Subject: [vwrap] Assets & Avatar space

From: Dzonatas Sol <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 09 Apr 2011 09:19:34 -0700

One thing to keep in mind is that ultimately it is the avatar and not 
the region that has the rights to wear whatever the user chooses the 
avatar to wear. Of course, it is not implemented that way right now 
since the grid overrides it all by default.

It may be simpler in the future to think of only physical and phantom 
data being sent to the grid and the local-region/local-simulator knows 
all other details the grid doesn't need to know. I think where this has 
comprehensively failed earlier by avoidance of middle-ware, as it 
appears that way. Assets are not quite split between physical data and 
everything else.

Let me know if I need to give more detail for above.

In particular, futurewise, avatar space (or space around the avatar) 
should be completely owned by the avatar in order to make sure 
consistent simulation occurs and there is no "can I wear these clothes 
before and after teleport" type questions. The answer should always be 
yes with only appropriate exceptions (adult/pg, battle sims/script 
limits, rpg, etc). This is, by the way, the dumb childish banning deal 
from... you know... and any further physics prediction makes it obvious 
what some want to avoid per their personal-agenda/biz-agenda rather than 
what's best for the avatar/user-experience. They cried the sky is 
falling (not in public) with loss of $$$ if it happens, and never 
considered the facts over the paranoid despair,  and called everybody 
stupid for any presentation of this. Obviously, a pinning point.

Seriously (& professionally), when you put on your clothes in the 
morning do you ever get faced with someone that says "hay you can't do 
that! Your stupid because our business down the road will lose $$$ if 
you let others see your clothes! You must wear what we allow you to 
wear! And we know you are going to walk down that road!"

All other disagreements of ability to render the clothes falls-back to 
the default conditioners and refineries (i.e. collada). That being it is 
the local-renderer that really displays the avatar, and the abilities to 
render the avatar is appropriately the onus of the viewer technology, 
not the grid technology. The viewer can display a lower-rez OBJ, refined 
from the collada file, rather than a higher rez format. (Of course, not 
all assets are collada, yet I have to remind someone of this as 
futurewise and ideal-consideration/from-use-case before another endless...).

---

From: Carlo Wood <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 9 Apr 2011 21:37:35 +0200

On Sat, 09 Apr 2011 09:19:34 -0700
Dzonatas Sol <[email-masked]> wrote:

Although it should be known / is known, then I'm all for
freedom ;)... I think I have to disagree.

I think that the reason for our disagreement is that
there is a difference between "being allowed to wear" something
and "being the authority" about what you wear.

Please recall that "authority" means no more and no less
than that it is the sole source of mutating messages:
mutating messages cannot be denied: downstream is TOLD that
something changed; hence the word 'authority'.

Let me add my remaining comments below in context.

> since the grid overrides it all by default.

While I agree that the viewer, or at least the Agent, should be
the authority for protocol messages that propagate changes of
what an avatar is wearing, it is possible and therefore has to be
supported that *someone* thinks it is needed that you can't be
allowed to wear whatever you like.

You even give an example of that yourself! In a PG region you
could be disallowed to take of your clothes.  If you are in a
prison you have to wear some uniform... It's not up to use to
decide that such use case should not be supported at protocol
level.
 
> data being sent to the grid and the local-region/local-simulator
> knows all other details the grid doesn't need to know. I think where
> this has comprehensively failed earlier by avoidance of middle-ware,
> as it appears that way. Assets are not quite split between physical
> data and everything else.

I have no idea what this paragraph means :(

> Let me know if I need to give more detail for above.

Yup, definitely ;)
 
> consistent simulation occurs and there is no "can I wear these
> clothes before and after teleport" type questions.

Not sure what you mean with 'space around the avatar'? The 3D space
around an avatar is nothing to do with what they wear imho. But I'll
assume you mean "what they wear", or more in general, "their
appearance".

> The answer should
> always be yes with only appropriate exceptions (adult/pg, battle
> sims/script limits, rpg, etc).

Even a single exception means the protocol has to support it, so you
are contradicting yourself here.

> This is, by the way, the dumb childish
> banning deal from... you know... and any further physics prediction
> makes it obvious what some want to avoid per their
> personal-agenda/biz-agenda rather than what's best for the
> avatar/user-experience. They cried the sky is falling (not in public)
> with loss of $$$ if it happens, and never considered the facts over
> the paranoid despair,  and called everybody stupid for any
> presentation of this. Obviously, a pinning point.

Not sure what you mean here... but it sounds like politics.
Unfortunately, we are not to make any political decisions: we have to
design a protocol that supports *every* required use case, by anyone.

> morning do you ever get faced with someone that says "hay you can't
> do that! Your stupid because our business down the road will lose $$$
> if you let others see your clothes! You must wear what we allow you
> to wear! And we know you are going to walk down that road!"

This is your opinion, and might be mine... but I fail to see what
it has to do with protocol design. We will have to support a use case
where some region wants to be able to refuse certain types of
appearances.

I think, therefore, that what it has to look like when you want to
change what you wear is something like this:

Agent --> Region  "Is it ok if I wear this?"
Region --> Agent  "Yes"
Agent --> Region Avatar is now wearing this.
Region --> others Avatar is now wearing this.

Note that Region is not sending back the message to the Agent,
because the Agent already made the change: the actual mutating
message is exclusively streaming away from the Agent.

If we didn't first ask the Region if it was ok, you get
the following problem(s):

Agent --> Region: I'm wearing X now!
Agent --> Region: I'm wearing Y now!
Agent --> Region: I'm wearing Z now!
Region --> Agent: You are not allowed to wear Y!

and the Agent has a problem synchronizing itself with what
the rest of the world sees: the refusal message has become a mutating
message (the Agent has to change back) and is travelling UPSTREAM
towards the authority. This leads to problems.

> All other disagreements of ability to render the clothes falls-back
> to the default conditioners and refineries (i.e. collada). That being
> it is the local-renderer that really displays the avatar, and the
> abilities to render the avatar is appropriately the onus of the
> viewer technology, not the grid technology. The viewer can display a
> lower-rez OBJ, refined from the collada file, rather than a higher
> rez format. (Of course, not all assets are collada, yet I have to
> remind someone of this as futurewise and
> ideal-consideration/from-use-case before another endless...).
> _______________________________________________ vwrap mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/vwrap

-- 
Carlo Wood <[email-masked]>

---

From: Dzonatas Sol <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 09 Apr 2011 13:53:55 -0700

My comments inline...

> and "being the authority" about what you wear.
That sounds more like semanticists argue about and not issues that 
programmers need to worry about. There is no reason to create straw men 
and then claim I'm contradiction over your straw man, not myself.

> something changed; hence the word 'authority'.

The arguments you presented, however, is that you say "region" 
semantically GOD. Why should we agree to your god? Again, semantics just 
turn the issue religious rather than something programmers really need 
in general.

There are "trust domains" and people screamed semantics over the word 
"domains", yet that already proves that that domains are what 
programmers desires just because, as the word is used in math, they need 
to know the range of relationships.

If some group doesn't implement the documentation then they need to use 
language the implementators desire and makes sense to them, not only 
what the writer prefers. That's like "do what I say, not as I do." I'm 
sure people, especially those who actually implement, don't need this 
kind of "authority".

> decide that such use case should not be supported at protocol

Again, lets not make this religious debate. Whatever the avatar wears is 
100% the result what the human being allows. Whatever happens to the 
avatar is 100% the result of what the human being allows. We are not 
going to allow clowned-jar-head psycho-traumatic "gods". We learned this 
lesson well back at the start of MUDs and MOOs where people used to 
think exceptions meant that the human being "lost control" of themselves 
due to virtual experiences.

Technically, what you want, by exceptions, happens to the agent, not the 
avatar.

> I have no idea what this paragraph means :(

Thats is probably why you disagree besides semantics.

Assets need their physical data separate from their visual data. The 
viewer/visual-simulator only needs the visual data. The physics 
simulator only needs the physics data. There is no need for either to 
have the complete asset. This is something that can help protect assets, 
future-wise, if someone asks for the complete assets, as we can then 
error back and say "either your are the visual side or the physical 
side, not both, unless your the owner of the asset." Optimization can 
happen also, likewise, where only partial data needs to go to either the 
grid or or the viewer instead of the full asset.

There is nothing political about those differences.

> assume you mean "what they wear", or more in general, "their

The space around the avatar is the simulation. What probably confuses 
this is that 256x256x(some-value) has become the default region of 
simulation. That's mainly due to technological and political reasons and 
not due to natural reasons. Within more natural reason, the space around 
your avatar is it's own simulation. If these simulations overlap, then 
there would be technology ability to compute such overlapped regions. 
This is not the current case, yet we want this to be the case. There are 
experimental simulators that due exactly these cases (even spherical 
instead of borgish cubes).

> are contradicting yourself here.

Don't create straw men and tell me I'm in contradiction of your straw men.

Given the overlap of regions, there is no contradiction.

> design a protocol that supports *every* required use case, by anyone.

True, yet there are some that appear here and on other lists that 
keep-up their agendas. It's strange when some business considers 
themselves open, yet they are not open to ideas of optimization due to 
political nature of revenue. Due consider how you even pointed out with 
semantics above about "authority", some only want to play god.

Any need for any region/server to play god is obvious turtles on 
turtles. Do you ever have to ask Earth if you can wear your jeans?

> towards the authority. This leads to problems.

This is easily solved by what "materials" the regions supports, and by 
regions we mean both visual and physical sides. Materials is one of 
those ideals (even by LL) that has been around for years that hasn't 
seen any practical implementation by LL or compatibles. This is one of 
those use-cases, however.

Avatar --> Agent : I just put on asset X!
Agent --> Region : Asset X uses material A, B, or C.
Region --> Agent : We only support material B.
Agent --> Avatar : Use material B.

This only further the case about conditioners and refineries. The 
refinery can take asset X and compile it with material B to produce what 
the region supports.

The viewer & human-user both technically denote the "Avatar" above as 
user and automation. The agent is the region's automaton in sync with 
the avatar's and region's simulation(s).

People get confused by conditioners and refineries because they still 
think in terms of parametric primitives.

-- 
--- https://twitter.com/Dzonatas_Sol ---
Web Development, Software Engineering, Virtual Reality, Consultant