Gender and appearance.

Crusty Goldshark: Do you ever change gender or species?
Fael Illyar: yes and yes :) ... although the first option is rather rare.
Fael Illyar: or not ;)
Wol Euler: not really, I stick to female and human. Unless you count "neko" as a species?
Wol Euler: though I do have an alt who changes gender and species often
Crusty Goldshark: an alt is another name - not Wol?
Wol Euler: yes, another name. "alternative account"
Crusty Goldshark: got it
Crusty Goldshark: Yesterday I was asked in RL if I was a transvestite
Wol Euler: !!
Wol Euler: wow
Crusty Goldshark: . . .. by my mother . . .
Wol Euler: um, why?
Fael Illyar: that's a bit shocking like that.
Crusty Goldshark: we were talking about how ONCE I dressed as a woman for a party
Wol Euler chuckles.
Fael Illyar: ah, yes, the binary thinking :)
Wol Euler: and she made a mountain range out of that molehill?
Fael Illyar: either, or :)
Crusty Goldshark: took me 6 hours with a lot of help - I was gorgeous
Wol Euler laughs
Crusty Goldshark: yep
Fael Illyar: whoa, that's a while :)
Wol Euler: how did it feel, being gorgeous?
Crusty Goldshark: I seem to remember I had 3 female helpers - shaving hands and arms etc
Crusty Goldshark: I'm used to it
Crusty Goldshark: :)
Wol Euler scoffs and throws a pillow at you
Wol Euler: yes, I suppose I should have known that you would give such an answer.
Wol Euler: OK, how did it fel to be a gorgeous WOMAN?
Crusty Goldshark: Well I did not try to be female - I was not a caricature of a woma - I was myself as a woman - that's all . .
Crusty Goldshark: thanks for the pillow
Wol Euler: my pleasure
Fael Illyar: (this outfit is a freebie by the way)
Wol Euler: nice
Fael Illyar: limited availability though
Crusty Goldshark: Being a woman is not much different or did not seem to be much different for me - people were amused . . . it was at college and the next day I turned up on a dare for cllasses - ah the second time I was a woman . . .
Fael Illyar: second time?
Crusty Goldshark: the party was the first - I just did not remove the very light makeup
Fael Illyar: not the second time then :P
Crusty Goldshark: ok
Fael Illyar: you just continued ;)
Crusty Goldshark: yes
Crusty Goldshark: time for me to go Christmas shopping
Crusty Goldshark: . . .. gotta find my dress - CU you guys :)
Fael Illyar: Sure, see you later Crusty :)
Wol Euler: bye crusty, merry christmas
Crusty Goldshark: thanks you gals :)
Fael Illyar: yes, happy christmas shopping :)
Crusty Goldshark: :)

Crusty leaves us and the conversation turns to autologging.

Wol Euler: do you see the "PaB Listener Master" messages just then?
Fael Illyar: no, didn't see any
Wol Euler: good.
Wol Euler: I reduced them to a few IMs after reading Quilty's complaint on the email group.
Fael Illyar: Yes, it was a bit spammy :)
Wol Euler: it _should_ be silent as far as open chat is concerned
Fael Illyar: those mostly help in diagnosing problems
Wol Euler: the numbers are misssing too, did you notice?
Fael Illyar: Ah, not yet :)
Fael Illyar: I tend to have them hidden behind the chat history window :)
Fael Illyar: nice to see progress here too :)
Fael Illyar: what's next ... I suppose object listener? or do we have that already?
Wol Euler: how is the autoposting progressing? Or have we given up on that?
Wol Euler: object listener is in progress, but won't be done before early January now, I fly to Canada on Sunday
Fael Illyar: Even if we do get autoposting, would be nice to have people checking the logs and making sure everything is ok.
Fael Illyar: Storm won't benefit much from this, apparently, but there are several who do
Wol Euler: I wonder if we were too hasty with the word "automatic"?
Wol Euler: never actually defining what would be automated?
Fael Illyar: perhaps give me a copy of the scripts? I might get inspired to finish it :)
Fael Illyar: Well, Pema was wanting everything to the wiki as fast as possible and autoposting would do that.
Wol Euler: If I may be so bold: I would very much prefer that you would work on the Deki API
Fael Illyar: just ... I actually like the human in between
Wol Euler: because you are the one who knows PHP
Wol Euler: and who built the database.
Wol Euler: the ugly part of posting logs is that we have to use Deki.
Wol Euler: getting the page title right, adding the new page to the month not to a previous log ...
Wol Euler: all that crap
Fael Illyar: once the object listener is done, the functionality for SL part is mostly there.
Wol Euler: right, Fael.
Wol Euler: That is why I would like to you to work on the Deki API.
Wol Euler: because that is NOT done, not at all
Fael Illyar: but before autoposting, it needs to ask for permissions too.
Wol Euler: well, we can forget it then, because it never will be reliable enough for that.
Wol Euler: every time the region is restarted it would lose the list of people who had approved/disapproved, and have to start asking again.
Fael Illyar: do you still reset the script on rez?
Wol Euler: I think we MUST rely on the GOC asking. I see no way around that which is fireproof
Wol Euler: the master, I mean. That should never reset, but in practice it will do so often.
Wol Euler: and because I cannot write from LSL out to a notecard, there is no way to keep what the Master has "learned"
Fael Illyar: well, I could add string storage to the php part
Fael Illyar: for that sort of stuff
Fael Illyar: but ... it does sound like a serious problem if scripts lose status on region restart
Fael Illyar: have you verified this?
Wol Euler: yep, all the lists and variables and states are reset.
Wol Euler: it also happens every time I put a new script into the master, obviuosly.
Fael Illyar: yes, obviously :)
Fael Illyar: so, config storage on the php-part would be necessary

At this point I lost my temper. Sorry, Fael.

Wol Euler: but utterly useless unless we are logging directly into the Deki API
Wol Euler: so we go in a circle.
Wol Euler: we only need that IF we autocreate wiki pages
Wol Euler: Fael, PLEASE write the autocreate pages bit. PLEASE
Fael Illyar: Ah, you're unwilling to write that unless I write the autocreate and I'm unwilling unless you write that :P
Wol Euler sighs.
Wol Euler: ok, whatever.
Wol Euler: write the php bit
Wol Euler: then write the autocraete pages
Wol Euler: whatever
Wol Euler: just PLEASE do it
Wol Euler: I don't have time to learn PHP myself, Fael!
Fael Illyar: the config storage would be good for storing the list of guardians too.
Wol Euler: who else can do this if not you?
Fael Illyar: Probably no-one.
Wol Euler: RIGHT
Wol Euler: Fael, do whatever you have to do to make yourself comfortable with the autocraete
Wol Euler: just PLEASE do it.
Wol Euler: we're five months late.
Wol Euler: the initial estimate was two weeks.
Wol Euler: if this were RL we would both hvae been fired four and a half months ago.
Wol Euler: can you tell that this upsets me?
Fael Illyar: but this isn't work ... Yes, it's obvious you're upset.
Wol Euler: I'm sorry that I am not calm and detached. This is an attachment, yes.
Fael Illyar: I'm just surprised it upsets you _that_ much...

Me too, actually. I took a few deep breaths and tried to be calm.

Wol Euler: I'm away for the better part of two weeks starting Sunday. I may not be able to get into SL at all, I don't know what the connections will be like.
Wol Euler: but I will check e-mail every two or three days, so we can stay in contact that way.
Fael Illyar: But whatever happens with autocreating wiki pages, we could make life easier for many people by just implementing what's necessary for the recorder to actually record all that's needed.
Wol Euler: whatever.
Fael Illyar: my priorities tend to be weighted to making it useful and then make it automatic ... although many things that are needed can't be really automated.
Wol Euler: all right, so where does that leave us?
Fael Illyar: Before we use autorecording, wouldn't it be good idea to have people making sure for a while that the logs are actually intact. As in reading and commenting them.
Fael Illyar: the test-period as Pema would call it
Fael Illyar: umm before we use autoposting
Wol Euler: all right. Do it. Go for it. Write that please.
Wol Euler: and an explanation that we can distribute on the wiki itself and by e-mail, and maybe as a notecard in-world too
Fael Illyar: Well, what I can see necessary for starting the test-period is object-listener plus code in the master to give links to the prepared logs for people.
Wol Euler: absolutely. Go for it.
Fael Illyar: I think I'll see if the wiki system can handle getting the title with copy&paste too...
Fael Illyar: that'd remove the hassle in getting that right
Wol Euler: excellent! go for it.
Fael Illyar: so, can I have the scripts before you leave for Canada?
Fael Illyar: Ah, thank you.
Fael Illyar: any start on the object listener yet?
Wol Euler: nohting that would be of use to you, no.
Wol Euler: I saw that as being unnecessary, so didn't bother with it.
Fael Illyar: ok, I was thinking the object listener could reside in the master object.
Fael Illyar: as a separate script
Wol Euler: mmhmm
Wol Euler: needs to be turned on and off with the sessions, you wouldn't want it running all the time
Fael Illyar: Of course :)
Fael Illyar: it needs to know the session name too
Wol Euler: yep
Fael Illyar: I'll add activating and deactivating it to whatever part currently activates or deactivates it :)
Wol Euler: and rename your scripts to "... v9" and "v5" please, so we don't get confused.
Wol Euler: (before putting htem in the Master)
Fael Illyar: I made copies that I renamed. I'll edit those and keep the originals as they are :)
Wol Euler: try to open the master object, see if you can see its contents
Wol Euler: the base of hte fountain
Fael Illyar: I can see it
Wol Euler: good.
Wol Euler: then you shold be able to replace the script with your own
Fael Illyar: well, contents are no copy, nomod, notrans though :)
Wol Euler: bugger.
Fael Illyar: I can probably add/remove though
Wol Euler: have another look?
Fael Illyar: ok, now they're just notrans
Fael Illyar: good enough :)
Wol Euler: don't want anyone taking copies until they work properly

Summing up, clearing up.

Wol Euler: ok, so where are we?
Wol Euler: can you lay out a roadmap of what you will do during the next few weeks, please?
Wol Euler: so there is no miscommunication
Fael Illyar: I was thinking of creating the object listener plus adding functionality to the master so it can give link to the log to the guardian. And right now I was thinking of seeing if I can make the format.php page contain the title too in a way that wiki will understand as the title, so you can just replace everything in the wiki page with the contents of format.php page.
Wol Euler: good! the page title is probably just <h1>
Wol Euler: view source should reveal that
Fael Illyar: yes, that's what I'd think too
Wol Euler: ok, that's excellent.
Wol Euler: thank you
Wol Euler: I must get back to RL, many things to do before I fly.
Wol Euler: See you this evening perhaps?
Fael Illyar: Ok, see you later :)
Wol Euler: bye fael