Holocluck Henly When they were first developing the extra layers for Universal, I had pipe dreams that the left arm and leg slots would be...well. More than they were. Obviously actual the alpha support that was never bothered with, but also the ability to, even on no mod items!, have some sort of toggle selection to apply right (full) side layers to both sides selectively, and then have the left side be exclusively to add more different layers to the left side (or, even better, just have all layers with a built in always accessible choice between all/left/right, which was my idea of how they would deal with it early in development). (And more flexible layer organization if you're just going to have the one slot, as that still gets into Undershirt/Jacket/etc. layering issues. Which is kind of on my wishlist in general, with the layers people choose to include being down to the decisions and whims of each creator.)

I also originally assumed it would be/wanted to see it applied to the System body and not just mesh bodies that chose to use it. I still haven't entirely given up on System bodies (I have a bunch of mesh heads...but I don't wear any of them as "me"- occasional annoyingly spiky as the default head may be, none of them look like Allegory. I liked my general shape with sliders better for the body than any mesh body that exists as well, though I've learned to grudgingly accept body hopping depending on what I choose to wear), but, well, seems like most people have. The incompatibility of the hands with the Bento system (animation uploads don't even allow for the shape key selection) makes it clear that LL is kind of lumped in there with "most people" now.

Even just for mesh clothing, actually implementing the left/right side properly would be really useful for properly alphaing out clipping- relying on alpha cuts built into a body is messy, to put it lightly. I (and I know I'm not alone on this one) was pretty disappointed with the "support" for left side we were provided not being delivered in a way that was generally usable.

Yman Juran "BOM" applies to mesh bodies, as long as they have been updated with the system (which came out a while ago, so every body that's still active has been). It's the way textures can apply to a body- Bakes On Mesh allows clothing layers, and alpha layers, to be applied to your add-on mesh head and body instead of having to rely on multiple layers of appliers. You can wear the same skin on your System body and ALL of your mesh bodies, without having to get a specific product for each.

If you're talking about shape issues for mesh items, that's an entirely different issue- aside from flipper feet and chunky polygons, the System body doesn't work by the same "rules" as one can use to create mesh items, so it's impossible to create things for it that "just work" all the time. To create prettier AND more flexible shapes, each mesh body came up with its own alternative shaping, and each mesh body is a product by a person who controls who can make items for it- so support for each body is entirely fractured. It's an issue that unfortunately is needlessly complicated, but it is what we are stuck with. There are Legacy basic bodies in your Library now, to wear some items without having to buy an expensive body. They have some limitations, but they can do a lot.

Udim is a way to deal with texture tiles- skins and tattoos for both mesh AND System bodies. It might be the way to go now, as perhaps it could get around some of the issues with the lack of different left and right arm and foot slots at launch.

There were new layers added in the Universal Layer system that were intended to fix that issue, but they were never fully implemented in a useful manner- lacking alpha support and not being able to share even a base layer with the default side, leaving bodies not supporting them so skins didn't support them so bodies didn't support them (as they needed BOTH for either to make sense- and still entirely discarded one of the great things about BOM, the ability to wear old things).

Allegory Malaprop Yman Juran At the same time "BoM" is where a classic avatar may look for modern clothing options since that IS what we are now calling a system layer article of clothing.

As I've said not all of us have turned our backs on full compatibility :) and there are plenty of classic bodies walking around with classic or mesh heads, just as there are people with mesh bodies keeping their classic heads for "branding" purposes.

This was rudimentary even 20 years ago and for the sole purpose of constructing the basics. This mindset was fine in beta but it's time we moved on. There IS a need to update these classic texture layers for independent assymetrical creation.