SL for Nowt

The Basics - 02 - Inventory icons explained

This post is one of a series aimed at newbies in Second Life. In the series, I hope to be able to answer all those questions that newbies have in-world and yet might not want to ask of anyone around them, for fear of appearing silly or noobish. There are no silly questions here; we all wondered these things when we first appeared in-world. *g*

This time we’re heading into the first of several posts about your inventory. This first post will explain the icons you’ll see in there, and the various items they are used for. All is not as obvious as it sometimes may seem!

Hop behind the cut to find out more.

Edit: Once again, WordPress ate the formatting of this post. *sigh* I think I’ve found a crafty workaround, though…

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The basics - 01 - Getting stuff out of boxes

This post is the first in a series aimed at newbies in Second Life. In the series, I hope to be able to answer all those questions that newbies have in-world and yet might not want to ask of anyone around them, for fear of appearing silly or noobish. There are no silly questions here; we all wondered these things when we first appeared in-world. *g*

We begin with boxes. Some of the questions you might have about them are:

* I’m in a store and it has stuff that’s free and in boxes. How do I get it?
* Someone told me I need to ‘rez’ my stuff. What does that mean?
* I got this stuff, but it’s in a box. How do I get it out of the box so I can wear it?
* Why can’t I unpack my boxes here? I keep being told I don’t have permission.
* I tried to wear these clothes I got, but I’m wearing a box. What went wrong?
* I opened the box, but do I choose ‘Copy to inventory’ or ‘Copy and wear’?
* I opened the box, but what’s this about ‘you have selected no-copy items’?
* I opened the box and got the stuff out. Where did it go? How do I find it again?
* What do I do with the box once I’ve got the stuff out of it?

If you’re new, and you have any other questions about boxes, please do feel free to ask them in a comment here, and I will add to the post. I’ve tried to think of all the questions that might be asked, but there’s bound to be something that I’ve missed! Likewise, if you’re an older avatar and notice something that I’ve missed out, please let me know in a comment.

Hop behind the cut for answers to the questions listed above.

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Hi, guys! Last but not least in this series for you is a tutorial in putting together a full AO, or animation overrider. An AO will get rid of that funny, waddling ‘duck walk’ that is the newbie default, and it can also give you many more options for standing, sitting, flying and other poses in-world.

There are many great AOs to be bought in Second Life, and some of them are very pricey. There are a couple of good new freebies around, too, which I’ll mention at the end of this post. But whether you stick with a pre-made freebie or want to put together your own AO with individual animations you’ve found and bought, it’s still a very useful thing to know how to do.

Hop behind the cut for your tutorial.

ETA1: My apologies, guys. Once again, WordPress has screwed up the formatting on a post for me. I’m doing my best to fix it, but it looks a bit squished up at the moment. I hope it’s still readable, for all that :(

ETA2: OK, it’s fixed to the best of my ability. I’m afraid the sidebar is still screwed when you view the post, but the post itself should be more legible.

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Lads, I’m sorry it’s taken me so long. For a while I thought I might have to wind this blog down, but I have managed to put together this second part of the non-newbieness for boys guide.

Hop behind the cut.

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OK, it took a long time to put together, but here - at last! - is the boy’s version of my fast-track guide to non-newbieness.

In this first post, as with the girls’ series, we’re going on a whistlestop tour of the Second Life Grid, only this time it’s purely for the lads.

So, boys. You’ve finished wandering around Orientation Island. You have learned how to walk, fly, and squash medium-sized rodents under the wheels of a car or motorbike. And now you’ve found out how to get into Second Life proper; away from all that newbie learning stuff and into where all the other people are.

All the other beautiful people, that is. How come those guys have a slow, meandering walk when you’re stuttering forward like a toddler that’s only just found its feet? Where did the bloke in front of you get that awesome haircut? Hey, I want a pair of jeans like that, not these horrible newbie things. And argh! Get these flipflops off my feet!

Guys? Breathe. Go make a coffee or grab a beer, then hop behind the cut. In this post we’re going to grab some of the basic stuff you need in order to stop looking so newbish.

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So you’ve got the looks, you’ve got the walk. Now all you need to do is to create a simple AO (animation overrider) so that you no longer have that characteristic set of newbie stand poses. You can use any of the freebie static poses to be found in-world, but I’m going to show you how to use the free animated poses created by ANIMAH, and available at FabFree. If you decide to stay in Second Life, then there are a lot of stores that sell great animations and animation packs, so you can put together your own unique AO. For now, though, we’re concentrating on freebies.

Hop behind the cut.

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In the first post of this series (here) I sent you whizzing around the grid to gather everything you needed to get rid of those newbie looks as quickly as you can. No doubt your inventory is absolutely heaving right now, because I’ll bet you didn’t limit yourself to just what I told you to grab, eh?

*grins* Thought not. You can sort through all that lot later. For now, I’m going to show you how I took Roxie from rough to rawr in less than an hour.

This way, if you please…

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OK, I’ve been away for a while, but I return with a humdinger of a posting series: the fast-track guide to non-newbieness. The first three of these posts will be for the girls, but guys you just have to hang on a couple of days and there’ll be posts for you, too.

So, girls. You’ve completed Orientation Island. You’ve done all the tutorials, you know how to fly and walk and buy stuff (even if you don’t have any money yet) and you finally teleport onto the mainland.

Oh. My. God. Everyone looks gorgeous! Why don’t you look like that? Slowly, you realise that eek! you look like a newbie! You really look like a newbie! Your hair’s AWFUL! Your shoes are crap! You wanna stop looking like that as fast as you can! So you frantically start searching for free stuff, only to find yourself in a load of horrible freebie malls filled with horrible clothes. Maybe you even get griefed at a telehub.

Never fear, Mar is here. Behind the cut is part one of my three-part ‘look good fast’ guide, and it will cost you not one single penny. Or Linden. Whatever. *g*

Follow me, girls. I’ll have you looking great in less than an hour.

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I’ve just been to Bewitched Hair, buying the contents of 12 trees (no laughing about getting a purseful of leaves at the back there!) for their Earth Day hunt (which, due to SL problems, was only just announced). As with all hunts at places as popular as Bewitched Hair, the sim was very busy. I got there within minutes of the group notice going out, and already there were 29 people in the sim, which is pushing the limits of how many it can contain.

Normally, wearing all my clothes, hair, AO, and other bits and bobs, walking or flying around a place as busy as that would be like trying to wade through molasses, but of great help in busy situations is the FREE low-lag avatar, from Shapes By Zada.

No, it doesn’t look pretty, but it does the job. It doesn’t cut lag completely (hell, there’s always enough poufy hair, poufy dresses, bling, AOs galore and other bumph at major stores to mean lag will NEVER completely go away when you use this avatar) but it really does help. (And guys, there’s a male shape in there, too!)

I’ve created a new group tag in Del Mar Updates, for when Mar’s wearing this avatar. It says simply: Low Lag Avatar! And in her picks there’s a section about it with a TP to Shapes By Zada. That pick reads thus:

Spotted me wandering around looking rather strange? If you see me looking completely black from head to toe, and sporting a ‘low-lag avatar!’ title, then that’s what I’m wearing: the low-lag shopping avatar, from Shapes By Zada. This avie is free (check out the TP on this pick) and is ultra low-lag. Useful for busy areas, treasure hunts, and other high-lag situations!

Get the low-lag avatar from the freebie wall at Shapes By Zada.

A little tip for those that go on treasure hunts: sort thy inventory!

I just opened up my main Map window, to try and find a place to teleport to, and I boggled as I realised I had about 25 LMs, all going to the same place. A quick scroll showed several instances of this, and I realised that - after half a dozen treasure hunts of late - it was about time I cleared my inventory of extraneous and duplicate landmarks and notecards. You know the kind of thing: the same LM and info notecard that is put into every single prize in a gridwide treasure hunt.

Then I got stuck into the other LMs and notecards (again duplicates) that I had received when grabbing multiple boxes of freebies from vendors.

One and a half hours later and my inventory is 939 items lighter. Let that be a reminder to you (and to me!) to sort that inventory more often.

939! Sheesh!

Edit: Okay, I broke the 1K barrier because I’ve also just deleted all of the hovering text scripts in my inventory. If I want a hovering text script, I can write one myself. They’re really easy, especially if you follow Torley’s video tutorial: Fun with floating text.

Total unwanted items now deleted = 1109.