OnLive, the company behind the revolutionary SL Go service which streams the SL viewer and SL content directly to the user’s computer or Android device, is looking to supplement the development of their version of the viewer by hiring contract developers to help with fixes and new features.
Since its introduction in March 2014, SL Go has proven popular among SL users, and OnLive have sought to improve the service in order to better meet users’ needs. In April 2014, for example, the company introduced a new pricing model in response to users’ feedback, and on Tuesday June 3rd, the company announced that the original 20-minute free trial period had been replaced by a 7-day free trial.
SL Go by OnLive: the full functionality of Second Life as seen on a Nexus HD 2013
Now, conscious of the pace with which the SL viewer is developing, OnLive want to ensure their viewer keeps up-to-date with developments coming out of the Lab and – potentially, as things progress over time – incorporate some of the functionality seen in other TPVs.
“We are looking to move forward with SL Go in many ways,” Dennis Harper, the Senior Product Manager for SL Go at OnLive informed me when he contacted me about this move. “The first order of business would be to merge our code to the latest branch of the SLV code, bringing SL Go completely up to date. Then, it becomes more features. I’d like to do a number of tweaks on the UI and camera to make it easier to use on a tablet. Then voice chat would be a huge addition. The text chat system needs an overhaul.”
The work would be offered on a paid contract basis, and subject to applicants passing an interview process. However, the benefits could be far-reaching, as Dennis pointed out to me, “I would think that this would be a fantastic opportunity for developers,” he said. “They would get to create cutting-edge technology and work with a world-class development organisation.”
So, if you have a solid track record of viewer code development and enhancement, and you would like to be involved in a project at the very cutting-edge of viewer development and implementation, then OnLive would like to hear from you.
To make your interest known, please submit an e-mail with a brief summary of your background and experience to Dennis Harper, Senior Product Manager, OnLive, at this address: dennis.harper@onlive.com.
As always, please refer to the server deployment thread in the Technology forum for the latest updates, news or changes to the deployment schedule and for any issues which may have been reported.
Main (SLS) Channel
There was no main channel deployment on Tuesday June 3rd. Instead, the maintenance work which had been scheduled for May 22nd, but which had to be postponed due to problems earlier in the week, took place. Some of us who report on server updates, etc., had mistakenly believed that this maintenance work was actually carried out May 28th; so ho-hum on that score!
Release Candidate Channels
The release channel updates for week 23 will be:
BlueSteel will remain on the inventory update project, and will not be rolled this week. This project enables support for a new version of the inventory service, AISv3. To make use of this new feature, login with the Sunshine RC Viewer
Magnum will remain on the Experience Tools project, but will gain some minor changes related to the project – release notes
LeTigre will move to the “group ban” project. As the name implies, this project adds the ability to ban users from groups (more below) – release notes
The release candidate channel rolls (Magnum and LeTigre) should take place on Wednesday June 4th.
SL Viewer
On Tuesday June 3rd, the Lab released the MemShine release candidate viewer, version 3.7.9.290582. This viewer combines updates from the MemPlugs RC viewer (a variety of fixes to address memory leaks in the viewer and to improve crash rates), and the Sunshine / AIS v3 RC viewer (additional server-side appearance improvements and AIS v3 improvements aimed at outfit changes). Both of these RCs also remain listed on the Alternate Viewers wiki page at the tim of writing.
As noted above, the server-side code for group bans is due to start its deployment to the main grid. This functionality, which comprises both server-side and viewer updates, provides the means for owners (and selected roles) in an open enrollment group to selectively ban people from either joining / re-joining their group, in order to help with issues such as group spamming.
The following general points apply to the group bans functionality:
By default, only the Owners role is assigned the ability to ban other avatars from a group
The ability can be granted to other roles, if required
Roles which are granted this ability are also granted the Eject Members and the Remove Members from Roles abilities
Group members with the Manage Ban List ability will be able to add or remove other users to and from the group ban list
When a group member is banned from the group, they are automatically ejected
A user who is banned from a group will not be able to join it either directly or through an invitation (once the capability is fully deployed)
The ban list for a group can store a maximum of 500 entries
Group Owners cannot be banned
When a user is banned from a group, their viewer version does not matter; they will be ejected and banned whether or not they are also using a viewer with the group ban ability
Additional notes on the capability can be found here.
The code is initially being deployed to the LeTigre RC, and the remaining RCs and the main channel will follow in due course.
There is currently no formal release of a project viewer able to use the group ban functions available via the Alternate Viewers wiki page. According to Baker Linden, speaking at the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday June 3rd, the project viewer will most likely be formally released once the server code is fully deployed across the grid.
Group bans provides the ability to ban (and remove, where appropriate) people from a group. The Group Bans project viewer contains the necessary updates to ban individuals or lists of people from a group (whether or not they are already members of the group) and to view the names / dates of all those banned
However, those wishing to test the capability can obtain the current version of the project viewer (Windows / Mac / Linux). If you opt to do so, please keep in mind that until the server-side functionality has been fully deployed across the main grid, group bans will only be enforced by simulators which support the feature.
This means that user who was banned from a group may still be able to join or re-join the group by moving to a region running on a channel which does not currently support the group bans. This may result in them appearing on both the Members List and the Banned Residents list, so once the project has gone grid-wide it might be necessary to either eject or re-ban them once more.
I’ll be providing a complete overview of the group ban function once it has been fully deployed to the grid and the project viewer is officially available via the Alternate Viewers wiki page.
Important note: The SL Go service is to be shut down on April 30th, 2015. For more information, please read this report.
On Tuesday June 3rd, OnLive announced that with immediate effect, the trial period of their SL Go service, which provides a full Second Life viewer experience to both computers and android devices, will be extended from 20 minutes to a full seven days for those who sign-up to the service.
The OnLive announcement came via Dennis Harper, OnLive’s Senior Product Manager for SL Go, and reads in full:
OnLive will now be offering new SL Go users a 7-Day Free Trial with sign up for an ‘unlimited access’ subscription package. A valuable piece of feedback from the Second Life community has been that the 20 minute free trial is not sufficient to get a true experience of SL Go. Now new users can try SL Go free for an entire week, experiencing Second Life on their Android tablets or seeing how SL Go can render ultra-high graphics even on a lower powered laptop computer.
Impressions of SL Go from the Second Life community have been brilliant so far, and this new 7-day Free Trial will hopefully encourage even more players to check it out.
Dennis Harper Sr. Product Manager, OnLive
The SL Go service streams Second Life, including the viewer, directly to the user’s system or device. Because all of the processing occurs within the OnLive SL Go servers, and the fact that there is no viewer to install locally, SL Go is an ideal solution for those needing to access Second Life from low-end computers or who wish to access SL from a suitable android tablet while on the move.
SL Go now features a 7-day free trial period for subscribers
Since its introduction in March 2014, the service has proven popular with users, but has also received some criticism – which has been heard and reacted to by OnLive. In April 2014, for example, and a month after launching the service, the company announced a new pricing structure for the service directly in response to user feedback concerning the original pricing system.
The original 20-minute free trial period offered to new subscribers also came in for criticism – more so after the pricing change -, with users feeling that it wasn’t sufficiently long enough for them to gain familiarity with using the service, particularly from a mobile device when using the on-screen UI overlay. Extending the trial period is a direct response to this criticism and should allow users more than enough time to familiarise themselves with the service.
Second Life user Mondy Bristol has produced a video showing SL Go in use on her Nexus 7 (2012).
Updates for the week ending: Sunday June 1st, 2014
This summary is 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
Official LL Viewers
Current viewer release: no change from version 3.7.8.289922
SL Memplug RC updated to version 3.7.9.290286 on May 28th and then to version 3.7.9.290405 on May 30th – core updates: fixes to address memory leaks in the viewer (download and release notes)
SL Zipper RC version 3.7.9.290133 removed from the Alternate Viewers page on May 30th
Maestro Linden used the Server Beta meeting to announce that Simon Linden’s work on adding some LSL support for materials is now available for testing on Aditi.
Regions roller-test102 and roller-test103, both on channel DRTSIM-253, have the server-side scripting support (note the SLurls are for ADITI).
Please note that this is very much a work-in-progress, and the Lab’s own testing is still underway.
Behaviour for both getting and setting materials parameters should basically correspond to behaviour with PRIM_TEXTURE
The color vectors use 0.0-1.0 as the range, as with llSetColor()
The integer parameters for PRIM_SPECULAR correspond to the same values that you see in the build tool
Components of a material can be ‘reset’ as follows:
PRIM_NORMAL and PRIM_SPECULAR settings are set to default values by setting the texture to NULL_KEY
PRIM_ALPHA_MODE settings are set to default values by setting the alpha_mode to PRIM_ALPHA_MODE_BLEND – mask_cutoff is actually reset to 0 unless the alpha mode is PRIM_ALPHA_MODE_MASK
When PRIM_NORMAL, PRIM_SPECULAR, and PRIM_ALPHA_MODE settings are all set to default values, the material is deleted from that prim face, and LI may be updated accordingly
This new scripted capability will only work on the nominated test regions
ALM must obviously be enabled.
Known Issues
The version currently on Aditi lacks proper throttling, so there could be performance issues if scripts behave badly. A throttle will be added in due course
There is a viewer rendering issue, where the face will not be rendered and you’ll see log spam (BUG-6187). This can happen:
If the viewer has ALM enabled
And a prim face has a material on it
And PRIM_ALPHA_MODE is PRIM_ALPHA_MODE_BLEND (this is the default after a material is added)
And the diffuse texture does not have an alpha channel (e.g. plywood)
With reference to BUG-6187, Maestro added, “One thing to keep in mind … is that if your diffuse texture lacks an alpha channel, you’ll also want to set the alpha mode to PRIM_ALPHA_MODE_NONE to avoid the bug, even if you really just want to add a normal map.”
The bug itself doesn’t mean the alpha mode should be set every time a materials map is changed, only when adding a material to a face which previously didn’t have a material. Maestro went on to give some further information on the issue:
What happens when you add a material via the build tool, is that the viewer inspects whether the current diffuse texture has an alpha channel and automatically sets the alpha mode to ALPHA_MODE_NONE if the diffuse texture is opaque, but keeps it at _BLEND if there’s an alpha channel. Unfortunately, the simulator can’t do this, because it doesn’t necessarily have the texture asset and doesn’t have the right libs to process texture assets in that manner. The build tool has some trickery where it always greys out the UI for alpha mode when the texture doesn’t have an alpha channel. Anyway, it’s kind of a hassle, but once PRIM_ALPHA_MODE is set to something ‘friendly’, you should be able to update normal or specular settings without touching it again.
As this is a viewer rendering bug, there is no timescale as to when a fix may appear.
The Lab is particularly interested in seeing how use of these new parameters may affect performance (such as through rapid and repeated changes to maps), and what kinds of rates cause these issues, so that they can more accurately assess the required level of throttling.
Depending upon how further testing goes, what additional changes the Lab needs to make, and what has already been scheduled at the time, these updates might be available on an RC on Agni in a few weeks.
Radegest is a lightweight client for OpenSim and Second Life available for Windows, Linux and Mac. As well as providing text-based capabilities, it was the first lightweight Second Life client to offer a 3D world view (windows and Linux), allowing users on low-end systems to have a visual experience when using a virtual world.
Offering a similar level of capabilities and interaction as a full viewer, and supporting recent updates and improvements to the SL service (mesh rendering, HTTP protocol updates, Marketplace Direct Delivery, Server-side Appearance, etc.), Radegast has become very popular among users with visual impairments and with audio gamers. So much so that Roxie Marten and Celene Highwater of Virtual Ability Inc., have written a comprehensive Accessibility Guide to help people get started with Second life through Radegast. This not only serves as an excellent introduction for the visually and aurally impaired, but forms a thorough introduction for anyone wishing to gain familiarity with using Radegest.
Radegest gives you almost all the capabilities of a full viewer in a lightweight package (image courtesy of Radegast)
Because of Radegast’s popularity among the visually impaired, Celene Highwater will be teaching a special class on Radegast for all those interested in assisting new users understand the client and in helping them become a part of the growing community of blind SL users.
The class will be held at the The Tavern on Wolpertinger, on Thursday May 29th, at 12:00 noon SLT / PDT, and will take place in text, or voice upon request.
Anyone who is interested in learning the ins and outs of Radegast in order to help blind or visually impaired users make effective use of the client, is extended a warm invitation to attend the session.
OnLive, the company behind the revolutionary SL Go service which streams the SL viewer and SL content directly to the user’s computer or Android device, is looking to supplement the development of their version of the viewer by hiring contract developers to help with fixes and new features.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 