Author: Inara Pey

Eclectic virtual world blogger with a focus on Second Life, VR, virtual environments and technology.

Tranquil Droplets at Nitroglobus in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Nitroglobus: Bamboo Barnes – Traquil Droplets

Opening on Monday, June 8th, 2020 at Nitroglobus Roof Gallery, curated by Dido Haas, is Tranquil Droplets, an exhibition of art by Bamboo Barnes.

There can be few involved in the art world within Second Life who can be unfamiliar with Bamboo’s work; it is by turns vibrant, evocative, provocative, emotive and so often rich in narrative. A physical world artist hailing from Japan, Bamboo works with digital tools to produce her pieces, her finished works strongly assertive in terms of its presentation, ability to dominate the space it occupies and in the way it demands the attention of the eye and mind.

Nitroglobus: Bamboo Barnes – Tranquil Droplets

There’s hopeless life still seeking for hopes like abandoned walking shadows of people on the street, my artworks are expression of confusion of life, darkness of light and strangeness of love. I create what I see but maybe you won’t, they are about people’s reality and mind.

– Bamboo Barnes, discussing her work

Much of her works is produced entirely outside of Second Life, which presents itself – along with Flickr – as a means for Bamboo to reach her audience. Which is not to say the pieces offered in Tranquil Droplets originated beyond our digital realm; rather the reverse, in fact, as the focus here is very much on avatar faces.

Not that the pieces offered are in any way a “traditional” avatar portrait / study; far from it. Each is presented in Bamboo’s rich, evocative style such that her use of colour, digital highlighting and layering all serve to add depth to the portraits offered. This gives each piece a life of its own, an expressive richness that presents us with a sense of story.

Nitroglobus: Bamboo Barnes – Traquil Droplets

For Bamboo, emotions are a core element of her art, be they those that are invoked by the piece she is working on; those she felt at the time she started working, and / or those evoked by the music she is listening to, as well as those she sees within her subject.

All of this is strongly evident within the 17 pieces offered within Traquil Droplets, each one of which offers unique reflections of both her subjects and of various artistic techniques – abstract, modernist, hints of dadaism / collages, and impressionism, all without ever merely mimicking these styles.

Nitroglobus: Bamboo Barnes – Tranquil Droplets

As Bamboo says, these pieces are like water whose dripping echoes in the silence; once heard, it cannot easily be forgotten, except here, it is that each of these images that continue to live with the imagination long after they’ve been seen, because of their richness of colour, presentation and emotion. In other words, this is a captivating exhibition.

SLurl Details

2020 viewer release summaries week #23

Posted on by Inara Pey
Logos representative only and should not be seen as an endorsement / preference / recommendation

Updates for the week ending Sunday, June 7th

This summary is generally 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.
  • Note that for purposes of length, TPV test viewers, preview / beta viewers / nightly builds are generally not recorded in these summaries.

Official LL Viewers

  • Current Release viewer version 6.4.3.542964,, dated May 29th, promoted June 2nd, formerly the FMOD Studio RC viewer – NEW.
  • Release channel cohorts:
    • Tools Update RC viewer, version 6.4.4.543148, issued on une 5th – this viewer is built using VS 2017 / a recent version of Xcode, and Boost.Fiber. It contains no user-facing changes.
    • Love Me Render RC viewer updated to version 6.4.4.543142 on June 3rd.
  • Project viewers:
    • Mesh uploader project viewer updated to version 6.4.3.542535 on June 3rd.

LL Viewer Resources

Third-party Viewers

V6-style

  • No updates.

V1-style

  • Cool VL viewer stable branch updated to 1.26.24.21 and Experimental branch to 1.27.0.1, both  on June 6th – release notes.

Mobile / Other Clients

Additional TPV Resources

Related Links

A Vulcan crisis, a fallen bridge, flappers and fantasy

Posted on by Inara Pey
Seanchai Library

It’s time to highlight another week of storytelling in Voice by the staff and volunteers at the Seanchai Library. As always, all times SLT, and events are held at the Library’s home, unless otherwise indicated. Note that the schedule below may be subject to change during the week, please refer to the Seanchai Library website for the latest information through the week.

Monday, June 8th, 19:00: Spock’s World

Gyro Muggins reads Diane Duane’s take on a classic figure from science fiction.

In the 23rd Century…

On the planet Vulcan, a crisis of unprecedented proportion has caused the convocation of the planet’s ruling council, and led to Starfleet ordering the U.S.S. Enterprise to the planet in the hope that its first officer, and Vulcan’s most famous son, can help overcome the issues the planet faces.

As Commander Spock, his father, Sarek, and Captain James T. Kirk struggle to preserve Vulcan’s future, the planet’s innermost secrets are laid open, as is its people’s long climb to rise above their savage pre-history, merciless tribal warfare, medieval-like court intrigue to  develop and adhere to o’thia, the ruling ethic of logic, and to reach out into space.

For Spock, the situation means he is torn between his duty to Starfleet and the unbreakable ties that bind him to Vulcan. Confronted by his own internal conflicts, he must quell them and prevent his world – and possibly the entire United Federation of Planets – from being ripped apart.

Tuesday, June 9th

12:00 Noon: Russell Eponym, Live in the Glen

Music, poetry, and stories in a popular weekly session at Ceiluradh Glen.

19:00: The Bridge of San Luis Rey

With Willow Moonfire.

On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travellers into the gulf below.

Thus begins Thorton Wilder’s second, and 1928 Pulitzer Prize winning novel. Influenced in part by Wilder’s own conversations with his deeply religious father, and inspired by Prosper Mérimée’s one-act act play, Le Carrosse du Saint-Sacrement, Thorton described the novel as a means to pose the question, “Is there a direction and meaning in lives beyond the individual’s own will?”

The bridge of the novel’s title and opening is a fictional Inca rope bridge, and its collapse is witnessed by a Franciscan friar, himself about to cross over it. A deeply pious man, Brother Juniper finds his faith challenged by the tragedy, and as a result embarks upon a “mission” to prove that it was divine will rather than chance that led to the deaths of those who fell with the bridge.

Over the course of six years, he compiles a huge book on the lives of those who perished, much of it obtained through interviews with those who knew them, in an attempt to to show that the beginning and end of the lives of those lost in the tragedy might be a a window into the will of God, and that the beginning and end of every life is in accordance with God’s plan for the individual.

Thus, within his book, he records the lives of those killed, as presented in succeeding chapters of the novel, mapping all that led them to their fate. The novel itself weaves a story through time, from the opening tragedy, then back to the lives of those who perished, then forward to the book’s reception by the church, then back once more to the events that immediately followed the tragedy and before Brother Juniper embarked on his quest.

Through this, we not only witness the lives of those lost, but also Brother Juniper’s own fate as a result of his efforts – a fate itself foretold within his book, and which again leaves one pondering the question Wilder set in writing the novel: is there indeed direction in our lives beyond our own will – and if so, is it rooted in the divine, or humanity’s own attitudes of a given time?

Wednesday, June 10th, 19:00: The Phryne Fisher Mysteries

Corwyn Allen brings us stories about Kerry Greenwood’s Australian heroine of the 1920s, possibly made popular to a globe audience through the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s series, Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries.

Phryne Fisher is rich, aristocratic and far too intelligent to be content as a flapper in the Jazz Age. She collects men, fast cars and designer dresses. she flies, dances, shoots and has a strong bohemian outlook on life. But no matter how delicious the distractions, Phryne never takes her eyes off her main goal in life: bringing down villains.

Thursday, June 11th 19:00: Strong Medicine – Weird Westerns

Shandon Loring reads Tad William’s short story. Also in Kitely – grid.kitely.com:8002:SEANCHAI).

Space Sunday: moving a mole and Planet Nine

Posted on by Inara Pey

InSight’s scoop gently presses against the top of the “mole” of the HP³ experiment, ready to gently push it down into the Martian regolith. Image Credit: NASA/JPL

NASA and its partner, the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) finally have some good news about the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package, or HP³, carried to Mars by the InSight Lander: they’ve made some progress towards perhaps getting moving again.

As I’ve noted in past Space Sunday articles, the experiment has been a source of consternation for scientists and engineers since InSight arrived on Mars in November 2018. Following the landing, HP³ was one of two experiment packages deployed directly onto the surface of Mars by the lander’s robot arm. One of the key elements of the experiment is the “mole”, a self-propelled device designed to drive its way some 5m into the Martian crust, pulling a tether of sensors behind it to measure the heat coming from the interior of Mars.

After a good start, the probe came to a halt with around 50% of its length embedded in the soil. At first it was thought it had hit solid bedrock preventing further motion; then it was thought that the mole was gaining insufficient traction from the hole walls, on account of the fine grain nature of the material it was trying to move through. That was in February 2019.

The InSight lander was commanded to deploy the HP3 drill system on February 12th, 2019. Credit: NASA/JPL

Since then, scientists and engineers have been trying to figure out what happened, and how to get the mole moving again – because of the delicate nature of the sensor tether, the HP³ experiment couldn’t simply be picked up and moved to another location and the process started over. instead, various attempts were made to try to giving the mole material so it might gain traction.

Most of these revolved around using the scoop at the end of the lander’s robot arm to part-fill / part compress the hole created by the mole, the theory being that loose regolith would gather around the head of the mole and help it regain the necessary fiction to drive itself forward once more. Initially, some small success was had – until the mole abruptly “bounced” almost completely back out of the hole.

Further attempts were made to compress the ground around the hole, but all forward motion remained stalled, leading scientists to believe the mole had struck a layer of “duricrust” – a hard layer formed as a near the surface of soil as result of an accumulation of soluable materials deposited by mineral-bearing waters that later leech / evaporate away. These layers can vary between just a few millimetres to several metres in thickness, and are particularly common to sedimentary rock, which itself has been shown to be common on Mars.

The rub for the InSight mission is that if it is a layer of duricrust beneath the lander, it is impossible to tell just how thick it might be.

This images shows how difficult “pushing” the mole would be. The scoop (upper right) had a very small surface area at the end of the mole with which it could safely make contact, shown circled, without potentially damaging the tether harness. Credit; DLR

Earlier this year it was decided to use the scoop on the robot arm more directly, positioning it over the exposed end of the mole and applying pressure in the hope it could push the mole gently down into the ground in a series of moves that would allow the mole to get to a point were it could resume driving itself into the ground.

However, this approach has not been not without risk. The end of the mole has a “harness” – a connector for the tether, so the scoop has to be precisely positioned and any sort of pressure applied very gently and carefully to avoid any risk of slippage that might result in damage to the tether and / or harness and render its ability to gather data and information from the probe useless.

However, on June 3rd, NASA announced that a series of gentle pushes had resulted in the mole being completely below the surface, and with no apparent damage to the tether or harness. However, whether or not this means the mole is able to proceed under is own self-proplusion is unclear, as NASA noted in their tweet.

In all, the tip of the mole is now some 3m below the Martian surface. That’s deep enough for it to start registering heat flow, but to be effective, the mole still needs to drive itself down the full 5 metres. It is only at this depth that the mole and sensors can correctly start to measure the sub-surface geothermal gradient, and thermal conductivity, the two pieces of information required by scientists to obtain the heat flow from deeper in the planet. By studying the thermal processes in the interior of the planet, scientists can learn a lot about the history of Mars, and how it formed. They may also gain insights into how other rocky bodies formed.

Attempts have yet to be made to see if the mole can move under its own spring-driven propulsion, but for now NASA and DLR are rightly treating the current status of the probe as a victory. The tether harness at the end of the mole is undamaged, so if the mole can resume progress under its own power, there’s not reason why it shouldn’t start recording information.

Continue reading “Space Sunday: moving a mole and Planet Nine” →

The Isle of Pandasia in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey

Isle of Pandasia, June 2020 – click any image for full size

Update, July 14th: Pandasia is no longer available for public access.

Welcome to the island of Pandasia, mystic with a Zen atmosphere for nature lovers, relaxing and taking photos or taking a boat trip. the sim is fully open including the beach side house. [Have a] Good visit!

– About Land, Isle of Pandasia

For those looking for somewhere just a little bit different in-world to visit, Isle of Pandasia could be just the ticket. The work of T-Chat (noisette Haller), it is a curious mix of oriental themes, fantasy, whimsy and animal cuteness. It might best be described as a series of interlinked vignettes than a continuous landscape, held together by water.

On first arrival, the region seems simple enough: a body of water ringed by high-sided islands of rock, some of which appear to intrude into the region from their off-sim placement. It seems to simply be the home of a couple of low-lying islands, with wooden walkways connecting a Japanese-style shine and pier-end buildings, one of which forms the landing point. But looks can be deceptive.

Isle of Pandasia, June 2020

A walk along the board walk from the landing point can bring visitors to the shrine, Buddha waiting peacefully within. He shares the island with some of the pandas that give the region its name, their presence, like the groves of bamboo close by suggesting more of a Chinese influence than Japanese, while the large sampan-like boat sitting between the board walk and the larger island  suggests either Chinese or Japanese origins.

This larger island offers a little Koi house and garden to be explored. Cranes, flamingoes, rabbits and other critters are scattered around the island, all watched over by a little panda on his rocky throne, and who has apparently wandered here over the bridge connecting the island to the shine.

Isle of Pandasia, June 2020

Beautifully laid out, rich in blossom, this is all a soothing setting ideal for restful moments and photography – but t is far from all that is available. Despite appearing as if it is in the centre of the region, the landing point is actually off to one side, and several of the walls of rock surrounding rising from the water actually sit as curtains hiding the rest of the region’s secrets. How you reach these points is a matter of choice: flying is permitted – but if you can find one, there are little rowing boats that can be used to cross the water.

To the west and north, the rocks screen the beach mentioned in the About Land description, complete with the beach house sitting on its own small sand bar. A ring of the curtain cliffs here encircle a lagoon in which castaways can hide from the world if they like. To the south, a great shelf steps out from the cliffs to provide room for cherry blossom trees and a Japanese-style bath house where a cat might offer a massage.

Isle of Pandesia, June 2020

The bath house overlooks a giant blossom tree that rises from the glass-like water. Lanterns dance around this tree whilst sprites form and roll and then vanish. This is another magical place where a rabbit sits on the water with his lantern and a snowy owl shares the boughs of the tree with two wyrm-like cloud dragons as glass flowers sit in the sunbeams.

More is to be found within the deep gorge sitting between high cliffs to the south of the landing point (the southern end of the gorge the home to a rowing boat rezzer, another little house on the shore nearby. Meanwhile, people can, if they wish, escape the water and take to the air on the back of the blue whale that slowly circles to the north-east.

Isle of Pandasia, June 2020

Rich in wildlife, critters and with koi swimming the waters below, Isle of Pandasia has a lot to see and appreciate, and plenty to photograph, all of which makes for an enjoyable visit.

SLurl Details

Lab Gab 27 summary: Relay for Life

Posted on by Inara Pey

via Linden Lab

The 27th edition of Lab Gab live streamed on Friday, June 5th, and featured members of the Second Life Relay for Life team Stingray9798 Raymaker, Trager Alter, MamaP Beerbaum, and Nikki Mathieson, to mark the 2020 Relay weekend (which you can read about here). They were interviewed by co-hosts for the session, Strawberry Linden and Patch Linden.

The official video of the segment is available via You Tube, and is embedded at the end of this article. The following is a summary of the key topics discussed and responses to questions asked.

About the RFL Team

  • Trager Alter has been directly involved in Relay for Life of SL since 2017 after being introduce to Stingray by MammaP. He’s been directly involved in Relay Refresh – telling the stories of people who have faced and survived cancer.
  • MammaP became involved with Relay for Life of Second Life at a time when her father was suffering from cancer. It gave her the opportunity to do something practical to help raise money for cancer research whilst simultaneously caring doe her father in the physical world.
  • Nikki Mathieson joined SL alongside of MamaP, and became enamoured with the platform, the opportunities it offers, and realised that it offered huge potential for Relay for Life, and became involved in RFL of RL for that reason.
  • Stingray came to SL through the American Cancer Society, having been the manager for RFL’s on-line content. He was asked to look into RFL activities in SL as a result of RFL of SL volunteers working with ACS’s Innovations Team, and everything had reached a point where the Innovation Team were ready to hand it over to the ACS Relay Team, and he was asked to take the lead, so becoming the official liaison between RFL of SL and ACS.

Strawberry Linden (seated left) with (standing) Trager Alter (l), and Stingray9798 Raymaker (r), (seated)Nikki Mathieson (c) MamaP Beerbaum (r)

What is the Relay Weekend?

  • Every year, Relay for Life raises money for the work of the American Cancer Society via a season of events. Many of these are run by individual Relay Teams formed by Second Life residents, and some are “mega events” (such as the Home and Garden Expo, Fantasy Faire, the Sci-Fi Convention, Making Strides Against Breast Cancer and Xmas Expo).
  • The Relay Weekend is the culmination of those events held during the core Relay season (February to June), where all the teams, large and small come together alongside the RFL track, each team with its own parcel to promote the work in providing care, support and treatment for sufferers of cancer in all its forms and their families and carers.
  • The event carries the ideal of Relay events in the physical world by having members of each team take turns to walk around an in-world track for the full 24 hours of the event. This is to symbolise two things:
    • When someone is dealing with cancer, they are no doing it alone, there are others who can support them and be with them.
    • The 24-hour aspect is recognition that cancer never sleeps, and the quest for cures to it cannot rest either.
  • The camp sites and themed regions all offer opportunities to socialise, to make friends and to learn more about cancer and how it can affect lives, be treated, etc., and the role of the ACS in all of this.

How does the Weekend Differ from Physical World RFL Events?

  • Abbreviated history of Relay:
    • In May 1985, Dr. Gordon Klatt, a colorectal surgeon from Tacoma, Washington, raised money for ACS by walking around the track at Baker Stadium at the University of Puget Sound for 24 hours, covering approximately 83 miles around the track.
    • Throughout the night, friends paid $25 to run or walk 30 minutes with him.
    • After this event, Klatt thought about how other people could participate in a similar event in their own community. He recruited a small team of people to host the City of Destiny Classic 24-Hour Run Against Cancer, and from this Relay for Life grew.
  • Relay for Life events now take place in some 30 countries around the world.
  • Events generally comprise:
    • A Survivor Lap, which starts the Relay event.
    • An Opening Lap, in which all the participants take a lap around the track
    • A Luminaria Ceremony, usually with a candlelight vigil
    • A “Fight Back” Ceremony, in which participants pledge to take specific actions against cancer.
  • The SL Relay Weekend comprises the same format and key activities. But differs in execution:
    • It does not require so much central logistical organisation and management.
    • It does however, require far more infrastructure coordination.
    • It is effectively a bigger event, both in terms of virtual vs. physical size (the 2020 track, for example, equates to some 6 miles), and in terms of the numbers of people participating.
    • Teams are able to do more than “just” camp and walk the track: they can directly support fund-raising by organising and running their own mini-events and activities.
    • It is a fully international event.

What is the Luminaria Ceremony?

  • It is the hour of the event (started at 21:00 on the Saturday of the Relay Weekend, roughly half-way through the weekend.
  • At that time, the track is darkened, and everyone in the Relay Regions are asked not to engage in open text or voice chat but to walk the track in silence or stand to one side.
  • During the hour, the names of those to be remembered, as submitted by the Luminaria Dedication Form that has been available for some time before each Relay Weekend, are read out over the event audio channel (which can be best listened through via the T1 Radio pop-up media player).
  • It is a time for people to reflect on how cancer has touched them personally, to recall those they’ve lost to the disease, or someone who is facing it as a part of their life, or someone who has seen it enter remission.
  • Also honoured throughout the weekend are the names hovering above the Luminaria lanterns that line either side of the track, and through which residents can make a donation to RFL of SL (minimum L$50) and add a name / dedication.

How Has the SARS-C0V-2 Pandemic Affected ACS?

  • Like most non-profit organisations world-wide, ACS relays on large-scale, multi-people fund-raising events, with Relay For Life being the largest annual event for ACS, with the primary RFL fund-raising period world-wide being April-May.
  • SARS-CoV-2 has therefore significantly impacted RFL both as the ACS’ main means of raising funds, and the amount of funds overall that are flowing into the organisation on a daily basis.
  • RFL of SL and Second Life users – and their families and friends – are therefore critical to the mission of ACS, by:
    • Engaging in events such as the Relay Weekend and donating money.
    • And / or by visiting RFL of SL page at the RFL website and making a donation.
  • ACS and Relay teams around the world have recognised that RFL of SL is now the spear of fund-raising efforts.
  • Second Life users have rallied to this call, at the time of writing, RFL of SL has raised around US $275,000.
    • Overall, RFL of SL has raised some US $4 million (around L$1 billion) during the years it has been operating.

RFL of SL Events

  • RFL of SL comprises a range of events, most of which take place during the core in-world fund-raising season between February and June each year.
    • This period includes the majority of the mega events (Home and Garden, Fantasy Faire, Sci-Fi Convention and the Relay Weekend.
    • There are also all the team events held across SL.
    • There is also the Xmas Expo and Making Strides Against Breast Cancer in October, which is to be expanded to have its own Renaissance mega event.
  • In terms of fund raising, Fantasy Faire remains the biggest mega event for in Second Life, with Making Strides also a focused and effective fund-raiser.
  • Outside of these, mega and large events tend to evolve and change. There used to be a major RFL of SL clothing / fashion event, for example, and when breedables became very popular in SL, there was a dedicated Breedables Fair.
  • The days of relay has also proved popular among communities wishing to support RFL / ACS. This started as the 5 days of relay in 2019  and had to be expanded to the 10 days of relay in 2020 to accommodate everything.

Where Do All the Donations Go?

  • Kiosks for RFL of SL are set up to allow events and teams see how much they have raised and contributed.
  • When a donation is made, it briefly goes to the kiosk holder account, but then is immediately paid out of that account and into the ACS fund account.
  • RFL of SL merchant vendors work on the same principle of payment in, then immediate transfer of the amount to the ACS fund raising account.
  • Funds are cashed out from the ACS L$ account in s similar manner: they are converted to US dollars and then process credited to ACS, not to any intermediary account.
  • When the funds are received by ACS, there is a certain amount that has to cover expenses (e.g. the running costs associated with having a presence in SL), but all other funds beyond this go directly to supporting ACS in its various missions.
  • Some of the money raised may be directed at a specific programme, as is the case with Making Strides, Fantasy Faire and the Xmas Expo:
    • Money raised by Making Strides goes directly to the ACS breast cancer mission.
    • In 2018 / 2019 funds raised be Fantasy Faire went directly into the Kenyatta National Hospital Hope Hostel in Kenya (see here for an initial report on this project from 2018).
    • This year, the US $75,000 raised by Fantasy Faire is reserved for use in the ACS global mission.
    • Similarly, the funds raised by the Christmas Expo are earmarked for the ACS child cancer programme.
  • Funds not earmarked for specific missions / programmes is referred to as “purple money” and goes towards the ACS cancer research mission in the United States. ACS is believed to be the largest funder of cancer research in the world outside of the US government.
  • Within SL, the funds pay for ACS island and all the resources, facilities and support than can be offered through the island directly to cancer sufferers and cancer care workers in-world, the Cancer Survivors support group, etc.

How Can SL Communities Get Involved and Help?

  • Individuals can attend RFL of SL events and donate through kiosks, make purchases (where available), etc.
  • Out-world donations can be made through the RFL of SL web page.
  • Those wishing to form a Relay Team, run an event, etc., should go the American Cancer Society Island, or contact Stingray and the rest of the team participating in this Lab Gab session.
  • Those wishing to help can join the Relay for Life Volunteers in-world group.