Tag: Restrained Love Viewer

Restrained Love 2.8.5.5: “z-offset” height adjustment update

Posted on by Inara Pey

In my week 35 project updates on SSA, I brought word that both Henri Beauchamp’s Cool VL Viewer (V1-style) and Marine Kelley’s Restrained Love Viewer (V3-style) have incorporated a means developed by Henri by which the new “hover” capability from LL can be used to make on-the-fly avatar height adjustments in a similar manner to the old TPV “z-offset”.

However, a slight error with the initial release of the new “z-offset” capability within the Restrained Love Viewer (version 2.8.5.3) meant that any changes made were only locally applied; they were not being passed to the baking service for onward transmission. This meant that while you would see your avatar’s height adjust, no-one else would.

Marine has rectified this with the release of Restrained Love 2.8.5.5. If you’ve already downloaded and installed 2.8.5.3, you’ll need to update for the capability to work correctly. As with Henri’s original implementation, there are a number of up-front points to note how things work, as they have changed from the “old” z-offset functionality:

  • As with LL’s hover feature, that avatar shape must be modifiable (if not, the Z-offset won’t work)
  • There will be a delay in setting the offset and seeing the final result because each change does require viewer / server communications. Multiple quick changes to the z-offset should therefore be avoided, as they may not propagate correctly.

Marine notes that there are a couple of niggles with her implementation, and that care should be taken with height adjustments.

In addition to the time taken for adjustments to propagate through the system, you may find that when they have done so, you avatar may appear a little higher or lower than you originally set. Should this happen, don’t juggle with the slider; wait another second or two and the avatar’s height will make a final adjustment and appear as you intended.

With this update, the slider will also adjust a seated avatar as well, although adjustments don’t show-up on-the-fly; instead you have to make an adjustment and wait for it to propagate via the baking service in order to see your avatar shift (along with everyone else).

The update is available for all three versions of Restrained Love, links below.

Related Links

Restrained Love Viewer updated

Posted on by Inara Pey

Update: May 13th: The Linux version of RLV was updated by Kitttin Ninetails to version 2.8.4.1 on Sunday May 12th, and is available here.

On Friday May 10th, 2013, Marine Kelley released the latest version of her standalone version of the Restrained Love Viewer (RLV) for Windows – RLV 2.8.4.1. The release is the first update to RLV in 2013, and is based on LL’s 3.5.2 viewer code (3.5.2.264760, dated April 21st, 2013). As such, it brings RLV pretty much up-to-date with the majority of LL’s viewer-side updates and fixes.

Note that this article only applies to RLV for Windows, as supplied by Marine Kelley. The Linux and Mac versions supplied by Kittin Ninetails remain at version 2.8.3.5.

Communications Hub User Interface

With this release, RLV now uses the Communications Hub User Interface (CHUI) and the standard means of managing chat and IMs, together with the majority of fixes and updates made to CHUI through recent development and beta updates.

RLV 2.8.4.1 includes CHUI for managing communications
RLV 2.8.4.1 includes CHUI for managing communications

Server-side Baking / Appearance

Despite no mention being made of it in the release notes, version 2.8.4.1 of RLV appears to also include viewer-side support for the upcoming deployment of Server-side Baking to the main grid.

To confirm this, as I was somewhat surprised that the release notes failed to make mention of any support, I dropped into the SSB/A test regions on Aditi to see how my avatar would render to others, and they would render to me when using the viewer. With the aid of my Crash Test Alt, all appeared to be fine.

Server-side baking: my avatar and Crash Test Alt as seen through RLV 2.8.4.1 (l) and through another SSB-capable viewer (r). Both render correctly; no greying or ghosting
Server-side baking: my avatar and Crash Test Alt as seen through RLV 2.8.4.1 (l) and through another SSB-capable viewer (r). Both render correctly; no greying or ghosting

I also didn’t encounter any issues in changing / re-ordering outfits which others have reported as encountering recently (although I admittedly have  – perhaps fortunately – yet to encounter any issues of this type while using any SSB/A-enabled viewer).

Other Updates and Fixes

Marine provides a list of additional updates and fixes:

Changes:

  • Camera focus is no longer lost when clicking on an in-world object. To change camera focus, right-click on your avatar, press Escape or focus on something else
  • Viewer allows moving an item or a folder from a locked folder to another locked folder (prevent only from locked to unlocked and from unlocked to locked)
  • Viewer does not expect the user to press Enter before chatting while in Mouselook, since they don’t have to when in 3rd person view
  • Viewer does not automatically rename folders or items in the inventory unless “RestrainedLoveAutomaticRenameItems” is set to TRUE (it is FALSE by default). This is no longer necessary since the viewer no longer needs to figure out whether or not it will kick a locked object because it now Adds by default now.

Fixed:

  • It is no longer possible to drag and drop an item from an object in-world directly into  inventory, regardless of RLV attach restrictions
  • It is no longer possible to wear rezzed items by right-clicking on them in-world and selecting “attach to”, even when @unsharedwear was active
  • It is now possible to hide the UI when unable to rez
  • It is no longer possible to create new pieces of clothing regardless of RLV outfit restrictions
  • The Control key wouldn’t work in Mouselook. Fixing this removes the ability to control the speed of the mouse view while holding Control, but Shift already does something similar.

Related Links

“Tiling” snapshot fix (and more) now in the SL release viewer, Dolphin, Niran’s and RLV

Posted on by Inara Pey

Snapshot Tiling Fix

The snapshot tiling fix (MAINT-628) can now be found in the following viewers:

  • Dolphin viewer 3.4.6.26773+ (current release now 3.4.7.26856)
  • Niran’s Viewer 2.0.5+
  • Restrained Love 2.8.3.5+ (Windows)
  • SL release viewer 3.4.3.268262+ (released: 18th December).
Tiling test for Dolphin
Tiling test for Dolphin (3.4.6.26773+): image taken at 3500×2134 resolution using Dolphin 3.4.6.26773. Location: The Island of Armenelos (M) (click to enlarge) – fix also in the latest SL official viewer (3.4.3.28262), Niran’s Viewer (2.0.5+) and RLV (2.8.3.5+)

Graphics Preferences Updates for GPU Classes

The SL viewer, Dolphin and RLV all include the new Graphics Preferences settings related to the ongoing GPU table updates. These new options place additional “stops” on the Quality and Speed slider between the four original settings of Low, Mid, High and Ultra, which are intended to better represent the default SL capabilities of different GPU classes,

The new "intermediary" graphics settings intended to better represent the capabilities of different GPU classes
The new “intermediary” graphics settings intended to better represent the default SL capabilities of different GPU classes

SSAO Fix for Horizon Haze

Also included in the recent Dolphin and Niran’s Viewer releases, is Tofu Buzzard’s SSAO improvements for generating horizon haze over Linden Sea (“ambient  distance fog”). This helps overcome a long-standing bug within the viewer which has effectively broken / nerfed horizon haze over Linden Water for a considerable time.

SSAO haze effect - fix from Tofuu blizzard, available in deferred mode on Dolphin and Niran's viewers.
SSAO haze effect – fix from Tofu Blizzard, available in deferred mode on Dolphin and Niran’s viewers. (image courtesy of Niran V Dean) – click to enlarge

Space Reflections

Niran’s viewer also introduces an interesting / experimental viewer-side feature from Tofu Blizzard called “space reflections”, designed to create reflections on shiny surfaces when running in deferred mode and with the appropriate Graphics Preferences option enabled. It’s not perfect, but it can be used to produce some interesting effects, as shown below, if only for those running a viewer which can render the desired results.

Tofu blizzard's "space reflections": (l) a viewer running in deferred mode; (r) Niran's viewer running in deferred with "space reflections" active
Tofu Blizzard’s “space reflections”: (l) a viewer running in deferred mode; (r) Niran’s viewer running in deferred with “space reflections” active to produce reflections both on the floor and inside the large sphere (click to enlarge)

Related Links

Direct Delivery: Restrained Love and Dolphin with Merchant Outbox

Posted on by Inara Pey

Update April 1st: Dolphin Viewer has been updated to 3.3.1.23706. Percipal updates comprise the Kokua mesh uploader (Nicky Perian), Firestorm’s ability to attach a short message to avatar-to-avatar payments, and some fixes to the gstreamer audio playback and client-side AO.

This week sees the Restrained Life Viewer and Dolphin Viewer gain Merchant Outbox functionality for Direct Delivery.

Restrained Love 2.8.3.1

The V3.2-based standalone version of Marine Kelley’s Restrained Love Viewer is built on the standard V3.2 code, with a number of UI improvements. Marine develops the Windows version, with Kitten Ninetails maintaining the Mac and Linux versions.

As well as the arrival of the Merchant Outbox, this version sees a number of updates and fixes to the Restrained Love capabilities within the Viewer, all of which can be found listed on Marine’s blog. In testing the Merchant Outbox on the Windows version, I found it worked without any problems, while the revision to the position of the draw distance slider helps make this more usable.

Dolphin 3.3.0.27000

This release brings with it support for the Merchant Outbox for Windows, Mac and Linux. In addition, as an added and welcome tweak, Lance has doubled the length timeout on the Outbox so disconnects should be less frequent than may be experienced in other Viewers.

The remaining updates comprise:

  • The “RLV Height offset” slider is now wide enough to be properly functional, and has a reset button.
  • A checkbox to disable rendering of attached light sources has been added in Preferences->Dolphin Viewer 3->Graphics.
  • A fix for scripted sounds from FireStorm has been imported that makes scripted sounds play correctly the first time.
  • Codebase has been updated to official 3.3.1 source from SnowStorm.
  • RLV has been updated to 2.08.03.01.

Performance

Both of these Viewers are using the latest 3.3.1 code release from LL, which has yielded some stunning results on my “regular” system. Together with the latest SL Viewer (3.3.0 (251182)), I experienced the following frame rates on my home sim with 4 others present on the same region:

  • Average fps, no-deferred / no shadows, @ 390m: 45fps
  • Average fps, no-deferred / no shadows, @ ground level: 36fps
  • Average fps, deferred / shadows active, @ 390m: 20fps
  • Average fps, deferred / shadows active, @ ground level: 18fps

While visiting a popular store (Graves main store), with seven other avatars present, my frames rates were: 32 fps with deferred rendering / shadows off, and 14fps with deferred rendering and shadows on. Taken together and in terms of running with lighting / shadows enabled, these figure represent the best results I’ve had for any Viewer running on my PC, and leave me hoping that similar improvements will be seen in other Viewers as they cut over to the 3.3.1 code.

Related Links

Restrained Love, Dolphin 3 and Niran’s updated

Posted on by Inara Pey

This week has seen a number of TPVs updated. Rather than dwell interminably on each of them, here’s a rapid rundown, based on the individual blog entries for the three Viewers.

Restrained Love Viewer

Release 2.8.3 brings with it many bug fixes and:

Added

  • New keyboard shortcuts for builders (they are also added to the Build > Options sub-menu):
    • – Alt+W to edit linked parts
    • – Alt+T to set to stretch textures
    • – Alt+B to set to stretch both sides
    • – Alt+R to set to set grid mode to World
    • – Alt+F to set to set grid mode to Local
    • – Alt+V to set to set grid mode to Reference
    • – Alt+G to set to set current selected object as Reference and set grid mode to Reference
  • Debug setting “RenderMeshDeformed” to switch Qarl’s parametric alpha mesh deformer on and off (it is off by default
  • LL’s patch for the new inventory features (i.e. no accidental nudity)
  • Allow to click in-world while in Mouselook mode, even when your controls are taken, but only while pressing Alt

Fixed

  • Inventory offers were unreadable (the Show button used to overwrite the URL), same for teleport offers
  • Shift+Right-click on an object in world failed to open it
  • In Mouselook mode, we could only click on something or fire with a gun once
  • RLV_50: Fix to the alignment tool in the Build floater is broken (thanks given to Lance Corrimal and Jonathan Yap)
  • RLV_52: another avatar sitting down while in ML resets my camera (with thanks to Lance Corrimal)

Changed

  • Unable to be force TPed when in Busy mode.

Links

Dolphin Viewer

Version 3.2.4.22939 brings with it:

  • The main inventory tab can now show or hide links, or show only links (the recent and worn tabs always hide links). Switch it on via the Inventory gear icon
  • The use of private memory pools has been switched off. If you notice more crashes than before, switch it back on with the Debug setting “MemoryPrivatePoolEnabled” and let Lance know (via a post on the forum)
  • This version of the Dolphin Viewer 3 does not send “LookAt” data anymore, if you switch on “Do not point at objects” (Preferences->Dolphin Viewer 3->Miscellaneous). Lance notes that, “The options to have the LookAt / PointAt crosshairs on-screen will be gone in the next release, unless someone points out good use cases for having them that are not based on drama or paranoia.”
  • The inventory patch recommended by Oz Linden has been implemented – no “accidental nudity” for Dolphin Viewer 3 users
  • Updated to RLV 2.8.2.1
  • When you take a Snapshot to disk using the keyboard shortcut CTRL-SHIFT-D, it uses the file format that you selected for your last “snapshot to disk” from the snapshot floater
  • The check boxes for switching AutoCloseOOC and AllowMUpose are back in Preferences->Dolphin Viewer 3->Miscellaneous
  • The linux version of the Dolphin Viewer 3 now uses dbus calls in the secondlife: handler script to send SLurl to whichever viewer is running at the time. Lance comments, “This is not available on 64-bit Windows, so please vote for VWR-28073 and VWR-28074. Thanks.”
  • The Windows installer should not use the term “Second Life” anymore anywhere in any language. It should read “The Dolphin Viewer 3″
  • Some Windows build issues have been addressed.
  • Fixes:
    • The tips of the handles of the Align tool in the Build toolbox point in the right directions
    • Sharing inventory items with more than one inventory window is open is now working correctly
    • The hovertip on the local chat bar mentions whispering as well
    • Previews of textures show the checkerboard pattern again under transparent areas. Lance notes: “This version still does this with the old deprecated OpenGL calls. The next version of Dolphin Viewer 3 will do it “right”, thanks to Shyotl from Singularity”
    • Fixed: the “Preview As” dropdown in the texture upload preview is not covered by the texture anymore.

Links

Niran’s Viewer

Release 1.12 brings with it:

  • New Build floater
  • Ability to select the use of your right arm when selecting / pointing / building
  • Revised pie menu
  • Ability to see UI when in Mouselook
  •  Shining updates.
Niran’s: UI visible in Mouselook (note ML crosshairs in the centre of the image)

The UI-in-Mouselook is interesting – NiranV mentions it as coming via Dolphin, but I’ve failed to notice it in that Viewer (or any other V3-based TPV) – not that I’m a major user of ML at the best of times and so may well have missed it if it is a debug setting (or I managed to skip the option in Preferences). It’s an interesting addition to direct 1st person use of the Viewer, especially given UI options can be accessed using the Alt key. For those who prefer a more traditional Mouselook view, the UI can currently be hidden using a debug command: AllowUIHidingInML.

As a semi-regular user of Niran’s Viewer, I have to say, I’m not totally convinced with the build floater changes (which need a small amount of tidying-up) on two counts. Firstly, because Niran’s is one of three Viewers I routinely use, and so the layout cuts against the other two – this is admittedly more *my* problem than the Viewer’s.

Secondly – and more importantly – while the “traditional” builder floater is getting increasingly crowded (and one could argue it does need a bit of a re-think), it does have a certain logical flow in the way information is presented – and scanned by the user. This is something that appears to have been lost in this initial presentation within Niran’s Viewer.

Links