Please refer to the server deployment thread for the latest news and updates on the week’s deployments.
On Tuesday, June 25th, the SLS (Main) channel was updated with server maintenance package 19#19.06.11.528038 which contains a number of Environment Enhancement Project (EEP) fixes (see below), the long awaited (by some!) Animesh-specific constants for llGetObjectDetails() (see BUG-225815) and internal fixes
On Wednesday, June 19th, the main RC channels will be updated as follows:
No deployment to BlueSteel, leaving it on 19#19.06.14.528215, comprising internal changes.
As noted above, the SLS (Main) channel joins Magnum and LeTigre in having fixes to a number of EEP-related issues deployed to it. These are:
BUG-226815 [EEP] Since the grid was rolled to 19.04.15.526263 yesterday, region windlight is broken for all legacy viewers.
BUG-226252 [EEP] Please create an internal error code for llReplaceAgentEnvironment() & llSetAgentEnvironment() that distinguishes whether an agent does not have the experience allowed and if the experience is not allowed at their location.
BUG-226917 EEP Environment, New Sky should default to midday and not 6pm.
SL Viewer
At the time of writing, there have been no official viewer updates to mark the start of the week, leaving the pipelines as follows:
Current Release version 6.2.3.527758, formerly the Rainbow RC viewer dated June 5, promoted June 18 – NEW.
Release channel cohorts:
Bakes on Mesh RC viewer temporarily withdrawn, June 18.
Love Me Render viewer, version 6.2.3.527826, June 10.
Legacy Profiles viewer, version 6.2.3.527749, released on June 5. Covers the re-integration of Viewer Profiles.
Linux Spur viewer, version 5.0.9.329906, dated November 17, 2017 and promoted to release status 29 November 2017 – offered pending a Linux version of the Alex Ivy viewer code.
Obsolete platform viewer, version 3.7.28.300847, May 8, 2015 – provided for users on Windows XP and OS X versions below 10.7.
General Notes
Teleports
I’m cautiously optimistic about teleports … there have been some fixes. I asked for testing help in the Second Life Beta group and volunteers did a few thousand TPs and the results were pretty good .. it’s not perfect but very few disconnects.
– Simon Linden
Script Processing Issues
As I’ve noted in recent SUG summaries, there have been numerous reports of script run time issues. See BUG-226851 and BUG-227099 as examples. These continue to be felt across the grid, and the Lab is continuing to investigate, with Rider Linden noting:
As far as the script performance I think I may have a few things coming in soon that will help.
BUG-225288 “llStopAnimation is stopping all animations on detach instead of only the one specified”
This is not a new bug, but it is an odd one. It seems to be particularly affecting those users with “high” avatar ID keys (e.g. those starting with “f” tend to encounter it a lot. There doesn’t appear to be a confirmed repro that this is the case, other than general observation. Nor has any apparent underpinning cause been found as yet.
The problem is that there literally isn’t a comparator for less than and greater than keys. It’s just not a thing that exists. I’ve dangled this in front of multiple devs and had them show me why that really, honestly can’t happen. And yet it does.
It had been promised some time ago, but on the 18th June it finally arrived – if quietly so. Linden Lab now have a web form for submitting IP complaints.
However, one sticking point that has been around for a long time has been the requirement for users to notify the Lab via snail mail or … fax.
A page of the Lab’s IP Infringement Complaint web form, which went live on June 18th, 2019
The option to file via web form was promised as far back as December 2017 (see: SL Project Updates 49/2: Web User Group), with the hope it would be implemented in early 2018. Needless to say, it has, for assorted reasons, taken a little longer to arrive. However, it will hopefully be greeted positively by those who have been requesting it.
The form can either be accessed from the Intellectual Property Infringement Notification Policy – the link sits within section 1.1 form the policy, immediately above the Lab’s mailing address and fax details. It can also be accessed directly – however, it is always recommended people read the policy in full before submitting a DMCA claim to Linden Lab. The form will replace fax submissions, but I understand filing complaints by regular mail will remain available to those who prefer.
On Monday, June 24th, 2019 at the SL16B celebrations, the first of five Meet the Lindens sessions was held at the SL16B Auditorium. It featured the Lab’s senior Director of Product Operations, Patch Linden.
The following is a summary of the session covering the core topics raised, with audio extracts where relevant.
Note that there are three videos of this event that I’m aware of:
Discussion points have been grouped by topic, and not necessarily in the order raised during the session.
I have focused on those topics liable to be of the most interest to readers / generated the most informative answers, so this is not a summary of all comments. etc., but of those up to the 51:00 minute mark, after which the session includes more general feedback / comments from the audience. Please refer to the videos for these.
Topics are give as bullet-point highlights for ease of reference.
Audio extracts are provided.
These have been cleaned-up in places to remove repetition or pauses, etc.
Audio extracts may concatenate comments on specific subjects that may have been made at different points in the discussion, and so do not always match the chronology of the video.
There are some unavoidable instance of audio break-up (notably from Patch’s microphone).
Timestamps to the SL4Live – TV video are provided for those who would prefer to listen to Patch’s comments “in the raw”. This video is also embedded at the end of this article.
Note that the session was interrupted a couple of times by an 18-carat blockhead deciding to shout abuse over the voice channel, and this is reflected in the videos, although I have intentionally not include audio from my own recording where this noise occurs.
About Patch
Patch started as a Second Life resident, first joining the platform in 2004, and has been a male fashion designer, mentor, and community lead. His efforts with the latter brought him to the attention of the Lab, and in 2007 it was suggested he consider applying to work for the company.
Patch Linden. Credit: Linden Lab
Initially working as a support agent, he spent a brief period as a support liaison before moving to the Concierge team, eventually becoming that team’s manager. He later moved to the role of Operations Support Manager for a year prior to pivoting away from support entirely and joining the Product group, the team responsible for defining the features, etc., found within Second Life.
Here he developed the Land Operations team, which includes the Linden Department of Public Works (LDPW), which is really his most visible role, from a user perspective, in Second Life, as he tends to be very hands-on with the LPDW projects.
As the Senior Director of Product Operations, his role encompasses the LPDW and all of the Lab’s user support organisation – a total of five teams – and also the Sansar support team, which is managed on a daily basis by one of his line managers, Patch having little day-to-day involvement in that side of things.
As a part of his role in managing / overseeing the support teams, in 2018 Patch established a support centre in Atlanta, Georgia, and is currently overseeing an expansion to this centre, which is doubling in size in terms of staff and also about to move to a larger office space as result.
There are a lot of aspects of SL he particularly enjoys, notably the social aspects, interacting with the residents. He’s also attracted to the power SL gives to people across the globe to connect to one another, support one another in multiple ways, to form friendships and relationships, provide broader social interactions (e.g. links to physical world event such as Pride Month), etc.
He regards his biggest challenge as seeing and feeling the pain people so often feel when they feel threatened by the deployment of a new aspect / feature / capability of Second Life. However, he also sees taking the upset and the often negative reactions to such things as learning experience to help inform future projects and work to try to ease the sense of pain / upset as they are announced / deployed.
We like to have ears all over the place. We pay attention to the forums, we pay attention to groups in-world. There’s all sorts of places that we tend to be, and that, I think, gives us a lot of insight. We can’t catch everything, though, so sometimes somebody will come to me and say, ‘Hey! did you know such-and-such a thing was going on?’ And I’m like, ‘No, I had no idea. Tell me about it.’
So as much as I like to say we can try to be everywhere and listen to everything at the same time, there’s a whole lot more of you [residents] out there than there is us, so I try to give everyone as much attention and time as I can to make sure that you know that we hear you.
– Patch Linden on trying to capture user feedback, thought, concerns, etc.
[Video 14:45-15:34]
They develop and maintain Mainland infrastructure (roads, railway lines, seaways, Linden-developed buildings, etc), working with the Mainland Land Team.
They help build out large-scale projects for the Lab such as Nautilus, Bay City, the Horizons residential regions and Bellisseria.
They lay out infrastructure and facilities for a wide range of events in SL, including those at SL16B, the Lab-run shopping events, the town hall meeting spaces, etc.
They construct and maintain the physical aspects of the various Lab-provided games (e.g. Horizons, Paleoquest, Linden Realms.
SLB used to be driven by the Lab, but more recently (SL9B through SL14B in particular) have been community-driven, with the Lab staying in the background. LPDW was more involved in SL15B, and SL16B sees the Lab back driving things.
See this as a means to leverage engagement with users.
Recognises and appreciates the work done by residents in organising the SLB festivities over the last few years.
Are again trying to learn from the lesson of those events.
Believes the LL teams involved have had a lot of fun bringing the regions together and working with residents (e.g. exhibitors and performers).
Has received positive feedback from people whilst in the SLB regions.
Again, lessons are being learnt and will be folded back into future large scale events organised and managed by the Lab.
Note the order of these discussion points is not representative of the MTL session with Patch. The subject covered have been re-ordered compared to the video to hopefully provide a more structured presentation of the information given during the session.
New Traditional houses being added to the Bellisseria region of New Hamsterdam. These an other houses within the more recent developments on Bellisseria will be subject to a new rolling release process
Release Cadence: Houseboats and Traditional Houses
Linden Homes Have been and continue to be extremely popular.
Starting on Monday, June 24th, the release process for the available themes of houses will be changing:
It is planned to release one region of homes every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
This schedule may slip a little as a result of things like holidays, any QA issues that might crop up, etc., but the Lab aim to try to maintain the cadence.
This is why the current development of homes on Bellisseria has been “in the open” and observable by residents.
Developing regions like this offers some transparency to the process and helps demonstrate that regions in Bellisseria are not (as has been claimed in various places) “cookie cutter” region layouts that are simply replicated across the continent. They are all individually laid out to offer variety in road layout, parks, public spaces, land elevation, coastline, etc.
SL16B offers a preview of the next major theme – Campers [Caravans] and Trailers.
Four styles of these new types of home were initially previewed at SL16B prior to Meet the Lindens with Patch.
In all there are eight styles (4 camper and 4 trailer styles), and the remaining styles were revealed at the SL16B Spellbound preview area during Patch’s MTL session.
The units are designed to fit both 512 sq m and 1024 sq m parcels, and will initially be issued on 512 sq m lots.
When ready, these types of home will be initially released as a large deployment to Bellisseria, including new landscaping that encompasses a very large communal social space.
After the initial deployment (date still TBA), these homes will roll into the new release cadence described above.
One of the additional styles of the upcoming trailer theme of Linden Homes, as unveiled at SL16B
The Campers and Trailers are going to come in a large release initially. We kind-of feel like rolling out that entire area, because it is a bit of a scenery change, a theme change and stuff like that. Thematically it doesn’t quite line up [with the current home types and styles], but it is designed to all blend together so you’ll transition from one area of the continent to another.
But as we go through that process, you’ll see a who bunch of regions get spun up, for those of you who keep an eye on these things … You’ll probably see the building versions of those regions come soon, and we’ll start building those out and then at some point we’ll have a really large release for those as well; and then those will enter that same process of this more frequent release cadence.
A large communal events space located on its own island regions.
Connected to Bellisseria via airstrip, landing pad, moorings and ferryboat.
Intended to provide a space to a range of community fairs and events (it is not intended to be an amusement park – think of it as Bellisseria’s version of the Bay City Fairgrounds).
It will be available for bookings for events – details are still TBA, but will likely involve a special group and sign-up process.
Inaugural events already planned for July 4th and July 6th organised by the Bellisseria community itself.
Currently occupying the centre of the new Bellisseria Fairgrounds island is a huge “Torley-fied” statue of Magellan Linden, the colours (and the flag he holds) presented in support of Pride Month
As the old, old saying goes, “I have some bad news and some good news.”
The bad news is that if you were hoping to visit Cica Ghost’sLuna Park (see Cica’s Luna Park in Second Life), that build has now gone from Second Life, the result of low visitor figures, possibly as a result of clashing with SL16B.
The good news is that Cica has replaced it with something that is quite dynamically wacky (literally, if you wander across the landscape!), a piece she calls Cubes.
Occupying the same region as Luna Park, Cubes is a curious piece, comprising a barren landscape under a bright sky, occupied by a few bare trees, but which is periodically deluged by downpours of … huge steel reinforced concrete blocks.
These appear a handful of metres above the dry land, hover for a few seconds as if waiting for gravity to notice them and question just what the heck do they think they are playing at, before yanking them down to the ground, where they tumble and roll against one another and build random mounds and towers before silently poofing and starting over.
With the lines of steel bars embedded within them creating checkerboard patterns on their face, these great cubes look like a certain cubic puzzle game, albeit one usually made up of smaller cubes with coloured faces. Hence why, perhaps, Cica gives Cubes a quote from that game’s creator:
The Cube is an imitation of life itself – or even an improvement on life.
And, given these cubes are physical, they can have quite an – impact, shall we say – on life should you happen to wander out and stand when they are falling!
There is something very faintly Petrovsky Flux-ish (for those who remember that installation) about Cubes. The way the Cubes fall is mindful of the destruction of each Flux build – be here, all the pieces are regular, and the fantastical forms they create are entire as a result of their dropping from the sky, rather than the starting point for their collapse. Watching them, like the parts Petrovsky Flux, can be oddly hypnotic.
I’m not sure how long Cubes will be open, but like Luna Park, it’s meant in fun.
The four styles of the upcoming Bellisseria Camper and Trailer homes initially unveiled at SL16B – additional styles were added to these on Monday, June 24th
Note: the Camper and Trailer Homes are still in development, as such details of the designs and the planned environments for them that will be developed in Bellisseria may differ with the designs and landscape seen in this article.
One of the things that may have caught some people by surprise at SL16B is the preview region featuring the upcoming Linden Camper (aka caravan) and Trailer Homes, planned as a future phase of the Linden Homes continent of Bellissera.
Deliberately unannounced, the inclusion of these homes at SL16B, sitting within a landscape park, was an idea put forward by Patch Linden, the Lab’s Director of Operations, and while we have been promised a near future release of homes that would be different to those that have thus far been made, the use of trailers / caravans as home is potentially novel enough to have caught many by surprise.
Given that Patch discussed the trailer style homes during his Meet the Lindens session on Monday 24th, I thought I’d take his comments concerning them from that event, and take a further look at this new type of Linden Home.
One of the trailer style homes unveiled at SL16B after Patch’s Meet the Lindens session
The first couple of points to note about these styles of Linden Home is that:
In all, there are 8 styles of camper and trailer home, four of which were initially previewed at SL16B, with more added following Patch’s talk at SL16B.
They have been designed to fit both 512 sq m and 1024 sq m parcels, but will be initially offered with 512 sq m land.
This may seem an odd fit, given the first phases of houses within Bellisseria are provided with 1024 sq m parcels; however there is some logic behind the move. Not only do these trailer-style homes present a contrast, their use of 512 sq m of land means that those premium members who already have some of their “free” tier used for land can potentially obtain a property on Bellisseria without necessarily having to pay additional tier.
Another One of the trailer style homes unveiled at SL16B after Patch Linden’s Meet the Lindens session
There’s another aspect to this as well. While the Traditional houses and houseboats have proven popular, they are still nevertheless “enclosed” homes; they have walls, and even though the houses have yards / gardens and the houseboats can be moored in close proximity to one another, they still have a sense of “boundary” to them.
The new campers and trailers, however, are different. They are designed to be in open spaces and, given their smaller internal space, are liable to encourage people to spend time outside and to create outdoor spaces on their parcels in an environment that places neighbours relatively close to hand and without the same sense of intervening property boundaries.
So it might be that the Camper and Trailer type homes could encourage easier mixing and befriending and further develop a local community spirit among those occupying them. In keeping with this, Patch has indicated that when deployed, the Camper and Trailer regions will come with their own “large scale” community space intended to help encourage more community-developed events and activities.
The Camper and Trailer type homes preview region at SL16B
The Campers and Trailers are going to come in a large release initially. We kind-of feel like rolling out that entire area, because it is a bit of a scenery change, a theme change and stuff like that. Thematically it doesn’t quite line up [with the current home types and styles], but it is designed to all blend together so you’ll transition from one area of the continent to another.
But as we go through that process, you’ll see a who bunch of regions get spun up, for those of you who keep an eye on these things … You’ll probably see the building versions of those regions come soon, and we’ll start building those out and then at some point we’ll have a really large release for those as well; and then those will enter that same process of this more frequent release cadence. And then we’ll be off to our next theme after that which – I’ll not really going to talk that much about!
– Patch Linden, SL16B, Monday, June 24th, 2019
A further variant of the trailer style homes unveiled at SL16B after Patch Linden’s Meet the Lindens session
All of which should be enough to pique the curiosity – but there is more! While he didn’t go into things too deeply, and although they are a little off-topic for this blog post, Patch did indicate that:
Small commercial opportunities may be coming to Bellisseria (although some had already guessed based on a development on the SSP prototype regions).
Trains will be playing a role in Bellisseria, and will apparently be “linked” to the SLRR.
Both of these are clearly topics for the future, although I’ll have a little more on them in my upcoming summary of Patch’s SL16B Meet the Lindens session.
In the meantime, there is current no date for the release for the Camper and Trailer type homes, although there will obviously be an announcement about them once the initial deployment is ready. So, those who are curious about them and perhaps haven’t seen them – and the response so far has been positive – should perhaps drop into SL16B Spellbound before July 8th, 2019, and take a look.
The development of additional Bellisseria regions with houseboats and Traditional houses that people have been able to witness during May / June 2019 is part of a new approach the Lab is taking to releasing these Linden Homes, which comes into effect from Monday, June 24th
Update: Patch has now issued a forum post on the new Linden Homes release process.
Since their launch in April 2019, the Linden Homes, available to Premium subscribers, have proven exceptionally popular. The first release of the houses – offered in two types: land-based “Traditional” homes and houseboats, each available in for styles – were snapped up in the first couple of days following their release, with the houseboats going within hours. Similarly, a special release of regions with houseboats was completely allocated in just 27 minutes.
For the last several weeks, the Linden Department of Public Works – LPDW – and the Lab’s Land Team have been work on a further development across a number of regions in Bellisseria, implementing new infrastructure as well as more Traditional homes and houseboats, all under the watchful eyes of curious residents. As Patch Linden, Senior Director of Operations Patch revealed on Monday, June 24th during his Meet the Lindens event, this open development of Bellisseria is part of a deliberate change in strategy.
Ahead of that event, I had the opportunity to hear from Patch on what would be happening:
We are going to try and change our release strategy for a little while to see if a particular process works better for everyone involved, including many of you who have been very patiently waiting for one of the new Linden Homes. Many of you have already been witness to the new process unfolding in front of you whether you knew it or not.
Those regions that have been called out in various places such as. New Hamsterdam down to SSPE120 (soon to be officially named). We did this for multiple reasons, mostly in an effort to show all of you the process we go through in real-time to make these beautiful new regions come to life, and give a glimpse into the time-line involved.
Another of the new Traditional houses being prepared
In particular, and starting with this development, the Lab will be increasing the cadence of Linden Home releases, as Patch went on to explain:
Starting Monday, June 24th we’re going to try to release a region’s worth of new Linden Homes on a regular cadence. We’re aiming to try for a region per every other day, so Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, but as we cannot control all the factors involved in the lengthy process, such as QA requirements, we may have some gaps which could last anywhere between a day to several days and especially on the weekends.
This means that development of Bellisseria is going to be on more of a rolling basis as individual region are readied, rather than large-scale releases with extended period between them. Nor will the roll-out be restricted to the current Traditional houses and houseboats; other types of Linden Homes will be made available, including the upcoming trailer-style homes, which will initially come in a larger release (I’ll have more on these in a follow-on post to this one).
And just as a reminder – the place to obtain one of the new homes as they are made available is via the Linden Homes registration page, not by queuing up inside Bellisseria (as has been done). Just check the page and look for Bellisseria in the drop-down list (arrowed below left), and the available house option(s) – Traditional house and / or Houseboat – and click on the image.
The new Linden Homes are available through the existing Linden Homes registration page – just make sure Bellisseria is selected in the Theme drop-down (arrowed) and select your choice of house or houseboat – not that only one or the other may be available at any given time, and that further type of home will be added to this page as they are released.
Nor is this all in terms of development. Again, as many have already seen, there is a new island development within the arms of Bellisseria. Marked by the continent’s second airstrip, this 2-region island is to be the Bellisseria Fairgrounds, with Patch explaining:
Our vision for this space is to grant communal access to an area that is clear and ready for set-up of an event. We have supplied the outlying basic infrastructure which includes water taxi access to the main continent, an airstrip and landing pad. We will have a scheduling calendar and process in place where the space can be reserved in advance. The first events already in line for use of this space will be around the 4th of July holiday coming up. More information to come about how the reservation process will work in the near future.
Currently in the centre of the new Bellisseria Fairgrounds island is a huge “Torley-fied” statue of Magellan Linden, the colours (and the flag he holds) presented in support of Pride Month.
Note that the Fairgrounds aren’t an amusement park (or similar) but are designed to be used for a wide range of events.
It’ll be interesting to see how things go with the new cadence of releases – and the order in which they are made; given the idea is to release on a region at a time, and given regions tend to be split between land houses and houseboats, will the releases alternate between the two, or will it be more a more orderly release, proceeding region-by region along and down through the developed regions before moving on to the next set that are developed? I suspect the former, a this would give more of a mix to things – but the next week or so will show!
The Mill, Lemon Beach – blog post
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 