Using Firestorm in your browser for Second Life

On Friday, March 14th, Linden Lab, in conjunction with the Firestorm viewer team, launched Firestorm Zero, an expansion of the Lab’s viewer-in-your-browser Project Zero which, as the name suggests, features the release version of the Firestorm viewer. I provided an initial overview of the offering, together with notes on the overall status of Project Zero in Project Zero Update: Firestorm in your browser as well.

Table of Contents Key Points To Note Purchasing a Firestorm Pass and Accessing the Service Purchasing a Firestorm Zero Pass Accessing the Service Settings – Saving and Limitations Support And Feedback

Update: all available passes are sold out!

In this article, I hope to provide a brief re-cap on the work, and provide an hands-on to getting started and using Firestorm Zero.

Key Points To Note

• Firestorm Zero is a means to access Second Life by means of the Firestorm viewer being streamed to your computer from an Amazon GameLift servers, and your inputs transmitted back to the server.
• The service currently operates at a fixed 1080p screen resolution, and should generally provide a Second Life experience at least as good as any mid-range gaming PC, direct to your computer, no matter how old the latter might be.
• As the service is being streamed to your computer, not all of Firestorm’s setting and options may be saved between sessions – see below for more on this.
• Firestorm Zero is provided on a pay-to-play basis, using passes costing L$250 for up to five hours use of the service. See below on how to obtain passes.
  • Please note that this is an initial price, and may change – again, please refer to Project Zero Update: Firestorm in your browser as well for general information on the cost of streaming.
  • Payment is for using Firestorm Zero only, the official viewer Project Zero access at zero.secondlife.com is still free, but with limited access to existing users.
  • There are a limited number of passes available.
• The Firestorm viewer version is 7.1.11.

Purchasing a Firestorm Zero Pass and Accessing the Service

Purchasing a Firestorm Zero Pass

• Go to your Second Life dashboard.
• In the left-side menu column, click on Account → Purchase Streaming Hours.
• Click the Purchase 5 Hours for L$250.

• Once you have purchased your hours, continue below.

Accessing the Service

• On purchasing a pass, go to the the Firestorm Zero webpage – note that this may be referenced a “Second Life” in your browser tab, because it is Linden Lab providing the service, it does not mean you are about to be logged into the Official viewer.
• If you are logging-in for the first time:
  • Log-in with your log-in credentials using the Second Life web log-in request.
  • If you have Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) enabled (see: Second Life Multi-Factor Authentication: the what and how), you will additionally be asked to supply a Token.  Be sure to accept cookies to save you Token information.

• The warning that Project Zero is experimental will be displayed. click the Play button to proceed.
• The viewer will load and launch, delivering you in-world.

Settings and Options: Available and Limitations

As Firestorm Zero is streamed to your viewer, not all of Firestorm setting / options for saving settings within the viewer may work / be available. The following is a list of features I’ve been able to test; note that there are other Preferences that may also disabled within Firestorm Zero when compared to the locally-installed versions of the viewer. Also, these are obviously at the time of writing, and subject to future changes.

Option	Firestorm Zero
Retain Preferences between sessions	Yes
Set and retain Graphics Presets	Yes
Set and retain Camera Presets	Yes
Customise Toolbar buttons	Yes
Set and retain Camera Presets¹	Yes
Retain toolbar button size and alignment between sessions	No
Access Advanced Menu	No
Access Developer Menu	No
Upload textures, sounds, models, etc.	No
Retain IM histories	Yes
Retain Local Chat history	No
Back-up and Restore Settings	No
Enable RLVa & retain	Yes
Space Navigator Support	No
Save Snapshots to Disk²	No

1. I personally had issues with accessing Firestorm Zero after setting custom camera presets, and have reported this as a potential issue. Your mileage may vary.
2. As alternatives – use the options to save snapshots to e-mail or save to Flickr.

Support And Feedback

Firestorm Zero is a collaborative effort between Linden Lab and the Firestorm viewer team.

• Linden lab is responsible for the overall provisioning of the service: purchasing passes, accessing Firestorm Zero, providing capabilities such as viewer Preferences and settings being retained between sessions, etc.
  • Issues relating to any of the above can be reported through the Firestorm Zero category of the Second Life Feedback Portal.
• The Firestorm team retain responsibility for general support within the viewer itself.
  • Issues relating to using the viewer itself should, in the first instance, be raised through the usual Firestorm support channels.

Related Links

• Firestorm is now available in your favourite web browser – Linden Lab