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Nov 17, 2005, 2:20am

Sure would be nice to have these before the end of the year.

Bastillion, Curator of The Bastion
aw 1206n 7750w
http://www.bastillion.net
http://forum.bastillion.net

Nov 17, 2005, 11:52am

Is there somewhere I can get the mapper software? I would be willing to
host it, if I could only get the code...

-Jeremy



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Nov 17, 2005, 5:11pm

Regarding 4.1 -- would you rather 4.1 be released by January with bugs
and problems and lacking features or would you rather wait longer and
get a good, high quality product?

I think you ought to push for the mapper update - that's far more
realistic :)

Ryan

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Nov 17, 2005, 5:19pm

I'd call into question the beta process if it's taken that long to pin
down everything.

-Joe

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Nov 17, 2005, 6:16pm

I would beg to differ, everything in software development is relative.

Like the number of features you are adding, the affect they have on the
current ones and possible future ones.

The size of your development team, the array of testing of different systems
required to ensure your product is
functional in the field with a wide array of hardware and software.

based on those facts and the stages taken for testing then I would not
expect to see 4.1 in release until mid next
year and I would not wine if it took that long either.

I would how ever moan if it were released early, was very unstable and have
very few new features.

You have to remember that 4.1 is going be very different from the 3.x
releases to date with all its cool new
features so there will not be the option to run 3.6 and 4.1 at the same time
like with 3.4, 3.5 and 3.6

I for one do not want to convert to find I am costantly pulling my hair out
with crashing worlds, browsers
etc as there will be no way back.

not to mention that I expect value for money so expect to see good
documentation and tutorials to help me
understand the power of 4.1 and how to understand how to use it, model in
it, make avatars etc......


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Nov 17, 2005, 10:16pm

[View Quote] True, but to an extent. All professional software goes through the same
generic alpha/beta/production release cycle.

> Like the number of features you are adding, the affect they have on the
> current ones and possible future ones.

New features should have no effect on older ones, unless the newer one
replaces the older one. Well programmed software allows for expansion
of the program (new features) without disturbing the old ones.

> The size of your development team, the array of testing of different systems
> required to ensure your product is
> functional in the field with a wide array of hardware and software.

Thats why they have the beta testers, each with different systems, to
test the software for them. They need to do little in-house testing on
different machines to get a full array of usability results.

> based on those facts and the stages taken for testing then I would not
> expect to see 4.1 in release until mid next
> year and I would not wine if it took that long either.

Really now. Are they redesigning AW from the ground up or what? You're
saying beta testing is going to take ANOTHER SEVEN MONTHS? Do you know
how much time that is? SEVEN MONTHS.

> I would how ever moan if it were released early, was very unstable and have
> very few new features.

As far as Im aware, all of the features are added in before it hits beta.

> You have to remember that 4.1 is going be very different from the 3.x
> releases to date with all its cool new
> features so there will not be the option to run 3.6 and 4.1 at the same time
> like with 3.4, 3.5 and 3.6

What? Particle systems? Again, they're not redesigning the whole
thing. The wheel does not need to be reinvented, only improved.

> I for one do not want to convert to find I am costantly pulling my hair out
> with crashing worlds, browsers
> etc as there will be no way back.

Wow, seems like I do this now with 3.6. There's always a way back, if
something goes horribly wrong with the production release of 4.1, all
they need to do is load up the 3.6 uniserver and offer the 3.6 browser
for download again. Its as simple as that.

> not to mention that I expect value for money so expect to see good
> documentation and tutorials to help me
> understand the power of 4.1 and how to understand how to use it, model in
> it, make avatars etc......

You wont see any good documentation for it until AFTER it comes out.
People in the community cant document something they dont have. And, as
far as value for your money, you do realize this is AW, right?

>
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Nov 17, 2005, 10:41pm

Signed...them abandoning mapper was most uncool X_X

-Com


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Nov 17, 2005, 10:57pm

We actually just might get 4.1 before the end of the year.

http://www.supportaw.com/featured/ask_aw.html

Top question (at this time of writing):

GSK Asks: "Will there be an open beta in November for 4.1?"

Goshenta Asks: "Has an exact beta release date and version of 4.x been
released yet?"

AWI Answers: "Open beta any day now. Full release, after the open beta ;-)"

So "any day" now, however long that is...

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Nov 20, 2005, 11:45pm

Well, some of you know I got kicked off of 4.1 beta for documenting my bot
evo... But I can be objective..

4.1 is very, very good in some respects, other parts of it I would not
permit to go out from my company if my life depended on it, some of it is
absolutely shocking and the ergonomics are dissasterous.

The GUI is sweet, except the building dialog which lags like hell but at the
last I knew Chris could not allocate time to fix it despite it being a
critical weakness. Also is the use of 'hundreds' of scrolling dialogs, when
really the time should be taken to make tabbed options and create a good
professional impression. I hate the things, I know the dev team hate the
things.

The 4.1 browser has yet again failed to offer more customisation in terms of
options, the blaitantly obvious 30-second-coding features are missing such
as telegram logging and a few more 'elaborate' onces such as grouping
terrain.

The zones feature is dissasterously underutilised, I spent upwards of 30
hours creating literally 10 to 20 good solid ideas for use of these, that
probably wont be implimented.

As for BETA itself, as far as I know there is a group from AW, and some edu
client that is determining most of the 4.1 feature set that also runs 4.1,
as far as the community side in my 700+ hours of using 4.1 I rarely saw more
than 2 people on at once, myself included - although perhaps the exception
to that was Stacee working away at all god forsaken times in her 4.1 world.

There are a few new features, such as the new key-MIDI player which I helped
to write, along with zones and particles. The zone format is absolutely
useless for terms of world use, but may be useful for local builders in
small areas.

In both my personal, and (limited) professional opinion 4.1 is no where near
release standards and if AWI intends for it to be such a major upgrade then
there is an essential need to give all (or at least the majority) of these
simple requests that have been on wishlist for upwards of 3 or 4 years.

Case in point: Security nightmare, no way to see what has been downloaded,
no download audits etc, so on top of that I suggested that as you will find
on a hundred other similar systems, there was an 'only play media I
explicitly select' option - and was met just by agression because it would
'break worlds' more than a user disabling it entirely would... wha?

4.1 has its good points but I will be pissed if it is released in the state
I believe it to be in, it is not worthy of a new release number because the
effort to give what has been requested simply hasnt been made.

It has been made blaitantly clear from chatting with Chris that the browser
is very poorly written in terms of upgrade potential, the majority wrote in
C and has had an array of bugs, one or two of which let me crash the 4.1
universe and worlds 4 or 5 times!

AWI should do whatever they need for the edu client calling the shots, then
spend an extra 3 or 4 months making a decent product, and they should stop
fighting people like me who can give well thought out advice on what people
have wanted, here we go:

the_leet_telegram_log.cpp
void log_telegram(LPCSTR from, LPCSTR to, LPCSTR msg)
{
FILE* fptr = fopen("telegrams.txt", "a+")
if (fptr == NULL) return;
fprintf(fptr, "%s to %s (%s)\n\n%s", from, to, GetTime( ), msg);
fclose(fptr);
}

BOO YA! Outgoing Telegram log feature wrote in 32 seconds.

Guess what, brand new screenshot feature - guess how many screenshots you
can take with it? 1 - then it overwrites it, you can change this in the INI
file, there is no settings option for it!!! - Usefulness in current state:
USELESS!!!

World overrides to the SDK I had to fight for 4 WEEKS to get AWI to realise
that what they had implimented was dissasterous in its current form
(non-identifying), still having to send entire world attributes messages at
once, lazy lazy lazy design process!

We have had literally ever feature we want responded to by 'use a plugin
server' only to find out later that 3 months behind schedual the plugin
server wasnt even to production standard and was a mish mash of code.

I have put hundreds and HUNDREDS of hours into 4.1 and I have been treat by
Chrispeg especially as shite so I think I am well within my rights to vent,
they could have fixed all these things - but I very VERY much doubt it.

PS: With regards to 4.1 docs - I designed impressive documentation for 4.1,
and Shamus became agressive when I said his was poor... saying 'thanks for
telling me about the company I have worked of for 10 years', well to be
quite honest Shamus is just as bad and I actually got BORED of Chris ranting
about shamus. God damn im so angry about all of this.

A proper 'next generation' browser for AW will take months, not days and if
you all knew what was best for you, you would back them in doing that
because I have spent ages promoting 4.1 and saying how good it is, under the
impression that these things would be done.

I have made a signifcant contribution, I have tested more than anyone else,
I know that system inside out and at the way it was when I was forced out
for documenting my bots by Chris (after getting permission from phoning AWI
offices at the cost of a small fortune) I feel betrayed, and I feel like AWI
needs to get their act together.

That is the end of this rant.

--
- Mark Randall
http://zetech.swehli.com

"Those people that think they know everything are a great annoyance to those
of us who do"
Isaac Asimov

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Nov 20, 2005, 11:53pm

God damn its 2am and that had too many spelling mistakes in it to count, and
yes, about 3 or 4 'impliments'.

http://www.temporal-solutions.co.uk/?page=reports/blog_41

^^ Hope I spell checked that one.

--
- Mark Randall
http://zetech.swehli.com

"Those people that think they know everything are a great annoyance to those
of us who do"
Isaac Asimov

Nov 21, 2005, 12:32am

Are things so bad that it'll make more people leave AW?

Any improvement over 3.6 is welcome. It's hard to make a good judgement
though, since I don't have 4.1 in my hands yet. But is it any worse than
3.6?

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Nov 21, 2005, 7:21am

Its got better features than 3.6 - the problem is their implimentation is
lousy.

--
- Mark Randall
http://zetech.swehli.com

"Those people that think they know everything are a great annoyance to those
of us who do"
Isaac Asimov

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Nov 21, 2005, 10:56am

Seems to have become the standard for AWI......

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Nov 21, 2005, 1:11pm

[View Quote] Its a standard for many companies -

However, those companies arnt usualy directly vs there / 2nd life yarda
yarda.

--
- Mark Randall
http://zetech.swehli.com

"Those people that think they know everything are a great annoyance to those
of us who do"
Isaac Asimov

Nov 23, 2005, 4:06pm

yep, and also:
______
348037 Asks: "Is there a rumoured deadline for Active Worlds 4.1 yet?"

AWI Answers: "Yes, before the end of the year."
______

-SWE


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Jan 20, 2006, 4:28am

Wow Strike...

Okies, I think we are all in a little bit of a funk about AWI doing some
definite PR damage. I am the last person to say good things about AWI
(generally), but I at least give them the evil corporate benefit of the
doubt.

Took a look at 4.1 earlier last week, and so far it looks ok. Nothing
totally mind boggling here (as you may have read from Rapier). There are
particle effects, new icons for object types and stuff. VoIP is in there as
well... just some general stuff that would probably have taken the AWI team
about 6 months to implement if it was all just plugins.

Which I am inclined to believe.

The VoIP part was simply dropped in from one of Chris's older contract
programs he had sitting around. The Dockable windows are generally a plugin
system to add to the code (a DLL?) and the zones ability, while quite
spiffy, seems to lack a usefulness off hand.

The particle effects are pretty neat, but not something to rave about
(unless we are talking about the particle snow, which was pretty damned
neat).

The much touted Mover command as far as I am concerned is mostly a joke. If
you have seen vehicles in places like There or Second Life, then you will be
disappointed with the AW implementation of vehicles.

I did seem to notice something about the general 3D engine though that did
make me happy. I jacked up my visibility to 200 and barely had any lag.
Can't even attempt this in 3.6

I am under the impression that 4.1 was supposed to be some huge milestone
for AWI... but all I am seeing so far (and I've broken no rules whatsoever
in this posting) is that while the interface and general program is cleaned
up, it's more or less fluff. Customizable avatars are ok, as is an
inventory... (both in the version I saw) but it just seems lacking still.

Probably awhile off till a feasible release to the AW public.

But there is hope :) For those of you who wish to take a gander at 4.1 ahead
of schedule, and without being "special" and having a beta account with AW
(because we all know that is an exclusive buddy list) -pop over to the
following address online:

http://www.stagecoachisland.com

It's apparently a 4.1 server setup by AW for Wells Fargo Bank...
Registration is free and so is citizenship... I am cit# 1040. From what I
can gather, AWI may be looking to align itself as another version of There
or Second Life. Which would be horribly sad if they did... But since Stage
Coach Island is a seperate server and availible to the public, there can be
no harm is telling people about it's existence.

Take a look at 4.1 for yourself and draw your own conclusions. No VoIP and
stuff, but the majority of the features are there to take a look at.

MPL Knight
http://www.vr5online.com




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Jan 20, 2006, 4:42pm

You think particle emitters and zones are useless??? How much building do
you do, lol. Doesn't realize their potential you :P

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Jan 20, 2006, 5:04pm

[View Quote] > You think particle emitters and zones are useless??? How much building do
> you do, lol. Doesn't realize their potential you :P
>
>

Well,,,, someone who comes to AW in every 6 month (according to him), probably has no affinity to the system :)

--
Andras
"It's MY computer" (tm Steve Gibson)

Jan 20, 2006, 6:20pm

Well... not saying that they are "useless".

> The particle effects are pretty neat, but not something to rave about
> (unless we are talking about the particle snow, which was pretty damned
> neat).

Just disappointed at the implementation. Yes, particle effects are a great
thing (as I said about the snow). It will allow us to create weather in
small spots, but I am unaware of if this is useful for the world itself - ie
being able to set a particle effect for the entire world and not just a
small area.

I never said anything about coming into AW every six months. What I said was
that I don't get into here often to check up on messages. Here, being the
newsgroups.

I am happy to see the implementation of Autolook, as avatars rightly should
have the ability to gaze.

The mover command is slightly lacking in my opinion, but it's just that, my
opinion. From my guess, AW 4.1 comes across as an inexpensive version of
There, which is probably why Wells Fargo dropped SL in favor of AW (other
than the fact that SL doesn't allow seperate servers).

Seeing as Stage Coach Island looks like a prerelease of 4.1 (sans bug fixes)
I would think that the actual release would be alot more polished up.

Again, this is AW we are talking about. The same people who say that
switching between full screen and windowed mode causes crashes, when every
other 3D system offers that ability just fine (There, Second Life, Plastic
Planet). And that mirrors are just too much to implement. (Of course the guy
who created Plastic Planet single handedly now works for AW and he had
mirrors no problem in PP3D...)

The point here being that, while these things can be useful to a degree for
AW, their only purpose is to vaguely compete with SL and There. The
poverbial "me too" syndrome. For years AW has neglected these types of
innovations in their own browser, but now that competition is popping up, AW
suddenly says "we can do that too!" and proceeds to throw up a vaguely
comparible system.

Kind of like Microsoft suddenly seeing the light and offering 2GB of space
and nifty new features to hotmail after Google Mail starts stomping them
into the ground. Now a little survey says "Let us know what you think!", not
because they actually care about what you think, but because they suffer
from "me too" syndrome.

Yes, AW4.1 is a leap ahead from 3.6 - I give it that much (hence the part
about evil corporate benefit of the doubt). But it is still about two steps
behind it's competition.

The mover command is a step up from a bot doing the same thing (aka when
clicking an item the bot turns you into that object as an avatar). There is
some other details involved here, turn on axis etc, but it's generally a
suped up avatar switcher. Which is ok for AW.

But it's not like we are looking at Dune buggies, hoverboards and jetpacks
with realistic movement physics (like you see in There). Maybe nobody has
coded such a thing into the uniserver yet? Maybe I just don't get it.

A great thing to have customizable avatars, except as promised from AW
themselves, it's nothing more than a Mr Potatohead approach. Not like you
could go into your settings for avatars and set a web address where your
custom avatar is located. Which is something that is a standard even back to
VRML (Cybertown, Blaxxun). That is a custom avatar. And since this *is* 2006
I would expect the ability to actually do a fully customizable avatar like
you do in every other system (Sims, There, Second Life) if you do not have a
totally custom avatar made from scratch.

Alot of things are possible here. That AW is playing catch up to other
companies for the pure sake of money is not a problem, really. Thats how
business is done in the real world. But now that There and Second Life are
striving to shake the tag of "Online Game Environment" and AW is embracing
it just shows they are a step behind.

AW is a metaverse system. That is how it was originally designed, as you
would see in COFMeta. The structure in the browser exists to create a fully
3D Internet, embedded into normal webpages or standalone in it's own
browser. Instead we treat this like a suped up chatroom or "game". That
this is a metaverse also begs the question of why such a system is not a
real plugin... for instance, when you load up Blaxxun, it's a plugin - one
download works across all Blaxxun based worlds and systems. So why are we
downloading multiple copies of the AW browser for multiple systems?

It's totally possible to throw in the ability to have a single browser cross
multiple systems. And maybe have the ability for a system to block the main
browser in favor of seperate downloads. This whole island unto themselves
thing is going to kill the industry. It's a "betamax" approach. Now if a
user could download AW once and know that any company using AW technology on
the internet would be accessible (disregarding cit fees per server) without
having to download esentially the same browser again, then the AW browser
would propagate rediculously across the Internet as a standard for 3D
internet.

The real world is having a serious crisis of understanding right now. Entire
conferences comprised of some of the best minds in computing have no idea
what to call 3D Internet space. It's not really a game, but there are games
in the system to play. It's not entirely fake, as you can see from real
business offering shopping in here. Real and fake money easily change hands.
Communities form effortlessly, and the landscape isn't always predesigned by
a central company - so it is forever evolving in real time.

What we have here is a highly underutilized Metaverse. There is no reason we
cannot make this place more realistic looking (god knows textures do wonders
in here). But we somehow choose to do a poor job and not push ourselves. Its
a shame.

AW is a great company, I give them that much. While poorly marketed and
constantly playing catchup... and highly misunderstood. The technology
itself is nothing short of miraculous. When the rest of the world as just
discovering the world wide web, AW released Alphaworld. Way ahead of its
time.

I definitely have an affinity for this system. I just know it's not living
up to it's potential. I also know the old VHS vs. Betamax addage. VHS always
wins in the end. It may not be as pretty, or as high tech - but it always
wins over Betamax.

MPL Knight











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