Category: Viewers

Singularity prepares for SSB/A

Posted on by Inara Pey

singularityThe Singularity team released version 1.8.0.4114 of their v1-style viewer on Sunday April 21st. The chief update with this release is for server-side baking / appearance, which I’ve covered extensively in this blog.

The following is a look at the principal updates in the 1.8.0 release. For information on contribution credits, please refer to the Singularity release notes.

Server-side Baking /Appearance Support

This isn’t actually a visible change to the viewer – but it is an important one.

Server-side Baking / Appearance is a major change within Second Life which is primarily aimed at reducing or eliminating issues of “bake fail” (when the avatar skin & clothing layers fail to render correctly and with remain blurred or show the avatar wearing the “wrong” outfit). This capability is being introduced in two parts: viewer-side support and server-side support, with the former occurring first.

Viewers which do not have the viewer-side support will not work with the Server-side Baking  / Appearance service once the server-side of the capability has been activated on the grid. People using them will increasingly see grey avatars around them. Therefore, it is essential that Singularity users update to Singularity 1.8.0.

Server-side baking and how others see you: (l) if you continue to run Singularity without SSB support when the new service goes live, others will see you as a cloud, (and, other than attachments, you'll see them as grey); (r) when you're running Singularity with SSB support, you'll appear correctly to everyone else - and they will to you.
Server-side baking and how others see you: (l) if you continue to run a viewer without SSB support when the new service goes live, others will see you as a cloud, (and, other than attachments, you’ll see them as grey); (r) when you’re running a viewer with SSB support, you’ll appear correctly to everyone else – and they will to you.

For further information on Server-side Baking / Appearance, see the following blog posts:

Pathfinding Updates

Singularity 1.8.0 gains options to display pathfinding information on linksets and characters. These options are on the Tools menu > Pathfinding sub-menu, or by right-clicking on an object / character and selecting MORE > MORE > PATHFINDING from the pie menu.

Singularity 1.8.0 adds Pathfinding Linkset and Character floater support
Singularity 1.8.0 adds Pathfinding Linkset and Character floater support

For those unfamiliar with working with pathfinding, I have two summary articles:

Note this release of Singularity does not include navmesh support, so as to maintain compatibility with OpenSim.

Mesh Upload

Mesh upload capabilities also reach Singularity with the release of 1.8.0, with the incorporation of the non-Havok based uploader by Nicky Dasmijn.

Mesh uploads with Singularity on Aditi
Mesh uploads with Singularity on Aditi

 

Script Info

Script information can now be displayed for both your own avatar and for your current region in one of two ways:

  • Right-click on the ground and select ABOUT LAND from the pie menu and click on the Script Info button displayed in the General tab of the About Land floater
  • Right click on yourself and select TOOLS > SCRIPT INFO.

Either option will display the Script Info floater, with tabs for region memory information or avatar script information.

Continue reading “Singularity prepares for SSB/A” →

Viewer release summary 2013: week 16

Posted on by Inara Pey

This summary is published every Monday and is a list of SL viewer / client releases (official and TPV) made during the previous week. When reading it, please note:

  • It is based on my Viewer Round-up Page, a list of  all Second Life viewers and clients that are in popular use (and of which I am aware) and which are recognised as adhering to the TPV Policy
  • By its nature, this summary will always be in arrears
  • The Viewer Round-up Page is updated as soon as I’m aware of any releases / changes to viewers & clients, and should be referred to for more up-to-date information as the week progresses
  • The Viewer Round-up Page also includes comprehensive links to download pages, blog notes, release notes, etc., as well as links to any / all reviews of specific viewers / clients made within this blog.  

Updates for the week ending: April 21st, 2013

Discontinued Viewers

  • Phoenix – Development and support officially ended December 31st, 2012
  • Zen – Development and support officially ended January 27th, 2013.

Related Links

Exodus: passing the torch

Posted on by Inara Pey

exodus-4Recent updates to the Exodus viewer have been a little slow in some respects. This is in part hardly surprising – at least one member of the team (Geenz Spad) has been up to his eyeballs in working on the materials processing project. However, other factors – such as real life commitments  – have meant that other members of the team have also been unable to focus on the viewer perhaps as much as they would have liked.

As a result of this, both Clix Diesel and Ayamo Nozaki have decided to step aside from lead roles in the project and pass the torch on to others – with Katharine Berry taking over ownership of the project and the role of lead developer. Clix himself made the announcement in an Exodus blog post on Sunday April 21st, which reads:

Hello everyone!

I know it’s been a while since an update but we have some important news to share with you.

I would like to announce Katharine Berry as the new lead developer and owner of the Exodus viewer project!

Exodus has been a passion of Ayamo and myself for just shy of two years now and we have enjoyed leading the project immensely. Originally we built Exodus as a viewer to compliment various Second Life combat scenarios, Exodus has since catered for a wide variety of user and continues to provide a the best viewer experience we possibly can thanks to the skill and dedication of my team. This will never change. Recently we have not been able to focus on viewer development as much as we would like. Ayamo Nozaki will be leaving as our lead developer and passing the torch to Katharine Berry. Katharine is also the ideal candidate to hand ownership of the project, as Ayamo and I cannot spare the time to do so any longer.

Thank you everyone, from Ayamo and me, it’s been a blast!

Exodus remains one of the three viewers I most frequently use, depending upon what I’m doing in-world, so I look forward to seeing what this hand-over brings; I also wish Clix and Ayamo the best for their future endeavours, in-world and elsewhere.

Related Links

Firestorm video tutorials

Posted on by Inara Pey

firestorm-logoAhead of the upcoming Firestorm release – which will be available Real SoonTM, (sorry, I can’t say when as Jessica would douse me in catnip and set the moggies on me 🙂 ), Jessica has been busy on a new set of video tutorials for users.

Some of the videos are specific to the upcoming release, and one is for those still using Phoenix and who wish to make the switch to Firestorm. This is something which has been covered before in Firestorm tutorials (and something I’ve attempted to cover myself in the past), but as things have moved on somewhat since those days, the new video has been produced.

The Firestorm 4.4.0 video cover features which are both new to the upcoming release, and which are updated in the upcoming release in comparison with earlier releases of the viewer – such as with object de-rendering, as per the video  below.

The current list of updated videos comprises:

All of these are available on the Phoenix Firestorm You Tube channel, and Jessica informs me that more will be added as and when time permits.

Viewer release summary 2013: week 15

Posted on by Inara Pey

This summary is published every Monday and is a list of SL viewer / client releases (official and TPV) made during the previous week. When reading it, please note:

  • It is based on my Viewer Round-up Page, a list of  all Second Life viewers and clients that are in popular use (and of which I am aware) and which are recognised as adhering to the TPV Policy
  • By its nature, this summary will always be in arrears
  • The Viewer Round-up Page is updated as soon as I’m aware of any releases / changes to viewers & clients, and should be referred to for more up-to-date information as the week progresses
  • The Viewer Round-up Page also includes comprehensive links to download pages, blog notes, release notes, etc., as well as links to any / all reviews of specific viewers / clients made within this blog.  

Updates for the week ending: April 14th, 2013

  • SL Viewer updates:
      • Beta viewer released version 3.5.1.273869 on April 12th – core update: Server-side Baking / Appearance (release notes)
      • Development viewer released version 3.5.2.273873 on April 12th – core update: Server-side Baking / Appearance
      • Materials processing: project viewer updated 12th April – 3.5.1.273855 – alpha release, please refer to my blog post
  • Cool VL updated on April 14th to:

Discontinued Viewers

  • Phoenix – Development and support officially ended December 31st, 2012
  • Zen – Development and support officially ended January 27th, 2013.

Related Links

Viewer round-up summary: week 14

Posted on by Inara Pey

This summary is published every Monday and is a list of SL viewer / client releases (official and TPV) made during the previous week. When reading it, please note:

  • It is based on my Viewer Round-up Page, a list of  all Second Life viewers and clients that are in popular use (and of which I am aware) and which are recognised as adhering to the TPV Policy
  • By its nature, this summary will always be in arrears
  • The Viewer Round-up Page is updated as soon as I’m aware of any releases / changes to viewers & clients, and should be referred to for more up-to-date information as the week progresses
  • The Viewer Round-up Page also includes comprehensive links to download pages, blog notes, release notes, etc., as well as links to any / all reviews of specific viewers / clients made within this blog.  

Updates for the week ending: April 7th, 2013

Discontinued Viewers

  • Phoenix – Development and support officially ended December 31st, 2012
  • Zen – Development and support officially ended January 27th, 2013.

Related Links