Category: SL User Group Meetings

2025 week #11: SL SUG meeting

Posted on by Inara Pey
Borkum, January 2025 – blog post

The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, March 11th, 2025 Simulator User Group (SUG) meeting. They form a summary of the items discussed, and are not intended to be a full transcript, and were taken from Pantera’s video of the meeting, which is embedded at the end – my thanks to her for providing 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.
  • These meetings are conducted (as a rule):
  • Meetings 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.

Simulator Deployments

  • On Tuesday, March 11th, 2025, the SLS Main channel was updated with the Carrot Cake update should be deployed to all RC channels. This includes:
    • A patch for issues found with the version of Carrot Cake already deployed to BlueSteel, together with a fixed for issues in trying to deploy some of the new benefits announced as a part of the “March Membership Madness” month.
    • Monty Linden’s work on EventQueueGet (a simulator Capability that delivers messages from a simulator to viewers over HTTP using a long-poll scheme. It is core functionality without which viewer/simulator coordination is impossible).
    • In addition, an update combining Carrot Cake and the WebRTC back-end was deployed to the Preflight RC channel.
  • On Wednesday, March 12th, 2025, the remaining RC channels will be restarted without update.

SL Viewer Updates

  • Default viewer: 7.1.12.13550888671, formerly the ForeverFPS, dated March 1, 2025, promoted March 5th – NEW.
    • Numerous crash and performance fixes.
    • Water exclusion surfaces.
    • Water improvements.
  • Project viewer: Second Life Project Lua Editor Alpha, version 7.1.12.13526902562, March 3rd, 2025 – NEW.
    • Will only work on Aditi, within the following regions: [Luau Yardang], [Luau Tombolo], [Luau Mesa] and [Luau Tideland].

Lua(u): Initial Aditi Deployment – Recap and Update

  • An initial deployment of Luau support (which will eventually replace Mono as the back-end scripting language) is opening on Aditi (the beta grid) for user testing.
  • The regions running Luau support are: [Luau Yardang], [Luau Tombolo], [Luau Mesa] and [Luau Tideland].
    • These support both native Lua scripting and compiling LSL to Luau VM.
  • A Luau-capable viewer is required.
    • This viewer will work on any region in SL, but will only compile scripts to Luau on the Aditi regions noted above.
  • Discussion on Lua(u) is available through the scripting channel on the SL Discord server, for those with access.
  • It was noted that the server support has some “sharp edges”. In addition:
    • Error reporting when compiling scripts from LSL to Luau is “quite spartan at the moment”, but will be improved “in the next update or two”.
    • If objects with compiled Luau script assets are rezzed in a non-Luau region, they won’t work.
  • On the initial launch, LL constants hadn’t been exposed. Those should be available now.
    • Constants are in the global namespace now, with constant folding in the future to improve performance. Currently, there are no plans on moving them into a namespace.
  • Rider Linden indicated that there has been a high volume of testing of the past week on the Luau regions on Aditi, generating high quality feedback from scripters.
  • Signal Linden added that over the course of the last week, there has been some rapid development with bug fixes and features, with a new build nearly every day. Both he and Rider Linden passed on thanks to everyone who has been putting early work into testing the Lua work.

Luau Resources

In Brief

Please refer to the the video for details on the following.

  • The Durian Scone simulator update contains the new server certificate anchored by DigiCert. Monty Linden has a detailed post on the Technical forum. The Certificate supporting regions are Cloud Sandbox 1- on Aditi, and are open for testing.
  • There was a general round of potential naming for the SL implementation of Lua/Luau. Ideas including: SLuau; SLua (“slew-ah”); Linden Lua(u) Language (LLL / L³).
  • RegEx string functions: Rider Linden noted that he has most of the code written for some of the other RegEx things, and believes it would be mostly a matter of hooking the correct pieces together. However, work is currently focused on internal tooling, so he’s not at this point sure when he’ll be able to get back to the RegEx work. Some RegEx support can be found here.
  • Leviathan Linden is hoping to port game_control back into the main SL Viewer and also to submit some patches for Cool VL Viewer when he has an opportunity to get back to that work. He also noted that for the official SL Viewer it depends on the Linux-build support getting back in place because game_control was using SDL2 for input acquisition, which was supplied by the Linux build work.
  • A general conversation on the AI character tools, LSL, and opportunities.
  • Linden Lab is attending the 2025 Game Developer Conference (March 17th-21st, 2025) in San Francisco to promote Second Life.

† 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.

2025 week #10: SL CCUG meeting summary: new approaches (viewer / projects)

Posted on by Inara Pey
Hippotropolis Campsite: venue for CCUG meetings
The following notes were taken from my audio recording and chat log of the Content Creation User Group (CCUG) meeting of Thursday, March 6th, 2025.Please note that this is not a full transcript, but a summary of key topics .

Meeting Purpose

  • The CCUG meeting is for discussion of work related to content creation in Second Life, including current and upcoming LL projects, and encompasses requests or comments from the community, together with related viewer development work.
Table of Contents
  • This meeting is generally held on alternate Thursdays at Hippotropolis.
  • Dates and times of meetings are recorded in the SL Public Calendar, and they are conducted in a mix of Voice and text chat.

Official Viewer Updates and Release Changes

Viewer Status

  • Default viewer: 7.1.12.13550888671, formerly the ForeverFPS, dated March 1, 2025, promoted March 5th – NEW.
    • Numerous crash and performance fixes.
    • Water Exclusion Surfaces (see below).
    • Linden Water improvements – water should now appear much as it did “pre-PBR” (note: this viewer does have known Linden Water issues, for which fixes are already going into to the next viewer update).
    • Support for 20 Picks in the viewer’s Profile floater (requires simulator release 2025-02-14 or later).
  • Project viewers:
    • Second Life Project Lua Editor Alpha, version 7.1.12.13526902562, March 3rd, 2025 – NEW.
      • Will only work on Aditi, within the following regions: [Luau Yardang], [Luau Tombolo], [Luau Mesa] and [Luau Tideland].

Release Cadence and Numbering Changes

  • The Lab has been undertaking work to further streamline viewer development and the release cycle.
  • These changes specifically mean:
    • Official viewer updates will be moving to a planned monthly release cadence.
    • The viewer version numbering will be changed to reflect the year / month of release, so 2025.03 (March 2025) will be the next viewer in the pipe, followed by 2025.04 (April 2025).
      • It is presently unclear if these number system will include additional number to indicate individual updates as a viewer moves through its own update cycle prior to being promoted to de-facto release status.
    • Within this cadence, individual updates will be incorporated into each upcoming release on an “as needed” basis – so presumably high-priority fixes will be fast-tracked into releases as they occur.
  • This also means the old Develop Github branch is now archived (archive/develop in the LL viewer Github repo), and updates / changes within it will be pulled across to active viewer repos as decisions are made as to what updates are to be implemented in which viewer in the new release cycle.
  • A key reason for altering the viewer release cadence is that LL is trying to move away from implementing large-scale projects (involving both the viewer and the simulator / back-end services) which can take months / years to deploy, towards implementing smaller, more manageable projects which can be implemented / integrated more easily and iterated upon faster, in order to deliver improvements to the platform as a whole.

Upcoming Viewers

  • The 2025.03 release is being looked at as a maintenance release, which will incorporate (among other things):
    • The Linden Water fixes referenced above.
    • Improvements for VRAM handling, including a new VRAM divisor specifically for texture usage (by default will try to use half of the available VRAM available to the viewer for textures, with the ability to manually adjust the amount used as needed).
    • Monty Linden’s improvements to avatar loading.
  • The large volume of work which had been classified as a “Maintenance B” viewer update prior to releases being overtaken by the need to focus on performance fixes  (DeltaFPS, ExtraFPS and ForeverFPS) might be incorporated in to 2025.03 release, but could be held over until the following 2025.04 release.

Linux Support

  • It is hoped that the new approach to releases, coupled with the number of Linux-focused updates pushed towards the “Maintenance B” stockpile will help with Linux viewer development and support.
  • This does not mean LL will be guaranteeing a broader, more holistic support of Linux going forward, but rather it will put the Lab in a position to better address the question of on-going Linux support.
  • The above noted, Linux support is described as becoming “more and more of a forefront priority” in terms of how the Lab might more forward in supporting it, particularly as there are some internal (to the Lab) dependencies on supporting it.

Open Source Programme Revamp

  • In line with all of the above, Geenz Linden has put forward a proposal for revamping the open source programme and making it more responsive, inviting input from TPV and open source developers.
  • One aspect of this is the Lab will be clearly flagging areas in which they would specifically benefit from open source developer assistance.
    • A developing list of areas where such help / code contributions would be welcome can be found here.
  • Any open source developers who have not seen the proposal are directed to it.

Beta Testing New Features and Capabilities

  • As has been previously stated, one aspect of feature development and implementation will be adding features and capabilities to the viewer and then guarding them against use via flags controlled on the server-side.
    • This will allow features and capabilities to the viewer which might be back-end support requirements, and have the viewer completely ignore them until such time as the server-side flag is set so that they can be used.
    • It is hoped that this will again allow for a faster implementation and deployment of features and capabilities.
  • Given this, Aditi (the Beta grid) will remain as the place for general new feature testing and bug-hunting.

Water Exclusion Surfaces – Re-cap

  • Now available in the Forever FPS release, and all third-party viewers merging with that code base are Water Exclusion Surfaces (WES).
  • These in a similar manner to the old invisiprims:
    • When seen from above will “hide” Linden Water -thus allowing water to be excluded from inside boat hulls, dry docks, etc.
    • If looked at from directly below, it will cull the underwater plane but leave the water fogging.
A very(, very) basic example of a Water Exclusion Surface hiding Linden Water
  • Currently, all  invisiprims fitting the above use-case should now work, together the with scripts for converting prims into invisiprims.
  • A new UI element for more easily creating WES items will be added to the viewer in a future release – possibly 2025.04.
  • WES will work on any prim or mash face except rigged mesh or with attachments by intent due to performance issues.
    • Rigged meshes will likely be rendered black.
    • Attachment will render, but the exclusion surface will be ignored and will not hide Water  or rigged mesh (the rigged mesh will likely be rendered black.
    • Additionally, WES will not work with the system avatar.
  • Water Exclusion Surfaces will not provide volumetric water exclusion (e.g. “hiding” water from the rooms of underwater buildings).

Mesh Import Formats – glTF Mesh Support

  • The removal of support for the COLLADA mesh file format from Blender under Linux has raised  concerns about the longevity of the format in general in regards to Second Life.
  • LL are looking to implement glTF mesh imports for Second Life – something which has been promised since work started on moving Second Life towards compliance with the glTF specification.
  • However, the overall scope of the project has changed. Rather than being the overarching project with scene imports, etc., the work is now being focused on “just glTF mesh”.  See this planned implementation feature for details.
    • The idea is to have the glTF mesh import to work in the same manner as the current COLLADA .DAE import floater, and this work should be surfacing in a viewer in the near future.
  • This revised approach does not mean the rest of glTF import is “going away”; it is more a re-prioritisation of work and breaking things down into smaller deliverables, in keeping with LL’s desire to implement and iteration projects and work faster than might be achieved through single grand “omnibus” projects.
  • Along with this, two requests were asked of LL:
    • The ability to select which part of a mesh model are to be uploaded (e.g. via check box), rather than defaulting to the entire model.
    • The ability to select at upload which attachment point rigged meshes should attach to, so as to encourage creators to do this, rather than leaving them defaulting to the the right hand position and letting the rigging take care of appearance.
    • Both of these ideas were seen as beneficial – with the caveat that they would require additional UI design and testing / iteration, adding further complexity to the work, delaying the initial release. As such, they are unlikely to be a part of the initial release of the glTF mesh uploader, but could potentially be looked at as future additions to it.
  • LL is not currently working on a means for automatic LOD generation on in-world objects.

In Brief

  • There are continuing reports of people who are on-line reporting as off-line once again. Canny reports if encountered, included where the issue occurred.
  • There are plans in-hand for LL to hold a Town Hall in which the product development roadmap for Second Life will be discussed.  Details are currently TBA.
  • Alpha gamma work:
    • In order for PBR lighting to render anywhere close to correctly, alpha blending had to be switched from SRGB to linear colour space.
    • This caused some older content using Blinn-Phong, to look either more opaque or more transparent than in did pre-PBR.
    • The fix for this giving people the ability to adjust the alpha/gamma on per texture entry for the object (including no mod items).
    • However, the work was targeted via the old viewer development branch, and needs to be re-targeted for implementation as a part of the new viewer release cycle, and this has yet to be done.
  • Puppetry project:
    • There are currently no plans to re-start the Puppetry project.
    • There are some significant technical hurdles LL believe need to be understood and addressed (such as a joint transmission between viewers), which the project as a whole needs to be reviewed in terms of requirements and priorities in order for it to be more easily addressed.
  • Terrain painting (summarised here) remains on hold due to other priorities.

Next Meeting

March 2025 SL Web User Group: web site refreshes, Project Zero and Mobile

Posted on by Inara Pey
The Web User Group meeting venue, Denby
The following notes cover the key points from the Web User Group (WUG) meeting, held on Wednesday March 5th, 2025. These notes form a summary of the items discussed and is not intended to be a full transcript.

A video of the meeting, recorded by Pantera Północy, is embedded at the end of this summary, with sections of this summary times stamped to the relevant points in the video for those wishing to refer to the audio. My thanks as always to Pantera for recording it and making it available.

 Table of Contents

Meeting Overview

  • The Web User Group exists to provide an opportunity for discussion on Second Life web properties and their related functionalities / features. This includes, but is not limited to: the Marketplace, pages surfaced through the secondlife.com dashboard; the available portals (land, support, etc), and the forums.
  • As a rule, these meetings are conducted:
    • On the first Wednesday of the month and 14:00 SLT.
    • In both Voice and text.
    • At this location.
  • Meetings 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.

MFA Enabled across Web Property Log-ins

[Video: 2:56-3:14]

  • Multi-factor authentication (MFA) is now enabled for all Second Life web properties.
  • Those with MFA logging-in to the majority of SL web properties (e.g. the dashboard, Marketplace, Project Zero, the Destination Guide, etc.,), will be asked to supply a token from an appropriate authenticator the next time their current token expires.
  • As with the viewer, tokens will generally be valid for 30 days, the exception being should you clear cookies from your browser, in which case you will also have to supply a new token on logging in.
Those with MFA enabled on their account will now see an MFA token request when logging in to the majority of SL web properties (which includes Project Zero) for the first time OR after clearing browser cookies will be asked to present a authentication token – which should now remain valid for the 30-day period / until the site cookies are cleared (whichever comes first)
  • This work should harmonise logging-in across most of the popular SL websites.

What Next? Page Refresh

[Video: 3:15-3:38]

  • The What Next page, accessible via the Dashboard menu has been refreshed.
  • The new look include new tabbed sections, more relevant video, and the style in keeping with the overall web properties style refresh.
  • However: at the time of writing, the Destination Guide – present under the drop-down previously available when hovering the mouse over the What Next? menu option – is absent from the page.
  • This means that currently, the Guide can be accessed using its dedicated URL – https://secondlife.com/destinations.
  • This prompted a discussion later in the meeting on where the Destination Guide should go – e.g. as its own menu item.
The refreshed What Next? page as accessed from the dashboard

Viewer Download Page Refresh

[Video: 3:15-4:03]

  • The viewer download page has been updated to the new Dark Theme, and includes a refreshed look which now includes links to the SL Mobile viewer pages on the Apple Store and Google play.
The updated viewer / SL mobile download page

Marketplace

[Video: 4:09-7:25]

  • Responsive product listing pages were enabled on Wednesday, March 5th, 2025.
    • This should mean product listings should be displayed in a responsive manner, depending on whether you are viewing them on a large monitor or Tablet / Mobile device.
    • Not all of the Marketplace is responsive as yet, so expect this to be an iterative implementation.
  • The Marketplace legacy pay-out page has been “put back”, and work has been carried out some optimisations to the Account History page, with more to come.
  • Coming Soon: Improvements to the Mobile / Tablet versions of MP Search, which are “pretty stripped down” at present.
    • This is being actively worked on, and the iteration of further responsive MP pages will come after this work has been completed.
    • The approach is to start making “small, incremental improvements to your Marketplace lives.”

Project Zero and SL Mobile

[Video: 28:00-46:13]

Note: Project Zero is the code name for the viewer-in-a-browser experience:

Project Zero

  • Numbers able to access the service are still limited, with the priority (for want of a better term) being given to users signing-up to Second Life over existing users.
    • If the service is running at capacity, the “endlessly spinning” loading circle should now eventually time-out and display the message below.
The number of existing users able to access Project Zero is limited in favour of users signing-up to SL, so the above message might be frequently encountered.
    • Whilst the number of concurrent users able to use Zero is low, when combined with the session limit and the fact the service s available 24/7 it should still mean that “several thousand” users per day are be able to access it.
    • The ratio of slots for existing users and those for new users is also subject to adjustment up and down.
  • LL are curious as to why existing people are using the viewer in a browser and the type of device being used. Those at the meeting responded in terms of:
    • Curiosity, better performance than on their own machines, testing (including trying it on different devices), logging-in via a tablet device to offer support to customers.
    • Devices used ranged from desktop PC through laptops to tablets + mobile devices(!).
  • Feedback on experience varied in feedback:  avatar loading was seen as better; region crossings / teleports (and associated failures) were seen as about the same for some, improved in terms of success for others.
  • The fact that many appear to be using Zero from a tablet seems to have surprised LL, with Sntax Linden (project lead) curious as to how people were managing sans and UI overlay (in my case, multi-channel wireless keyboard and trackball both switched to BT mode and linked to tablet).
  • Feedback was also taken on whether people would prefer using Project Zero over the Desktop experience (screen resolution, etc., adjusted). Responses were varied.

SL Mobile

  • The Lobby function has been extended to Premium Plus subscribers and to (some? iterative deployment?) Premium members.
    • Lobby appears to be included with iOS version 0.1.534 and Android version 2025.2.543.
  • Requests have been made to be able to simultaneously log-in to SL Mobile whilst also being logged-in to the viewer (and vice-versa).
    • This is something for which LL has an awareness, and the Lobby function is seen as a possible first step towards it by allowing communications ,etc., to occur prior to the world loading-in.
    • However, overall, making it possible to be logged-in from both Mobile and the viewer simultaneously does have some significant technical challenges, due to the way client / simulator interactions are managed. For example, a client must have an avatar physically present in SL in order for chat, IMs, etc., to work, and the system doesn’t support having an avatar effectively in-world twice.
  • Philip Rosedale asked for people’s preferences for SL Mobile, if they are only given a binary choice, either:
    • Have SL Mobile fully render the 3D world and use it to interact with the world through it much as they would with the viewer? Or:
    • Have it as a “communications companion” with chat, IMs, Groups, etc., prioritised and without the associated world rendering etc (e.g. pretty much as the iOS Mobile project had originally been initiated under Oz Linden)?
    • Those at the meeting, while a small sample, leaned towards the latter (rather ironically, given that during the development of the iOS Mobile option, there were multiple calls for it to offer world rendering as a priority in order to be useful).
  • As an extension to the above conversation, some at the meeting indicated they’d actually prefer some means of chatting / responding to IMs via their account dashboard.
    • As per the notes regarding being simultaneously logged-in via Mobile and the viewer, whilst the Lab are aware of the desire for a web-to-in-world chat capability, it would require a substantial re-engineering effort given chat + IM communications are predicated on the avatar being logged-in to a location in SL.

In Brief

Please refer to the video for details on the following.

  • [Video: 7:30-9:18] Marketplace Styles (aka variants):
    • Styles is the ability to list multiple versions of a single items in a single Marketplace Listing (e.g. different colour versions of the same sweater, together with a demo and any fatpack (if offered)).
    • As I’ve previously noted, this was reported as something planned for deployment at that start of 2023, but has since seemingly fallen off the table.
    • Kali Linden indicated that the Web Team still want to implement Styles, but the work essentially lost its management sponsor before it could be seen as completely ready for deployment.
    • Threfore more the subject is mentioned, the more likely it is to receive the necessary management support – this being the case: Brad, Grumpity, whomever! give us Styles on the MP! 😀 .
    • Also, if you would like to see the capability implemented on the MP, upvote the feature request.
  • [Video 10:00-11:47] maps.secondlife.com:
  • [Video: 15:42-20:20] A general discussion on on things like style cards, lists of items, etc., new starters can get to assist them in customising / clothing their avatars.
    • This included the idea of the Lab providing a “Starter Pack” that could include things like a basic AO, leading to a broader discussion on the use of AO, their availability and importance to news users, the weakness of the Senra wearable AO system, building the AO system into the viewer, etc.
    • No conclusions drawn.
  • [Video: 20:34-25:56] General discussion on web properties and issues / possible updates, including:
    • The status of Place Pages (in short: a means to promote in-world locations user have created, introduced in 2017 as a “beta”,  then launched shortly thereafter – and basically left to wither on the vine.
    • (Again) aligning maps.secondlife.com functionality with that seen within the in-viewer World map.
    • Giving the dashboard page (and associated pages – transaction history, etc.) a broader facelift. Kali indicated this requires the input of two teams, and will likely be a longer-term top-to-toe redesign.
    • Reducing the amount of sub-menu nesting evident in some web properties.
  • The last 15-ish minutes of the meeting (approx: 47:00 onwards) formed a more general conversation on MP reviews (particularly “bad” reviews), dashboard chat capabilities and what else might be possible, such as making notecards viewable without being logged-in – which led to mention of having Inventory accessible through the web), search the MP via date ranges, etc.
    • Kali notes that a feature request to add the date listed (/updated) added to an item’s listing has been accepted, and will likely be implemented (see also the Chrome Marketplace Enhancer extension).
    • Adding a tab to listing where creators can drop their log files / update notes into a listing.

Next Meeting

  • Wednesday, April 2nd, 2025.

2025 week #10: SL SUG meeting: Lua(u) Aditi testing

Posted on by Inara Pey
Ruehaven Village, January 2025 – blog post

The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, March 4th, 2025 Simulator User Group (SUG) meeting. They form a summary of the items discussed, and are not intended to be a full transcript, and were taken from Pantera’s video of the meeting, which is embedded at the end – my thanks to her for providing 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.
  • These meetings are conducted (as a rule):
  • Meetings 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.

Simulator Deployments

  • On Tuesday, March 4th, 2025, the SLS Main channel was restarted without anu deployment.
  • On Wednesday, March 5th, 2025, the Carrot Cake update should be deployed to all RC channels. This includes:
    • A patch for issues found with the version of Carrot Cake already deployed to BlueSteel, together with a fixed for issues in trying to deploy some of the new benefits announced as a part of the “March Membership Madness” month.
    • Monty Linden’s work on EventQueueGet (a simulator Capability that delivers messages from a simulator to viewers over HTTP using a long-poll scheme. It is core functionality without which viewer/simulator coordination is impossible).

SL Viewer Updates

  • Default viewer: version 7.1.11.12363455226, formerly the ExtraFPS RC (multiple performance fixes, aesthetic improvements and UI optimisations), dated December 17, promoted December 20 – No Change.
  • Release Candidate: Forever FPS, version 7.1.12.13550888671, March 1, 2025 – Updated.
    • Numerous crash and performance fixes.

Lua(u): Initial Aditi Deployment

  • An initial deployment of Luau support (which will eventually replace Mono as the back-end scripting language) is opening on Aditi (the beta grid) for user testing.
  • The regions running Luau support are: [Luau Yardang], [Luau Tombolo], [Luau Mesa] and [Luau Tideland].
    • These support both native Lua scripting and compiling LSL to Luau VM.
  • A Luau-capable viewer is required.
    • This viewer will work on any region in SL, but will only compile scripts to Luau on the Aditi regions noted above.
  • A blog post will be “up soon”, and discussion on Lua(u) is available through the scripting channel on the SL Discord server, for those with access.
  • It was noted that the server support has some “sharp edges”, with Signal Linden noting:
Incredibly sharp, we are expecting it to be trivial to crash regions. The goal is to experiment with what can be created with the language and how it compares to LSL
  • Additional general notes:
    • Error reporting when compiling scripts from LSL to Luau is “quite spartan at the moment”, but will be improved “in the next update or two”.
    • If objects with compiled Luau script assets are rezzed in a non-Luau region, they won’t work.
  • The above announcement dominated the meeting with specific questions on functions (what will be available, how Luau will handle existing LSL functions, etc.), with Signal Linden noting the plan at the moment is to have the full library of LSL functions available. Provision of new APIs is still TBD.
  • Please refer to the video for details, and the resources below for specific information.

Luau Resources

† 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.

February 2025 SL Mobile UG meeting summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
Campwich Forest grounds: location for the Monthly Mobile User Group (MMUG)
The following notes were taken from the Thursday, February 27th 2025 Monthly Mobile User Group (MMUG) meeting.

These notes should not be taken as a full transcript of the meeting, which was largely held in Voice, but rather a summary of the key topics discussed. The meeting was recorded by Pantera, and her video is embedded at the end of this summary – my thanks, as always to her in providing it.
Table of Contents

Meeting Purpose

  • The Mobile User Group provides a platform to share insights on recent mobile updates and upcoming features, and to receive feedback directly from users.
  • These meetings are conducted (as a rule):
    • The last Thursday of every month at 12:00 noon SLT.
    • In Voice and text.
    • At Campwich Forest.
  • Meetings 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.

Resources

Re-Cap on Recent Releases

[Video: 2:58-3:49]

  • Version: 2025.1.542 (Android) / 0.5.533 (iOS).
  •  Create / Delete accounts – see: SL Mobile gains account creation workflow (and more).
  • Improvements to the format of Group notifications.
  • Streaks rewards (see here for more) broader release among subscription accounts.
    • [Video: 8:59-9:25] There is no guarantee as to how long the Rewards scheme will run. However, it will not end at the start of March, and there is potential for “new cool things happening with log-ins in March”.

Bone Attachment Point Handling

The new Bone Attachment Developer Tools option (requires restart)

[Video: 3:56-5:31]

  • A new Developer Tool option (Menu → Settings → Developer Tools).
  • This is off by default – so no behaviour change from previous versions of the app.
  • When enabled and SL mobile is restarted, it can improve avatar mesh appearance handling.
    • However, it might also cause cause new problems!
  • More debug information relating to rigged meshes is sent for developers to use.
  • A request was made for users to enable the option an provide feedback either through the app (Help → Feedback) or via the Feedback Portal.

Campwich Forest Cloning

[Video: 24:26-26:54]

  • In line with the account creation capability mentioned above, Campwich Forest in Bellisseria is currently the initial Landing Point for users signing-up to Second Life via SL Mobile.
  • As this has seen a lot of traffic with new users within the Linden homes around the Campwich location, the decisions has been taken to clone Campwich Forest and use that as the Landing Point.
  • The clone will be located separately from Bellisseria.

Roadmap Updates

[Video: 5:59-7:01]

Still in progress:

  • Addition of an Address Bar to the app,  making it possible to:
    •  Search landmarks /create landmarks.
    • Share SLurls with people on other apps (Discord, Reddit, WhatsApp, etc.) via the native share cards found in Android and iOS.
    • Allow maps.secondlife.com work on the Mobile App.
  • Providing quicker access to chat when using the app – e.g. a button on the in-world view to go directly to Chat, rather than having to go via the menu.
  • Improving in-world interactions within the app – making it easier to identify objects with which an avatar can interact, and know that something is happening when long-pressing an interactive object.
  • [Video: 14:17-15:51] Pluto Linden indicated:
    • The work on improving in-world interactions may be surfacing in the Mobile app during March.
    • The work to provide quicker access to chat is also a step along the road to having chat as an overlay on the in-world view.

Lobby Alpha Testing

[Video: 11:41-14:16]

  • Lobby is a new feature, intended to enable communications, allow users to see who is on-line and provide general information whilst the app continues to load things like the 3D world view in the background.
Coming soon: the SL Mobile: Lobby
  • Announced in December 2024, Lobby was made available to users on the SL Mobile Alpha testing programme on Thursday, February 27th, 2025.
    • This is an initial release, and will be iterated upon and improved, potentially with more information being provided.
    • Note that currently, when using the Lobby, scene loading will continue in the background, and you will arrive in-world at the last location at which you were previously present, be it when using the viewer or SL Mobile; you are not held in a separate environment.
    • However: the plan is for Lobby to be accessible to users without any in-world loading taking place, thus making SL Mobile even more of a “lightweight client” for those on lower / mid-tier mobile devices to use it as a communications tool.
  • As I am not a part of the Alpha Testing, I will have an article on Lobby as it is made more generally available.

Texture Loading

[Video: 19:41-22:35]

  • Texture resolution, as currently handled, is not very well optimised in terms of resolution.
  • In short, two channels are used for loading textures, one for in-world objects and one for avatars. however, as neither are currently optimising, they can load larger objects requiring higher resolution textures using the same resolution as small objects that can get away with lower resolution textures.
  • One of the reasons for this has been trying to get everything rendering under the memory constraints imposed by mobile devices (e.g. 500-800Mb), with the intent of then going back and adjusting things for better rendering / performance.
  • An outcome of this is particularly noticeable on avatar rendering (see also the discussion from the January meeting), is where avatars may not load, or only load as far as a transparent outline.
  • Adam Sinewave is currently working to optimised texture resolution when loading, and this is now at a point where it allows avatars to be automatically refreshed on loading, which should help make the problems of avatar load failures / transparency be greatly reduced / go away.
  • This work will also help towards the proper prioritisation / re-prioritisation of texture loading within Mobile, making more efficient use of memory.
  • The plan here is that as memory use is improved, then it will be possible to start looking towards PBR materials support within Mobile (PBR requiring 2x or 4x the memory compared to textures).
  • Adam also noted that there have been a “couple of tweaks to the defaults” on texture handling, but these have yet to surface in any version of SL Mobile.

Beanie Linden’s Tips’n’Tricks

[Video: 27:14-34:03]

  • View account  / L$ balance: Menu → tap the down arrow alongside account name to open the Account draw. Can be used to verify payments made via SL Mobile have gone through.
  • Reporting a bug: Menu → Help → Feedback. Can also be used to give general feedback / suggestions.
    • If you encounter issues while logging-in via Mobile, tap the gear icon at the top right of the screen, and this will open the Feedback form.
  • Abuse Reports: can be accessed several ways:
    • Log-press on the avatar responsible for the abuse display the context menu → Report Abuse.
    • In Chat (nearby / IM) locate the three dots alongside the avatar’s name to access the context menu
    •  → Report Abuse.
    • People list: tap on the avatar name to open Profile → tap the … More option → Report Abuse.
  • Togging audio stream on/ off: tap the menu → tap the location displayed at the foot of the screen to open the Location Tray → tap the audio icon to toggle audio stream. Use the volume slider to increase / reduce audio stream volume.

In Brief

Please refer to the video for details on the following.

  • [Video: 23:23-24:20] Culling distances: currently the app has a set of “fairly pessimistic” set of default culling distances.
    • This will be changing in future updates to respond according to hardware (e.g. those with new mobile devices with better capabilities / more memory will show more content before culling commences; with culling on devices with lower specifications also better optimised for memory use).
    • These changes will also allow for the loading / unloading of avatars as they move out of / into range.
  • [Video 34:45-49:48] A run through of some of the top bugs / features, including:
    • HUDS:
      • HUDs are difficult to render in a meaningful way because of the form factor involved with size of the screen on mobile devices, coupled with the fact that HUDs can function in multiple ways(expanding / collapsing, paging etc), all of which requires careful consideration in order to be implemented/
      • As such, the work is liable to b split, with an initial focus on addressing HUDs, etc. that call for llDialog menus / responses, as these seem to be the easier option to implement, and then build towards more complex HUD support over time.
    • Inventory:
      • Regarded as a very large project that needs to be broken down into areas of functionality that can be implemented and built upon.
      • Current thinking is to enable the ability to buy items from the Marketplace and receive them in inventory using SL Mobile, and then interact with them.
      • This would require an initial view of inventory and a number of functions to allow the required interactions with items visible in that view (e.g. potentially the ability to add / remove items to / from your avatar; view sub-folders, etc.).
      • Use this as a bassline to build-out inventory functionality.
  • A further note, following from those at the January meeting, that work is continuing to improve avatar rendering and to try to chase down those issues where avatars do not render correctly.

Date of Next Meeting

2025 week #9: SL SUG meeting

Posted on by Inara Pey
Malice in Wonderland, January 2025 blog post

The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, February 25th, 2025 Simulator User Group (SUG) meeting. They form a summary of the items discussed, and are not intended to be a full transcript, and were taken from Pantera’s video of the meeting, which is embedded at the end – my thanks to her for providing 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.
  • These meetings are conducted (as a rule):
  • Meetings 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.

Simulator Deployments

  • On Tuesday, February 25th, 2025, the SLS Main channel was restarted without anu deployment.
  • On Wednesday, February 26th, 2025, the Carrot Cake update should be deployed to the rest of the RC channels (having already been deployed to BlueSteel). This includes:
    • Monty Linden’s work on EventQueueGet (a simulator Capability that delivers messages from a simulator to viewers over HTTP using a long-poll scheme. It is core functionality without which viewer/simulator coordination is impossible).
    • Simulator support for the  increase to viewer Profile Picks (from 10 to 20) announced as a part of the Membership Mania promotions.

Future Deployments

  • The next simulator update is to be called Durian Scones. The size and content of this update is still TBA. However, Monty Linden indicated it will carry updated SSL certificates – he will be publishing details here.
    • These will be Digicert-signed, not Linden-signed.
    • Protocols should mostly be compatible. But looking to a future with old stuff being deprecated.
    • The new certificates should fix the longstanding issue of llRequestSecureURL being untrusted.

SL Viewer Updates

  • Default viewer: version 7.1.11.12363455226, formerly the ExtraFPS RC (multiple performance fixes, aesthetic improvements and UI optimisations), dated December 17, promoted December 20 – No Change.
  • Release Candidate: Forever FPS, version 7.1.12.12999043440, February 4, 2025 – No Change.

In Brief

Please refer to the video below for the following:

  • Leviathan Linden is working on the issue of objects not rendering on logging-in. He describes his work as not yet having found a cause, but working on a new theory. This led to a discussion on whether the issue is within the viewer (e.g. caching errors, issues with objection occlusion calculations) or a simulator-side issue (e.g. Interest List transmission problems). This discussion is woven through most of the meeting.
  • A discussion on improving the calculations used to determine the LI of Animesh objects, which also touched on the LI calculation formula being revisited as a whole “at some point”.
  • Combined with the above was a discussion on optimising LOD / incentivising better LOD generation on the part of creators.
  • A general discussion on gravity and changing it, revolving around this suggestion.  As Rider Linden noted, fiddling with SL’s gravity is both difficult and can have unforeseen outcomes.
  • A general discussion on when Lua(u) will be surfacing (Rider Linden: “VERY VERY VERY VERY soon!”), with a reiteration that LSO is not going to be deprecated; however Mono will eventually be removed, with LSL compiling to Lua. This included a discussion on preserving data stored in script memory in transitioning away from Mono to Lua when it comes to in-world scripts that are running.

† 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.