How come I barely ever see furniture, especially OpenSim-made furniture, with SFposer? It's always either PMAC or, if people don't even know PMAC or dislike its shortcomings, AVsitter.

Maybe it's because nobody knows that SFposer even exists. But it does: (https://opensimworld.com/library?view=44). A starter pack with a copy of the manual can be found on Satyr's sim OpenSimWorld (https://opensimworld.com/hop/74730).

For those who don't know it, and I guess it's most of you: SFposer is an animation controller. Much like AVsitter which can be found in just about all furniture copybotted from SL, probably also because it uses AVsitter in SL already which you can simply replace after the scripts got lost in transition. Very similar to PMAC which is often used in furniture made in and for OpenSim. And somewhat like poseball-based MLP which was state-of-the-art about a decade ago.

In other words, it makes those blue menus that pop up when you sit down on a chair or a bed, and that let you choose your sitting animation. This is what an animation controller does. This is what AVsitter and PMAC do. And this is what SFposer does.

Like PMAC which was created by the same person as the Clubmaster dance ball and those line dance floors, SFposer was made in OpenSim and for OpenSim. Its creator and maintainer is Satyr Aeon, the same person who runs OpenSimWorld and who also gave us the Satyr Farm and SFsail. And it's open-source, but that's what PMAC, AVsitter and MLP are, too.

Now, what's so great about SFposer? In which way shall it be better than PMAC and omnipresent AVsitter?

In general, SFposer combines all advantages of PMAC with almost all advantages of AVsitter. And it adds being the least resource-heavy animation controller on top. SFposer furniture only needs one single script, no matter what. And this one script safely shuts down after use.

If you compare it with PMAC, it's extremely similar. In fact, SFposer is backwards-compatible with PMAC. You can easily convert PMAC furniture to SFposer without even touching the config, just by replacing a few bits and pieces.

Its major advantage over PMAC is that everyone can adjust their position. This has always been AVsitter's killer feature over PMAC. With PMAC, only the owner can adjust positions and even this only by editing the piece of furniture and moving the position markers around. With SFposer, everyone can does that. SFposer is the ultimate animation controller for romantic and especially sex furniture.

Also, while PMAC is already easy on resources, SFposer is even easier. As I've already mentioned, SFposer only uses one script, and this script can do everything. PMAC's main script doesn't offer much beyond basic functionality. Extra functions require plug-ins, i.e. more scripts. SFposer doesn't need plugins.

This advantage is even bigger over AVsitter which is still widely considered the be-all, end-all, ultimate animation controller. AVsitter always needs two scripts per avatar. For absolute bare-bone functionality. A park bench for two needs four scripts at the very least. Any extra feature is an extra script. You want to make an orgy bed for four avatars with some extra bells and whistles? That's a dozen scripts at least. SFposer can do the same with one single script. The same and more.

This also means that SFposer can do stuff out-of-the-box for which AVsitter add-ons are very hard to find, if there are any in the first place. For example, NPCs. Or rezzing props on the furniture. Or rezzing props on avatars, e.g. in their hands. SFposer can put a mug in your hand if you're sitting on a café chair. All with that one script. Okay, the mug itself needs an internal script, but that isn't any different from PMAC.

Besides, SFposer makes it fairly easy for creators to adjust initial avatar positions when making furniture or scripting unscripted furniture. Just like PMAC, you can put it into edit mode, and then you get position marker prims which you can push around. No manually entering coordinates into notecards or something. Speaking of which: If you copy the SFposer settings from another similar but differently-sized piece of furniture, you don't have to re-adjust everything. You can instead enter a general offset for all animation positions. This also makes slapping an invisible prim onto furniture just for animations unnecessary.

AVsitter has only got one major advantage over both SFposer and PMAC: Since it comes from Second Life (don't worry, it's still legal), it's written in LSL, and it works on sims where pretty much all OSSL has been disabled by the sim or grid owner. Exceptions apply whenever an AVsitter-scripted piece of furniture can do something that doesn't exist in Second Life: Since Second Life doesn't have NPCs, you can't control them with LSL; it takes OSSL to control them. Thus, the rare NPC plug-in for AVsitter is written in OSSL.

Some minor advantages include a camera control plug-in and being able to specify different default starter animations for male and female avatars. Mimics control isn't AVsitter-exclusive; it's built into SFposer, too.

Those long-time OpenSim users amongst you who are several years behind in OpenSim technology may still see MLP as state-of-the-art because it was just that in their days. But PMAC already rendered MLP obsolete, and PMAC came before AVsitter.

So here are the advantages over MLP:

You don't have to click the furniture first before using it, nor do you have to wait for SFposer to initialise itself first. You can sit down right on the furniture instead of having to wait for poseballs to rez. There are no poseballs. Again, you can adjust your position even if you aren't the owner of the furniture. You can have NPCs. And it only takes one lightweight script to do what often requires over a dozen CPU-hogging scripts in MLP. MLP is easily the most resource-heavy animation controller out there; SFposer is the most lightweight one.

Fortunately, you can convert furniture from MLP to SFposer. You can also convert it from PMAC or AVsitter to SFposer.

PMAC to SFposer is easy: You throw out all scripts, you drop three items from the SFposer starter pack in, you reset the script, and you're done. Even tinkering with the config is optional. If you have plug-ins, convert their configs with this: https://opensimworld.com/tools/pmac

MLP and AVsitter to SFposer requires a bit more of an effort because you need new notecards. The notecard converter for MLP is here: https://opensimworld.com/tools/mlp2pmac The one for AVsitter's AVpos is here: https://opensimworld.com/tools/avpos2pmac