Particle interference?

[Ozwell Wayfarer]

I'm am having a strange issue with particle scripts. I have a smoke script and a fire script. Both work well individually. The smoke always has no issue with it, but when the fire script is rezzed, if the smoke particle effect is present on sim but off screen, the smoke particle texture starts to "jump into" the fire script and flickers like mad. It looks awful.

Another bizarre aspect of this I have just noticed....I have a two monitor setup, so my viewer is on one screen, this forum is on the other. When my viewer is selected, the issue occurs, when I select my firefox window, its stops immediately. Select the viewer and it starts again. Weird. I checked the scripts and there is no conflicting information. Both scripts should be totally independent.

[Ilan Tochner]

That sounds like a viewer rendering problem Ozwell. Maybe the shader code you're using for both these effects uses a blink effect which causes them to look like they're flickering when they're overlayed on top of each other.

[Handy Low]

This sounds like a known issue with the SL viewer code (and inherited by TPVs). I believe that LL are working on a fix. It was introduced when the ribbon particles feature (something not currently available in OpenSim) was added.

Here is a Firestorm JIRA that discusses the problem: http://jira.phoenixviewer.com/browse/FIRE-11744

[Kayaker Magic]

Another known particle "feature" on Open Simulator is "particle starvation".
According to the SL Wiki, if you set PSYS_SRC_BURST_RATE to 0.0 the particles will be generated "as fast as possible".
But in OpenSim, if several emitters set this parameter to zero, they will starve all the rest of the emitters in the sim, which will emit very infrequently.
I read somewhere, can't find it now, that in OpenSim you should avoid (as in NEVER) set PSYS_SRC_BURST_RATE to zero, use a small number that gets the effect you want, but never set that to zero.
Try changing both of your scripts to PSYS_SRC_BURST_RATE, 0.001, and see what happens.

[Keith Selmes]

I think I've observed particle starvation, that describes it very well.
I simply assumed I'd overloaded my system.
I might check a few things ...

[Handy Low]

Another known particle "feature" on Open Simulator is "particle starvation".
According to the SL Wiki, if you set PSYS_SRC_BURST_RATE to 0.0 the particles will be generated "as fast as possible".
But in OpenSim, if several emitters set this parameter to zero, they will starve all the rest of the emitters in the sim, which will emit very infrequently.
I read somewhere, can't find it now, that in OpenSim you should avoid (as in NEVER) set PSYS_SRC_BURST_RATE to zero, use a small number that gets the effect you want, but never set that to zero.
Try changing both of your scripts to PSYS_SRC_BURST_RATE, 0.001, and see what happens.

Yes, the OpenSim particle system is bugged, and even with non-zero values of PSYS_SRC_BURST_RATE more particles are emitted than should be. A script run in both SL and OpenSim will produce noticeably more particles in the OpenSim environment.

[Dundridge Dreadlow]

Particle starvation explains what happens to my particles on my test world !
(luckily not my scripts, heh)

[Ozwell Wayfarer]

Though I dont think it is related to my issue, I have certainly seen Particle Starvation occurring and assumed the same as others that there were simply too many particles onscreen and overloading. Thats a useful bit of info.

[Handy Low]

Regarding "particle starvation", be careful that you're not seeing the old missing particles bug - some TPVs still have that code (the InWorldz beta viewer, for example). The current Firestorm is OK in that respect.

Here's the Firestorm JIRA for that bug: http://jira.phoenixviewer.com/browse/FIRE-4434.

[Constance Peregrine]

I have noticed that Torben Asp's shows seem to be more vibrant in OS grids, to my eye [yes, I only have one eye].

I used to see them in SL when I logged in there some time back, and of course have seen them in several OS grids, including here.

That's, this silly guy, who dances funny but cutely http://www.torbenasp.com/