Logos representative only and should not be seen as an endorsement / preference / recommendation
Updates from the week through to Sunday, October 15th, 2023
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
Release viewer, version 6.6.15.581961 (formerly the Inventory Extensions Viewer), promoted October 2 – No Change.
Release channel cohorts:
glTF / PBR Materials viewer updated to version 7.0.0.581886 on October 12.
Maintenance V RC viewer, version 6.6.16.582075, October 5.
Moochie All Hallows, October 2023 – click any image for full size
If you are looking for a low-key, engaging setting for Halloween, a place where you can share spooky stories, explore, take photos, have a dance with someone close to you or just sit before a blazing log fire and relax without being overloaded by spooks, goblins, ghost, monsters and scary noises and the other accoutrements often poured into Halloween-themed settings, then you could do no better than to visit Maia Macabre’s Moochie All Hallows 2023.
Through the witching season, visit All Hallows for haunted meanderings, autumnal hoodoo, darkly roaming, and Halloween encapsulated. Be strange, but don’t be a stranger…
– From the Moochie All Hallows introduction
Moochie All Hallows, October 2023
Now in its eighth year, Moochie All Hallows retains the familiar central clearing and focal point for Maia’s seasonal designs, ready for dancing and surrounded by various little vignettes (one of which appears to be an invitation to dance at the end of a rope after a spot of bobbing for apples, just to keep up with the more macabre feel of the season!). It sits under a dark night’s sky (be sure to Use Shared Environment (World → Environment) which is also suitably atmospheric, while the ring of paths and trails winding outwards from the clearing. Some of these paths might only lead a short distance while others might wind onwards under the trees, occasionally branching to offer various routes of exploration, all of them beckon explorers to follow them.
One of these paths actually descends into the clearing, sloping gently down as it does from the Landing Point. The latter is located alongside familiar railcars, where might also be found notes on how best to appreciate the setting, a couple’s HUD rezzer for those wishing to walk together whilst exploring, and a HUD book outlining some of the history of some of the traditions associated with Halloween. Whilst predominantly focused on those traditions for the season hailing from Ireland (I’d have liked to have seen some inclusion the Scottish form of guising, given it has something of a direct line to modern trick-or-treating), the book makes for a good read and offers a solid introduction to the Gaelic festival of Samhain, which very much encompasses activities (mumming, guising, the use of bonfires, etc.), carried down into modern populist forms of celebrating Halloween and the season it represents.
Moochie All Hallows, October 2023
Walking the various paths spreading outwards will bring visitors to the likes of storytelling circles deep in the woods, seating arranged around a warm fire just awaiting a storyteller or two and an audience, or to ruins and a chapel, the inevitable pumpkin patch (this one nicely laid out as a means of bordering a meandering path, rather than the perhaps more familiar fenced-in square or rectangular patch), a romantic wishing well (the smoochie Moochie well? 🙂 ), and more.
Follow some of the paths far enough and you’ll come to boardwalks running alongside the waters surrounding the region, or reaching out to decks sitting over the the dark waters. These offer a mix of places to sit, treats to enjoy and even a game or two to play. Tents, either on the boardwalks or under the eves of the trees, offer further snuggle-points for couples and / or places to sit and tell stories or simply think and pass the time.
Moochie All Hallows, October 2023
A nice touch throughout is that just about everything has been set to Phantom (outside of things like the boardwalks). This means that when trying to navigate paths marked by pumpkins, torches, chairs, and so on, you are not constantly bombarded with the annoying thunk-thunk-thunk of object collisions; thus, the local ambient sounds can be appreciated without distraction. Add to this the use of burning torches, pumpkin lanterns and strings of lights hanging from tree boughs, and the setting is provided with enough suitable illumination so that navigation is easy without the lighting spoiling the sense of night-time mystery.
Maia is rightly well-know for her seasonal settings at Moochie and I’ve frequently enjoy visiting the region in its winter guises. However, this my first time there with Moochie dressed for Halloween, and as someone not particularly into all the modern (i.e. 20th century onwards) aspects of the season, I really appreciated exploring the very relaxed manner in which it captures the ideas and fun of Halloween without being in-you-face with heavy-handed references or getting bogged down in belabouring spookiness.
IMAGOLand Art Galleries: Carelyna – Phantasmagoria
Having opened at the start of October and occupying a skybox gallery at Mareea Farrasco’s IMAGOLand galleries, Phantasmagoria is the latest exhibition by Carelyna.
Whilst the title might well evoke thoughts of ghosts and spectres, this is a collection which takes the term in a different direction to ideas of ghosts and demons, being far more subtle in intent – as I’ll get to in a moment.
The term phantasmagoria is said to have originated in the last decade of the 18th Century as a French concatenation of the Ancient Greek phántasma (“ghost”) with either agorá, (“assembly” or “gathering”) or (agoreúō, “to speak publicly”). Exactly who coined it is subject to debate, but Paul Philidor, a magician and showman, is perhaps most widely recognised as having popularised it in the late 1790s and early 1800s, using the terms to promote his shows featuring ghostly apparitions and the shades of departed famous people – although such shows, utilising everything from concave mirrors to magic lanterns and camera obscura to create / project such ghostly phantoms, reach back into at least the 17th century. Others who started using the term around the same time as Philidor include French dramatist and proto-science fiction writer Louis-Sébastien Mercier, and Belgian showman Étienne-Gaspard Robert – who is also credited with coining the term fantascope to describe the equipment he, Philidor and others used to create their spectres.
IMAGOLand Art Galleries: Carelyna – Phantasmagoria
For her show, Carelyna has created a collection of sepia-rich, ghost-like images of individuals. It overall tone, they are suggestive of the flickering images witnessed by those sitting through one of Philidor’s shows. Some are clearer than others, presenting an well-defined study; others are caught in a halo of light and brightness which both adds to the suggestion they have perhaps caught the spirit of a person who may not have been there – or that the image was taken a long time ago, and time and light have not been kind to it.
However, while they have that faded, ghostly sense about them, as noted above, these images are not intended to portray the spirits of the departed or suggest we’re within a magic lantern show; rather they and intended to evoke ideas of mood and emotion. From celebrations of life and expressions of love, to studies of strength and introspection and of potential loss or aloneness, the emotional depth found within these 12 pieces is both intense and also entirely open to interpretation: while Carelyna offers a suggestion or theme within the title of each. it is very much down to how we individually respond to each of them in its own right.
IMAGOLand Art Galleries: Carelyna – Phantasmagoria
Scare Me Silly 2023, in support of the American Diabetes Association (ADA), opened its doors on Friday, October 13th, 2023 for its 8th season in Second Life, and will remain open through until October 31st. As with previous years, the event is organised by Team Diabetes of Second Life, with Scare Me Silly featuring live performances, parties, a hunt and an art show and – of course – shopping!
All participating merchants this year can be found comprise: Adore Amore, @AdReNaLiZeD@, Angel Fae Boutique, Art & Fashion, Be Bold, Closer to the Heart Creations, Cosmos Boutique, Country Crafter, Couture Chapeau, Creepy Midget Designs, Darymple Designs, DINKIEWEAR, Dreadfully Dark, DUST, Fae Fantasy Creations, Fashiowl Poses, Fire Within, FIRELIGHT, Grumble, HJM Designs, House of papillon, IKR, Kittycat’s Creations, LC Fashion, Le Moon, Llama Inc./Little Llama, Manikin, MG Designs, Nocturne Skies, PAJAMARAMA, PEEPS Dinkies, Pendragon Designs, Pixel Box, Pixelancer, POTOMAC, QUE RICO, Redangel Clothing Co, Shy’s Creations, Starlight Apparel, Techicolor dolls, Telsiope’s Couture, TRS Designs, & The Undiscovered Jewel. In addition, items listed in the Scare Me Silly Shopping Guide.
The artists participating in the art event are: Hadiya Draper, Jamee Sandalwood, HarlowJamison Resident, Llola Lane, maggiemagenta, aquarius27, Eucalyptus Carroll, Jessamine2108 Resident and SNOW KELLEY.
For details of the entertainment and activities going on throughout Scare Me Silly, please see the entertainment schedule.
This year the Evil Pumpkin Hunt offers a number of exclusive prizes available from several of this year’s merchants. The prizes cost L$10, with 100% of proceeds going to Team Diabetes.
In addition to Scare Me Silly, and events organised directly by Team Diabetes of Second Life, individuals, businesses and organisations are encouraged to hold fundraising events in support of Team Diabetes of Second Life. The official fundraising season toolkit is available at Team Diabetes’ offices within the Nonprofit Commons region in Second Life.
About the American Diabetes Association
Established in 1940, the American Diabetes Association is working to both prevent and cure diabetes in all it forms, and to help improve the lives of all those affected by diabetes. It does this by providing objective and credible information and resources about diabetes to communities, and funding research into ways and means of both managing and curing the illness. In addition, the Association gives voice to those denied their rights as a consequence of being affected by diabetes.
About Team Diabetes of Second life
Team Diabetes of Second Life is an official and authorised fund-raiser for the American Diabetes Association in Second Life. Established with the aim of raising funds in support of diabetes treatment and to raise awareness of the disease in SL, Team Diabetes of Second Life was founded by Jessi2009 Warrhol and John Brianna (Johannes1977 Resident), who serve on the Advisory Board along with Eleseren Brianna, Veruca Tammas, Rob Fenwitch, and Dawnbeam Dreamscape.
The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, October 10th Simulator User Group (SUG) meeting. They form a summary of the items discussed, and is not intended to be a full transcript. A video of the entire meeting is embedded at the end of the article for those wishing to review the meeting in full – my thanks to Pantera for recording 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.
They are open to anyone with a concern / interest in the above topics, and form one of a series of regular / semi-regular User Group meetings conducted by Linden Lab.
Dates and times of all current meetings can be found on the Second Life Public Calendar, and descriptions of meetings are defined on the SL wiki.
Server Deployments
No deployments for the week. However, all simhosts (SLS Main and RC) will be restarted.
Upcoming Deployments
The initial work on updates to the SL damage system – specifically making damage a property of the object (e.g. a bullet), rather than being a script property (see the previous SUG meeting notes and this forum thread discussion) will now hopefully be available for testing on Aditi in week #42 and are being lined-up with the upcoming “Fall Colours” simulator update.
The rez_object_fail update planned for the upcoming “Fall Colours” simulator update is likely to slip back to a later simulator release.
The ability to turn an avatar invisible when they are sitting is being targeted for a simulator release following “Fall Colours”. This will help address issues such as allowing avatars to sit on small vehicles without them having to be deformed and folded up inside them to fit. This may additionally encompass the likes of feature requests BUG-232678 and/or BUG-233175.
Viewer Updates
No updates to viewers for the start of the week, leaving the official viewer pipelines as:
Release viewer, version 6.6.15.581961, promoted October 2 (formerly the Inventory Extensions Viewer).
Release channel cohorts:
Maintenance V(ersatility) RC viewer, version 6.6.16.582093, October 6.
Maintenance W RC viewer, version 6.6.16.582075, October 5.
glTF / PBR Materials viewer, version 7.0.0.581684, September 8.
Puppetry project viewer, version 6.6.12.579958, May 11.
Potential for Games Controller Use
No major update, Leviathan is trapped in a loop of bug-hunting whilst trying to set-up a test region on Aditi with the necessary LSL support for controllers.
Region Crossing Code Tests
Monty Linden provided an initial breakdown on the recent region crossing code tests (see the two previous SUG meeting summaries). The summary being:
While chaotic and the resultant data not entirely reliable in all cases, it was sufficient to demonstrate the code tested can offer noticeable improvements to teleport and physical region crossings.
The tests specifically demonstrated that the impact of “bad” (script-heavy) attachments can be significantly reduced with the new code (up to around 5-6 faster in the very worst cases). That presumably relates to vehicle-related crossings more than anything, but hopefully Monty will clarify this once he gets to a stage of confidence in the data to perhaps provide a forum post).
Monty also commented that “bad” avatars (again for some undefined measure of “bad”) faired somewhat better during region crossings than he had anticipated.
More formalised testing method for crossings is being developed within the Lab, but Monty expects that the revised code thus far tested is likely to find its way into simulator releases in the future.
In Brief
Following the region crossing discussion, several people participating in the last pile-on test reported issues of attachments failing to re-load correctly following a teleport, and having to be manually re-attached. However, the same issue was also noted as occurring for some prior to the test, and also by some who didn’t attend the test, suggesting it may be an uptick in a pre-existing bug.
Rider Linden indicated he is considering implementing a fix to correct the following scenario:
An agent can select a physical object that they do not own and have no rights to edit and stop it in place. It is useful to be able to select the object, but causing it to stop interferes with events like racing. Somebody in the stands can grab the leader’s vehicle and hold it there.
This sparked a debate on the issue having been fixed with the implementation of llSetStatus(STATUS_BLOCK_GRAB_OBJECT) having already achieve this, together with suggestion to revise it (if it requires implementation) to exclude land owners, so they might continue to stop and move unwanted physical objects rezzed on their land by others. This discussion took-up most of the latter half of the meeting.
The end of the meeting includes a short discussion on revamping the Linden trees which focus on ideas and requests more than actual work being planned.
† 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 rooftop of people every week. They are taken from my list of region visits, with a link to the post for those interested.
On Monday, October 9th, Linden Lab sort-of formally launched the new Linden Homes Store for Second Life, showcasing all the Linden Home types and themes available to those users holding a qualifying subscription account (at the time of writing, Premium / Premium Plus), and which had been previously semi-previewed in a September 27th official blog post.
The new Linden Home Store is part of a project to completely overhaul what Linden Lab calls the “Land Journey” in order to provide a resource hub for all matters pertaining to land holdings in Second Life: how to lease one or more regions from Linden Lab, types of regions available, how to obtain Mainland, even how to go about locating and renting land from private estates / land providers.
The first part of this work actually launched in February 2023 in the form of the Land Portal, the core of the new hub. At that time, the Portal was little more than a “front page” showing what was to come, so rather than devote a full post to it, I covered it in one of my Web User Group meetings, as it was at one of those meetings where the launch of the portal was announced. While it does gather together information related to buying / renting land from existing sources, the Linden Homes Store is really the first major piece of meat on the bones in terms of a new suite of pages for the Portal – so what’s been done and how does it look?
The upper part of the new Linden Homes Store main page, as seen by someone in possession of a Linden Home.
General Overview
Store Home Page
In terms of looks, the first thing that hits the eye is that the store has – unsurprisingly – been produced using the new general page style and colours which have started to roll out across the Second Life web properties, as was the case with things like the Destination Guide. The Linden Home Store also borrows from DG in some elements of its look and feel, thus helping to further instil a sense of platform identity in to the pages whilst encouraging a degree of familiarity to help promote confidence of use.
But to get down to specifics. The Store’s home page offers two slightly different layouts, depending on whether a user is either logged in our out of their secondlife.com account and / or has a qualifying subscription account with a Linden Home already associated with it or not, per the images above and below.
upper part of the new Linden Homes Store main page, as seen by someone who does not have a qualifying account type / is not logged into the the Second Life web properties.
The What Next? section of pages displayed for qualifying accounts has some curiosities within it which raised my eyebrows:
The “Your home’s content pack” links to third -party purchasable add-ons for “2019+” Linden Homes. Whilst these are a handy resource, they actually have bugger all to do with the Content Packs actually supplied with the various themes – so why name the link thus? It’s unnecessarily confusing for those interested in seeing the different selections of items supplied with the various Linden Home themes.
Why on Earth utilise a video from 2010 which has nothing to say about the far more recent Linden Homes themes, which are liable to be of the most interest to recently upgraded account holders? Could not a more up-to-date video have been produced prior to the launch? If nothing else, a video that properly encompasses all of the Linden Homes products also lends itself to acting as a promotional tool aimed at anyone accessing the Store, regardless of their account type.
Why on Earth is “Choose a different home” so called? It’s a link to the SL wiki page serving to introduce and describe “2019+” Linden Homes – so why not call it “Introducing Linden Homes” or something? As it is, the title suggests that by clicking it, the user will be magically whisked to where they can swap their existing home without the need to scroll further.
A closer look at the What Next? section of the Linden homes Store, as displayed to qualifying account holders with the niggling links (your home’s contents pack, Video tutorial and Choose a different home).
Beneath the What Next? / Amenities section of the page, is the main store listing. This comprises information panels for all Linden Homes, 2019+ and 2010., with panels listing slightly different information:
2010 Linden Homes only provide a photograph of the house type, the name of its theme (e.g. “Tahoe” or “Meadowbrook”), and the parcel size.
“2019+” Linden Homes are listed by theme name (e.g. Ranch, Log House, Silt House, etc.), provide a photograph of one of the styles from the theme, number of layouts (styles) within the theme, location and parcel size.
This listing is periodically updated to reflect the current status of all Linden Homes: available themes / types are listed firt in the order Premium Plus Homes then Premium 2019+ Homes then Premium 2010 / 51w sq m parcel homes. And themes or types currently unavailable are then listed in the same order and labelled NOT AVAILABLE.
For those on non-eligible (for Linden Homes) accounts / who are not logged-in to the SL web properties, the Store will go on to display additional useful information on Linden Homes below the index list.
House Panels / Information
Clicking on a specific house / theme in the Store’s index list will refresh the page and display expanded information on the selected house / theme that the top, with the more recent Linden Home themes having more information available than the 2010 Homes, per the images below. The listing of homes will then continue below this expanded panel.
An information panel within the Linden Home Store for one of “2010” styles of Linden Home. Note the information on the left.
That the “2019+” homes have more information associated with them is not surprising, simply because they have more to offer. however, it did again give rise to some niggles:
The text “Includes X layout versions to choose from” (where X is a number) is followed by a link called Learn More. This gives the impression that clicking the link will display further information directly related to the theme (such as what the layouts are). Instead, it takes the user out of the Land Store and to the 2019 Linden Homes wiki page.
While this does contain some information related to the various themes, it’s hardly more informative that the information displayed within the Store and totally disrupts what has thus far been a relatively contained, seamless experience.
Given the effort put into the Store, it’s a shame time wasn’t taken towards building more detailed pages (with images) for the themes ahead of any launch.
Similarly, the text “Customise the colours of this home’s surfaces” is perhaps mis-labelled, and would be better called “About the Linden Homes Controller”, given it links to the section of the SL wiki page devoted to all of the Controller’s options, not just decorating.
An information panel within the Linden Home Store for one of “2019+” themes of Linden Home. Note the expanded information on the left, and the critquies of it noted in the above bullet points.
Some have also commented that listing the “2019+” Linden Homes within the Store in terms of their collective theme (e.g. Houseboat) rather than style (e.g. Windlass, Barnacle, Jolly Roger, etc.), and doing the reverse for the “2010” Homes, listing them by style (e.g. Aspen, Birch Cedar) rather than collective theme (e.g. Tahoe) is further confusing.
However, while I can understand thinking this way, I’d actually point out that it does in fact make sense: all “2019+” Lindon Home styles within a given are available through a rezzing system on the parcel, allowing the user to swap between them whenever they wish. However, this is not the case with the “2010” homes; regardless of the over-arching theme (Tahoe, Meadowbrook, etc.)., the only way to swap from one theme to another is to physically swap homes through the Store – ergo, listing them by style rather than trying to group them by theme does in fact make sense.
General Observations
I will confess, other than kicking the tyres of the new Linden Home Store as described above, I’ve not taken it for a drive in terms of using it to obtain a Linden Home; frankly, I’m perfectly happy with the location of my current Linden Houseboat, and I have no desire to pack-up and be randomly moved for the sake of a test. Sorry.
That said, it should be noted that whilst you can see the various types and themes of Linden Home currently available when browsing the Store, while the actual house type / theme you pick might be in-world is still down to a random selection from the available stock; you cannot puck a specific parcel in a specific region. Nor should this be expected: building a system to list all the locations of a given house type / theme when these could run into the hundreds just isn’t reasonable; thus Support ticket remains the means but which to request a specific location.
I do find several other points in the design niggling / confusing. Why, for example, are “2019+” Linden homes on 512 and 1024 sq m parcels listed as “Free with Premium Membership” when they are in fact available to both Premium and Premium Plus? Why do Basic and Plus members who might not realise have to get half-way through the Choose This Home before being told they are not eligible? Would it not be better to divert them to the account updates page on clicking the Choose button, rather than displaying angry red text when they try to Confirm Their Choice? Why wasn’t the store hooked into the Linden Homes widget in the top right of the secondlife.com dashboard for Premium / Premium Plus members from the outset (and which currently still links to the “old” Linden Homes store)?
The updates page for choosing a Linden home. It is only at this point that Basic and Plus users are informed they are ineligible for a Linden Home and need to upgrade – diverting them to the account upgrade page on chick the earlier Choose This Home button might be friendlier.
These are all small points, and to be fair, LL does have a long history of releasing not-quite-baked features and updates into the wild and then tweaking them after the fact. As such, there is the potential for all of these personal annoyances to be be address as a natural part and parcel of that work. However, the fact that there are all these little niggles and potential points of confusion does negatively impact first impressions. Which is a shame, because overall, it has to be said this new Linden Home Store is a significant and welcome improvement to to previous version.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 