Category: SL User Group Meetings

2024 week #42: SL CCUG summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
Mad Hatter’s Tea Room, September 2024 – blog post †

The following notes were taken from my audio recording and chat log transcript of the Content Creation User Group (CCUG) meeting held on Thursday, October 17th, 2024. There was no livestream or video for this meeting

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. This meeting is held on alternate Thursdays at Hippotropolis.
  • Meeting dates and times are recorded in the SL Public Calendar, and they re conducted in a mix of Voice and text chat.
  • The notes herein are a summary of topics discussed and are not intended to be a full transcript of the meeting.

Official Viewers Update

  • Release viewer: version 7.1.10.10800445603, formerly the DeltaFPS RC (multiple performance fixes, etc), dated September 11th, promoted September 17th.
  • Release Candidate: ExtraFPS RC, version 7.1.11.11074622243, September 30.
    • Performance improvements: enhanced texture memory tracking, broader hardware compatibility and higher FPS gain.
    • Aesthetics improvements: new Antialiasing setting – SMAA; Contrast Adaptive Sharpening; Khronos Neutral Tone Mapping (can be changed to ACES via the RenderTonemapType Debug setting).

Near-Term Viewer Release Roadmap

  • ExtraFPS work remains focused on bug fixes.
  • The first maintenance RC to follow ExtraFPS will be the Maint B viewer, which will include updates put on hold during the focus on performance issues plus additional updates, some of which may be further “post-PBR” performance / aesthetic improvements.
    • Maint B, as noted previously in these summaries, will have updates to help with Linux support / builds.
  • Maintenance C is also being put together, but updates changes have not yet be specified, outside of a desire to keep the changes separate to Maint B in the interests of keeping updates easier to manage.

Avatar LookAt /  Eye Tracking in the Viewer

  • A conversation relating to avatar eye movement / use of Look At cross hairs (& the resultant drama it can cause (“Stop perving me!”), and whether because of the latter, the capability should be removed completely from the viewer.
    • The core problem is, even though the option for a user to see their own LookAts in the Official viewer is disabled by default, the data (cross hairs and avatar name) is broadcast to surrounding viewers, resulting in unwarranted drama (“Stop perving me!” or “You’re on the wrong viewer!”).
    • Various viewers handle this situation in different ways; some follow the SL viewer, other’s provide means to see the LookAt crosshairs from others whilst supressing their own LookAt data (e.g. so I can see your LookAt crosshairs (if not supressed), but you cannot see mine – possibly leading to more drama).
    • Given this, LL sought the best way to reduce the level of upset: remove the LookAt broadcast altogether, or limit it / make it subject to having be physically turned on through a debug. The consensus of replies appeared to be to limit it / disable it behind a setting.
  • This conversation also crossed-over into avatar head movement tracking the movements of the mouse (e.g. you move the mouse up to the menu bar and your avatars head tracks upwards, then you move to a toolbar to the side or bottom of the window, and your avatar’s head again tracks).
    • This is perhaps more immersion-breaking that Look Ats (drama on the latter notwithstanding) and as  some TPVs allowing such head movement to be disabled, there was a consensus that this should be disabled / removed from the viewer.

Graphics Team Work

PBR Terrain Transforms and PBR Terrain Painting

  • PBR terrain transforms: As per my week #38 update, PBR terrain Texture transforms for applying scale, offset and rotation to any one of the four PBR terrain materials, have been developed for use in the viewer.
    • The capability is a subset of the KHR texture transform.
    • Currently the viewer-side options are setting behind debug flags.
    • The simulator support for this work is currently targeting the Barbeque simulator update, which is due to start deployment after the  WebRTC simulator deployments.
  • PBR Terrain Painting: the work on PBR terrain painting (see my week #31 update for a summary and previous status) has been “shelved” for the foreseeable future.
    • While no specific reason for this was given at the meeting, it seemed implied that this work has been superseded by the need to focus on other work for the time being.

General glTF / Graphics Comments

  • In response to a question about additional  glTF work, Runitai Linden confirmed that user-made shaders will not be supported, but blend shapes and (possibly) animation of texture coordinate transforms from Blender.
  • Displacement maps won’t be supported for the time being as their is no available glTF specification for them.
  • Given the percentage of people not using PBR enabled viewers, LL is considering adding a simulator-side update that can detect a non-PBR viewer, and then take the base colour and Normal layer from the PBR material and move them to the Blinn-Phong parameter, so users on those viewers will at least see some surface detail on PBR objects rather than only seeing then a flat grey surfaces or untextured prims.

In Brief

  • A fair portion of the meeting was taken up with issues pertaining to the New User Experience / Marketplace issues – both of which those Lindens (Engineers) at the meeting were unable to directly address as these areas are outside of their remit.

Next Meeting

† 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 gathering of people every week. They are taken from my list of region visits, with a link to the post for those interested.

2024 SL SUG meetings week #42 summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
La Côte Sauvage, September 2024 – blog post

The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, October 15th, 2024 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 my chat log and 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

Quoting Rider Linden:

Two weeks ago we had a bit of a rough roll, so some of the main grid was left on Summer Fun. Last week the entire engineering team was at an offsite and we decided it was probably not a good idea to do anything while we were all distracted. We believe that we have a fix for the issue and are going to be making a final decision later today about doing an off schedule roll on the SLS regions that are still causing problems. Once we have that out of the way we’ll be able to get back to the regular schedule. I believe that that the next in line is WebRTC, but we need to make sure that enough people have upgraded to an RTC capable client.

SL Viewer Updates

No changes at the start of the week:

  • Release viewer: version 7.1.10.10800445603, (formerly the DeltaFPS RC), dated September 11th, was promoted to de facto release status on September 19th. This includes:
    • Performance boosts. Memory management has been optimized and users will experience a higher FPS across various systems. A comprehensive range of bug fixes are also provided. This includes better PBR material handling and resolving frequent crashes. See the release notes for more.
    • UI for scheduling region restarts now available via a new button located in the Region/Estate floater. (Note: there is currently an issue with scheduled region restarts working correctly and a fix is due to come in the next server release).
  • Release Candidate: ExtraFPS RC, version 7.1.11.11074622243, issued September 30th.
    • Performance improvements: enhanced texture memory tracking, broader hardware compatibility and higher FPS gain.
    • Aesthetics improvements: new Antialiasing setting – SMAA; Contrast Adaptive Sharpening; Khronos Neutral Tone Mapping (can be changed to ACES via the RenderTonemapType Debug setting).

In Brief

Please refer to the video below for the following:

  • Leviathan Linden requested a “top five” (or so) features / options people would like to see added to the official viewer. Responses at the meeting included:
    • RLV  – currently, RLV/a code is being submitted to LL by its author, Kitty Barnett, for inclusion in the Official viewer and (I believe) RLV author Marine Kelley may have also provided information on RLV functionality to LL.
    • Client- side animation override (AO) capability.
    • Object derender.
    • Contact Sets (Firestorm).
    • Autrespond outside of Do Not Disturb mode.
    • Automatically rezzing under land Group.
    • ADD instead of WEAR as the default behaviour for attachments.
    • Adjustable toolbar button sizes.
  • Leviathan also dropped the following question into the meeting:
Suppose SL added a VR mode that allowed for seeing SL content in stereo vision a-la VR goggles. NOT the ability to be in the avatar body and move the limbs with trackers but just the ability to view SL content as a fly-cam in VR mode… would that be useful to anyone? Would anyone here use it? What would you use it for?
    • Responses were broadly positive, if the capability could be tired to the likes of using a vehicle in world.
    • Concerns were raised over the viewer’s ability to maintain a smooth, high enough frame rate consistently through a VR session.
    • The above does nor mean LL is about to implement and kind of VR / partial VR element within the viewer; Leviathan made it clear he was just looking at feed back in relation to the general idea of a partial VR experience with SL.
  • A further discussion on the issue of attachments failing (being dropped / lost / ghosted issues (see: Attachment loss on RC channel 2024-08-29.10619830788) which can be experienced during region crossing (TP or physical) & the fact the LL are working on a fix.  is being
  • A discussion on making Media on Prim (MOAP) safer, and which threaded throughout much of the meeting.
  • The above drifted into discussions general media handling and also on rendering, colour maps, support for look-up tables for rendering / colour grading in the viewer (e.g. to give post-processed effects).
  • A further discussion on editing tools, scripting options, etc.

 

† 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.

2024 week #40: SL CCUG summary: tone mapping

Posted on by Inara Pey
Poesy Wildes, August 2024 – blog post †
The following notes were taken from my audio recording and chat log transcript of the Content Creation User Group (CCUG) meeting held on Thursday,  September 5th, 2024.

Tis meeting was also livesteamed on You Tube by the Lab. The video is embedded at the end of this summary, my thanks to the Lab for providing it.

Table of Contents

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. This meeting is held on alternate Thursdays at Hippotropolis.
  • Meeting dates and times are recorded in the SL Public Calendar, and they re conducted in a mix of Voice and text chat.
  • The notes herein are a summary of topics discussed and are not intended to be a full transcript of the meeting.

Official Viewers Update

[Video: 1:18-2:30]

  • Release viewer: version 7.1.10.10800445603, formerly the DeltaFPS RC (multiple performance fixes, etc), dated September 11th, promoted September 17th.
  • Release Candidate: ExtraFPS RC, version 7.1.11.11074622243, September 30.
    • Performance improvements: enhanced texture memory tracking, broader hardware compatibility and higher FPS gain.
    • Aesthetics improvements: new Antialiasing setting – SMAA; Contrast Adaptive Sharpening; Khronos Neutral Tone Mapping (can be changed to ACES via the RenderTonemapType Debug setting).

Near-Term Viewer Release Roadmap

  • ExtraFPS work is focuses on bug fixes with the aim to get it promoted to default viewer status ASAP.
  • The first maintenance RC to follow ExtraFPS will be the Maint B viewer, which will include updates put on hold during the focus on performance issues plus additional updates, some of which may be further “post-PBR” performance / aesthetic improvements.

WebRTC Status

[Video 2:34-3:41]

Summary

  • A new project intended to move Second Life away from reliance on the Vivox voice service and plug-in, and to using the WebRTC communications protocol (RTC=”real-time communication”). Roxie Linden is leading this work.
  • Key benefits:
    • WebRTC supports a wide range of real-time communications tools in common use (e.g. Google Meet), supporting audio, video and data communications, and is thus something of a “standard” approach.
    • Offers a good range of features: automatic echo cancellation, better noise cancellation and automatic gain control, much improved audio sampling rates for improved audio quality.
    • Opens the door to features and capabilities to voice services which could not be implemented whilst using Vivox.

Status

  • Still awaiting wider simulator RC deployment. Per recent SUG / TPVD meetings, this now looks set to commence on October 16th, although the date may still change.
  • In the meantime, WebRTC support is available on the following regions Pop Rock RC, comprising: WebRTC Voice 1, WebRTC Voice 2, WebRTC Voice 3 and WebRTC Voice 4.
  • LL is already looking ahead to further work with WebRTC once it has been deployed, in terms of “Voice and media”. More to follow on this in the future.

Graphics Team Work

Linear Alpha Blending

[Video: 4:08-6:06]

  • Again, as per the previous CCUG meeting, in order for PBR lighting to render anywhere close to correctly, alpha blending had to be switched from SRGB to linear colour space. This can cause some older content using Blinn-Phong, to look either more opaque or more transparent than in did pre-PBR.
  • For those with access to the Content Creation Discord channel, this work is now available in a pre-release viewer there.
      • Note: due to a request from Derrick Linden, I am unable to post information on how to access the Content Creation Discord channel. Requests to do so should be made to Vir or Derrick Linden.
  • This work is supported on (the Beta grid) – again, refer to the Discord channel for details on this.
  • Those using the Discord build are asked to provide feedback (with screen shots as appropriate).

Tone Mapping

[Video: 8:00-12:18 and 24:31-End]

  • Originally slated as being a part of the viewer to follow ExtraFPS, the Khronos Neutral tone mapper (another code contribution by Rye Cogtail), which should improve overall ambient lighting in SL, making things somewhat brighter and more vibrant.
    • Options for this are available within the ExtraFPS viewer as debug settings:
      • RenderToneMapType – set the desired tone mapper (either Khronos Neutral (new default) or ACES .
      • RenderToneMapMix – mix between linear and tone-mapped colours.
    • If this approach is continued, these options will likely become UI elements within the Sky settings, allowing the desired Tone Mapper  / mixing be set at parcel level for the viewer, together with Advanced Graphics options for determining which should be the general default.
    • Results to these have thus far been mixed, so more feedback is being sought – which is felt to be better (ACES or Khronos Neutral (or even something else, etc).
  • Some concerns have been voiced by creators over the idea that tone mapping can be user-configurable (“how can I make sure the tone mapping on my item is correct, if the user can change tone mapping in their viewer?”).
    • Allowing tone-mapping offers the ability for people to view Second Life as they prefer / set their regions / parcels to be viewer under specific lighting conditions; ergo offering tone mapping options via the EEP Sky settings as has been suggested above was seen by most at the meeting as a good thing.
    • Some questioned how consistency of appearance can be maintained (per the question above)  if they cannot be certain on the adjustments users make to their viewers.
    • One suggestion was for LL to designate one as the default that creators should be testing and creating against, and if the parcel is different, then it is up to the parcel owner to deal with.
    • Overall, keeping with Khronos  / glTF would be preferred,
  • Further help in setting the brightest / contrast for for scenes can also be offered through exposure control and the colour gradient, with Geenz working on these as well.
  • The above grew into an extended technical discussion through to the end of the meeting, please refer to the video.

In Brief (Q&A)

  • [Video: 12:23-13:30] A brief discussion on glTF punctual lights (coming with glTF scene import), which might also offer the opportunity to offer more lights on alpha (rather than just the 6 closest, as it currently the case).
  • [Video: 15:00-16:50] more Bakes on Mesh channels (e.g. individual left / right eye channels to allow for individual eye colours er eye:
    • Nothing currently planned beyond the existing Aux channels.
    • LL has had internal discussions on a “simplified editor for decorating houses, etc.”, and feedback has been requested as to what kind when / if the concept of layer channels is re-visited, it might be from the perspective of replacing them with something more accessible – but this is not something currently being investigated.
    • In terms of channels for individual eye colours (or similar), a feature request was requested.

Next Meeting

† 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 gathering of people every week. They are taken from my list of region visits, with a link to the post for those interested.

October 2024 SL Web User Group summary

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 October 2nd, 2024. They 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 – my thanks as always to Pantera for recording it and making it available.

Note: This meeting was entirely text-based.

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), the forums.
  • As a rule, these meetings are conducted:
    • On the first Wednesday of the month and 14:00 SLT.
    • In both Voice and / or 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.

General Update

Data Feeds

[Video: 1:38-2:36]

  • Updates to the Lab’s internal data warehousing infrastructure resulted in some breakages to the data feeds API providing metrics (number of users logged-in, etc), for use by external services and the count of users in regions listed in the Destination Guide.
  • These breakages should now all be now be fixed.

Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)

[Video: 2:42-3:21]

  • MFA is being extended across all of the Lab’s web properties, so those opting-in to MFA will find at times that they may have to re-authenticate when accessing a wider range of Second Life web properties.
  • This work is expected to surface during the October-December 2024.
  • Hopefully, a blog post will be provided as this role-out goes ahead.

Marketplace and Web Properties Updates

[Video: 3:23-5:30]

  • The Marketplace has been undergoing a facelift with its layout, together with other web properties.
  • With the MP, the changes have been intended to make in more Mobile-friendly and making it more responsive, particularly with mobile.
  • The deployment on the MP to Mobile had been referenced in the July 2024 WUG meeting, and it is hoped MP for mobile will be “totally shipped” by the end of October 2024.
Some of Marketplace page layout updates: 1 – Buy L$ & current balance display enlarged; 2- new user-related menu dropdown providing access to list and other options; 3 – (partially hidden) updates purchase option buttons; 4 – new scroll bars for viewing additional item images. Note: selected listing for illustrative purposes only
  • More is to be done with this, and once things are moved further along, it is likely their will be a more formal announcement on changes made and why.
  • [Video: 6:33-6:56] The overall aim of the changes across all web properties is to make them all consistent in terms of look and general functionality (e.g. colours, were to find links, etc., in the header / footer areas, etc.
  • There was assorted feedback provided for the MP page layout (e.g. the image sliders, the use of orange, the layout of the a user drop-down menu and use of sub-menus to display options, together with concerns over colour choices and readability for those with visual impairments.

  General Discission

  • [Video: 5:33-5:59] Marketplace Variants:
    • Variants (at one time “Styles” – e.g. having multiple colour options for an item in a single listing) was again raised.
    • Despite being something stated as being in the works by Reed Linden (since departed from LL) as long a two years ago, and being reported as close to being available for release a year ago, it is once again something the Lab “want to do”.
    • Apparently, there designs for the idea, but “it’s definitely not happening this calendar year” (no surprises there), but is is noted as something “people want”.
  • [Video: 9:54-10:30] Dark Mode UI:
    • “Most” web properties will move towards offering a dark mode UI, “but its going to be a while” before this reaches the Marketplace.
The Linden Homes web portal offers an example of the dark mode UI the Lab is moving towards
  • [Video: 10:49-12:35]  Further Web Property Updates / Refreshes
    • As a part of the web properties refresh, both the Second Life dashboard (secondlife.com) and the associated Account pages below it will be received some TLC.
    • The Log-in and download pages for the viewer will also be receiving a more responsive, dark mode update.
    • This work is apparently targeting Q4 of 2024.
  • [Video: 12:43-19:03] New user sign-up discussion – and extensive discussion on user sign-up page, including:
    • Lack of explanation around the choice of user name and its potential impact (e.g. being display in the avatar’s name tag, etc.). Which has in turn led to people using their physical world names or gibberish name in the believe that this information will not be shown and they’ll have the ability to create an alias / persona once in-world (as done with many MMOs).
    • Lack of any password confirmation field to account for mis-types when entering a password.
    • It was noted that some joining the Lab have the same issue vis: user name.
  • [Video: 19:33-23:18] Marketplace Categories a discussion on potential new categories and overhauling the Categories listing. Please refer to the video.
  • [Video: 23:56-37:35 and 42:38-44-35] Discussion on flagging items on the MP and on the stars + reviews:
    • Categories for flagging.
    • Ability to flag reviews that have been responded to as responded to / resolved.
    • Providing a guide for star rating (e.g. 1 = bad; 3 = perfectly OK; 5 = absolutely outstanding).
    • Providing review incentives / reminders.
    • Suggestions on (God help us) “Marketplace Influencers” based on the reviews they give.
    • Allowing reviews on the MP for items purchased in-world but available on the MP (which is under discussion at LL using CasperVend).
    • Refer to the video for more.
  • [Video: 44:39-49:29] L$1 demo discussion – please refer to the video.
  • [Video: 49:40-50:48] Marketplace API:
    • This has been requested a number of time.
    • LL is engaged in some design work around the idea.
    • However, due to the complexity of the Marketplace and its development history, it is not an easy task to tackle. There are also some “non-Marketplace technical hurdles” to cross as well.
  • Please refer to the end of the video for the rounding-out of the above discussions of listing, demos, and categories.

Next Meeting(s)

  • Wednesday, November 6th, 2024.

2024 SL SUG meetings week #40 summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
*80 Days*: Copper Canyon, August 2024 – blog post

The following notes were taken from the Tuesday, October 1st, 2024 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 my chat log and 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, October 1st, the SLS Main channel saw the deployment of the Picnic /Doubtfire update, making it grid-wide.
    • There were apparently some issues with the deployment, resulting in it taking longer than anticipated, due to a need to fix them on the fly.
  • Wednesday, October 2nd should see all RC channels restarted without any deployment.

WebRTC Simulator Deployment Status

    • As a result of an Engineering team summit in week #41 (commencing Monday, October 8th), it now appears the deployment of the WebRTC updates to some of the main RC channels will now not take place until Wednesday October 16th.
    • In the meantime, WebRTC can still be tested on the four WebRTC regions (WebRTC1 through 4) on the Pop Rock channel, and on the Preflight test RC channel.

SL Viewer Updates

No changes at the start of the week:

  • Release viewer: version 7.1.10.10800445603, (formerly the DeltaFPS RC), dated September 11th, was promoted to de facto release status on September 19th. This includes:
    • Performance boosts. Memory management has been optimized and users will experience a higher FPS across various systems. A comprehensive range of bug fixes are also provided. This includes better PBR material handling and resolving frequent crashes. See the release notes for more.
    • UI for scheduling region restarts now available via a new button located in the Region/Estate floater. (Note: there is currently an issue with scheduled region restarts working correctly and a fix is due to come in the next server release).
  • Release Candidate: ExtraFPS RC, version 7.1.11.11074622243, issued September 30th.
    • Performance improvements: enhanced texture memory tracking, broader hardware compatibility and higher FPS gain.
    • Aesthetics improvements: new Antialiasing setting – SMAA; Contrast Adaptive Sharpening; Khronos Neutral Tone Mapping (can be changed to ACES via the RenderTonemapType Debug setting).

In Brief

Please refer to the video below for the following:

  • Game Control:
    • This work has apparently not been merged into the initial release of ExtraFPS. A bug fix failed to pass QA, causing issues on the Mac flavour of the viewer.
    • It is hoped that this issue can be resolved and the code merges in the near future.
  • Combat 2.1:
    • Rider Linden has published a new proposal specification for “Combat 2.1”,  the next update to the Second Life Combat System (SLCS), this one expanding on teams and respawning.
    • Feedback is being sought on this, with the note that it should be offered sooner rather than later by anyone who may not have seen it, as Rider is hoping to start converting it into actionable items, after which he can then start to implement.
  • A fix for at least some of the attachment dropping / loss / ghosting issues (see: Attachment loss on RC channel 2024-08-29.10619830788) which can be experienced during region crossing (TP or physical) is being deployed and tested.
    • The plan is to deploy it with either the WebRTC simulator updates or the Barbecue maintenance update that will follow, depending on which is the the next to go out (currently WebRTC, as noted above).
    • However, the fix is currently available on Aditi (the Beta grid) for those wishing to test it.
  • Rider Linden is working on llSetAgentRot (turns the avatar to face the direction indicated by rot., with a +/- 3 degree variance), which should be going into the Barbecue simulator update.
    • However, there is a corresponding viewer change it requires in order for the avatar turning to be seen viewer-side, and this update is going into the viewer Develop branch for a future viewer update.
    • This sparked a further discussion which ran into the topic of Child Agents (instances of an avatar which are registered in regions adjacent to the region the avatar is in, allowing the avatar to be “tracked” in case it is actually going to move from the region it is in to the region in which the Child Agent is registered, for example) and the subject of ghosted objects.
  • LDPW have requested a new LSL function – llTransferOwnership – which would allow a scripted change of ownership for an item with Transfer permissions.
    • This sparked an end-of-meeting discussion on how it might work and suitable safeguards.
    • As the function is still in the discussion phase at this point in time, please refer to the video below for further information.

Date of Next Meeting

  • Tuesday, October 15th, 2024, due to the Engineering Team summit meeting.

† 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.

2024 week #39: SL TPVD meeting summary: WebRTC

Posted on by Inara Pey
New Deer Isle, August 2024 – – blog post †

The following notes were taken from my audio recording + the video recording by Pantera (embedded at the end of this summary) of the Third-Party Developer meeting (TPVD) held on Friday, September 27th, 2024. My thanks to Pantera as always for providing it.

Meeting Purpose

  • The TPV Developer meeting provides an opportunity for discussion about the development of, and features for, the Second Life viewer, and for Linden Lab viewer developers and third-party viewer (TPV) / open-source code contributors to discuss general viewer development. This meeting is held once a month on a Friday, at 13:00 SLT at the Hippotropolis Theatre.
  • Dates and times are recorded in the SL Public Calendar, and they re conducted in a mix of Voice and text chat.
  • The notes herein are a summary of topics discussed and are not intended to be a full transcript of the meeting.

Official Viewers Status

[Video: 0:00-2:11]

  • Release viewer: version 7.1.10.10800445603, formerly the DeltaFPS RC (multiple performance fixes, etc), dated September 11th, promoted September 17th.
  • Release Candidate(s):
    • None at present.

Upcoming Viewers

  • The next RC viewer due to appear is the ExtraFPS viewer. There are some bugs still to be resolved before this viewer can see the light of day on the Alternate Viewers page; like DeltaFPS, it is primarily focused on performance improvements.
  • Further performance improvements will be made to the viewer following ExtraFPS, but work will also be transitioning to other viewer work. This next viewer after ExtraFPS will likely be the Maintenance B viewer. Details on it contents are still TBC, but it will hopefully include some of the work being put into getting Linux builds back up and running.
  • After this, maintenance viewer updates will follow in the usual alphabetical patten (C, D, E, etc.), with viewer being given a suitable name in accordance with the current dinosaurs naming convention.

WebRTC

[Video 2:31-7:55]

Summary

  • The replacement of the Vivox Voice service and plug-in, with the WebRTC communications protocol (RTC=”real-time communication”). Roxie Linden is leading this work.
  • Key benefits:
    • WebRTC supports a wide range of real-time communications tools in common use (e.g. Google Meet), supporting audio, video and data communications, and is thus something of a “standard” approach.
    • Offers a good range of features: automatic echo cancellation, better noise cancellation and automatic gain control, much improved audio sampling rates for improved audio quality.
    • Opens the door to features and capabilities to voice services which could not be implemented whilst using Vivox.

Status

  • Under the latest schedule, simulator deployment of WebRTC support is now set to commence during the week commencing Monday, October 7th. This means if all goes well, it could be fully deployed across the grid during the week commencing October 21st.
  • The delay has been to allow LL to make further adjustments to the service.
  • In the meantime, peer-to-peer and ad-hoc WebRTC can be tested on the WebRTC regions of WebRTC Voice 1, WebRTC Voice 2, WebRTC Voice 3 and WebRTC Voice 4. However, there is no bridging between WebRTC peer-to-peer  / ad-hoc and Vivox.
  • During the transitional period when there will be a split between regions running Vivox and region running WebRTC, so:
    • General spatial audio should work through the viewer, regardless as to whether a region is running WebRTC or Vivox.
    • However, peer-to-peer, conference calls and group chat sessions might be subject to various disruptions (e.g. if you attempt to make a peer-to-peer call from a WebRTC region to some on a Vivox region (or vice-versa), the call will not go through; if you commence a call with both parties on a WebRTC region and one subsequently moves to the Vivox region during the chat, the call will be dropped, etc.).
  • [12:42-14:00 and 24:04-27:45 – chat only] It was noted that Voice roll-off on WebRTC regions does not appear to be as effective as with Vivox, with people much further away still being heard.
    • This was apparently an intentional decision, but can be further adjusted.
    • It was noted that perhaps the roll-off for WebRTC should be adjusted, as it was felt the distance over which voice conversations can now be heard could discourage active conversations in Voice regions, due to potential problems of conversations overlapping one another.

Additional Changes

  • There have been issues with the overhead Voice visualiser (the white do that displays “sound waves” when someone is speaking) always being red on viewers with WebRTC, and in muting and unmuting – both of these issues should be fixed in the upcoming ExtraFPS viewer.
  • ExtraFPS also introduces a new Preference option for users to turn off the overhead Voice visualiser in their view if they wish.
    • The switch is located within Preference → Sound & Media.
    • The inference is that the option will likely be OFF by default (i.e. no visualiser shown), as the introduction of the toggle option is to “reduce screen clutter” – although this may be revised, subject to feedback.
    • A further inference is that having the option off will not alter the Voice visualisers in the Conversation / People floaters.

In Brief

Please refer to the video below.

  • [Video:  9:31-10:25] Graphics work:
    • The focus remains on performance fixes.
    • As per my previous TPVD Meeting summary and my week #38 CCUG summary, Geenz Linden is working with Rye Cogtail on the visual improvements  (improved tone mapping, alpha blending, etc.) , with work also continuing on the anti-aliasing improvements.
  • [Video: 10:26-11:39] The above led to a reminder  updates to improve linear alpha blending for objects using Blinn-Phong materials; again, please refer to my week #38 CCUG summary for specifics.
    • This work is being targeted at the Maint B viewer, and are said to be pending some simulator-side work (which itself should be in the Barbecue / BBQ simulator code update that will follow behind the WebRTC deployment.
  • [Video: 16:51-18:33] A question was asked on the state of the pose tool developed by NiranV Dean.
    • This was originally developed for Black Dragon and has been ported to Alchemy. It was also contributed to LL several years ago.
    • It give the ability to pose an avatar (in your local view), such as for photography.
    • The code has never been integrated into the SL viewer, and part of the reason seems to be the old chestnut of “shared experience”.
    • However, LL are interested in developing it, and in receiving code contributions which may help overcome their reservations.
  • [Video 29:14-32:46] There have been a number attachment issues making themselves felt (e.g. attachments vanishing on teleport arrival; attachments adding and then seeming to remove “after a few seconds”, etc.).
    • LL are aware of a number of such issues and are investigating them.
    • The fix for the attachments being lost following a TP will be deployed as a part of the WebRTC simulator update (which, as noted, is now due to start deployment during the week commencing Monday, October 7th).
    • Those encountering attachment issues should check the feedback portal, and if they have a specific issue that does not appear to have been reported, file a report.
  • [Video: 40:03-44:09 with extended chat discussion through to near the end of the meeting] Future viewer work:
    • Brad Linden has been looking at native Apple / ARM support for the viewer, and considered this more of a “next year” project as the number of ARM users increases as opposed to those on Intel-based Apple systems.
    • He also noted that he has been working on some of the 3rd party libraries required to build the viewer to make them more “universal” for use in different OS versions of the viewer. This should ease the viewer build process when working on multiple platforms, and he noted that contributions from TPVs who may have done similar would be welcome.
    • It was reiterated that where Mac systems are concerned, LL is unlikely to implement Metal as n OpenGL replacement, but could look to a middleware layer to implement Metal compatibility for the viewer via Vulkan (or whatever is finally chosen to replace OpenGL for Windows).
    • In terms of performance improvements beyond the current work, the Lab is looking to better profile hardware and then seek targets of opportunity where improvements might be made to general viewer performance.
  • [Video: 50:03-50:28] RLVa contributions from Kitty Barnett: one pull request has been taken and is expected to make its way into the viewer Develop branch soon (if it is not there already), with more to follow.
  • [Video: 50-29-End]  A discussion on have the avatar selection process within the viewer point to the Senra avatars rather than the older “classic” basic avatars to help new users (there is currently a strong disconnect with the on-boarding process which utilises Senra with no real pointers for new users to understand the different avatar selection processes, Senra being entirely inventory-based).

Next Meeting

† 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 gathering of people every week. They are taken from my list of region visits, with a link to the post for those interested.