On Thursday, May 4th, the AssetHTTP RC viewer updated to version 5.0.5.325940, which looks to be to addressing further crash issues with the previous RC version.
All other viewers in the pipelines remain unchanged:
Current Release version: 5.0.4.325124, dated April 3rd – formerly the Maintenance RC viewer overview
Project viewers:
Project Alex Ivy (LXIV), 64-bit project viewer version 5.1.0.504536, dated April 25th
360-degree snapshot viewer version 4.1.3.321712, dated November 23rd, 2016 – ability to take 360-degree panoramic images
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.
Inventory Loss Issues
I recently reported on people’s experiences with inventory losses, as recorded through the forums. As a result of both the forum discussion and JIRAs filed such as BUG-100541), the Lab has been looking again at inventory and possible causes of inventory loss. This will be resulting in some viewer behaviour changes as Grumpity Linden explained during the Server Beta meeting on Thursday, May 4th:
So we are actively looking at the various reports of inventory loss (Quick thank you to everyone who takes the time to file bug reports… It helps!). With this recent wave of reports, it seems like there are a lot of things ending up in trash unexpectedly and we can’t be sure whether there’s an evil gremlin in the machinery or a bunch of accidental key presses. So we’re putting in some viewer changes to at least make the accidental key presses less likely. We’re:
Amending the prompt that comes up when you have over 5K items in trash to show the trash folder when you’re ready to purge it – before you can purge it.
Backspace will only delete on mac, not windows.
[The] purging trash warning will give you the count of items you’re deleting and will be unavoidable.
You’re going to have to see the “Are you sure you want to delete this thing” warning at least once per session.
Also, I’d like to clarify something – a lot of reports we’re seeing come up right now but are actually of past incidents. I think the discussion on the forum(s) has led to an increase in reporting. which is great because then maybe we’ll finally get a reproducible scenario and find ways to fix.
These changes may not resolve all the issues being experienced, but they may help with at least some, and in creasing people’s awareness of what might be happening in their Trash folder. There is currently no time frame as to when these updates will appear in an RC / project viewer; I’d assume they would most likely be appearing in a Maintenance RC.
Profile Feed Snapshot Uploads
People are (once again) experiencing issues with uploading snapshots to their Profile Feed. A bug on the matter has been raised – BUG-100516.
LeTigre and Magnum should receive a new server maintenance package containing “Sim logging improvements”.
SL Viewer
There have been no updates to the current viewer pipelines to start the week, leaving them as follows:
Current Release version: 5.0.4.325124, dated April 3rd – formerly the Maintenance RC viewer overview
Project AssetHttp RC viewer version 5.0.5.325825, dated April 27th – This viewer moves fetching of several types of assets to HTTP / CDN – overview
Project viewers:
Project Alex Ivy (LXIV), 64-bit project viewer version 5.1.0.504536, dated April 25th
360-degree snapshot viewer version 4.1.3.321712, dated November 23rd, 2016 – ability to take 360-degree panoramic images
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.
Region Crossings
There have been reports of worsening in vehicular region crossings recently (by coincidence, Caitlyn and I ran into so particularly unpleasant crossings over the most recent weekend). Simon Linden agreed to have a poke at server logs, time permitting, to see if there is any other change in crossing stats. He also mused on the potential impact of mesh bodies and attachments on such crossings, which constitute a considerable amount of additional data (including saving and restoring the state of scripts associated with them.
It was also pointed out that worn mesh attachments bring with them an (unneeded?) physics shape calculation, potentially adding to the load. This prompted a further discussion on whether any attachments should have a physics shape data used or calculated until such time as it is physically rezzed in-world.
As a first point of call, Simon repeated that as time permits, he’ll look into what goes into the region crossing calculations, and have a closer look at attachments physics calculations in general to she what is going on.
What Is the Lab Working On?
Things seem pretty quiet at the moment, but the Lab is working on a lot right now, although much of it is transparent to users, as Oz linden indicated at the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday, May 2nd:
At the moment, we happen to have a number of projects in flight that are either not good to discuss (security changes), or system upgrades that really shouldn’t be visibly different…. that’s unfortunate, but we’re getting started on (or getting ready to start on) some that will be much more interesting.
The recent changes to land access and control, together with the upcoming changes to allow region / estate staff to better managed Public Access regions are examples of more visible changes affecting users – or will be, once the viewer has been updated to handle the latter; and there a further changes to the likes of region-level ban lists coming down the pipe which will also bring visible changes to the viewer and provide better controls / support for land owners.
The Project Alex Ivy (LXIV) project viewer updated to version 5.1.0.504536 on April 25th. According to comments passed at the TPV Developer meeting on Friday, April 21st, this update should now include Havok for Mac, although the release notes currently do not reflect this, possibly because they have not been updated from the previous release.
Outside of this update, the viewer pipeline is as follows:
Current Release version: 5.0.4.325124, dated April 3rd, promoted April 19th – formerly the Maintenance RC viewer overview
Release channel cohorts:
Project AssetHttp project viewer version 5.0.5.325600 dated April 20th – This viewer moves fetching of several types of assets to HTTP / CDN – overview
Project viewers:
360-degree snapshot viewer version 4.1.3.321712 dated November 23rd, 2016
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.
Inventory / Inventory Loss Issues
Inventory loss is not a new issue within Second Life, and it is something the Lab has acknowledged in the past and sought to try to reduce. However, there are new reports of odd cases of inventory loss resulting from folders apparently somehow being moved to the Trash folder without apparent user intervention, from whence they are then purged (see this forum thread for examples). Others have also reported seeing folders move themselves to Lost & Found.
While it is only speculative, it has been suggested that a bug somewhat akin to BUG-4617 might be in part responsible. It is also possible that is some cases, the loss is due to accidentally moving a folder to Trash and then purging as a result of a (fairly) recent introduction of the pop-up warning to purge Trash (intended to show up when Trash exceeds 5K items, unless the threshold is manually increased via debug), which may be causing people to purge their Trash without double-checking to ensure nothing is there that shouldn’t be there.
However, the above doesn’t explain the apparent movement of folders into Trash (or lost & Found) where the user is certain then did not mis-click or mis-drag. A further problem appears to be that when moved, folders don’t always appear in Trash – although this may be due to people incorrectly looking at Trash via the Recent Tab in the Inventory floater, or as a result of inventory filters being active.
Kyle Linden is apparently ware of the latest batch of reported issues, which means that hopefully, they are being looked into. In the meantime, if you do suffer any kind of noticeable inventory loss on the scale being reported, immediately file a support case; it may not work, but the sooner a case is logger potentially the greater the chance of the matter being resolved.
General Steps to Help with Inventory Loss
The following steps are not suggested as a panacea for the kinds of losses noted above, but are offered as a potential help to those experiencing lost inventory (and are based on using the official viewer):
Try a cache clear first:
In the top menu bar of the viewer, go to Me > Preferences > Advanced -> Click the “Clear Cache” button -> OK
Restart the viewer – the cache will be cleaned when the viewer launches
Login to a low lag region (for example Pooley), open your inventory and wait for it to fetch
If you are still missing inventory, then work through all the relevant steps on the Inventory Loss wiki page
On Tuesday, April 18th the Main (SLS) channel received the server maintenance package previously deployed to the RC channels in week #15. This includes:
Several internal fixes and two new internal logging modes
Another adjustment to fix issues with off-line IM and Group Notice delivery reliability
Fixes an issue where large numbers of objects could be returned after a rolling restart.
On Wednesday, April 19th, the RC channels should be updated as follows:
Magnum looks set to receive a new “secret” update, which has been under testing on the Snack channel (and will likely have Snack reabsorbed into it).
SL Viewer
There have been no viewer updates thus far this week, leaving the viewer pipeline as:
Current Release version: 5.0.3.324435, dated March 13 – snapshots to e-mail hotfix
Release channel cohorts :
Project AssetHttp project viewer version 5.0.4.325368 dated April 12th – This viewer moves fetching of several types of assets to HTTP / CDN – overview
Maintenance RC viewer version 5.0.4.325124 dated April 3rd – avatar rendering and other updates
Project viewers:
Project Alex Ivy (LXIV), 64-bit project viewer version 5.1.0.503537 dated March 17th
360-degree snapshot viewer version 4.1.3.321712 dated November 23, 2016 – ability to take 360-degree panoramic images – hands-on review
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.
Other Items
Differences Between Teleporting and Physical Region Crossings
As we know, whether you teleport between one region and another or physically cross the boundary between two regions, you are performing a region crossing. However, there is a slight different in how they are handled. Rider and Simon Linden described the processes involved during the Simulator User Group meeting, which makes for interesting reading if you weren’t previously aware of the processes involved.
In referencing teleporting between regions, Rider said, “Teleport packs your avatar into a big ball of data and throws you at the destination.” It’s then left up to the destination region to determine whether or not you actually get in. Hence the teleport progress bar.
Simon then said of a physical region crossings, “They do a bit more pre-crossing checks to see if you go into the neighbour[ing] region than TPs do.” Rider Linden then added, “If the regions are adjacent, the sim you are on checks to see if it should smush you into that ball before it does.”
These pre-crossing checks are handled through your child agent on the neighbouring region, allowing the simulator running the region you’re currently in to “see” if you’re able to access the neighbouring region. If it believes you can’t, it won’t bother creating the ball of data about your avatar (and everything attached to it), reducing its workload.
When is a Region Not a Region?
A curious topic came up at the meeting: when is a region not a region? The simple answer is probably “when you can’t see it”. But what about if you can – apparently – see it, at least on the map, and it doesn’t appear to have a name.
The mystery island as it appeared for some people using both the LL viewer and Firestorm
Whirly Fizzle spotted this phenomenon on the World Map with a region apparently adjoining The Epiphany, although her curiosity was piqued as it was apparently without a name. The mystery deepened when most of those at the meeting reported they couldn’t see any such region on their maps – although two or three besides Whirly could, on both TPVs and the official viewer (ruling on an issue in how a specific viewer is handling the map data).
What was equally mysterious, was that those who were able to see the unnamed island on the World map could also see it on the web SL map – while those who couldn’t see it on the world map also couldn’t see it on the web SL map.
As other saw the same area on the map – regardless of viewer
Several theories were put forward for the phenomenon, including it being a non-updated map texture; a potential error in map tiling and loading; an old texture loaded and stuck at the wrong LOD; and so on. Running a quick check, Simon Linden couldn’t find any evidence for a region ever having been placed in any of the eight grid areas surrounding The Epiphany. He did, however, offer a possible explanation of what might have happened:
I do know the support team will do some interesting tricks sometimes … they will move one of their regions next to another to do some sort of work, then move it away. Perhaps that got captured there.
Either way, a curious little anomaly.
Mesh UUID Flipping via Script / UUID
Back in the mists of time as mesh support was being added to Second Life, there was the ability to change mesh assets via UUID / LSL. However, the ability was used most frequently as a means of animating meshes – putting considerable stress of the rendering system in the process. Because of this, a wiki page on the subject was raised, and the ability to change mesh UUIDs via script was eventually removed altogether.
The Lab is currently considering implementing a means to animation meshes (something routinely discussed at the Content Creator’s User Group meeting). This would be a far more efficient and less stressful means of animating meshes where it to be taken up as project, and completely negate the need for animation via UUID flipping.
However, while allowing meshes to be changed through scripts / UUIDs has other potential uses, it is unlikely to be re-introduced even if animated meshes are introduced to SL, because anyone obtaining the UUID for a mesh could potentially download the “mesh” as a vnd.ll.mesh file from the CDN, and could then theoretically reconstruct the original mesh item from that data (thus effectively stealing it).
The was no Main (SLS) channel deployment or re-start on Tuesday, April 11th.
On Wednesday, April 12th, the three RC channels should all receive a new server maintenance package which includes:
Several internal fixes and two new internal logging modes
Another adjustment to fix issues with off-line IM and Group Notice delivery reliability
Fixes an issue where large numbers of objects could be returned after a rolling restart.
It had been indicated that the new server OS build could be deployed to an RC this week. Whether this would be a “full” RC (BlueSteel, Magnum or LeTigre) or perhaps to a limited channel (as is the case with the increase avatar capacity updates, which are on McRib), was made clear. More on this later in the week, maybe.
SL Viewer
The recent Voice RC, version 5.0.4.324770 was withdrawn some time on Monday, April 10th / Tuesday April 11th as a result of suffering a high crash rate.
The AssetHTTP project viewer was promoted to RC status with the release of version 5.0.4.325144 on Monday, April 10th.
This leaves the remainder of the current viewer list as:
Current Release version: 5.0.3.324435, dated March 13th – snapshots to e-mail hotfix download page, release notes
Project Alex Ivy (LXIV), 64-bit project viewer version 5.1.0.503537 dated March 17th
360-degree snapshot viewer updated to version 4.1.3.321712 on November 23, 2016 – ability to take 360-degree panoramic images – hands-on review (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.
The notes in this update are taken from the following sources:
Server Beta User Group meeting, held on Thursday April 6th, 2017 at 3:00pm SLT – transcript here
The TPV Developer meeting held on Friday, April 7th, 2017 at 12:00 noon SLT.
A video of the TPV Developer meeting is embedded at the end of this update. My thanks as always to north for providing it. Timestamps in this report, where relevant, will link you to the point in the video where items are discussed (via a new browser tab).
SL Viewer
No changes to the current pipeline since part one of the week’s update:
Current Release version 5.0.3.324435, dated March 13th – snapshots to e-mail hotfix
Release channel cohorts:
Maintenance RC viewer version 5.0.4.325124, dated Monday, April 3rd – review
Voice RC viewer version 5.0.4.324770 released on March 20th – several improvements to voice
Project viewers:
Project AssetHttp project viewer, version 5.0.4.324828 dated March 30th – This viewer moves fetching of several types of assets to HTTP / CDN – overview
Project Alex Ivy (“LXIV”), 64-bit project viewer, version 5.1.0.503537 dated March 17th
360-degree snapshot viewer, version 4.1.3.321712 dated November 23rd, 2016 – ability to take 360-degree panoramic images – hands-on review
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.
64-bit Build Instructions & Windows Crash Rates
[11:15] The Lab plan to update the viewer build instructions on the wiki to match the 64-bit build process once the 64-bit viewer reaches release status, and the build process is seen as stable.
[29:14] The 64-bit build is being tested across all versions of Windows back to Windows 7. While the current project viewer cohort of users is small, there is evidence that Windows 7 64-bit systems have a “significantly higher” crasher rate with the viewer than Windows 8 or Windows 10, with Windows 10 systems having the lowest overall crash rate.
SL Voice: Linux Updates and Blocking Older Versions of SL Voice
[0:49] Vivox, the company that provides the Voice back-end service and delivers the Voice plug-in for the viewer are no longer providing updates for Linux. This means there will no longer be any Voice updates for the Linux flavour of the viewer unless Vivox reverses that decision.
[1:42] The plans to block older versions of SL Voice to ensure users are only using the most recent versions of the plug-in, first announced in the latter part of 2016 and placed on hold in December 2016, remain on the back-burner with Oz Linden noting, “We don’t have any time line for disabling older Voice versions … We may or may not get to it.”
Region Access Changes
There are two changes to region access which are currently in progress.
Region Capacity and Access
[2:36] The first is the Improved Region Capacity and Access updates as reported by the Lab on Tuesday, April 2nd, and which are being rolled-out in stages. There has been some negative reaction to these change (some basic account users have been particularly vocal about the upper capacity to a very busy region being “reserved” for Premium members); however, the deployment which was placed on its own limited server channel (McRib), appears to be going well and so will be rolled to a larger selection of regions in week #15 (commencing Monday, April 10th).
[3:28] The Lab will continue to look at avatar capacity within region types as they continue to make other changes to the system, and if the opportunity arises to increase the numbers, they “probably will” (quote). Of course, increases to region capacity on the back-end can have a negative impact at the viewer end of the equation, where the viewer and client system potentially have to work than much harder.
Revised Region and Parcel Access Controls
[4:40] The Lab is revising how Public Access controls are set at both region and parcel access. This involved changes to both the back-end (already on RC) and a set of changes to the viewer UI. You can read more about this in my separate report here.
Simulator Operating System Update
[4:07] As noted in recent SL project updates in these pages, the Lab has been working on a new region simulator build using an updated version of Linux. These work has been on test on Aditi (the beta grid) for the last several weeks (on channel DRTSIM-323), and is due to move to an RC release in week #15, pending no last-minute show stoppers arise in final QA / test.
This is an extensive back-end change to the simulator, which should be largely invisible to users. However, the Lab will be watching the initial deployment carefully, because as Mazidox Linden commented at the server beta meeting, “It won’t change anything you should notice, and could change anything, at the same time.” This being the case, there is a standing request that as the update is deployed, those using regions running on the RC channel(s) on which it is running (see the week #15 server deployment notes in the Second Life Server forum, once published) to be extra vigilant and report anything untoward they may see / encounter.
Once this operating system update has been completed, the Lab will start work on a further update.
Other Items
Rendering Cost Calculations
[19:25] The Lab is running a background project to look at the cost of rendering a wide range of Second Life features across a range of different client systems running the viewer. The tests for this work have now been defined and are about to be put into use. Once sufficient data has been gathered, the Lab will use it to determine what might need to be done to improve the accuracy of the avatar rendering calculations with a view to making them more accurately reflect the real cost of rendering high poly count items. Changes will be communicated through forums such as the TPV Developer meeting ahead of any implementation.
[33:55] One potential project which might help with mesh avatar complexity is to allow system layer texture baking to be applied to mesh avatars. This has been the subject of numerous discussions at the Content Creation User Group meetings (see here and here for more), and while it is still not officially adopted as a project by the Lab, they are continuing to take a detailed look at the idea,
Ban List Improvements
[28:00] This was first raised at the TPV Developer meeting held of Friday February 17th. Essentially, the region ban lists are seen as difficult to use, particularly where the ban list is extensive. There have also been requests that the upper limits for both region and parcel ban lists are raised.
Both subjects are still subject to discussion within the Lab, and while no project is currently on the cards to deal with either, it seems likely that were they to be addressed, they would be addressed together. It has been noted that one possible driver for change might be the upcoming changes being made to how Public Access is managed for regions where it is set (see above).
Windows 10 / Nvidia Shadowplay Bug
Whirly Fizzle has reported a bug which appears to have started with a recent Nividia driver update or a Windows 10 update. In short, launching the Nvidia GeForce Experience and enabling ShadowPlay on a Windows 10 system with Nvidia graphics, which tend to result in a viewer crash. See BUG-11530 for more, including a response from Nvidia on the issue.
