Day: September 2, 2023

2023 week #35: SL TPVD meeting summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
Natthimmel, July 2023 – blog post

The following notes were taken from my chat log transcript of the  Third Party Viewer Developer (TPVD) meeting held on Friday, September 1st, 2023, together with the video recording of the meeting made by Pantera Północy, and embedded towards the end of this summary. My thanks, as always, to Pantera for making these recordings. 

Meetings Overview

  • The TPV Developer meeting provides an opportunity for discussion about the development of, and features for, the Second Life viewer, and for Linden Lab viewer developers and third-party viewer (TPV) / open-source code contributors to discuss general viewer development.
  • As a rule, these meetings are:
    • Generally held once a month  the third or fourth Friday, at 13:00 SLT at the Hippotropolis Theatre. See the SL Public Calendar for specific meeting dates.
    • Open to all with an interest in viewer development.
    • Conducted in a mix of text and voice.
  • The notes herein are drawn from a mix of my own chat log and audio recording of the meeting, and are not intended to be a full transcript.

Viewer Updates

[Video: 0:00-3:17]

  • The Inventory Extensions RC viewer updated to version 6.6.15.581538, August 29.
  • The Emoji RC viewer, version 6.6.15.581557, was released on August 31.
  • The Maintenance V(ersatility) RC viewer, version 6.6.14.581315, August 30.

These updates comprise a promotion to RC status (Emoji viewer) and merging with the new release viewer code base. The remaining official viewers are unchanged as:

  • Release viewer,  version 6.6.13.580918, formerly the Maintenance U(pdate) RC viewer, version 6.6.14.581101, promoted August 23.
  • Release channel cohorts:
    • glTF / PBR Materials viewer, version 7.0.0.581126, June 26.
  • Project viewers:

Note that the alternate viewer page also lists “Win32+MacOS<10.13 – 6.6.12.579987” as an RC viewer. However, the Win 32 + pre-Mac OS 10.13 was promoted to release status on July 5th, and viewer version 6.6.12.579987 points to the Maintenance S viewer, promoted to release status on May 16th.

General Viewer Notes:

  • The Emoji viewer does not include the font updates, which have been moved to their own project. This viewer currently does not have sufficient data to determine where it might stand in terms of being promoted to de facto release status. It normally takes a few days for a reasonable cohort of users on the viewer so that stats on crash rates might be more accurately gathered, together with thing like bugs reported.
  • The Inventory Extensions viewer is currently awaiting UI updates, but is otherwise defined as “pretty close” to being ready for promotion once these updates have been implemented.
  • LL is in the process of determining how to standardise the use of whitespace in the viewer code. This is described as “getting around the infinite conflicts problem” in merging code within the viewer where whitespace is defined (e.g. tabs) differently to other / existing code (e.g. spaces – or vice-versa). It is also defined as “not fixing” the issue of coders all having different opinions on what whitespace should be, but while it is acknowledged the solution will not please everyone, LL will be moving forward with it, and will give more details on the direction they are taking in due course.

Multi-Factor Authentication Update

[Video: 3:27-5:50]

  • Multi-factor authentication has been a part of SL for some time (see here for notes on its introduction), and extended to the viewer shortly thereafter.
  • Within the next “week or two” the log-in service will be updated so that users who have opted-in to MFA will only be able to do so on viewers providing the necessary MFA support.
  • This move was first announced in October 2022, but implementation was delayed to allow all TPVs the time to incorporate the viewer-side MFA code – which should now be the case.
  • Notes:
    • This does not mean all users must use the authentication process; MFA as a whole remains optional. It simply means users who have opted in to MFA will only be able to log-in to SL using a viewer supporting MFA.
    • Should users lose there ability to access SL via the authentication process for whatever reason, they should file a support ticket to have their MFA status reset.
    • Brad Linden also indicated that LL does not have “any additional MFA methods in development right now”, and that requests for things like authentication via e-mail should be made via feature request Jiras.

In Brief

Refer to the video for the following:

  • [Video: 6:05-9:38] a general discussion on code-signing – approach, pros and cons (most TPVs have not implemented code signing). In short, LL are looking to leverage the move to Github Actions for the viewer build process / code management to make code signing “more portable” should any TPVs wish to implement it.
  • [Video: 26:06 to practically to the end of the meeting] Extended discussion on the Emoji viewer and use of emojis particularly being given the choice to enable / disable whether emojis are displayed in text within your own viewer, as several other platforms provide.
    • Some of the discussion appeared predicated on the automatic conversion of text to emojis, which is not actually what the Emoji viewer is doing.
    • It was pointed out that disabling emojis might be beneficial as an accessibility option.
    • The option to add a switch to disable rendering of emojis within the viewer was requested as a feature request for consideration.
  • [Video: 46:46 onwards] discussion on ambient lighting within EEP settings, PDR, PBR reflection probes behaviour (much of it is local chat).

Next Meeting

† The header images included in these summaries are not intended to represent anything discussed at the meetings; they are simply here to avoid a repeated image of a gathering of people every week. They are taken from my list of region visits, with a link to the post for those interested.

Discovering art at Motown in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Motown Welcome Hub Art Gallery, September 2023

Since it opened in June (see: Linden Lab and Motown: a new approach to user on-boarding in Second Life), the Motown Welcome Hub has hosted a number of events, with the most recent being a Scavenger Hunt and, for the weekend of the 2nd September, 2023, a Trivia event with music (from noon through until 14:00 SLT).

However, on new venue which may have been overlooked in the hubbub surrounding the recent Scavenger Hunt is the opening of the Motown Art Gallery, feature for it’s first (?) exhibition, the work of one of SL’s most well-known – and rightly celebrated – physical world artists, JudiLynn India, who uses the platform as a means to bring her art to a global audience, thus demonstrating one of Second Life’s great strengths in providing a reach which can at times exceed that available to us in the physical world.

Motown Art Gallery, September 2023: JudiLynn India

The gallery is housed in a warehouse-like building on the north side of the open-air music events area within the main Motown region, and offers both an indoor display space across a main an mezzanine floor, and additional space within its back lot (which can be either reached most readily via the alleyway running between the gallery’s neighbouring beauty salon and pizza house, or in the case of JudiLynn’s exhibition, the thoughtfully-provided teleport disc on the gallery’s main floor.

I’ve been drawing since I could hold a crayon. I studied art throughout school, Commercial Art in high school and Graphic Design at Tyler School of Art/Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. I’ve always been interested in various crafts such as sewing and ceramics. I’ve also been active in music, playing piano, guitar and violin. After the turn of the century, I decided to focus my creativity on acrylic and digital painting and have totally enjoyed the ongoing journey.

– JudiLynn India

Motown Welcome Hub Art Gallery, September 2023

JudiLynn is perhaps best known is Second Life for her vibrant and richly layered abstract art, produced both through “wet” painting and digital means, and which might be most accurately described as intuitive art. By this I mean that rather than being based on an specific premeditated design or idea, these are pieces that are defined through the artistic process itself; the loop between mood, colour, texture and imagination all combining with what is already on the canvas or screen to inform what should come next. allow each piece to grow entirely organically to a finished state.

The result of this are pieces rich in colour and contrast and also highly fluid in their nature. They attract the eye and offer patterns and interactions which seem to ebb and flow as the eye passes over them, provoking the imagination. Sometimes motifs or patterns will become apparent which will lead JudiLynn to experiment with them across two or more pieces, resulting in small collections such as the likes of  Spiralling, Land of Fantasy, Jazzy and Fences, all of which can be found within the “backyard” section of this exhibition.

Motown Art Gallery, September 2023: JudiLynn India

However, JudiLynn’s work covers a much broader canvas – so to speak – which encompasses portraiture, pieces exuding an impressionist sensibility and landscapes. Some of this work is again demonstrated within this exhibition through the likes of the utterly captivating Royal Elegance, Grace and Majestic pieces.

None of the pieces presented is available for sale; for those looking to make some purchases for their SL homes / appreciation, please refer to the list of galleries included in JudiLynn’s biography available through the wall panel under the stairs leading up to the mezzanine area. For those who would like to have JudiLynn’s work as part of their physical lives, do be sure to visit her website.

Motown Welcome Hub Art Gallery, September 2023

As noted through the use of the bracketed question mark towards the top of this article, I’ve no idea whether exhibitions at the gallery will be rotated or on what basis; frankly, I’d be very disappointed if this were not the case; the inclusion of the gallery within the Welcome Hub is an excellent means of demonstrating SL’s ability to stand as a platform for artistic expressionism in its visual forms as much as the music venue outside the gallery demonstrates its ability to be a venue for social events and entertainment (and in regard to  visual art, I would also note JudiLynn has taken care to give a subtle underlining of SL’s scope for 3D artistic expression as well). As such, and whilst recommending JudiLynn’s exhibition, I certainly hope we’ll get to see the gallery reflect all genres of 2D and 3D art popular within SL.

SLurl Details