Day: October 20, 2026

2026 week #43: SUG Leviathan Office Hour

Posted on by Inara Pey
The Simulator User Group meeting place at Longfellow

The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, October 6, 2026 Leviathan Office Hour, the “off-week” sessions of the Simulator User Group (SUG) meeting. These notes form a summary of the items discussed, and are not intended to be a full transcript. A video of the meeting by Pantera is embedded at the end of this summary – my thanks to her for providing it.

Meeting Overview

  • The Simulator User Group (also referred to by its older name of Server User Group) exists to provide an opportunity for discussion about simulator technology, bugs, and feature ideas is held every other Tuesday at 12:00 noon, SLT (holidays, etc., allowing), per the Second Life Public Calendar.
  • The “Leviathan Office Hour” meetings are held on the Tuesdays which do not have a formal SUG meeting, and are chaired by Leviathan Linden. They are more brainstorming / general discussion sessions.
  • Meetings are held in text in-world, at this location.

Simulator Deployments

  • No updates, only restarts.

General Updates

Game_Control

  • Game_control has now been been remerged with the 26.5 Chat Modernisation viewer code.
  • This means game_control should start appearing as part of future updates to the current RC version of 26.5 and will be a part of the viewer when it is promoted to release status.
  • Current points of note:
    • Game_control is be positioned behind a feature flag so it won’t send the GameControlData UDP message to simulators without the required back-end support in order to prevent crashes.
    • “Send GameControl Data to server” option is also disabled by default in Preferences UI.
    • The reason for the above is if the GameControlData UDP message is sent to a simulator without the required game_control support, the simulator will take the message as an “attack” or a hacked viewer, eventually dropping the UDP circuit to the viewer AND the region would put that UserID + computer_fingerprint on a short-term blacklist – logins to that region would fail for several minutes unless the user migrates to a different computer.
  • Whilst the current simulator release (code-named Nectarine) is grid-wide, it doesn’t have the necessary code to correctly set the feature flag to the viewer (and so issues can occur). The next simulator version – Olive (in development at the time of writing) – will have the required code.
  • During discussions a bug with game_control in which buttons don’t appear to fire when used in Mouselook. Leviathan is going to look into this.
  • Leviathan further noted:
    • Items “not set in stone” for game_control: default mappings and the full list of client-side actions available to be mapped.
    • Items “pretty much” set in stone: the UDP message format and the LSL constants (new constants can be added, but existing ones cannot be changed).
    • Items seen as “missing right now”: the ability to navigate the viewer UI with a game controller.

New Group Ability to Define Who Can Post Links to Group Chats

  • Leviathan Linden has developed a new Group Role ability to define who can post random web links in group chat.
  • This capability will:
    • Allow the posting of URLs to be set to the default Everyone, Owner and Officer roles, with Group Owners and moderators will be able to set it as required to other roles.
    • Include a defined “whitelist” of LL domain URL links which can be posted regardless of who is positing them and whether or not the ability has been set. This list may include certain recognised third-party website URLs as well, and may be subject to expansion.
    • Not (initially?) include support for user-defined whitelists of URLs.
  • This new ability will be deployed as a part of the upcoming Olive simulator update. However, as it requires corresponding viewer updates and back-end database changes, it will initially be set behind a feature flag. The viewer-side updates should be made available in viewer 26.5.
  • Per my notes from the previous SUG meeting:
    • Messages posted with URL links by those not authorised to do so will see the message go through, but the URL will be redacted.
    • This is part of the on-going work to limit the ability of some to post scam and phishing links to Group chats.
  • In this meeting, Leviathan indicated the new ability will be “on” by default for the default roles mentioned above; this brought forward understandable requests that the Everyone role does not have the ability to post links be default.
    • This would more effectively deal with issues of phishing in existing Groups, notably those Groups which no longer have an active Owner or assigned Officers who can adjust Role abilities.
    • Currently, the plan appears to be to only have the ability to post links toggled of the the Everybody role when creating new Groups.
    • Leviathan noted the final decision on how the ability should be set is down to the Product Team, but he would relay the feedback to them.
  • Broadly speaking, the time frame for this ability is possibly going to be: simulator  updates (Olive simulator release): late October / early November; viewer-side support (26.5 release): and the database updates: by late December.

General Discussion

Please refer to the video, below.

  • The Group Role ability news led to a discussion on Group abilities and capabilities (e.g. renaming a Group, providing additional information within Groups – date Group created, date someone joined, managing groups where the Owner is no longer active and there are no active Officers, etc.).This ran through the second quarter of the meeting.
  • Kyle Linden noted he has “a long list of group improvements in my back pocket,” and is writing Product Requirement documents for them one at a time.
  • Leviathan Linden is trying to track down some physics crashes on the simulator  – although it is providing difficult to identify the cause.
  • The Puppetry project remains shelved. However, there have been some internal discussions / questions asked around it in terms of possible future capabilities for the viewer – but this does not mean the project is about to (or will) resume, just that aspects of the work – such as Inverse Kinematics (IK) might be looked at again in the future with the hope of enabling “simple” actions: holding hands, touching a light switch, etc.
    • This led to a discussion on IK, animation, etc. during the last quarter of the meeting.

Date of Next Meetings

  • Formal SUG meeting: Tuesday, October 27, 2026.
  • Leviathan Linden: Tuesday, November 3, 2026.

From Emberhaus to Teapot in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Emberhaus, October 2026 – click any image for full size

The Destination Guide recently gave me cause to drop into a four-region estate operated by Clare (Clare Loring) and Dean (Dean Xochitl), forming a unified and engaging visit which simply put, is an absolute delight.

The primary region within the group is Emerhaus, a Full private island region utilising the Land Capacity bonus offered by Linden Lab. Its description alone offers a warm invitation for people to drop in:

Step inside and leave the rush of everyday life behind. A place to listen to live music, meet friends, explore, or simply find a quiet corner and stay awhile, or take photos.

– Emberhaus Destination Guide / About Land description

Emberhaus, October 2026

Emberhaus sits at the southern end of the estate, and is neighboured to the west by Thimblewick and to the north by Oakmere and Teapot, to which it is joined by an old and long disused railway line.

Thimblewick is also a Full region and home to the small town of San Virello, which also appears to be open to the public. However, as I didn’t come across a means of crossing one to the other during my visit (or at least not one I spotted!), I’ll leave that for possible future visit.

Emberhaus, October 2026

A Landing Point is set for Emberhaus, delivering visitors to a point no far from the middle of the region, located on a large wood deck. This sits before a grand row of what might have once been warehouses and one point, but which have been combined and converted into an engaging hangout space, complete with a miniature underfloor garden with little childhood remembrances scattered through it.

Where you go from here is entirely up to you; there is much to discover throughout the region, from the store and park office just across the deck from the warehouse-hangout, to the waterfront facing San Virello to the old track pointing north to Oakmere and Teapot.

Teapot, October 2026

This is a setting offering a balance between rugged woodland, water, and human habitation. The waterfront area on the west side of the region is marked by the local pub and a large terrace open-air event space with the old railway lining running beside both.

Directly on the waterfront and facing Thimblewick are a series of nautical businesses – although I rather think the local boatwright might have an interesting time when it comes time to launch the boat he has up on the stocks!

Emberhaus, October 2026

The southern half of the region sits as a group of islands; a large body of water crossed by bridges and connected to the open waters at their eastern end by reedy wetlands, separates them from the rest of the region.

This area is notable for the roughly rectangular island sitting within the channel separating it from the rest of Emberhaus, and for being the home of a local café and a large greenhouse through which the landscape flows, the glass roof perhaps offering shelter from rainy weather for the deer within. The smallest island has the remnants of a garden sitting on its back, perhaps best seen by the pier extending out from the café’s island.

Oakmere, October 2026

Within all of this there is a lot to explore and discover, including places to hang out and wildlife to see, so to be sure to take your time wandering.

Taking the route north along the old rail lines will bring you first to Oakmere, and herein comes a word of warning: there are three residential units to be found along this ribbon island as it connects to Teapot, so whilst it is open to visitors to wander, do be aware of them and try to avoid trespassing!

Teapot, October 2026

Sitting furthest to the northern, Teapot has its own Landing Point sitting on a little bridge, together with its own Destination Guide entry and description.

Teapot is a welcoming community cantered on creativity, conversation, and acceptance. Explore peaceful gardens, discover scenic spots for photography, relax with tea at the café, and enjoy live music and art in a friendly atmosphere.

– Teapot Destination Guide / About Land description

Emberhaus, October 2026

This is a rugged little island which is ideal for getting away from everything and just relaxing. Scattered across it are multiple hideaways and decks for hanging out – including the one that gives the island its name!

When approaching via the rail lines, the island is reached via a covered bridge with a tunnel facing it. Whether you head through the tunnel into the heart of the island or swing to the right and around the coast to head inland is entirely up to you.

Emberhaus, October 2026

As with Emberhaus, there are good opportunities for photography to be found across Teapot. There’s even a touch of Halloween to be found here as well, although me being me, I preferred some of the other places to sit and watch the world go by 🙂 .

There are one or two rough edges in the landscaping, but this is down to the fact Dean and Clare have been making one or two alterations, so will likely be be cleared up. I gather a horse riding rezzer should be making a return to the setting in the near future, and a kayak rezzer is due to get positioned – maybe for paddling to Thimblewick? I also understand from Dean that the estate could be seeing a further region added, so I’ll be keeping an eye out for that as well!

Teapot, October 2026

All three regions  – Emberhaus, Oakmere and Teapot – share the same overall environment (I assume this is true for Thimblewick / San Virello, but as noted that will be for a possible future visit). This gives a nice sense of natural continuity between the three; no suddenly roiling skies and galloping Sun as the environments transitions 🙂 .

An engaging visit to a engaging setting and well worth the time taken to explore.

Emberhaus, October 2026

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