Category: SL Tech

On Monday, June 1st 2026 (SLT), Firestorm released version 7.2.4.80712 of their viewer. This release brings Firestorm into line with most of the recent releases of the official Second Life viewer (SLV) up to and including release 26.1.0, with additional cherry-picked updates from upstream. Note that the following is not a complete review of the 7.2.4 release and all the changes made therein; it focuses on the more visible and user-facing updates. Those requiring a list of all changes and updates, including all bug fixes, etc, should refer to the Firestorm 7.2.4 release changelog, which also provides all proper credits for the work.

Table of Contents General Notes Installation Linden Lab Updates Viewer 26.1.0 – Stability and Legacy Search Viewer 26.1.1 – Special Note LL Upstream Fixes included with Firestorm 7.2.4 New Features for 7.2.4 Avatar Alignment and Facing Tools Region-Based Group Activation Added Protection: Disable URL Masking Other Notable Updates / Improvements Preferences Updates Search-Related Updates / Improvements Firestorm Animation Override and Avatar Poser Building and Scripting Contact Sets Updates / Improvements And the Rest Feedback Related Links

General Notes

Installation

• Only download Firestorm from the Firestorm website. Do not utilise any other third-party site purporting to offer the Firestorm viewer, and remember Firestorm will never ask for log-in credentials in order to download a release version of their viewer.
• There is no need to perform a clean install with this release if you do not wish to.
• Do, however, make sure you back-up all your settings safely so you can restore them after installing 7.2.4.

Linden Lab Updates

This release brings Firestorm to full parity with the following recent official viewer releases from Linden Lab.

Viewer 26.1.0 – Stability and Legacy Search

Version and release notes:  26.1.0.22641522367 – March 2026.

• The ability to hide transparent reflection probes via Build Menu → Options → Highlight Transparent Probes or pressing ALT-SHIFT-T.
• Quality of Life improvements:
  • Gestures (Comm Menu → Gestures or CTRL-G): now includes a sortable “Status” column. Click the leftmost column to move all active gestures to the top of the list.

• • Camera controls have multiple improvements, including better aspect-ratio handling and a shortcut for panning the camera downward.
  • Improved outfit list performance, especially for larger wardrobes.
  • Restored support for avatar cloth: Developer Menu → Rendering → Render Animated Avatar System Cloth.
• Bug fixes.
• Elements already offered by Firestorm:
  • Re-implementation of Legacy Search, added to the World menu (Firestorm has been utilising a Legacy Search capability, however please read Search-Related Updates / Improvements, below).
  • Ability to search the Resident Chooser using Agent ID (agent key).
  • Ability to save Snapshot to Inventory at 1024×1024 as a selectable resolution.

Viewer 26.1.1 – Special Note

• The Second Life viewer release 26.1.1.23806384790 (April 2026) implemented a new one-click installer feature for the official viewer.
• Firestorm is not implementing this feature, so nothing from this release is relevant to Firestorm users.

Upstream Fixes included with 7.2.4

• WebRTC:
  • Fixed WebRTC connection’s task outliving the connection (LLVoiceWebRTCConnection) – Github issue.
  • Fixed WebRTC voice being muted after quickly toggling the Speak button – Github issue.
  • Fixed incoming WebRTC voice audio being disrupted after editing audio settings – Github issue.
  • Fixed voice-disabled parcel does not immediately transmit audio after joining a p2p call – Github issue.
  • Fixed P2P text chat timeout on WebRTC regions and delay voice renegotiation on disconnect – Github issue.
• General fixes:
  • Fixed “Quick Jump” sometimes being enabled when it shouldn’t be (due to race conditions with AGENT_CONTROL_FINISH_ANIM when chaining jumps). This corrects a issue for the Ponygirl community, where use of Quick Jump is usually banned; see FIRE-34049.
  • Fixed alpha debug overlay blend and mask conflict – see FIRE-36474.
  • Fixed PBR materials with alpha mode BLEND and alpha value of 0 are not highlighted – see FIRE-36363.
  • Fixed the default save location on Mac is the Resources file of the current viewer – see FIRE-36609.

New Features for 7.2.4

Avatar Alignment and Facing Tools

To facilitate better alignment for facing other avatars for things like hugs and kisses – or simply as a courtesy when chatting – or for fine-tuning facing a specific direction, Firestorm 7.2.4 implements new tools and avatar alignment / facing options.

• Avatar Alignment Compass:
  • Accessed via a new toolbar button.
  • Provides options for turning your avatar and facing specific directions (per the diagram below).

• 

  Face Nearest Avatar: a new toolbar button which will turn your avatar to face the nearest avatar to you within 20 metres. This is supported by the following Face Towards Avatar option found on the following menus / floaters (avatars must be within 20 metres):

  • Context / Pie menus: when right-clicking on a nearby avatar.
  • People floater: when right-clicking on the name of an avatar.
  • Radar avatar list: when right-clicking on the name of an avatar.
  • Minimap or Radar minimap: when right-clicking on the green dot for that avatar.
• General Notes when trying to align your avatar with another for hugs, etc:
  • One person right-clicks on the other avatar and selects Face Towards Avatar.
  • The other person does the same to get both avatars initially aligned.
  • The first person right-clicks on the other avatar again and selects Face Towards Avatar to fine-tune alignment.

Region-Based Group Activation

• Allows you to set a Group to become automatically active when entering a region.
• Accessed via the Groups panel (Comm Menu → Groups or CTRL-SHIFT-G).
• To set a Group to become active for a region whilst physically within the region:
  1. Open the Groups panel in your viewer and click on the Group Titles button to display the Group Tiles floater.
  2. Click on the required Group name in the Group Tiles floater to highlight it.
  3. Click the This Region button.
• To set a Group to become active in a region when not in said region:
  1. Follow steps 1 and 2 above.
  2. Click on the Type Region button.
  3. Enter the exact region name in the pop-up prompt, and click OK to apply.

• To remove Group selection when visiting a region:
  • Open the Groups panel in your viewer and click on the Group Titles button to display the Group Tiles floater.
  • Click on the required Group name in the Group Titles floater to highlight it.
  • Click the Clear Region button.

Added Protection: Disable URL Masking

• Preferences → Firestorm → Protection → Disable square-bracket links in chat (URL stays visible).
• When enabled, square-bracket links sent in chat, IM, group notices and object text from other Residents are not collapsed into a single labelled link – the actual URL is shown and linked.
• This helps reduce phishing where the visible label hides a different destination.
• Built-in viewer text (notifications, preferences, etc.) is not affected

Other Notable Updates / Improvements

Preferences Updates

• Group IM Tabs by Conversation Type: it is now possible to order the appearance IM tabs in your Conversations floater by type.
  • Go to Preferences → Chat → Chat Windows.
  • Check Order IMs by Type and then select your preferred IM order from the drop-down, where:
    • Groups, Conferences, IMs will display all Group IM tabs first, then any Conference session IMs then any person-to-person IMs.
    • Groups, IMs, Conferences will display all Group IM tabs first, then any person-to-person IMs then any Conference session IMs.
    • And so on through the displayed drop-down list.
  • Once set, any incoming IMs will be appended to the relevant group of tab (so any new Group IM will appear at the end of the grouping of that type of IM), rather than just appearing at the end of the list of open IM sessions.
  • Alternatively, you can check Add New IMs First ad have new IM tab open at the top of their respective grouping.
  • Once set, the ordering will persist across log-ins until changed. 

• Updated options for de-selecting chat: you can now opt to de-select chat in third-person viewer and / or when in Mouselook after sending a message –  Preferences → Chat → Typing → Deselect Chat after Sending Message + sub-options.
• Sounds & Media:
  • The “Buttons” sliders in Preferences → Sounds & Media → Sounds and the volume control drop-down (top right of the screen) have been renamed to “Interface” for clarity.
  • Preferences → Sounds & Media → UI Sounds has been refactored from 3 individual panels (UI Sounds 1, 2, 3) into a single scrolling list of UI sound options. Also added to the panel is:
    • The ability to double-click on a sound entry to hear a preview of the sound.
    • The ability to right click a sound entry and Copy sound UUID
  • A new option to play a sound when someone uses nearby chat: Preferences → Sound & Media → UI Sounds → New Nearby Chat Message.
• Viewer colours and Opacity: new option to set semi-transparent menu backgrounds:
  • Preferences → Colors → Miscellaneous → Menus Background Opacity.
  • This controls the opacity of context menus and top menu bar background where 0.0 = fully transparent and 1.0 = fully opaque.
• Time format updates:
  • New Time Format drop-down in Preferences →  General →Time Format to change the appearance of chat timestamps between 12-hour and 24-hour formats.
  • This option includes a link to User Interface → Top Bars → Time Format to direct those wanting to change the the format of the time ( 12-hour or 24-hour) displayed in the the viewer window’s clock display (top right corner of the viewer).
  • Preferences → User Interface → Top Bars → “Time Format” has been renamed to “Clock Format” to better indicate it refers to setting the clock’s time format.

Search-Related Updates / Improvements

• LL and Firestorm Legacy Search:
  • Linden Lab’s implementation of Legacy Search is used by default in Firestorm 7.2.4.
  • To continue to use the Firestorm Legacy Search implementation:
    1. Open the viewer’s Debug Settings floater (Advanced Menu → Debug Settings).
    2. Enter FSUseFSLegacySearch into the floater’s search filter.
    3. Enable the TRUE radio button.
    4. Close the Debug Settings floater.
    5. Close and re-open the Search floater if required. On re-opening Search, the Firestorm Legacy Search floater should be displayed.
  • To switch back to used the LL Legacy Search floater, repat the steps above, but set FSUseFSLegacySearch to FALSE.
  • The following have been added / ported to the LL Legacy Search implementation to offer matching functionality with the Firestorm Legacy Search:
    • An Open Profile button has been added to the People / Group searches.
    • Ability to search via Agent ID in People Searches.
  • There are multiple additional fixes and improvements to Legacy Search – see Legacy Search in the changelog.

• Area Search: Copy functionality added to Area Search results using keyboard shortcuts to copy selected rows from the Area Search results list to the system clipboard in tab-separated format.
  • CTRL-C: copies selected rows to the clipboard.
  • CTRL-A: select all items in results list.
  • Copied information is in tab-separated format for easy pasting into spreadsheets, can paste directly in Excel/Google Sheets, and includes header row with column names.
• Gesture floater: a Search field has been added to the Gestures floater (Comm Menu → Gestures or CTRL-G).
• World Map Region Search: region maturity rating (G, M, A) has been added to the names of regions returned in a search.

Firestorm Animation Override and Avatar Poser

Multiple update to the above, for details please refer to the following changelog entries:

• Firestorm AO.
• Firestorm Poser.

Building and Scripting

• Major improvements to the Firestorm Local Mesh capability – see glTF support for Local Mesh in the changelog for details.

Contact Sets Updates / Improvements

• Drag and drop capability:  enables dragging-and-dropping name into a Contact Set from the Friends list and calling cards. See FIRE-31146.
• Names can now be moved between Contact Sets.
  • Contact Sets → Move This Avatar to Another Contact Set.
  • See FIRE-34543.
• Search/filter field has been added to Contact Sets.
  • Contact Sets → Filter people bar.
  • People → Contact Sets → Filter people bar
  • See FIRE-17568.
• People in your Contact Sets can now be highlighted as such in your Friends list.
  • Contact Sets → Configure selected Contact Set → Custom Colors → Color friends list entry based on their Contact Set.
  • See FIRE-32748.
• Sort Contact Sets by people’s On-line status:
  • Contact Sets → Configure Selected Contact Set → Sort by Online Status.
  • See FIRE-21531.
• Set custom Autoresponse messages to Contact Sets.
  •  Contact Sets → Configure selected Contact Set →select one of:
    • Use custom Busy-mode Autoresponse for This Set.
    • Use custom Autoresponse-mode message for This Set.
    • Use custom Non-friends Autoresponse for This Set.
  • See FIRE-17006.
• It is now possible to bulk apply Set Alias in Contact Sets. See FIRE-31777.
• Contact Sets are now supported in the Avatar Picker. See FIRE-34809.
• If an avatar is in one or more of your Contact Sets, you will see those Contact Sets listed below their Groups list when viewing their Profile. See FIRE-32401.
• Quality of Life Contact Sets improvements and fixes.

And the Rest

For information on RLVa updates, OpemSim updates, skinning & translations, performance and stability updates, viewer build Improvement and Fixes in the changelog for details.

Feedback

I’ve been using the various beta release of this version of Firestorm – and most notably 80712 since it was made available and have found it as stable and reliable as the previous release version. While I’m not aware of specific performance boosts (and so this could be purely subjective). this version does appear to load my home location in SL a lot more smoothly than 7.2.2.80036. Of the new / updated features, I like the Firestorm implementation of LL’s Legacy Search – if only because I no longer have to click over the the People tab (my usual Search option) when opening the floater. The avatar alignment / facing addition is rather neat and the region-based Group activity is handy for making sure rezzing rights are maintained when hopping around regular haunts where I have said rights.

As to the rest, I leave it to you.