A while ago, I was invited to display a selection of my blog images of the places I’ve written about at the NovaOwl gallery. For various reasons, I couldn’t make the dates initially offered, so things were re-scheduled for July 2022.
The exhibition – which I opted to call Fifty Shades of Pey in an entirely tongue-in-cheek moment – had a “soft” opening on July 3rd within the ground-level exhibition space at the gallery, and at 12:00 noon on Wednesday, July 13th the exhibition will have a more “formal” opening with music by Dj Uli, and I’d like to invite you to come along if you happen to be free, while the exhibition will be open through to July 29th.
I’d also like to thank Owl, Ceakay and Uli for the invitation to some my work, and for Owl for her promotion and support of Fifty Shades, as well as he continued and unstinting work in supporting art and music across Second Life.
The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, July 12th, 2022 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.
There was no deployment for the SLS Main channel on Tuesday, July 12th, leaving all servers assigned to the channel on the crash fix deployment of Friday, July 8th (version 573149).
On Wednesday, July 13th, the Ferrari RC will be upgraded to simulator version 573176 (joining BlueSteel), intended to help future deploys work better. Simhosts on the remaining RC channels will be restarted without any deployment.
Available Official Viewers
The Nomayo Maintenance RC (Maintenance N) viewer updated to version 6.6.2.573023, on July 11th.
The rest of the current crop of official viewers remains as follows:
Release viewer: version 6.6.1.572458 – formerly the Maintenance M(akgeolli) RC viewer, promoted June 29 – no change.
Release channel cohorts:
Maintenance Optimisations RC version 6.6.2.573065, July 7.
Project viewers:
Performance Floater project viewer, version 6.5.4.571296, May 10.
Mesh Optimizer project viewer, version 6.5.2.566858, dated January 5, issued after January 10.
Legacy Profiles viewer, version 6.4.11.550519, dated October 26, 2020.
In Brief
The PNG-instead-of-jpg200 images issue and the “fallback” use of UDP messaging via the simulator for texture data fetching was covered in brief – both are outlined in more detail in my TPVD week #27 meeting summary.
The question was asked whether – should the need arise for an automated return of items within a region / parcel due to overflow – there is an implied hierarchy in which items are returned (e.g. are “unlocked” items returned before “locked”?
LL does not believe there is any differentiation between unlocked or locked objects when it comes to an automated return, but this will be confirmed at the next SUG meeting.
There are other potential factors involved in the selection of items to be returned in these circumstances which may come into play that could complicate which items are returned.
The purpose of the question was to ascertain a way of minimising damage in a region where a griefer manages to trigger the return of objects.
The question sparked a broader conversation on returned objects (particularly as coalesced packages) across much of the rest of the meeting – please refer to the video.
BUG-231802 “Prevent vehicles from entering parcels their riders cannot access”, together with providing a means for a viewer to request all active ban lines within a region, is said to be “queued” for work to commence on them – although no coding has started as yet.
BUG-232324 “Add STATUS_DIE_AT_NO_ENTRY Object Status” is described as being in the next maintenance simulator update.
There is a discussion on map tile texture UUIDs and surfacing them so that tools similar to those used by the (3rd party) Grid Survey tools could make use of them.
Missing Melody, July 2022 – click any image for full size
Bambi (NorahBrent) has been busy with her region designs, with both Longing Melody and Soft Melody gaining a lot of attention – including in this blog – since the start of the year (see: Visiting Longing Melody in Second Life and A Soft Melody in Second Life). Given this, a return to her Missing Melody was on my game card for 2022, but a poke from Shawn Shakespeare encouraged me to make a summer visit to this always-engaging homestead region.
What is a Missing Melody? It’s that song in your head that you can’t get out but not sure how it really goes. It’s that temptation you want to have in your life so you can fight to resist. It’s that place in your heart that is always waiting to be filled.
– Bambi (NorahBrent)
Missing Melody, July 2022
For this iteration, Bambi offers a region setting that is beautiful in its simplicity: a pair of small islands separated by a deceptively deep channel spanned by a long boardwalk floating serenely above the waters. Both islands occupy the northern half of the region, sitting under a bright summer sky (I recommend using the region’s shared environment settings).
To the north-east, the small island rises a rich green hump of land, its slopes carpeted by flowering wild grass, and its crowned by green trees and a copse of lavender wisteria.
The latter form a canopy over the landing point, sitting as it does at the end of a fence-bordered track that points the way westwards before dropping down the gentlest of the island’s slopes, and along which an unexpected family is taking a constitutional walk.
Across the channel, the larger of the two islands holds multiple attractions awaiting discovery. These include the winding climb of steps which lead up to where a caravan and cabin lie on a tree-shaded shoulder of the island’s hills, through a second set of steps that descend to the island’s arc of beach to the north-west, through to the rocky path the climbs up the west side of the island, connecting the beach with a high promontory where a lighthouse watches over the southern waters.
Missing Melody, July 2022
The beach offers the most tropical feel to the setting – and the most places for visitors to relax and spend time, both on the sand and over the water. However, both the cabin and the caravan up on the hill top are furnished as well, making for quiet retreats, whilst between them there sits a little stage and outdoor seating for impromptu musical jams.
Picturesque, (obviously) photogenic, and finished with a gentle soundscape, Missing Melody really doesn’t require a lot of exposition on my part; it genuinely speaks for itself, as I hope the images here show. So why not pay a visit yourself?
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 in Nowhereville, 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, July 11th, 19:00 Dandelion Wine
The inventor who almost took the pleasure out of life by building a Happiness Machine; the young reporter who fell in love with an alluring lady of ninety; the old gentleman whose last act was listening to the clang of a green trolley car going round a corner, two thousand miles away.
These are just a few of strange and vivid people who entered the secret world of a twelve-year-old boy during one enchanted summer when he discovered the fact that he really was alive…
“The summer of ’28 was a vintage season for a growing boy. A summer of green apple trees, mowed lawns, and new sneakers. Of half-burnt firecrackers, of gathering dandelions, of Grandma’s belly-busting dinner. It was a summer of sorrows and marvels and gold-fuzzed bees. A magical, timeless summer in the life of a twelve-year-old boy named Douglas Spaulding—remembered forever by the incomparable Ray Bradbury.”
Intrepid canine Bob sets out on a dangerous journey in search of his long-lost sister with the help of his two best friends, Ivan and Ruby. As a hurricane approaches and time is running out, Bob finds courage he never knew he had and learns the true meaning of friendship and family.
In the tradition of timeless stories like Charlotte’s Web and Stuart Little, Katherine Applegate blends humour and poignancy to create an unforgettable story of friendship, family, and hope in this sequel to her 2013 Newbery Medal winner The One and Only Ivan.
Read by Caledonia Skytower.
Wednesday, July 13th, 19:00: Seanchai Flicks
A special for Star Wars month as the Seanchai cinema space plays host to videos and throw popcorn around!
Thursday, July 14th, 19:00: The Mandalorian
Shandon Loring reads the novelisation of the popular Disney+ original series.
Logos representative only and should not be seen as an endorsement / preference / recommendation
Updates from the week ending Sunday, July 10th, 2022
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 6.6.1.572458 – formerly the Maintenance M(akgeolli) RC viewer, promoted June 29 – no change.
Release channel cohorts::
Maintenance Optimisations RC version 6.6.2.573065 issued on Thursday, July 7th.
Kondor Arts Centre; Chuck Clip – America The Crumbling
Art is a powerful tool, offering as it dos the ability for many things from extraordinary creativity, self-expression through to hard-hitting social and political commentary. In this latter regard, art has the ability to prick our conscience and force us, often quite unexpectedly, to confront thoughts and reactions we might otherwise want to try to avoid -and it can also of a means to express pent-up feelings and work through concern and fears. It can thus be both challenging for the audience and cathartic for the artist.
Such is the case with America The Crumbling, an exhibition of visually stunning and socially expressive paintings by Chuck Clip, which opened on July 7th, 2022 at the Kondor Arts Centre, operated and curated by Hermes Kondor. Chuck has, in recent years, perhaps been best known for hosting and promoting art in Second Life through his Sinful Retreat regions or for providing music and entertainment as DJ Matrix. However, he is also a 2D and 3D artist, and with America The Crumbling he returns to theme exhibitions of his own work in-world for the first time in eight years.
Kondor Arts Centre; Chuck Clip – America The Crumbling
Described as being intended to “shine a light on society in America” that is “colourful, disturbing, maybe even offensive”, America The Crumbling tackles head-on the rising threats to democracy and personal freedoms that are being witnessed both in America and around the world, in paintings that are intensely evocative and a veritable tour de force of an artist’s ability to convey thoughts and feelings through the curation of a specific approach to his paintings and the use of a thematic palette (notably the use of red, white and blue both as colours and tones) to convey his sentiments.
From the militarization of the police (which is actually the root concern of the Defund the Police movement, rather than an outright attempt to strip police forces of their abilities to perform their core functions, as some pundits would like people to believe), through the wholesale assault on democracy (most visibly the attempted January 6th, 2020, insurrection in the United States and also the war in the Ukraine), to the more “subtle” attacks on rights and freedoms such as the persistent assault on social care in the US and the erosion of the traditional barrier between church and state that has allowed a radical religious right to embark on what could well become a wholesale assault on the individual rights of those they deem as undeserving of such rights.
Kondor Arts Centre; Chuck Clip – America The Crumbling
As the introductory notes point out, some of these paintings could well outrage some – but I would suspect those who do react so might not full appreciate the existential tripartite threat the American Experiment currently faces politically, religiously and even through its own judicial system.
For my part, I can only admire Chuck’s ability to challenge and evoke through images that are first and foremost expressions of art, and which do not, for the most part, belabour their point, but work far more subtly: Liberty on her sick bed; the splash of yellow in an otherwise monochrome piece that points to the source of the referenced “Evil”, and so on. Which is not to say Chuck has tried to wrap his comments in a “softness” of presentation: his pieces on the state of US policing pull no punches, whilst And the Magats’ Red Glare… carries an emotional power that can result in the sting of tears being felt behind the eyes.
Kondor Arts Centre; Chuck Clip – America The Crumbling
Richly presented and layered, America The Crumbling is a genuinely startling and evocative presentation and not one to be missed.
The inventor who almost took the pleasure out of life by building a Happiness Machine; the young reporter who fell in love with an alluring lady of ninety; the old gentleman whose last act was listening to the clang of a green trolley car going round a corner, two thousand miles away.
Intrepid canine Bob sets out on a dangerous journey in search of his long-lost sister with the help of his two best friends, Ivan and Ruby. As a hurricane approaches and time is running out, Bob finds courage he never knew he had and learns the true meaning of friendship and family.
