There was no deployment to the Main (SLS) channel on Tuesday, May 10th.
At the time of writing, the planned deployment of a new server maintenance package to the RC channels planned for Wednesday, May 11th, was under question as a result of an outage of Aditi, the Beta grid, throwing out the testing schedule for the updates. Should it go ahead, this deployment is described as “Minor internal improvements. No visible functional changes to Second Life.”
SL Viewer
The Quick Graphics viewer is still awaiting update, which should occur once it has been merged with the current release viewer (formerly the Maintenance RC viewer). This leaves the SL viewer list unchanged from the end of last week:
Current Release version: 4.0.4.314579 (dated April 28), promoted May 5th – formerly the Maintenance RC viewer
RC viewers:
Quick Graphics RC viewer, version 4.0.4.314426, dated April 26th
Project Veiwers:
Project Bento (avatar skeleton extensions) viewer, version 5.0.0.314884 dated May 5th – this build contains several updates related to joint offsets and meshes and slider changes
The following notes are primarily taken from the TPV Developer (TPVD) meeting held on Friday, May 6th, 2016. A video of the meeting is embedded at the end of this report, my thanks as always to North for supplying it, and time stamps in the text relate to this recording.
Week #18 Server Deployments – Recap
On Tuesday, May 3rd, the Main (SLS) channel received the same server maintenance package originally deployed to the three RC channels in week #17, comprising a crash fix and minor internal improvements. There was no RC deployment during the week.
Week #19 Attachment Inventory Limits
There will be a new RC deployment in week #19 (commencing Monday, May 9th). This will include new limits, I believe, on the total number of assets which can be contained on worn attachments. The exact limits aren’t clear to me. However, in-world objects cannot be rezzed if they contain more that 10K inventory individually, or 30K in the case of linksets, so I suspect similar limits will apply to attachments, and any attempt to attach objects that exceed these limits will fail. More on this next week.
SL Viewer Updates
Release Viewer
[03:40] The Maintenance RC viewer, version 4.0.4.314579, released on April 28th, was promoted to the de facto release viewer on Thursday, May 5th.
Quick Graphics Viewer
[03:50] The Quick Graphics RC viewer (currently version 4.0.4.314426, dated April 26th) is now “perilously close” to being promoted to release status, and apparently only needs to be merged with and tested against the new release viewer code.
[04:55] The next update to this viewer will refer to rainbow avatars as “Jelly Dolls”, in keeping with the new popular term for solid-colour avatars, which has been “adopted with enthusiasm” by the Lab.
[05:20] There is also a new control added to the viewer screen for making quick adjustments to the Max Avatar Complexity setting.
Project Bento
The Project Bento viewer updated to version 5.0.0.314884, also on Thursday, May 5th.
This build contains several updates related to joint offsets and meshes:
Joint offsets will be ignored if they define a position identical to the default position for that bone. We use a 0.1 mm tolerance to determine whether a position has changed, so to force the offset to be applied you can make an invisibly small tweak to the bone in your modeling tool.
Along with this, we provide some log message feedback during upload to show which joints will have active offsets.
Meshes can now have multiple skeleton roots – for example, you could have a model rigged to both hands without including any bone that both hands are descendants of.
Joint offsets are now enforced during shape editing.
Slider changes:
We include a fix for a long-standing bug with female torso muscles
The male “package” slider can now be supported in mesh models by weighting to mGroin. (note that the currently available test models do not have this weighting yet).
[04:15] The Lab believes the project is now stable enough to be “close to” moving to the Main grid.
Oculus Rift Viewer
[04:26] The Lab is continuing to work on the Oculus Rift viewer. The next release, which will remain at project status, is expected “real soon now”, but will support the latest Oculus VR SDK, etc.
64-bit Viewer Project
[07:13] The 64-bit viewer project has been temporarily suspended recently while the developers working on it were assigned to other tasks, including the ongoing QuickTime remediation project.
Upcoming Viewers
In September 2015, I wrote about the Lab’s plans for further improvements to inventory management and handling within the viewer. Part of this work involves the removal of older UDP paths / mechanisms for inventory handling are properly deprecated / removed and replaced by newer and more robust mechanisms, and that all older mechanisms which have already been replaced are properly removed.
[05:45] This work had been on hold pending the recent HTTP work. It is now expected that an RC viewer containing these updates will be appearing shortly. Once these updates have reached release status and been fully validate through their active use, the associated UDP support for the deprecated paths and mechanisms will be removed server-side.
Aditi and Agni Inventory Caches
As I’ve previously reported, the new Aditi inventory syncing process created local inventory caching issues (see also BUG-11651). A fix for this was proposed by the Lab, which would allow the viewer to create separate inventory caches for Agni and Aditi, with the correct cache being automatically selected depending on which grid a user logs-in to (see here for more).
This update was incorporated into the Maintenance RC, and so is now a part of the de facto release viewer, and so should also be appearing in TPVs as they adopt the 4.0.4 code base from the Lab.
The current release viewer, version 4.0.4.314579 including the new Aditi / Agni local inventory caching capability to prevent local inventory caches being incorrectly merged when logging between the main and beta grids
Other Items
Double Posts in Chat
There have been reports of users experiencing double posts of their own text chat (local or IM) appearing in their viewer (although other people only see their comment displayed once. The Lab has requested that the problem be tested using the their own viewer, and a JIRA raised stating the precise circumstances when the issues occurred, as soon as possible after it has occurred, together with all relevant data – logs, viewer About information, etc., and further occurrences are similarly logged against that JIRA.
TLS 1.2
As per a blog post from the Lab, which I also reported here, users are being advised to update (if necessary) their web browser and their SL viewer to a version that supports TLS 1.2 by June 15th, 2016. After that date, any web browser or viewer that does not should TLS 1.2 will no longer be able to access Second Life cashier services to send, receive, or exchange L$.
On Tuesday, May 3rd, the Main (SLS) channel received the same server maintenance package originally deployed to the three RC channels in week #17, comprising a crash fix and minor internal improvements.
There will be no deployment to the RC channels on Wednesday, May 4th, and no scheduled restart of simulators on that channel.
SL Viewer Updates
The two release candidate viewers currently in the release channel were updated at the end of week #17:
The current Maintenance release candidate updated to version 4.0.4.314579, dated April 28th
The Quick Graphics release candidate updated to version 4.0.4.314426, dated April 26th.
This means there has been no promotion of an RC to de facto release status, while the project viewers have not been updated, leaving the complete list of remaining official viewers as follows:
Current Release version: 4.0.3.312816, dated March 23rd and promoted on April 1st, formerly the HTTP / Vixox RC viewer
Project viewers:
Project Bento (avatar skeleton extensions), version 5.0.0.313876, dated April 15th
Oculus Rift project viewer, version 3.7.18.295296, dated October 13, 2014
Obsolete platform viewer version 3.7.28.300847 dated May 8, 2015 – provided for users on Windows XP and OS X versions below 10.7.
Avatar Complexity
There are still some issues yet to be resolved with Avatar Complexity which is why this viewer is currently not progressing towards a release status at present. One of these is avatars which should render as solid colours (or “Jelly Dolls” as the popular term for them is now) or imposters are invisible.
This has been a long-standing issue (see BUG-10330), which has proven hard to reliably reproduce, and has had a number of theories attached to it. Recent testing has suggested one of the causes is a possible conflict between the viewer trying to render avatars as Jelly Dolls whilst trying also to account for any alpha mask applied to the avatar with all the layer check boxes ticked. This is possibly because ticking the alpha mask check boxes result in a “special” UUID being applied. Currently, the precise cause of the issue has yet to reach a consensus opinion, and investigations and tests continue.
The following notes and audio were taken from the weekly Bento User Group meeting, held on Thursday, April 28th at 13:00 SLT on Aditi. For details on each meeting and the location, please refer to the Bento User Group wiki page.
Note that this update is not intended to offer a full transcript of the meeting, nor does it present the discussion points in chronological order. Rather, it represents the core points of discussion to Project Bento, grouped together by subject matter were relevant / possible.
Issue Fixes
Partial Joint Offsets
As noted in my last update, one issue facing Bento is in how best to handle defining partial joint offsets – a mesh that specifies the override positions for some of the joints but leaves other joints alone, which would allow different meshes to be mixed and matched to create an avatar look. Currently, the viewer doesn’t handle multiple root bones in a mesh with partial rigging correctly, and to help correct this, Vir Linden has published a proposal for moving forward. Essentially, this would filter out any joints which have a position unchanged from their expected default, even if the mesh claims to use an offset, with only a very small adjustment (0.1mm or greater) is required to have a joint treated as having its own offset.
Offset and Slider Conflicts
Another issue which has been discussed recently is that joints offsets (notably translation offsets) can conflict with adjustments made using the appearance sliders, resulting in adjustments made using the sliders “snapping back” to their original location on leaving edit shape or following a relog or after removing / rewearing the avatar mesh.
An adjustment has now been made so that where an offset has been set for a joint, adjustments made using the sliders which only affect the offset will be ignored, only changes to the scale of a joint (length, height) made using the sliders will work. It is thought that this fix will also address the likes of BUG-11854.
Work in progress: Aki Shichiroji demonstrates a wearable wyvern utilising Bento bones for animation.
It has also been noted that BUG-10991, “[Bento] Mesh rigged to the new joints either partly disappears, collapses or melts when viewing that avatar as an imposter” has not been fixed with the latest version of the project viewer. It will hopefully be one of the issues addressed with the next update.
Next Viewer Update
The above fixes, coupled with other work which has been carried out are regarded as being sufficient to kick-off another update to the project viewer, although there is a further piece of work Vir hopes to include. If all goes according to plan, this should see a new version of the Bento project viewer appearing in week #18 (week commencing Monday, May 2nd).
Animation File Size Limit
Currently, there is a file size limit of 120 Kb on animation files enforced by the back-end servers. With the increased number of bone available for animation. As it is now possible to animate a far large number of joints, some creators have started to find this limit a problem, and a request has been put in for it to be increased (see BUG-11836).
While there is potential for this to be done, it is currently unclear how much the file size limit should be increased. There are also other considerations to take into account, such as the intention for animation assets to be moved to the CDN for better delivery.
If there are specific examples of animation with large file sizes which could be attached to the JIRA as examples, they would be welcomed by the Lab. It has also been suggested that the Lab establish a best practices guide for animations files on the wiki.
This lead to a brief discussion on interpolation and the differences between .BVH and .ANIM animations, with Vir providing background information on how each are respectively handled.
Sliders for Remaining Bento Bones
While many Bento bones – notably those of the face / head – have been tied-into the existing appearance sliders, there are still those which do not have slider support because they would require the development of dedicated sliders. this has been considered outside the scope of the initial Bento work, and it is far from certain it will be taken up in the near-term future, if at all.
Part of this comes down to the added complexity further sliders would thrust into the viewer UI, and also – as Vir explains – because the use of many of the Bento bones is intended to be arbitrary, therefore providing sliders to adjust them may not suit all of the uses to which they might be put, and cause further confusion / unpredictable results when used.
There was no Main (SLS) channel deployment on Tuesday, April 26th.
One Wednesday, April 27th, all three RC channels should receive the same server maintenance package, comprising a server crash fix and some minor internal improvements
Oculus Rift project viewer, version 3.7.18.295296, dated October 13th, 2015 – Oculus Rift DK2 support (download and release notes)
Obsolete platform viewer, version 3.7.28.300847, dated May 8th, 2015 – provided for users on Windows XP and OS X versions below 10.7 (download and release notes).
The following notes are primarily taken from the TPV Developer (TPVD) meeting held on Friday, April 22nd, 2016. A video of the meeting is embedded at the end of this report, my thanks as always to North for supplying it, and time stamps in the text relate to this recording.
Server Deployments – Recap
There are no scheduled deployments for week #16. The next deployment should be to the RC channels in week #17 (week commencing Monday, April 25th). This is liable to include at least one fix to help prevent simulator crashes.
SL Viewer
[0:40] There have been no further updates since my part #1 report.
The Maintenance RC viewer is progressing well, with no backwards compatibility issues
The Quick Graphics viewer now has “almost all” of the pending changes made to it. with Oz noting:
There is still a shiny rendering issues with muted avatars which has yet to be resolved
The account properties for materials have yet to be added. Testing for this in terms of the cost multiplier, etc., is in progress
However, the viewer could ship with these “as is” and then have them incorporated later
A further RC build is in progress and is expected to be made available in week #17
The favoured unofficial term for muted avatars at the Lab at the moment is “rainbow people”
It is hoped that this viewer will go to release status in “significantly less” than a month
A further update to the Bento project viewer is anticipated ahead of the project moving to the main grid, after which the viewer will progress through project to release candidate to de facto release over time
Work continues to try to resolve or improve some pre-existing issues with animation handling, etc., all of which may or may not be completed as a part of the Bento project
There is no definitive time frame as to when the project will move to the main grid, although the aim remains for this to occur in Q2 2016
See my weekly Bento updates for more information
The Oculus Rift viewer is reaching a point where it “almost” works
It now works with the latest SDK
Very precise graphics settings are required, and it is likely that it will be updated and issued with a notice it will only work decently with these graphics settings
There are still some UI issues to be dealt with
The Lab will be watching usage stats for this viewer closely once available
[14:22] 64-bit viewers: The Lab has been testing 32-bit builds against their updated libraries, which are now in a position to support 64-bit builds
[15:22] A contributed fix for issues around modifier keys on the Mac viewer has passed LL’s QA, and should be in the next Maintenance RC viewer to be released
Apple QuickTime
[10:52] As I recently noted, Apple have deprecated support for QuickTime on Windows, leaving some critical vulnerabilities unpatched, leading to advisories that windows users uninstall the package from their systems.
As the QuickTime SDK has tended to be a part of the viewer build process, there has been an ongoing discussion within the opensource-dev mailing list as to how to replace it. Currently, the Lab is testing what happens if the QuickTime plug-ins are completely removed from the viewer, and trying to handle media which used to be handled by the plug-ins directly by CEF. However, it is unlikely that a version of the viewer without QuickTime will be appearing in the immediate future.
Teleport Web Widget
[13:25] As noted in my last TPD update, there is a new web widget to handle SLurls and map URLs into Second Life from the web. The should be making an appearance soon via the wiki, and in things like the Destination Guide. There will hopefully be a blog post outlining the widget and how to use it appearing as well in due course.
The SL Viewer and RLV
[27:22] The RLV (restrained love viewer) extensions for the viewer have a mixed reputation. Initially conceived to help make certain adult activities more life-like, they have also been shown to have a range of much broader applications (e.g. enabling “portal” like teleporting of avatars, controlling camera movement, etc).
Some of these types of capabilities have been mirrored through the introduction of Experiences. While the Lab has no intention of adopting RLV or RLV/a “as is” or in a manner that’s compatible with the existing RLV API, they are considering possibly folding some more RLV-style functionality into the Experience set of capabilities as a longer-term project.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 