Category: SL Tech

SL projects update: week 47 (1): server releases, viewer

Posted on by Inara Pey

As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

Main channel: Tuesday November 19th

The Main channel received the maintenance package deployed to BlueSteel and LeTigre in week 46. This package comprises further infrastructure changes for the yet-to-be-announced Experience Keys (experience tools) project

Release Candidate Channels, Wednesday November 20th

BlueSteel and LeTigre should receive a new maintenance package comprising the update deployed to Magnum in week 46, with additional bug fixes. However, at the time of writing, testing was still ongoing, and Simon Linden noted at the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday November 19th that things were “down to the wire” in terms of getting the release out. If it does go ahead, the package will include:

  • Bug Fixes
    • Fixed “Sim crossing on vehicle fails when parcel at opposite sim border is full.” (BUG-4152)
    • Fixed a case in which a viewer with a high draw distance would not connect to distant regions which are within the draw distance area
    • Fixed some crash modes
    • Fixed “Vehicles containing a mesh are returned to the owner upon region crossing when destination parcel is full”
    • Fixed “Temp Attachments are sometimes not removed on the viewer when detached from a region change event.”
    • Fixed “Avatars inside a private parcel can see other avatars 2 regions away” (BUG-4356)
    • Fixed an issue with object return to inventory on test grids
  • New Features
    • Objects which are rezzed by sat-upon or attached scripts no longer inherit the temp-on-rez or auto-return timer of the parent object
    • Estate managers and region owners are now prevented from being teleported by llTeleportAgentHome()
    • Estate managers and region owners are no longer affected by scripts which use ESTATE_ACCESS_BANNED_AGENT_ADD
    • The grey goo fence is now stricter for large physical object rezzes
    • More robust handling of inventory management within objects
    • Cleanup of controls-grabbing in LSL scripts (no functional changes)
    • Parcel owners are now prevented from being teleported by llTeleportAgentHome()

Magnum should remain on the same maintenance project as deployed to it in week 47, but which features a further update to the grey goo fence change made in week 46, but which now only applies to objects which are both large and physical. This alteration is in response to BUG-4448.

Thanksgiving Code Freeze

Week 48 (commencing Monday November 25th) is Thanksgiving week in the United States, so there will be no server-side releases during the week. Sever updates will resume in week 49.

SL Viewer

No updates as yet in week 47 to the SL viewer.

Default Object Permissions

A number of TPVs include the ability to specify the default permissions applied to a new prim object (cube, cylinder, torus, etc.) on creation. A similar capability is being developed for the LL viewer (STORM-68) by Jonathan Yap, a long-time contributor to the viewer. Currently, the work is awaiting some server-side capabilities tweaking which will likely be done by Andrew Linden. This work is unlikely to be completed ahead of Thanksgiving, so there is no date as to when the new capability might appear.

Default Region Restart Sound and Notification

Jonathan is also working on STORM-1980 (“Improve awareness of region restarting message”) to add  a default region restart sound added to Second Life. This would be played automatically by the viewer on receipt of a region restart message, adding an additional warning of an approaching restart for those who may miss the pop-up notices, giving them time to take the appropriate action prior to logging-out. The work on this is also progressing, with a modified notification which includes new colours and a countdown. again, further work is required on this, so there is currently no timescale as to when it will be showing up in an RC viewer.

Viewer release summaries 2013: week 46

Posted on by Inara Pey

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 Viewer Round-up 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
  • By its nature, this summary will always be in arrears
  • The Viewer Round-up Page is updated as soon as I’m aware of any releases / changes to viewers & clients, and should be referred to for more up-to-date information
  • The Viewer Round-up Page also 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.

Updates for the week ending: November 17th, 2013

Official LL Viewers

  • Current Release version updated on November 12th to version 3.6.10.283403 (dated November 6th) – formerly the Maintenance RC viewer comprising finer access control for estate/parcel owners; CHUI: toggle expanding conversations by clicking on icon; GPU table update + more (download page, release notes)
  • Release channel cohorts (See my notes on manually installing RC viewer versions if you wish to install any release candidate(s) yourself):
    • GPU Table Update RC updated on November 16th to version 3.6.11.283787 – GPU table updates only, no functional changes (download and release notes)
    • “Project Interesting” RC 3.6.11.283895 released on November 14th  – more viewer-side control of which objects are loaded in memory at any given time; more aggressive scene caching; faster scene load when visiting a region never previously visited; expanded performance metrics (download and release notes)
  • Project viewers:
    • None at present

LL Viewer Resources

Third-party Viewers

V3-style

  • UKanDo updated on November 14th to version 3.6.10.27888 – core updates: LL 3.6.10 code base; SLShare (Facebook) integration, updates to area search, toolbar button icon updates, Advanced Build Options floater, + more (release notes)

V1-style

  • Cool VL updated on November 6th to:
    • Stable version: 1.26.10.1
    • Experimental version: 1.26.8.38
    • Release notes (both) core updates: FMOD Ex updated to v4.44.26; added Advanced menu option to save both default and current settings globally and per-account; Improved shared media handling; Backport of minor speed optimisation to alpha rendering from Singularity; numerous updates and improvements & pruning of dead code
  • Singularity updated on November 14th to version 1.8.4.5433 and then on November 16th to version 1.8.4.5434 after an issue with the camera controls was discovered in 1.8.4.5433 – core updates: materials and updated particle rendering support (ribbon, glow), Google Breakpad for crash reporting; assorted menu updates; inclusion of context menus; + more; Windows 64-bit release (release notes)

Text Clients

  • Group Tool updated on November 7th to version 2.2.23.0.

Additional TPV Resources

Related Links

November 18th: Firestorm to commence blocking of older versions

Posted on by Inara Pey

firestorm-logoOn Monday November 18th, Firestorm will commence blocking older versions of the viewer from accessing Second Life.

This is a move that has been coming for some time, and has been announced on a number of occasions through the Firestorm blog, through Firestorm user meetings and Q&A sessions, and which has been repeated through various blogs, including mine.

As it is, there are a good number of users still running versions of Firestorm that pre-date the introduction of Server-side Appearance (“avatar baking”) and some which even pre-date mesh rendering. Not only does running such versions lessen the user experience and increase the workload Firestorm support volunteers have in trying to assist people on older versions of the viewer.

Nor are the Firestorm team doing this entirely off their own backs. For obvious reasons, the Lab would like to see more users benefiting from the broad range of improvements which have already been rolled-out to SL (and those still being deployed in terms of further viewer-side updates), including SSA, interest list updates, improvements to the rendering pipe, improvements to viewer / server communications, and so on, all of which should improve the user experience, even for those on older hardware.

Given that Firestorm does have the lion’s user of active users, just under 65,000 of whom are still logging-in to Second Life on versions of the viewer pre-dating the more recent SL updates such as SSA, the easiest way to encourage them to update is to block older versions of the viewer.

Many Firestorm users are on version pre-dating SSB and mesh rendering
Many Firestorm users are still on versions pre-dating SSB and mesh rendering

This being the case, once the block comes into force, it means only users on Firestorm 4.4.0 through to the current version(s) will be able to access Second Life. As such, from November 18th, the following versions of Firestorm will be blocked from Second Life (numbers of people still using each version given in brackets):

  • 4.3.1.31155 (40,451)
  • 4.2.2.29837 (14,120)
  • 4.2.1.29803 (60)
  • 4.1.1.28744 (3334)
  • 4.0.1.27000 Beta (4585)
  • 3.3.0.24882 maintenance release (606)
  • 3.3.0.24880 hotfix release (571)
  • 3.2.2.24336 (881)
  • 3.2.1.24179 (166)

For those who feel they may be unable to run later versions of Firestorm, the recommendation is to give a later version a go and to contact Firestorm support teams for assistance or try the Firestorm troubleshooting wiki pages, as issues encountered may be fixable. For those who have genuine issues in trying to run later versions of Firestorm, Linden Lab’s Third-party Viewer Directory offers a list of self-certified alternative viewers you might want to try.

For further information, please refer to the Firestorm blog announcement.

Please note: I cannot address technical questions relating to Firestorm through this blog. Please contact the Firestorm support groups if you have specific technical questions.

Related Links

Singularity 1.8.4: materials, particles, 64-bit Windows and more

Posted on by Inara Pey

singularity

Update: Singularity 1.8.4 was updated with release 1.8.4.5434 on November 16th, after an issue with the coamera controls was discovered in the 1.8.4.5433 build. Not other changes were made, and the functions / updates described in this overview remain current for the the 1.8.4 release.

Thursday November 14th saw the release of Singularity 1.8.4.5433, which brought to the v1-style viewer a 64-bit Windows version to sit with the existing 32-bit Windows version, and alongside the 64-bit Linux offering.

The new release adds a good number of Lab-driven updates to the viewer, including materials processing support (which has been available in various pre-release / alpha versions of Singularity for a while), inclusion of Google Breakpad for better crash reporting, support for the GetMesh2 capability for improved mesh object downloading and inclusion of support for the new LSL particle options. The release also brings with it a host of TPV updates and improvements, either from the Singularity team or which have come by way of other viewers.

The following is a rapid-fire overview for the release, rather than an in-depth review. As always, for a complete list of updates and changes together with all attributions for originators / contributors, please refer the official release notes.

Materials, Particles, Breakpad

Materials arrives in the Singularity release viewer
Materials arrives in the Singularity release viewer

Materials processing support has been available for a while with pre-release and alpha versions of Singularity, and with 1.8.4.5433, they arrive in the release version. For those familiar with using materials (diffuse, normal and specular maps), the Texture tab on the Build floater presents the expected options in a familiar layout.

A couple of nice additions with materials are the Synchronize Materials check box in the main build floater, and the carry-through of the UUID field from the texture picker to the normal / specular map pickers. The former makes it a simple one-step process to keep parameter changes between the different maps on the face of an object in synch, while the latter makes it easy to apply maps using their UUID if known.

The particles support sees Singularity able to support the latest particle parameters, including ribbon particles and particle glow. However, while testing the viewer, I found that it does not appear to support the particle muting capability LL also introduced, whereby right-clicking on a particle stream will mute the corresponding emitter.

The Google Breakpad crash reporting system is enabled by default on first installing release 1.8.4. Providing such reports allows a TPV team to better understand and deal with potential crash modes within a viewer and identify and eliminate potential errors which can result in crashes, and users are therefore encouraged to keep the option enabled. However, if you don’t wish to send any reports, or don’t wish to be asked prior to a report being sent should you crash, you can change the crash reporting setting through a drop-down menu in Preferences > General (shown below).

Google Breakpad enables crash reporting to the Singularity team, and can be configured through the Preferences > General tab
Google Breakpad enables crash reporting to the Singularity team, and can be configured through the Preferences > General tab

 

Menu Updates

Singularity adds some nice little touches to the use of the pie menu, and adds the option to switch between using the pie menu and context menus.

  • Shift-clicking on the central “hole” in the pie menu will either step you back through levels (if you have been using the More > option), or close the pie menu
  • The pie menu can be displayed when in Mouselook by holding the ALT key and right-clicking. It can be cleared by holding the ALT key and left-clicking
  • For those who, like me, prefer context menus, they can be enabled in place of the pie menu via Preferences > System > Use Context Menus instead of Pie Menus.

Other Updates of Note

This release of Singularity also includes the following updates:

  • Inclusion of the latest fixes for the latest ATi/AMD Catalyst drivers
  • Addition of the default camera presets to the Quick Preferences panel
  • Several improvements to the instant message panels
  • Improved reliability of the texture cache
The mini-map gets updated with additional options on the right-click menu
The mini-map gets updated with additional options on the right-click menu
  • Mini-map updates:
    • right-click option to hide or show objects
    • Ability to show Whisper, Chat and Shout range rings (hat rings aware of OpenSim chat range settings)
    • MiniMapPrimMaxAltitudeDelta and MiniMapPrimMaxAltitudeDeltaOwn debug settings added to allow customisation of objects displayed on the mini-map based on proximity
  • Linden tree animations re-enabled  (Advanced > Rendering > Animate Trees)
  • Clicking on clock toggles display of local time
  • Grid URLs can be entered directly into the login panel’s grid field, bypassing the need to open the Grid Manager
  • OpenSim / Aurora sim updates, including:
    • Support for variable-sized regions
    • More OpenSim conformity
    • Issue with teleport failures and saving scripts taking a very long time on OpenSim regions run in the same simulator instance fixed
  • And more, again, please refer to the release notes for details and for the code attributions of all updates.

Windows 64-Bit

The 1.8.4 release of Singularity sees the arrival of a Windows 64-bit version. There is a known issue with this version of the viewer, which lacks support for the  Quicktime plugin, so certain types of parcel media will not play. However, this does not affect streaming music and media on a prim (MoaP).

While my tests are far from conclusive, I have spent time running the 64-bit version on the SL Aditi (beta) grid and have encountered no problems or crashes.

Related Links

SL projects update week 46 (2): Server news, viewer update, group ban list

Posted on by Inara Pey

Server Deployments week 46 recap

As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

  • Main channel: Tuesday November 12th:  no deployment
  • BlueSteel and LeTigre: received a maintenance package comprising further infrastructure changes for the yet-to-be-announced Experience Keys (experience tools) project
  • Magnum received a server maintenance project comprising a number of fixes and changes to script behaviours to prevent Estate managers and region owners from being teleported by llTeleportAgentHome() and so they are no longer affected by scripts which use ESTATE_ACCESS_BANNED_AGENT_ADD

Two further notable bug fixes with the Magnum release were “Sim crossing on vehicle fails when parcel at opposite sim border is full.” (BUG-4152) and a bug where a high draw distance set in the viewer would see the viewer to sometimes fail to connect to the requisite number of regions around it. According to Maestro Linden, this bug affects viewer using the current release viewer code (or earlier), but not the newer “Project Interesting” viewer code.

Speaking at the Server Beta meeting on Thursday November 14th, Maestro commented on the Magnum release, saying, “There were also under-the-hood changes to object inventory management, and llTakeControls() behaviour in LSL. Those shouldn’t cause any behavioural differences, but I added them to the release notes in case they did cause problems.” These are the “clean-up of ‘control grabbing’ in LSL scripts” referred to in the release notes.

Grey Goo Issues

The Magnum update also included updates to the grey goo fence, which is intended to combat griefing. The specific changes were to combat the use of large object rezzing, which can be used to crash a region. However, the tightening of the fence led to unforeseen problems, as Maestro reported:

There are reports in JIRA about building rezzer systems hitting the grey goo fence. The one case I saw was where one rezzed about a dozen large linksets rapidly, and when it hit the grey goo fence, it would ‘fail’ halfway through the rez. Anyway, Simon and I talked about how to address this; for now, I think he’s going to go with a fix where only large and physical linksets are penalised.

Another option under consideration is rather than denying the rezzing, to slow it down. It’s not clear which option will be taken forward by the Lab at this point, for now their intention is to deploy a fix to Magnum in week 47 which “unbreaks”, as Maestro put it, any affected rezzing systems on Magnum regions.

Maestro mixes and Baker be-bops at the Server Beta meeting, Novermber 14th
Maestro mixes and Baker be-bops at the Server Beta meeting, November 14th

Upcoming Updates

Maestro Linden  gave an overview of some of the updates which will be making their way into a server  maintenance package, which  include:

  • A fix for ‘ Vehicles containing a mesh are returned to the owner upon region crossing when destination parcel is full’, which is similar to BUG-4152, fixed in the Magnum RC deployment in week 46, but only affects meshes and involved the actual entry parcel being full
  • A fix for “Temp Attachments are sometimes not removed on the viewer when detached from a region change event.”
  • A follow-up fix to  “llTeleportHome() should not teleport estate managers”, mentioned above, which extends the protection to parcel owners  (or a group owner if the parcel is group owned)

These may well form a small update package on their own and get deployed to one or more RC channels in week 47.

SL Viewer

The “Project Interesting” RC viewer, version 3.6.11283895,which has the viewer-side updates for the recently interest list updates was released on Thursday November 14th.

Continue reading “SL projects update week 46 (2): Server news, viewer update, group ban list” →

“Project Interesting” arrives as a release candidate viewer

Posted on by Inara Pey

The long-awaiting “Project Interesting”  viewer has finally made it to release candidate status with the arrival of version 3.6.11.283895 of the viewer on Thursday November 14th.

This viewer represents the last stage in the current work on improving interest list functionality, the code which controls how the data relating to your in-world view is handled by both the server and the viewer. This includes what is sent to the viewer, what is retained by the viewer for reuse and things like the order in which objects are rendered when you log-in to SL or teleport (so that the “interesting” objects which are closer to you or which are particularly large should render first, for example).

The vast majority of the interest list work has already been delivered, and everyone should already be enjoying the broader benefits. However, the final phase of the current batch of work has been focused on both server and viewer changes, and the latter have been somewhat delayed due to a number of bugs, some of which were the result of the need to further tweak things server-side which in turn adversely affected the viewer’s behaviour, while others were bugs which appeared to have been dealt with, only to return in a later build.

AS-12_001
The “project interesting” viewer updates should further improve scene loading for users through improved caching of region and object data, better use of memory, etc.

The core changes within this viewer relate to what can be cached locally. This should allow the viewer to store more information on objects and regions than is currently the case, enabling it to re-use object / region data without having to rely on the server to re-send the information, improving rendering times when you are exploring a region / teleporting back to a region previously visited.

One of the bugs which delayed the arrival of the “project interesting” viewermeant that some objects would not render (as is the case with the house in this image). Unlike the recent “missing prims” issue, no bounding box, etc., was loaded by the viewer, so right-clicking where the house should be would not resolve the issue – a relog was required (image courtesy of Whirly Fizzle)

There are other improvements to further assist with scene loading as well. For example, when teleporting into a region never before visited, the viewer can now tell the simulator that it has no data for the region cached, and the simulator can in turn simply get on with prioritising the data and downloading to the viewer, rather than it having to repeatedly ask the viewer if it needs the data, as is currently the case. The result of this is that “several seconds” can be shaved from scene loading times for uncached regions. Also, the viewer will no longer load objects from cache into memory if they are completely by scene geometry, thus reducing unnecessary memory use.

The viewer is currently a release candidate, which means it will be downloaded and installed for some users who have indicated a willingness to participate in the release candidate programme through their viewer Preferences (Set-up > Willing to update to release candidates). Those who wish to manually install the viewer can read the release notes and download it from the link below.

The Lab issued a blog post to accompany the viewer release (which I initially missed), which includes a video demonstrating the changes, narrated by Torley Linden.

Related Links