On Tuesday, June 25th, 2024, Linden Lab held special Town Hall Meeting of the Product and Engineering team, featuring the following personnel:
This is a summary of the topics discussed at the session. Audio extracts are included were appropriate, and a video of the session is embedded at the end of this article – my thanks to Pantera for providing it. |
Table of Contents
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For ease of reference, timestamps are provided to the relative points within the video where specific topics are discussed, allowing readers who prefer to listen to the comments directly to be able to do so.
A Little Background
A brief introduction to each of the people participating:
- Kali Linden: has been with Linden Lab for nine years and heads-up the teams responsible for the Lab’s web properties (Marketplace, Secondlife.com, etc., the account management and log-in services, etc.
- Signal Linden: a software engineer with a long history with virtual environments (MU* platforms, etc.), and started using SL as as high school student. He joined LL in 2015, initially working on Sansar. His background is software engineering, and he now leads both the viewer and server engineering teams.
- Grumpity Linden: joined SL as a contractor with The Product Engine and helping with the development of (the then) Viewer 2.0, and formally joined LL in 2014. As the Senior VP of Product and Engineering she is responsible for coordinating both teams and overseeing their various projects, often in a hands-on capacity (as with SL Mobile).
- Sntax Linden: manages the Lab’s web properties under Kali Linden (as he leads the monthly Web User Group meetings), and currently has a specific focus on the Marketplace and improving Second Life’s commerce environment.
- Kyle Linden: as a product manager, is focused on creator tools within the platform. He is a 17-year veteran of Second Life and has worked in most areas of the Linden Lab / the platform in that time.
Major Announcements
SL Mobile
- The Premium Plus / Premium Open Beta has been launched, see:
- The App is not currently visible on Google Play, as new apps take up to 7 days to become searchable there.
- It is hoped the Beta can open out more widely Soon™.
- As a Beta product, there is still much more work to do – but a lot has been achieved with the assistance of the closed alpha users / testers.
- However, SL Mobile will never provide all of the features found in the viewer, as it is impractical to do so (e.g. in-depth content creation is unlikely to be a part of the app).
- In keeping with the above, feedback from those trying the Beta is welcomed – refer to the link to the official blog post above for details.
- Feedback is requested through the SL channels, not through either the Apple Store or Google Play, as the latter could unbalance the app’s ratings unfairly, given it is only a Beta product, not a released product.
- LL are still in consultation with Apple over the issue of the iOS version of the app not being allowed to access Adult rated regions.
- LL have been in discussions with Unity (as the app is built on that engine) over Unity’s sudden licensing changes earlier in 2024, and the belief is that this will not be an issue for SL mobile in the future.
Scripting and Lua(u)
[Video: 26:31-31:17] – Signal Linden
[Background: In February 2024 it was confirmed LL is looking to natively adopt Luau, a Lua VM implementation viewer-side as a means of providing better support for, and control of, scripted agents (including automated testing capabilities using such agents; providing a means of supporting custom UI extensions / plug-ins without having to resort to C++ and adding custom displays to present exiting information in the viewer. See here and here for more on the initial announcement. The following is in addition to that work.]
- Signal indicated at as well as running Lua natively on the client-side, LL is now looking to replace the Mono VM runtime engine with Luau’s runtime engine on the back-end.
- This means that scripts should be more efficient in their memory use and execute faster.
- The work is still in the benchmarking / development phase, and more information will be provided as work progresses.
- As this is now a viewer / server project, it is liable that information will be made available through both the Simulator User Group meetings and the TPV Developer meetings, as it become prescient.
The project will end up swapping the underlying Mono VM out for a Lua VM under the hood … Our plan is to support both [LSL and lua]. We will end up compiling the LSL down to the Lua bytecode. [So essentially] 2 VMs. LSO (the old stuff) and ultimately the Lua VM. The Mono -> Lua bytecode change should be invisible.
Content Creation
Educating Creators (Best Practices, Content Optimisation, etc) – Kyle Linden
- The existing community of Second life creators as their greatest educational asset, and so are thinking about ways to spotlight creators who provide videos, guides, tutorials, and / or by teaching in-world, etc., on a “best practice” basis.
- That said, LL acknowledge their own documentation is often poor – much is out-of-date, features are often released without full documentation [which also might never follow as a result], and focus needs to be placed on this.
- Believes that LL are going to try to build a better repository / resource creators and users can use to find the kinds of tutorials / class / video guides mentioned above.
Improvements to Mesh Rigging and the Avatar Skeleton – Signal Linden
- LL is aware the current approach to rigging mesh and attachments to the avatar is a non-trivial task is is looking to ways to improve the workflow for creators so that content built outside of SL can be more directly imported and “work”.
- This involved moving to modern content creation standards [i.e. the glTF 2.0 specification, as frequently referenced in this blog].
- First phase of this work currently in development with glTF scene import, which will prototype a “drag and drop” approach to taking content from Blender and dropping it into Second Life [details on the glTF import / export work can be found in my CCUG summaries].
- One outcome of this work will be the ability to have more “local mesh preview” capabilities, where content can be temporarily displayed in the viewer exactly as it appears in the tool used to create it (e.g. Substance Painter, Blender), without having to go through any form of upload conversion (somewhat like the Local Textures capability).
- Further into the future, this work will mean SL can support custom armatures (rigs / skeletons).
Animation Improvements – Priorities and Editing – Signal Linden
- This is seen as an important capability by many, both for helping to improve the smoothness of things like Animation Override systems and in avoiding potential conflicts between animations.
- It has often been requested and is something the Lab would like to tackle. There are requests on the Feedback Portal, and people are asked to vote on them to indicate how important they think this is, and new ideas should be submitted there.
- Sees the issue potentially being tackled in a number of ways (e.g. better scripted support, supporting different animation formats, etc.).
2K PBR Terrain on Mainland / Support for PBR and 2K textures on Avatars -Signal Linden
- 2K PBR terrain on Mainland more a Product Operations question than an engineering question.
- 2K textures + PBR support for Avatar Appearance [Bakes on Mesh/Bake Service; wearables assets (inventory), appearance editing, etc.]: No 1 most voted request on the Feedback Portal and is currently being planned. Deployment should eventually be a combination of both at the same time, once ready.
PBR and Improvements – Signal Linden
- The graphics team is continuing to work on optimising PBR performance, including fixing redraw bugs, memory use, etc.
- This work is in part focused on optimisations for mid-range hardware (e.g. around US $800 brand-new).
- With regards to MacOS, there is a focus on the current memory issues
- LL recognise that the introduction is a world-changer in terms of SLs visuals – but it is also a world-changer in allowing content creators to more readily use their tools to produce good content for Second Life without having to resort to arcane measures.
- Appreciate the change can be painful for some, and are trying to respond where possible with updates and improvements.
- Pointed out (again) that the arrival of PBR is just one step in the overall plan for enhancing Second Life’s capabilities and full leverage modern content creation tools and techniques.
WebRTC
[Video: 45:48-50:00] – Signal Linden
[Background: WebRTC (RTC=”real-time communication”) is bing implemented to replace Vivox as the Voice component in Second Life. It is both a viewer and server project, with the viewer code supplied as a library with a wrapper, so there will no longer be a separate 3rd party Voice .EXE plug-in. It will offer a more extensible, “industry standard” approach to voice in SL, with better fidelity and sound quality. Initial deployment will see it work alongside Vivox (with some limitations).]
- The release candidate viewer can be found on the Alternate Viewers web page.
- Note that this will use Vivox on regions without WebRTC back-end support.
- To test the viewer with WebRTC you should visit one of WebRTC Voice 1, WebRTC Voice 2, WebRTC Voice 3, or WebRTC Voice 4 on the Main grid.
- The switch-over will be carried out in collaboration / cooperation with TPVs.
- Work has been put into securing the use of WebRTC Voice against attempts to eavesdrop, obtain people’s IP addresses, etc., by routing peer-to-peer communications via an internal server using a Lab proxy IP.
Commerce
- [Video: 58:11-1:00:33] Mult-Factor Authentication (MFA) – Kali Linden
- Will be added to the Marketplace.
- It will be opt-in, as per the viewer / SL dashboard.
- The overall goal is to have MFA applied to all points of entry to SL for those using it.
- [Video: 1:00:59-1:03:01] Marketplace questions – Sntax Linden
- Marketplace Search has been undergoing improvements and will continue to do so, all the the aim of improving the ability of content creators to promote their content and buyers get to the content they want to see.
- Marketplace on mobile devices: There is a project underway to update the Marketplace design and UI which it is hoped will make it more accessible to smaller screens, and when using the in-viewer web browser.
- Feedback on these welcome through the Feedback Portal and at the monthly Web User Group meetings.
- [Video: 1:03:05-1:04:16] CasperVend / Marketplace integration – Kali Linden
- A road map is being developed as to what makes the most sense to do first with CasperVend integration in general.
- Again the onus is on making the general shopping and merchant experience better across the Marketplace and when using / interacting with CasperVend products.
- It is likely one of the first areas for integration will be having CasperVend delivering go through the same mechanism as Marketplace deliveries, simplifying CasperVend redeliveries.
- Longer-term going is to have things integrated so that Merchants can manage their activities through a single point, whether selling through CasperVend or / and via the MP.
In Brief
Upcoming Initiatives – Kyle Linden
- Combat 2.0 [ first tranche of work updating the Second Life Combat system (SLCS – see my Combat User Group summaries).
- Implementation of game controller support (e.g X-Box game pads).
- Introduction of WebRTC Voice.
Additional Viewer Updates – Kyle Linden
- As well as those mentioned (glTF scene import, WebRTC, etc):
- More sample content to the Library (e.g. mirrors).
- HDRI support for skies, etc.
- Possible updates to the library EEP settings to HDR.
- Possibly extending the use of emojis in Display Names (this is problematic as it requires Unicode data to be stored, and so is only being explored at this time and many not make it to feature release).
Accessibility Initiative – Kyle Linden
- Some of work going into SL over the last few years has been focused on laying the foundations for improved accessibility options.
- One of the first elements of this work to surface will be server-side translation for text.
- In the future, the deployment of WebRTC could potentially allow for direct text-to-speech / speech to text.
- AI tools might be considered for giving access assistance to SL.
- Those with ideas for making SL more accessible to all should file feature requests via the Feedback Portal.
- It was pointed out that creators could help with accessibility by giving their creations meaningful names where appropriate, rather than leaving them as the default “Object”.
The future of Mesh Upload Prices – Grumpity Linden
- With the work on glTF mesh uploads and scene imports, LL will be re-evaluating the cost of mesh uploads across all membership levels.
- In the interim, the change to make 2K texture uploads free for Premium Plus subscribers is now live.
General Questions in Last 15 Minutes
Please refer to the video from 1:16:53 onwards.
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