FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions

[Tad Carlucci]

Long ago, shortly after when we changed the name to the Internet Protocol, I was the principal maintainer of the reference implementation of one of the core protocols. Back then it was all LISTSERV and USENET and every week I had my servers push out the FAQ. One of the other team members had been maintaining the FAQ and it was getting to huge.

When I took over the project, the documentation was a shambles: if it existed, it was way out of date.

While those of us working on the project were of the opinion that "RTFM" was sorta snarky, it came up often because other users would jump and say it before we could give a more full answer. Of course, early on, "RTFM" was more of a joke, since there was no FM to R. So one of the first jobs was to WTFM so users could RTFM! One of my first goals was to eliminate as many FAQs as possible .. by correcting the program and updating the documentation.

FAQs are good, when done right. But the project team should realize that, if an issue occurs often enough to become a FAQ, it probably means there's something wrong with the program or its documentation.

[Kayleigh McMillan]

(12-08-2012 07:46 PM)Tad Carlucci Wrote:  Long ago, shortly after when we changed the name to the Internet Protocol, I was the principal maintainer of the reference implementation of one of the core protocols. Back then it was all LISTSERV and USENET and every week I had my servers push out the FAQ. One of the other team members had been maintaining the FAQ and it was getting to huge.

When I took over the project, the documentation was a shambles: if it existed, it was way out of date.

While those of us working on the project were of the opinion that "RTFM" was sorta snarky, it came up often because other users would jump and say it before we could give a more full answer. Of course, early on, "RTFM" was more of a joke, since there was no FM to R. So one of the first jobs was to WTFM so users could RTFM! One of my first goals was to eliminate as many FAQs as possible .. by correcting the program and updating the documentation.

FAQs are good, when done right. But the project team should realize that, if an issue occurs often enough to become a FAQ, it probably means there's something wrong with the program or its documentation.

ROFL that is just hilarious!

[Bea Shamrock]

giggles at Kay's Reanimator and Tad's acronyms!

[Tad Carlucci]

Added Auction schedules.

[Tad Carlucci]

Added links to some users KittyCatS web pages.

Added who discovered what, when links.

[Bea Shamrock]

Regarding the box produced while cuddling: if all is well, mum should send you an IM that appears in local chat telling you that she's had a kitten and giving you the coordinates. Sometimes my kitties forget about this message, but I think telling they've had a kitten is the standard behaviour.

[Tad Carlucci]

Uploaded the KittyCatS View Pedigree script to the marketplace with a note card explaining how to use it.

[Kitten Longmeadow]

(12-07-2012 08:43 AM)Tad Carlucci Wrote:  Frequently Asked Questions

Interacting in-world with my Cats

I was cuddling my cat and it's lost! What happened?

This is an old, worn-out bug in the Second Life environment. It happens with objects which were rezed in-world by another object and then attached to your avatar using scripted action.

To avoid it, always use Drop from the pie menu, NEVER use Detach. If Drop is not offered, check you're standing on land where you can rez and check you have the correct group tag on to allow you to do so.

To avoid it completely, even if you crash while wearing a cat: take the cat into inventory and Attach it from there. This will let you chose a different attachment point or stack several cats on the same attachment point (yes, even your HUD attachment points!) .. BUT .. you won't see the pretty animation.

Kitten's Note - The cats will only receive the buff to Love/Happiness if attached to the Left Forearm or Chest (Teacup and Toy cats should be attached to either shoulder).

No matter what, it will still happen sometimes that you'll lose a cat. Read the next topic ...

My cat is lost! How do I get it back?

Don't Panic!

If you have a HUD, and the cat is listed, teleport the cat to you, or send it home. You can obtain a HUD at the KittyCatS Main Store.

Check your inventory, especially your Lost and Found and Objects folder. It can help to log out, wait a minute or two, then log back in before doing this.

If the cat has been gone a while you may get a message saying something like "Mew, I'm 30% hungry, please feed me and pay attention to me" followed by an slurl. Use it to teleport to your cat.

If you find your cats frequently wander off your parcel/sim you can reduce their range or turn their walk off.

If none of this works, contact KittyCatS support for assistance.

Kitten's note - If the customer uses the Phoenix or Firestorm Viewer, they can try using Area Search to locate the cat. Keep in mind also that if the cat is on the parcel, it will return to its Home point when it is time to sleep

<snip>

My cat won't eat! What should I do?
My cat won't drink milk! What should I do?

The most likely causes are:

• Food/milk in the wrong group
• Cats in the wrong group
• Food/milk out of range

Try this:

1. Pick up the cats which are not eating, as well as all food and milk.
2. Check your group tag!
3. Rez the food/milk
4. Rez the cats
5. Wait. Give it 30 minutes or so and if you see the hunger go down you should be fine.

Also, if you use one, check the setting on your food/automatic feeder. If it is set to group, be sure all the cats are set to the same group.

If that doesn't help, contact KittyCatS support for assistance.

Kitten's Note - Re-rezzing the cats is not necessary. Re-rezzing the food/milk is enough to restart the script communication between the cat and bowl

I have an FAQ that I keep for CSR use as a working document. I can try to clean it up for customer viewing and post here at a later date.

[Tad Carlucci]

(12-18-2012 01:22 PM)Kitten Longmeadow Wrote:  Kitten's note - If the customer uses the Phoenix or Firestorm Viewer, they can try using Area Search to locate the cat. Keep in mind also that if the cat is on the parcel, it will return to its Home point when it is time to sleep

I thought about mentioning Firestorm's Area Search. But I have never found it to be super reliable. The HUD, on the other hand, always knows all your cats and can call them to you.

(12-18-2012 01:22 PM)Kitten Longmeadow Wrote:  Kitten's Note - Re-rezzing the cats is not necessary. Re-rezzing the food/milk is enough to restart the script communication between the cat and bowl

Rerezzing the cats sets their Home. This should fix problems related to range/home. So, while not strictly required, it still seems a good idea.

[Bea Shamrock]

(12-18-2012 04:56 PM)Tad Carlucci Wrote:  

(12-18-2012 01:22 PM)Kitten Longmeadow Wrote:  Kitten's note - If the customer uses the Phoenix or Firestorm Viewer, they can try using Area Search to locate the cat. Keep in mind also that if the cat is on the parcel, it will return to its Home point when it is time to sleep

I thought about mentioning Firestorm's Area Search. But I have never found it to be super reliable. The HUD, on the other hand, always knows all your cats and can call them to you.

I use a tool called searchbert (luckily I haven't needed to use it in a long time for lost kitties, but use it regularly for boxes when mums forget to IM me or it gets capped). It's free and very reliable. It even points a beam to the matching object(s) found