This summary is published every Monday, and is a list of SL viewer / client releases (official and TPV) made during the previous week. When reading it, please note:
It is based on my Current Viewer Releases Page, a list of all Second Life viewers and clients that are in popular use (and of which I am aware), and which are recognised as adhering to the TPV Policy. This page includes comprehensive links to download pages, blog notes, release notes, etc., as well as links to any / all reviews of specific viewers / clients made within this blog
By its nature, this summary presented here will always be in arrears, please refer to the Current Viewer Release Page for more up-to-date information.
Official LL Viewers
Current Release version: 4.0.3.312816 (dated March 23) – no change
Opening on Monday, April 11th, 2016 is the Windlight Magazine Spring Arts Show, one of the biggest arts events taking place in Second Life this year.
More than 50 2D and 3D artists are participating, with art displays taking place both within traditional galley-style units, and outdoors under the open skies or within individual gazebos scattered across the Windlight lawns.
Running through until Sunday, April 17th, the Spring Arts Show also includes daily entertainment with DJs, live performances and tribute acts, storytelling and poetry readings, a hunt and photo contest, and a fashion show as well.
Land alongside the Windlight Gallery and office grounds has been transformed for the event, with lots to see and do. Many of the participating artists are taking part in a juried art competition with a prize pool of L$20,000, with the rest participating as non-juried artists. The event has been generously sponsored by Azul, Chop Zuey Couture Jewellery, Dope Magazine, Ferosh, Ghee, Lyrical Poetry Cafe, Magnum Opus, Meshopotamia, Pink Ice Boutique, PotPourri Markets, Prism Designs, SL Live Radio, Models Giving Back, The Edge Gallery, The Fantasy Angels, and Windlight Magazine.
To join in with the entertainment and events planned for the weekend, check the Spring Arts Show events calendar. However, some highlights for the week include:
With its rich diversity of 2D and 3D art, full entertainments programme, the Windlight Magazine Spring Show is a superb means of seen the work of photographers and artists from across SL as well as an opportunity to discover the art of the spoken word through poetry readings and storytelling. So be sure to check it out through the week.
Mars Odyssey: 15 years since launch and still going strong
Fifteen years ago, on April 7th, 2001, NASA launched their Odyssey mission to Mars. Since then, this orbital vehicle, whilst often overlooking in favour of its younger companions, Mars Express from Europe and NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, has done much to revolutionise our understanding of Mars.
Named for 2001: A Space Odyssey, the seminal science-fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke, Odyssey arrived in orbit around Mars in October 2001. In doing so, not only did it overcome the failures of the 1999 Mars Climate Orbiter and Mars Polar Lander missions, it almost immediately scored its own major success: one suite of instruments found evidence for water ice close to the surface in large areas of Mars – as significant finding which has since gone on to shape much of our thinking about what lies within the Martian crust.
In 2010, Odyssey provided the highest-resolution (at that time) global map of Mars, stitched together from 21,000 images returned by the Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS). Prior to that, in 2008 Odyssey spotted evidence of salt deposits across about 200 places in the south of Mars. NASA considers these areas to be signs of where abundant water used to sit. Scientists theorized the deposits could come from groundwater, which evaporated and left deposits of mineral behind. While in 2007, Odyssey imaged what appeared to be massive cave mouths on the surface of Mars.
THEMIS confirmed the openings – each between 100 to 250 meters (328 to 820 feet) across – were either vertical shafts running into the Martian crust or possibly openings leading to cavernous spaces beneath the surface. Dubbed the “seven Sisters” the openings were discovered on the flank of Arsia Mons, one of the gigantic Tharsis volcanoes, prompting speculation that they might be the collapsed roofs of lava tunnels within the volcano’s slopes.
A 2007 THEMIS image from Mars Odyssey showing entrances to possible Martian caves, dubbed the “seven sisters.” Clockwise from upper-left: Dena, Chloe, Wendy, Annie, Abbey, Nikki and Jeanne. Arrows signify direction of solar illumination (I) and direction of North (N) – Credit: GE Cushing, TN Titus, JJ Wynne, USGS, USGS, Northern Arizona University, and PR Christensen of Arizona State University
The vehicle has also operated in concert with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in support of surface missions, including both the Curiosity and Opportunity rovers. As well as acting as a communications relay for such missions, Odyssey has been able to add context to the rovers’ work by providing thermal and other images which have helped science teams better understand the environments in which the rovers are operating. Nor does it end there. Odyssey has also been a careful observer of the Martian weather.
As each year on Mars lasts around 26 months, Odyssey has observed the planet through more than six Martian years. These observations have revealed some seasonal patterns that repeat each year and other seasonal events, such as large dust storms, which differ significantly from year to year.
A 2001 false colour map of Mars made from data gathered by Odyssey’s gamma ray spectrometer reveals the widespread distribution of hydrogen-enriched soil on Mars (in blue), the result of sub-surface ice deposits
In just this past year, Odyssey’s orbit has put the spacecraft in position to observe Mars in early morning light. Previously, the spacecraft flew over ground that was either in afternoon lighting or pre-dawn darkness. The new orbit enables studies of morning clouds and fogs and comparison of ground temperatures in the morning to temperatures of the same sites in the afternoon and pre-dawn, again helping to increase our understanding of the various atmospheric mechanisms operating on the planet.
With 15 years under its belt, Odyssey continued to work hard around Mars and shows no sign of stopping. So, happy anniversary, Odyssey!
On Land and Sea
Hard on the heels of Blue Origin’s third successful launch and recovery of their sub-orbital New Shephard capsule and propulsion module during a test flight, Elon Musk’s SpaceX has achieved what had been eluding them: launching a Falcon 9 rocket with a payload bound for the International Space Station and then landing the first stage of the rocket on a platform at sea.
The success comes after four prior attempted to land the first stage of the booster at sea – part of SpaceX’s efforts to develop a semi-reusable system to reduce overall launch costs – all ended with the booster crashing into the floating landing platform, or toppling over post touch-down.
The Falcon 9 1.1 furst stage of CRS-8 stands tall on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You, following its landing on April 8th, 2016 (credit: SpaceX)
The April 8th launch, officially titled CRS-8, lifted-off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, at 8:53 GMT. After separating from the second stage of the rocket, which carrying the Dragon cargo craft up to orbit, the first stage of the booster performed a series of three burns to slow it down and boost it back towards the landing platform – referred to as an autonomous drone ship – that was keeping station downrange of the launch site. Eight and a half minutes after the launch, the first stage made a vertical descent over the platform, re-firing its main engines to slow itself as the landing legs deployed from along the side of the rocket’s body, and it eased into a gentle touch-down.
After the landing, crew boarded the platform to weld the rocket’s landing pads to the deck as a precaution against it toppling over while the platform was being towed back to port. Current plans call for the platform to undergo examination and testing at Kennedy Space Centre to ensure no structural damage occurred during the landing, before it is refurbished for a further at-sea landing, possibly in June 2016. The Falcon booster stage will also undergo post-flight examination prior to being refurbished for a future launch.
The Hope: A Relay for Life Photo Exhibition opened it doors on Saturday, April 9th, and will run through until Saturday April 16th, inclusive. For the event, 25 Second Life photographers have paired with 25 cancer survivors and caregivers, to provide an exhibition of extraordinary portraiture coupled with deeply personal stories about dealing with cancer.
The exhibition has been organised by Catalina Staheli, and builds on her 2015 exhibition entitled Stand (which you can read about here). Greatly expanded, Hope is featured in a magnificent gallery set within a landscaped area on Saint Kitts Isle (making it reachable by water for those who like to sail the Blake Sea and points north, and who are looking for a destination).
Built around a central courtyard garden, the gallery provides two floors of exhibition space, with each featured caregiver and / or survivor featured in at least one wall-mounted portrait, their stories available from free-standing signs, the details of the artist who created their picture(s) available from plaques on the wall alongside each display.
With broad hallways, a glass roof, and plenty of opportunities to sit and admire the work on offer as well as tour the various display spaces, the gallery offers a bright, light space, rich in colour courtesy of the plants and the RFL of SL purple. All of which presents visitors with an exceptionally eye-catching environment without detracting in any way from the images on display.
Throughout the exhibition halls are RFL of SL donation kiosks, information givers on in-world support teams, the work of the ACS, and so on. To further help raise funds for RFL of SL, a silent auction is running throughout the exhibition period, with each of the exhibiting photographers offering a portrait package / photo-shoot opportunity to their respective highest bidders. In addition, there will be the opportunity to bid on a place in the autumn course with Visionaire Institute of Photography, and single portraits by special guest artists Skip Staheli, Magissa Denver, and Natzuka Miliandrovic.
Alongside of Skip, Magissa and Natzuka, the artists participating in the exhibition are: Tempest Rosca, Addison Summerwind, Grazia Horwitz, Calypso Applewhyte, Wendz Tempest, Isa Messioptra, AlexAvion, Roxi Richez, Polly Elan, Pam Astonia, mysterr resident, Lam Erin, Roy Mildor, Cubito Smit, Annie1111, Caitlin Tobias, Kaelyn Alecto, Wildstar Beaumont, WrenNoir Cerise, PinkRayne, Reya Darkstone, and of course Catalina.
Note: the following is based on a conversation at the end of the TPV developer meeting held on Thursday, April 7th. A video is available, and the discussion commences at the 37:43 mark. As such, the following is my interpretation on matters, rather than an official overview from the Lab.
As most people are aware, the Lab is working with a number of groups across Second Life to re-introduce the Community Gateway programme to help bring new users into Second Life. For more background on this, please refer to be September 2015 introductory blog post on the approach.
The original gateway programme was discontinued in August 2010, with the Lab citing several reasons for doing so, including issues around scalability and management oversight, together with question marks around its overall effectiveness in bringing new users into SL. However, there have been repeated calls over the years for it to be re-introduced, and the planned pilot programme is a response to these calls.
However, as I recently reported, there has been a slight issue around matters of legal compliance. Essentially, the Lab need to ensure that sensitive user information, such as account passwords, have to be handled directly by the Lab’s own registration services – they cannot be passed through a third-party service as would be the case with the new gateways, were they to use the current new user registration API.
To try to get around this, the Lab initially suggested the gateways make use of the “old” user registration API, as used with the original gateway programme. While this does handle account details through the Lab’s services, thus meeting legal requirements, it also has a major downside: there are no hooks into things like the web-based avatar picker. This means that when using it, new users cannot select a modern avatar, but instead are delivered in-world with either the default male or female Character Test Avatar (below) – hardly an ideal approach, given how the test avatars look.
The default Character Test Avatar, as used by the “old” new user registration API
In order to try to improve things, the Lab had toyed with the idea that users would be able sign-up through the third-party gateways, but would have a temporary account password delivered to them via e-mail from the Lab, which they could initially use to log-in to SL, and be able to change via secondlife.com.
While it is actually not uncommon for on-line services to use e-mail exchanges as a part of their sign-up process (e.g. to verify a person’s e-mail address), this approach was seen as potentially too intrusive with the SL sign-up, with fears raised that it could put new users off as the swap back and forth between sign-up pages and e-mail.
In response to this, the Lab are now proposing (and currently QA testing) an alternative approach. During the user registration process, the incoming new user is directed to a secure page hosted by Linden Lab, where they set-up their account details, before being returns to the gateway sign-up pages to complete their on-boarding and coming in-world (so it is like opting to pay for goods on website using your PayPal account and being redirected to PayPal’s secure server to make the payment before being returned to the website).
The new user sign-up process for the gateway programme currently in QA with the Lab, should present users coming into Second Life via a third-party gateway with a relatively transparent process which allows the Lab to meet its legal requirements on account information privacy. (Note: this diagram is for illustrative purposes only, and based on how the process has been explained during a meeting [42:35]. With the exception of the information handled by the Lab’s service, the number of steps involved in the process may differ in practice)Some concern has been voiced that this approach may still be off-putting to new users, however, it is hoped that it will be transparent enough to offer a more integrated sign-up flow than would be the case with the use of e-mails. There is still no indication as to when the revised API will be made available to groups in the trial gateway programme, but it has been approved by the Lab’s legal and compliance people, so hopefully once testing has been completed, we should hear more official news about it directly from the Lab. programme should resume moving forward “soon”.
It’s time to kick-off a week of story-telling in voice, brought to our virtual lives by the staff and volunteers at the Seanchai Library. As always, all times SLT, and events are held at the Library’s Second Life home at Bradley University, unless otherwise indicated.
Crazy Eights sees Caledonia, Corwyn and Kayden reading from The Return of Sherlock Holmes on Sundays from the living room of 221B Baker Street.
Holmes (c) with Waston (r) and Lestrade (l) near the scene of the murder (Sidney Paget, Strand Magazine, 1904)
It appears a vandal is at large in London, and has Inspector Lestrade somewhat baffled. Someone is going around smashing busts of the Emperor Napoleon. Three have so far been broken, one from a shop and two following break-ins at the home and office of one Dr. Barnicot.
Holmes is intrigued by the fact the all of the busts come from the same mould, suggesting that this is more than a simple case of someone having a deep-seated dislike for the dead Emperor.
When Lestrade brings word that there has been a further incident, this time accompanied by a murder, Holmes is more than intrigued. The bust has been stolen from the house of a journalist, one Horace Harker, who also discovered the dead man on his front doorstep.
It’s unlikely the dead man was responsible for taking the bust, as the remains of that are found shattered in the garden of an empty house up the street. The dead man has a photograph of another man in his possession, and things take a further strange turn when the deceased is identified as a member of the Mafioso, and the photograph he was carrying is that of an Italian immigrant…
The Storytellers’ Sandbox at Crazy Eights is designed to provide a forum for new stories, new storytellers, and new ways to present them. This week, Seanchai library welcomes to the Sandbox: Bryn Taleweaver, Virginia (UnderstandingComplexity Resident), and Boudicca Amat. Three voices with three unique stories to share.
Monday April 11th, 19:00 at Crazy Eights: Silent Running
Gyro Muggins continues reading Harlan Thompson’s novelization of the 1972 screenplay for Silent Running, by screenplay by Mike Cimino, Deric Washburn, and Steven Bochco.
In the future, all plant life on Earth has become extinct. A few specimens have been preserved in enormous, greenhouse-like geodesic domes attached to a fleet of space freighters, currently just beyond the orbit of Saturn.
Freeman Lowell, one of four crewmen aboard the freighter Valley Forge, is the resident botanist and ecologist who carefully preserves a variety of plants for their eventual return to Earth and the reforestation of the planet. Lowell spends most of his time in the domes, both cultivating the crops and attending to the animal life.
Then, orders come from Earth to jettison and destroy the domes with nuclear charges and return the freighters to commercial service. Orders Lowell’s crewmates are only too happy to follow if it means a return to Earth. Lowell, however, is less than sanguine about this new turn of events.
Tuesday April 12th, 19:00: Year of Yes
Caledonia Skytower reads selections from Shonda Rhimes’ bestseller.
Shonda Rhimes is best known as the creator of television’s Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal, as well as an executive TV producer. Despite her success and career, she is introverted and prefers to say “no” to invitations and engagements.
Then her sister presents a challenge to which Shonda reluctantly agrees: spend a year saying “yes” to unexpected invitations and opportunities.
This book is a record of that year, and how just saying one simple word – “yes” – had a positive and transformative impact on one woman’s life.
Wednesday April 13th 19:00: On Stranger Tides
Shandon Loring commences a two-part reading of On Stranger Tides, the inspiration for the 4th instalment of the Pirates of the Caribbean film franchise.
Thursday, April 14th 19:00: Batman in Nighttown
From The Further Adventures of Batman, edited by Martin H. Greenberg comes this tale penned by husband and wife team, Robet Silverberg and Karen Haber.
At a fairly early point in Batman’s career, a large charity masquerade event takes place at Wayne Manner. Bruce Wayne (wearing a red devil outfit) is surprised when an unknown guest arrives wearing, of all things, a Batman costume. Then the lights go out, jewels disappear, and the chase is on.
Saturday, April 16th, at Crazy Eights: Story Forest Tour II
A guided exploration of the Crazy Eights Story Forest with select stories shared live in voice. Guests meet at the Welcome Plaza and join Tour Guides or a walk and a talk featuring some of the 20 stories from around the world found in the Crazy Eights Story Forest.
Take the Crazy Eights Story Forest tour on Saturday, April 16th
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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 March / April is Project Children, building peace in Ireland one child at a time.
![The new user sign-up process for the gateway programme currently in QA with the Lab, should present users coming into Second Life via a third-party gateway with a relatively transparent process which allows the Lab to meet its legal requirements on account information privacy. (Note: this diagram is for illustrative purposes only, and based on how the process has been explained during a meeting [42:35]. The number of steps involved in the process may differ in practice)](https://modemworld.me/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/gateway-sign-up2.jpg)
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 