Month: May 2014

The danger of obsession, the path of reincarnation and tales to tell

Posted on by Inara Pey

It’s time to kick-off another week of fabulous story-telling in Voice, brought to Second Life by the staff and volunteers at the Seanchai Library.

As always, all times SLT, and unless otherwise stated, events will be held on the Seanchai Library’s home on Imagination Island.

Sunday May 25th

13:30: Tea-time at Baker Street: The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes

Tea-time at Baker Street sees Caledonia Skytower, Corwyn Allen and Kayden Oconnell open the pages of The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes, the final set of twelve Sherlock Holmes short stories first published in the Strand Magazine between October 1921 and April 1927.

This week: The Adventure of the Illustrious Client.

The year is 1902, and Sir James Damery visits Holmes and Watson on behalf of his mysterious and illustrious client. The latter never actually directly revealed to the reader, although it might well be the king himself.

Damery’s client is concerned about the relationship between Violet de Merville, daughter of General de Merville, and Baron Adelbert Gruner, from Austria. Gruner is viewed as a rogue and a sadist and – in Damery’s and Holmes’ opinion – a murderer.

Despite the matter of his last wife’s mysterious death and his reputation, Violet de Merville will not be dissuaded from her determination to marry Gruner. So secure is the latter in his position that he is unfazed by a visit from Holmes – indeed, he warns the latter that a French agent who once confronted him with similar accusations finished-up a cripple for life after receiving a beating from thugs shortly afterwards; a veiled threat if ever there was one.

So, lacking obvious proof, how do Holmes and Watson prevent Violet de Merville from marrying Gruner and possibly facing the same future as the Baron’s last wife?

Find out more by joining Cale, Kayden and Corwyn.

18:00: Magicland Storytime: More Selections from Flora and Ulysses

Join Caledonia Skytower in Magicland Park as she selects more reading from Kate DiCamillo’s second novel to win a prestigious Newbery Award (the first being The Tales of Despereaux in 2004).

Monday May 26th, 19:00: Hunter SL Thompson

Join the inimitable Crap Mariner in what is certain to be a most enjoyable and unusual voyage of words (the clue is in the title, folks!

Tuesday May 27th, 19:00: A Dog’s Purpose

Reincarnation can be confusing for a human; reborn into different lives, trying to learn lessons of the past in order to discover one’s purpose … Imagine what it must be like for a dog.

That’s exactly what humourist W. Bruce Cameron has done in his 2010 best seller A Dog’s Purpose.  Bailey, pup of a stray, is rather surprised to find himself reborn as a Golden Retriever after being euthanized. It surprises him even more when, after a happy life involving a young boy, a farm and more, Bailey passes from the world … only to return, this time in the body of a German shepherd bitch, and the realisation he is serving some higher purpose – but what?

Travel with Caledonia Skytower and Kayden Oconnell as they journey through Bailey’s heartwarming and funny tale of many lives, a dog’s-eye commentary on human relationships and the unbreakable bonds between man and man’s best friend; a story in which love never dies, and true friends are always with us.

Wednesday May 28th, 19:00:  Aoife in Ireland

With Aoife Niphredil.

Thursday May 29th

16:00 Freda in Progress

With Freda Frostbite.

19:00: Scylla and Charybdis, Part 2

From the pages of Greek mythology come Scylla and Charybdis, two immortal and irresistible monsters who beset the narrow waters (though to be the Straits of Messina) traversed by the hero Odysseus in his wanderings as described by Homer in his epic Odyssey. Scylla, a supernatural creature, with 12 feet and 6 heads on long, snaky necks, each head having a triple row of shark-like teeth, was once human in appearance, according to Ovid. Her transformation, he claimed within his Metamorphoses, was the result of jealousy and witchcraft on the part of Circe.

Credit: Bookpalace.com
Credit: Bookpalace.com

Charybdis, on the opposite shore of the narrows, was said to lurk under a fig tree and drank down and belched forth the waters of the straits three times a day. The shipwrecked Odysseus barely escaped her clutches by clinging to a tree until the improvised raft that she swallowed floated to the surface again after many hours.

Join Shandon Loring as he takes us, as the saying goes, “between Scylla and Charydbis”.

—–

Please check with the Seanchai Library SL’s blog for updates and for additions or changes to the week’s schedule. The featured charity for May-June is Habitat for Humanity: envisioning a world where everyone has a decent place to live.

Related Links

Loki: using the Xbox Controller with the Oculus Rift

Posted on by Inara Pey

Earlier in May I reported on Dave Rowe’s work integrating the Xbox 360 controller with his CtrlAltStudio viewer, allowing it to be used with the Oculus Rift or Stereoscopic 3D viewing options in that viewer, as well as with the normal display mode.

On Saturday May 24th, Loki Eliot tweeted that he’d been working on a similar approach, using the Xbox 360 controller and a dictation feature of OSX Mavericks to provide greater control over his avatar when using the Oculus Rift.

loki-tweet

Since tweeting, Loki has produced a blog post on his work, including links to the software he’s used and tutorials to help get things sorted out. his original video was posted to Telly, which WordPress.com doesn’t like, embedding-wise. However, Draxtor has, with Loki’s permission, reposted it to You tube, and so it’s that version I’ve embedded here.

Loki is the first to admit this approach doesn’t solve all of the Oculus related issues when using Second Life – he has a few wry observations as to where things will “suck” (his expression – not mine!). He also gives some musings on how technology might further assist things in the future.

Loki's work on integrating the Xbox 360 controller for use with SL and the Oculus Rift (image via Loki Eliot)
Loki’s work on integrating the Xbox 360 controller for use with SL and the Oculus Rift (image via Loki Eliot)

The use of HMDs brings with it a lot of challenges – some of which, the Lab freely admits in releasing its Oculus Rift project viewer, it has yet to really tackle. Seeing experiments like this is therefore interesting, as they demonstrate potential alternative (and not necessarily hyper-expensive) means of providing control over basic aspects of using SL with a headset which are not reliant on the keyboard and mouse and, in this case at least, also not dependent upon in-world voice (which many people don’t like to use for a wide variety of reasons). I wonder if approaches like this and Dave Rowe’s work with CtrlAltStudio might raise an eyebrow or two of interest at the Lab …?

Related Links

In the garden of The Snow Lion

Posted on by Inara Pey

The Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez; Inara Pey, May 2014, on FlickrThe Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez (click for full size)

The roar of the Snow Lion is a call for the awakening and integration of the body and the mind.  This garden is dedicated to that perfect integration and to the resulting bliss.

Thus reads part of the description for The Snow Lion, which occupies a quarter of Oceanside dAlliez; a place of serene beauty and tranquil settings.

The design, by parcel owner Sethos Lionheart, carries a strong oriental theme – which is the reason it caught my eye when browsing the Destination Guide – and is cleverly laid-out, offering paths to explore and secluded spots to discover.

The arrival point is in the lower portion of the garden, and the motif here may not be readily apparent until you cam out a little. When you do, you’ll realise land and water have been carved into a yin-yang, the Chinese philosophical concepts used to describe how apparently opposite or contrary forces are actually complementary.

The Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez; Inara Pey, May 2014, on FlickrThe Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez (click for full size)

The cleverness of this design is easy to miss: the yin is formed by the water element – in keeping with its passive, soft, and wet characterisation and its association with water. It is rich with water lilies as it curls around the landing-point to join with the sea. The yang element, by contrast, forms a sweep of land, fully in keeping with its solid, hard character. Follow its curve, and it will lead you to a torii gate sitting before a bamboo grove and guarded by two lions. Here the path climbs upwards, passing under a stone arch before splitting left and right.

Follow the path to the right, and it will take you on around the lower part of the garden to a natural-looking pool, fed by water from falls on one side, and open to the sweep of the water “yin” on the other. A stone bridge arches over the water, offering the way to a western-style folly and a quiet place to sit.

To the left, the path runs past a stone terrace, home to a grand piano shaded by the boughs of a huge cherry blossom tree, before climbing more steps upwards to a grassy nook. Here sit cut logs on which to sit, and a harp to play, while the path passes onward  to come before the stone figure of The Wise General, branching right and left before him.

The Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez; Inara Pey, May 2014, on FlickrThe Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez (click for full size)

Whichever branch you take is up to you. Follow one through the mid-level of the garden to tranquil lily pond where one can sit alone or with a friend, in quiet contemplation beneath a leafy canopy which naturally hides it from the garden above. Take the other, and it will lead you by stair and bridge to the highest level, passing another quiet glade along the way, this one presided over by a white figure of Buddha.

It is on this uppermost level that you’ll find the garden’s single building, a place of decidedly Tibetan looks, yet guarded by two Chinese Imperial lions. It offers a place to meditate or to partake of yoga or to enjoy a cup of simmering Japanese tea. A garden of wild flowers links it with a broad stone terrace, walled on both sides and watched over by the tall forms of torii gates, and which runs the length of one side of the garden.

The Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez; Inara Pey, May 2014, on FlickrThe Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez (click for full size)

Here you will find speaking scrolls made by  Sethos Lionheart, each one bearing an image of traditional design and which offer words of wisdom when touched. These can be purchased for a modest L$50 each, and would grace the wall of any home. Along this terrace, through a set of wooden gates, another place for contemplation can be found.

The garden offers many places to sit, with poses for individuals, couples and friends exploring together; discrete bird boxes offer opportunities to dance for those who would like to do so. Paper lanterns hang from the cherry trees to light the path at night,  while kimono-dressed foxes hold up lamps to illuminate terrace and folly.

The Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez; Inara Pey, May 2014, on FlickrThe Snow Lion, Oceanside dAlliez (click for full size)

All told, The Snow Lion is a lovely place to visit, and an attractive demonstration of yin-yang at work. These can be found in everything from the simple divisions of the path as it leads to very individual points in the garden, each with its own focus, yet still part of the whole, through the expression of the harmonious nature of high and low as you travel up and down through the different levels, to the complementary mix of cultural influences revealed as one explores: Chinese, Japanese, and western. Do make sure, as well, that you have local sounds enabled as you wander the paths and enjoy the terraces and glades.

Why things went wrong recently with Second Life, by Landon Linden

Posted on by Inara Pey

secondlifeWe’re all aware of the recent unpleasantness which hit Second Life over the past few weeks and which culminated in the chaos of Tuesday, May 20th, when the disruption not only caused issues with log-ins, but also caused both a curtailment in server-side deployments on Tuesday and a rescheduling of both deployments for the rest of the week and the postponing of a period of planned maintenance.

As noted in my week 20/2 SL projects update, Simon and Maestro Linden gave an explanation of Tuesday’s issues at the Serve Beta meeting on Thursday May 22nd. However, in a Tools and Technology blog post, Landon Linden has given a comprehensive explanation of the broader issues that have hit second Life in recent weeks.

Landon begins the post:

When I came to Linden Lab over five years ago, Second Life had gone through a period of the coveted hockey-stick growth, and we had just not kept up with the technical demands such growth creates. One or more major outages a week were common.

In my first few months at the Lab, we removed more than a hundred major single points of failure in our service, but several major ones still loomed large, the granddaddy of them all being the core MySQL database server. By late Winter 2009 we were suffering from a core database outage a few times each week.

It is that core MySQL database server that has been partially to blame for the recent problems, having hit two different fatal hardware faults which forced the Lab to stop most SL services on both occasions. As the blog post explains, work is in-hand to remove some of the risk in this database becoming a single point of failure by moving it to new hardware. This will be followed over the coming weeks and months to try to further reduce the impact of database failures.

But the MySQL issue wasn’t the only cause of problems, as Landon further explains:

A few weeks ago there was a massive distributed denial of service attack on one of our upstream service providers that affected most of their customers, including us, and inhibited the ability of some to use our services. We have since mitigated future potential impact from such an attack by adding an additional provider. There have also been hardware failures in the Marketplace search infrastructure that have impacted that site, a problem that we are continuing to work through.

Landon Linden: why things went squiffy with SL
Landon Linden: explaining why SL  has suffered servere issues of late

He also provides further information on the issue which impacted users and services on Tuesday May 20th, expanding on that given by Simon and Maestro at the Server Beta meeting.

At that meeting, Simon briefly outlined Tuesday’s issues as being a case of the log-in server failing to give the viewer the correct token for it to connect to a region, so people actually got through the log-in phase when starting their viewer, but never connected to a region.

Landon expands on this, describing how the mechanism for handing-off of sessions from login to users’ initial regions is a decade old and relies on the generation of a unique identifier (the “token” Simon referred to). Simply put: the mechanism ran out of numbers – but did so quietly and without flagging the fact that it had. As a result, the server team took four hours to track down the problem and come up with a fix.

Referring to this particular issue, Landon goes on:

Having such a hidden fault in a core service  is unacceptable, so we are doing a thorough review of the login process to determine if there are any more problems like this lurking. Our intent at this point also is to remove the identifier assignment service altogether. It not only was the ultimate source of this outage, but is also one more single point of failure that should have been dispatched long ago.

Such open honesty and transparency about technical matters is something that hasn’t really been seen from the Lab since the departure of Frank (FJ Linden) Ambrose, the Lab’s former Senior VP of Global Technology, who departed the company at the end of 2011. As such, it is an excellent demonstration of Ebbe Altberg’s promise to re-open the lines of communication between company and users, and one which is most welcome.

Kudos to Landon for his sincere apology for the disruption in services and  for such a comprehensive explanation of the problems. Having such information will hopefully aid our understanding of the challenges the Lab faces in dealing with a complex set of services which is over a decade old, but which we expect to be ready and waiting for us 24/7. Kudos, again as well to Ebbe Altberg for re-opening the hailing frequencies. Long may it continue.

Related Links

Where there’s No Signal in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
No Signal
No Signal

Out on the headland, there stands a great tower, so close to the water’s edge that when the tide is in, the only way to reach it is by a wooden walk winding through the coastal reeds.

They say that once it was a nexus, a hub for of our electronic comings and goings. Through the great dishes and between the long narrow repeaters, all our business rushed back and forth at the speed of light. Directed, amplified, boosted, beamed, messages too numerous to ever truly comprehend passed through that great tower.

No Signal
No Signal

But that was then, and this is now. The messages no longer come and go; the invisible beams of information no longer form an unseen web of lines spreading outward from its slender form, up down, left right, some passing one another so close, if they could ever have been seen, you’d swear they were touching. There is No Signal any more.

Now the tower stands alone on the headland, its great dishes broken, the clusters of microwave emitters hang forlornly by the heavy cables that once fed them power. Rust now coats the tower’s metal, and its platforms sit in disrepair, lopsided against the backdrop of the sea.

No Signal
No Signal

A ladder, as rusted as the rest of the tower, still runs up the side of the structure for those who dare to climb, the creak and groan of metal on metal an ever-present reminder of the decay that sits here.

They say there is a mystery here, waiting to be solved, that if you follow the clues, the enigma of the tower will be revealed. Perhaps the key to the riddle lies within the strange figure, one hand gripping the topmost spire of the tower tightly, their body outstretched, free hand reaching to catch … their hat? … As it is caught upon the wind.

Or perhaps the secret lay elsewhere in the tower’s slender finger. The only way to find out is to walk the headland yourself and visit the place where No Signal can now be found …

No Signal
No Signal

No Signal is the latest piece by Nessuno Myoo, currently on display at MIC Imagin@rium, curated by Mexi Lane, and open through until June 14th, 2014. be sure to grab a note card from the welcome board after you arrive. And while visiting, why not take the time to explore the new prim and mesh amphitheatre on the main island, the work of Rumegusc Altamura?

No Signal
No Signal

Related Links

SL projects updates 21/2: grid issues, server updates, viewer

Posted on by Inara Pey

Server Deployments week 21 – Recap

On Tuesday May 20th, the Main (SLS) channel received the server maintenance package deployed to Magnum in week 20.This includes a bug fix for a networking-related issue that sometimes affects busy sims. Issues encountered during the deployment, but unrelated to it (see below) meant it had to be curtailed.

As a result, the Main channel deployment resumed on Wednesday May 21st, with the result that the deployments scheduled for the 21st in fact took place on Thursday May 22nd, as follows:

  • The BlueSteel and LeTigre RCs remained on the Sunshine / AIS v3 server-side code, and received the networking-related bug fix deployed to the Main channel
  • The Magnum RC received a new project, which includes changes related to the ‘Experience Tools’ project.

More on the Log-in and Grid Issues, Tuesday May 20th

Simon Linden identified the issue which caused log-in issues on Tuesday May 20th
Simon Linden identified the issue which caused log-in issues on Tuesday May 20th

During the Server Beta meeting on Thursday May 22nd, Simon Linden, who identified the problem, gave a further explanation of Tuesday’s grid issues, which prevented people from logging-in to SL.

Essentially, the log-in server was failing to give the viewer the correct token for it to connect to a region, so people actually got through the log-in phase when starting their viewer, but never connected to a region. “The conversation between the login server, your viewer and the region didn’t work any more,” Simon said.

Maestro then added, “After logins were restored, there was a period where the inventory servers got pretty ‘heated up’, probably from people logging in after hours of downtime, so inventory was bad for an hour or two.” It was apparently at this point that the decision was taken to suspend the Main channel server deployment and resume the work on Wednesday May 21st, pushing the RC updates into Thursday.

It is not anticipated that the problem will recur now it has been identified and rectified.

As a result, the scheduled maintenance that had been planned for Thursday May 22nd was cancelled. This work has yet to be rescheduled, and is apparently to be focusing on the database hardware. “Sims should have slightly faster access after the maintenance,” Maestro said of the work, “though I wouldn’t promise anything major.”

The Grid Status page will carry the revised date and time of the work once it has been rescheduled.

SL Viewer

As noted in these pages, The Lab released its Oculus Rift project viewer to the public on Wednesday May 21st, with an announcement in the main blog. The viewer, version 3.7.8.289834, is aimed at getting people started on using the Oculus Rift in Second Life, rather than at providing a finished product with UI optimisations, and appears to be aimed towards encouraging early adopter of the Oculus Rift to try-out Second Life.

Also on Wednesday May 21st:

  • The Zipper viewer for faster installation was promoted from project viewer status to release candidate status with the arrival of the Zipper RC viewer, version 3.7.9.290133 in the release channel
  • The Sunshine / AIS v3 RC viewer returned to the release channel in the form of version 3.7.9.290131, referred to as “Sunshine v2”.

These two viewer updates see the total number of release candidate viewers in the release channel rise to four once more. As also, details of updates in my Current Viewer Releases page.

Group Ban list

One of the required central updates for the group ban updates was deployed to Agni on Wednesday May 21st. A further update is needed before a server RC with the group ban code gets deployed, however. These updates are related to the central service to manage group bans.

 Other Items

LSL Functions for Materials

Not a lot to add here. As mentioned in part one of this report, Simon is now actively working on this functionality. He didn’t have too much to add during the Server Beta meeting, other than Maestro Linden has also been looking at the work Simon has done and has fixed a few issues. There’s still no date when the work might become visible for people to poke at.

LSL Functions for Projected Lights

Talk of LSL functions for materials saw talk of LSL functions for lighting projectors resurface (see SCR-163), prompting Simon to ask, “Does anyone have ideas how people might cause trouble with the projector LSL functions? I wondering how it might cause problems, other than lots of updates … and if it would be any different from rezzing stuff?” Nothing of any serious impact could be identified, although it’s not clear whether the Lab will poke at that or not once the materials LSL functions have been sorted.

Hiding Objects from View and Parcel Privacy

BUG-5671 is actually a feature request, and concerns the provision of a check box in the viewer’s Parcel Properties so that all objects outside that parcel would be not be rendered for anyone within the parcel boundaries. The request appears to be for a server-side function, and the JIRA has seen some heated debate on the matter.

Simon Linden revealed that while working on the parcel privacy option (which hides avatars inside a parcel, and blocks their chat from those outside of the parcel (and vice-versa), he looked at also blocking object views, “and even played with a prototype,” he said. “It’s pretty ugly because you end up with nothing there … at least in my simple code. “Then you walk onto the parcel and all the trees and house and stuff pops up … it was odd.”

However, he revealed the request has been imported by the Lab, so there might be some interest in doing something with it. Part of the debate around the idea on the JIRA has been on whether the setting should be enforced server-side or just within the viewer (so the user retains the choice as to what they see outside a parcel). Commenting on this, Simon said, “server-side would be better so you wouldn’t get updates for things you can’t see, but a cosmetic viewer-side option might be possible.”

So that’s another one to watch out for.