Tag: Simulator User Group 2013

SL projects update week 46 (1): Server releases, SL viewer updates, general items

Posted on by Inara Pey

Server Deployments week 46

As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

Main channel: Tuesday November 12th

No deployment.

Release Candidate Channels, Wednesday November 13th

  • BlueSteel and LeTigre should receive the maintenance package originally scheduled for deployment to all three RC channels in week 45, but which was cancelled as a result of a last-minute issue being found. This package comprises further infrastructure changes for the yet-to-be-announced Experience Keys (experience tools) project
  • Magnum should receive a new server maintenance project this week.  This project fixes some bugs, including BUG-4152 related to vehicles crossing region boundaries, as described in this thread; and which also includes some changes around script behaviour, comprising:
    • The fix to allow objects rezzed by sat-upon objects should have a fresh auto-return and temp-on-rez timer, This will allow them to last the full ~60 seconds (for temporary) or parcel auto return time. This should help is situations where combat vehicles in regions with short auto-return times can have their ordnance immediately returned when a weapon is fired, and any temp vehicles are unable to rez attachments, even when sat upon
    • Fixes to  prevent estate managers / owners being teleported home through a misuse of llTeleportAgentHome(), and to prevent estate managers / owner  being affected by “Trojan” objects manipulating  ESTATE_ACCESS_BANNED_AGENT_ADD
    •  Updates to the grey goo fence do that it is stricter for large object rezzes in a further attempt to limit the ability of griefers to bring down a region through multiple rezzing of large objects
    • More robust handling of inventory management within objects
    • Cleanup of controls-grabbing in LSL scripts (no functional changes).
A simulator UG meeting (stock)
A simulator UG meeting (stock)

SL Viewer

The SL release viewer updated on Tuesday November 12th to version 3.6.10.283403, formerly the Maintenance RC comprising finer access control for estate/parcel owners; CHUI: toggle expanding Conversations by clicking on icon; GPU table update + more.

It is thought the project viewer containing the last of the current viewer-side updates for interest lists should be appearing very soon now. After recent setbacks in getting the viewer publicly visible, the time frame for its arrival had been noted to be unlikely before November 12th. However, speaking at the Simulator User Group meeting on the 12th, Andrew Linden indicated he believed the viewer may well be out in the next few days.

Other Items

Andrew Linden’s Bug Fixing

Andrew Linden
Andrew Linden

Andrew Linden has been taking time to fix a some unusual bugs. The first, which is not generally visible, he describes as, “In some cases our servers will upload an asset multiple times before it successfully creates an inventory item (on take to inventory for example). Which creates garbage assets in the asset system.” This issue could also result in multiple notifications being sent to the avatar uploading the item, if they remained in the same region.

The second issue he’s fixed is that of “ghost objects” appearing in the viewer but which are not present on the region server. This issue appears to have been caused by a race condition which could occur under certain situations such as deleting the objects too fast on a region crossing, so they’d be removed server-side, but not from the viewer. Both of these fixes should be appearing in an RC soon.

Group Management and Culling

Request have been made to have the limit of banned avatar lists raised from 500, particularly for regions that are popular with users. Whether there is a widespread need for this is entirely open to debate, but during the discussion of the problem being faced by a particular estate, suggestions were put forward by which such lists might be made easier to manage, including:

  • Auto-culling from all ban lists of any account name banned from the grid
  • Such auto-culling to take place only as a ban list approaches its upper limit
  • Add a feature by which  would  allow the removal from a list any avatars that have not logged-in to SL for a given period of weeks / months / years. If implemented, this could either take the form of a selectable set of options (e.g. something like 6 months, 1 year, 2 years), or possibly be a free-format field the owner can use to specify as the time period.

Whether any of these options eventually get implemented, remains to be seen (and doubtless on whether feature requests are filed).

This conversation was also bound-up with matters of group chat and group chat lag. Various suggestions were put forward for trying to address this as well, ranging from replacing the current group chat mechanism with something like IRC and whether it would actually work / scale any better, through to implementing a server-side change so that when someone leaves a group chat, the channel is actually closed, rather than messages still being sent to the viewer, which just disregards them, as is currently the case. Commenting on the status of group chat in general, Simon Linden stated, “Just FYI, practically speaking we’re not going to be re-writing the chat system any time soon.”

SL projects update week 45 (2): Server, viewer and group bans

Posted on by Inara Pey

Server Deployments week 44 – Recap

As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

  • The Main channel was updated on Tuesday November 5th with the same maintenance package previously deployed to the three release candidate channels, and which comprised bug fixes and crash mode fixes
  • On Wednesday November 6th, all three release candidate channels were all due to receive a new maintenance package, comprising further infrastructure changes for the yet-to-be-announced Experience Keys (experience tools) project. However, an undisclosed test failure meant the deployment was cancelled.

Upcoming Releases

Week 46 should see a new maintenance package in RC, which will include:

  • A fix for BUG-4152 Sim crossing on vehicle fails when parcel at opposite sim border is full
  • A number of crash fixes, including some which combat a physics griefer object
  • The fix to allow objects rezzed by sat-upon objects should have a fresh auto-return and temp-on-rez timer, This will allow them to last the full ~60 seconds (for temporary) or parcel auto return time. This should help is situations where combat vehicles in regions with short auto-return times can have their ordnance immediately returned when a weapon is fired, and any temp vehicles are unable to rez attachments, even when sat upon.
  • An interest list fix for issues where you don’t connect to regions far enough away when draw distance is set to 512m
Maestro Linden's disco-themed Server Beta meeting venue (stock)
Maestro Linden’s disco-themed Server Beta meeting venue (stock)

Trojan Objects

A further update is a change to try to deal with a griefing situation wherein estate managers/owners can be added to a region’s the ban list or teleported them home with llTeleportAgentHome(). This is apparently achieved through the use of what Maestro Linden refers to as “Trojan” objects, in that the object appears perfectly innocuous until passed to the an estate manager / owner but which, when rezzed, will  the manipulate the ban list via llManageEstateAccess().

Maestro described these scenarios thus:”I could give you ‘cute kitty’ which you then rez on your parcel.  But the script with the ‘purr’ function also has a ‘manipulate ban list’ function. Since you (the parcel owner) own the kitty, the script there can do the operation.”

It has also been noted that the use of such “Trojan” objects isn’t restricted to manipulating llManageEstateAccess(); they are also used to clear-down ban lists using llResetBandList(). In the case of llManageEstateAccess(), the function is being changed so that the owner is notified, and is given the option to allow the function to run in “stealth” mode.

The problem here is that by the time the notification is received, the Trojan script has done its job, so the solution is not ideal; the same would be true in the case of altering llResetBandList(). However, as Maestro put it, “But you’ll know exactly what it did in case you need to undo it.” A further concern in the case of llResetBandList() is that some estate owners use the function remotely to legitimately manage their ban lists, so if anything is done to alter its functionality, it might break existing content.  This led to extensive debate within the Server Beta meeting as to how such matters could best be addressed – or even if they needed to be addressed beyond people taking the proper precautions when receiving scripted objects from untrusted sources.

SL Viewer

Default Region Restart Sound

In part 1 of this report, I noted that a  JIRA has been put forward (STORM-1980) to have a default region restart sound added to Second Life. This would be played automatically by the viewer on receipt of a region restart message, adding an additional warning of an approaching restart for those who may miss the pop-up notices, giving them time to take the appropriate action prior to logging-out.

The work is progressing on this idea, although a suitable sound has yet to be found, and precisely how the region restart messages will be redefined has yet to be entirely settled. Sound-wise, something is required that would universally recognised and which is preferably not language-dependent. One of the more popular ideas at the moment is to have a submarine dive / air-horn like sound (the “A-wooo-GAH!” beloved of films), although there have been some muted concerns about people possibly being offended by the use of “military” sounds. Torley Linden also joined the discussion and, in fun, offered up his own idea  – just make sure you don’t have the volume up too loud before playing the clip!

Torley’s region restart warning

Sadly, it doesn’t meet that criteria of being language-independent, but it’s still fun to listen to.

Script Syntax Updates and Increasing Source Text Allowance

In week 39, I reported that Ima Mechanic and Oz Linden are working to improve syntax highlighting in the viewer’s LSL editor by allowing the viewer to obtain the information required for syntax highlighting directly from the simulator the viewer is connected to. This should eliminate issues of the current, manually updated, files used to manage syntax highlighting falling out-of-synch with new LSL syntax as new functions and parameters, etc., are added.

This work is progressing well, and may now additionally see the source code text allowance in the viewer’s LSL editor increased. Currently, the source code limit in the editor is some 65,000 characters, however a number of scripters having been finding that they frequently are coming up against that limit when writing the source code for their scripts, so it has been suggested the limit be raised to 256,000 characters.

Continue reading “SL projects update week 45 (2): Server, viewer and group bans” →

SL projects update week 45 (1): Server and viewer sundry news

Posted on by Inara Pey

Server Deployments week 44

As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

Main channel: Tuesday November 5th

The Main channel was updated with the same maintenance package previously deployed to the three release candidate channels, and which comprised bug fixes and crash modes.

Release Candidate Channels, Wednesday November 6th Currently Cancelled

The RC restarts have been cancelled, see the Grid Status report.

All three release candidate channels should receive the same maintenance package, comprising further infrastructure changes for the yet-to-be-announced Experience Keys (experience tools) project.

SL Viewer

There have been no release updates so far this week. However, a bug has been reported within the former “Sharestorm” viewer (the current release viewer, 3.6.9.282535), wherein fps rates are severely impacted when the CHUI conversation floater is open. If you’re using the current release viewer, and find frame rates are being impacted when conversing, try switching to CHUI’s Compact View.

If you find your FPS reates are being hit when you have the CHUI floater open in the current SL viewer release (or a viewer with the ShareStorm code), try switching CHUI to the Compact Viewer (above)
If you find your FPS reates are being hit when you have the CHUI floater open in the current SL viewer release (or a viewer with the ShareStorm code), try switching CHUI to the Compact Viewer (above)

A further bug that has been reported sees FPS impacted if the Build floater is opened after having About Land open in a region with a long covenant.

Region Restart Sound

A new JIRA has been put forward (STORM-1980) to have a default region restart sound added to Second Life. This would be played automatically by the viewer on receipt of a region restart message, adding an additional warning of an approaching restart for those who may miss the pop-up notices, be working on another screen / window or who are otherwise distracted while logged-in to Second Life, allowing them to take appropriate action prior to the region starting and them being logged-out. Work on this is in progress, and is generally seen as a good idea.

Other Items

Scripted Sound Improvements?

Requests have been raised at several meetings recently about the possibility of improving scripted sound functions (such as being able to use a single sound loop for a vehicle’s engine and using LSL to change the pitch of the loops when the vehicle is accelerating or slowing down, for example) and to possibly make the prim collision sound being a property of the prim instead of the script.

Commenting on the former request at the simulator user group meeting on Tuesday November 5th, Simon Linden said, ” there have been some JIRA feature requests about llLink-something with sounds  [“llLinkPlaySound”, “llLinkStopSound” and “llLinkLoopSound”].  We’ve discussed it internally and it seems like a good idea, but needs some work to see if we can cover as much functionality as possible with a reasonable API.” Expect more details as the work progresses.

SL projects update 44 (3): viewer, AIS, and HTTP

Posted on by Inara Pey

The following summary is taken from the TPV Developer meeting held on Friday November 1st. A video, courtesy of North, can be found at the end of this report. The numbers in braces after each heading (where given) denote the time stamp at which the topic can be listened-to in the video.

General Viewer News

As noted in part 2 of this week’s report, there are currently two release candidates in the LL viewer release channel, the GPU Table RC, which contains updates to the viewer’s GPU table but no functional changes, and another Maintenance RC, which includes finer access control for estate/parcel owners; CHUI: toggle expanding Conversations by clicking on icon  + more.

It is expected the Google Breakpad RC will be returning to the RC channel in week 45 (see below).

Several of the remaining anticipated viewer RCs / project viewers, again as previously reported, held-up as a result of issues uncovered in QA and / or bugs being re-introduced into them. These include:

  • The Group Ban List viewer: work here, which involves server and viewer changes, is held-up as a result of QA testing revealing some issues which Baker Linden is addressing (as per part 2 of this report)
  • The interest list viewer, which recently saw the issue of objects failing to render without a relog return to the code after having been fixed, and which still has one or two other issues to be fixed, although Oz Linden feels those working on it are homing in on solutions
  • The HTTP viewer updates, which were for a time awaiting QA resources (see below for a further update).

AIS v3

[02:29-07:07]

Nyx Linden, Tiny RobotTM, is in the Halloween spirit
Nyx Linden, Tiny RobotTM, in the Halloween spirit

The Lab is keen to start progressing this work towards a release. As with Server-side Appearance, they’re looking to TPVs to help with various aspects of testing.  To this end, a request has been passed to TPVs that they indicate to the Lab when they have merged the code into experimental versions of their viewers so that a pile-on test can be arranged in order to put the updates through their paces.

There is no specific date for when this will take place, and commenting on the project in general, Nyx Linden said:

Now is a good time to start your merges, I’ve just pushed an updated to Sunshine external, so you guys should have our latest and greatest … But again, this is not formally QA’d, we’ve been testing things as we’ve been going on, but it is not ready for release yet. But now is a good time to start doing test merges and getting side branches up-to-date with that.

The latest code includes a fix to viewer-side behaviour. On logging-in to Second Life, the server sends a list of the things it believed an avatar was wearing, although the message only had room for one wearable of each type (e.g. undershirt, shirt, jacket, etc.), and so it may or may not be up-to-date with the Current Outfit folder.

While the current release versions of the viewer ignore the contents of the message, they do still wait on the message for timing (thus slowing down avatar processing). With the new code, the timing pause is being done away with, so that the viewer should be able to start resolving the avatar from the Current Outfit Folder whether or not the message has been received. There is a slight side-issue with this change that may affect some avatars under limited circumstances, but a fix for this issue is due to be made available to TPVs before the code even reaches any experimental versions of their viewers.

Viewer Crash Reporting

[09:00-14:50 and 26:03-31:15]

There is an issue with the viewer crash reporting which means that a lot of crashes are being incorrectly reported as viewer “freezes”. This is something the Lab is aware of and is working to address. The problem lies with a number of the mechanisms used to determine various types of crashes are not working, with the result that the associated crashes are being misreported as the viewer freezing.

As well as addressing this issue, the Lab has also been working in other areas related to Google Breakpad and crash reporting, including:

  • Simplifying and cleaning-up the creation and interpretation of the marker files used to generate crash rate numbers
  • Re locating these files much earlier in the viewer initialisation and log-out processes so that crashes which occur during the viewer’s initialisation or termination can also be captured
  • Addressing those crash reports which are generated, but lack associated stack dumps or mini-dumps and ensure that in the future that do have the required information, thus allowing the Lab to fill-in more of the blanks and ensure even more meaningful data is gathered as a result of crashes.
TPV Developer meeting, Friday November 1st
TPV Developer meeting, Friday November 1st

It will be a while before this work is ready for inclusion in viewers; one reason for this is because the improvements to Google Breakpad require continual rounds of user testing as changes are made (hence why the Google Breakpad RC appearing and vanishing and reappearing in the viewer release channel). However, once the code is ready for release, it should provide for more accurate crash reporting across all viewers. As the work comes to fruition, it should allow for more accurate identification of a range of crash situation and assist with the work in trying to eliminate them.

Continue reading “SL projects update 44 (3): viewer, AIS, and HTTP” →

SL project updates week 44 (2): Group bans and sundry news

Posted on by Inara Pey

Server Deployments week 44 – Recap

As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

  • Main channel: no update
  • Release Candidates: all three received the same new server maintenance package on Tuesday October 29th, which fixed some crash modes.

The RC release will likely be promoted to the Main channel during week 45.

Upcoming Work

At the Server Beta meeting on Thursday October 31st, Maestro Linden indicated that Simon Linden is working on a new package, but that it might not see the light of day for another week or so. “[It] has a bunch of miscellaneous fixes, including a potential fix for BUG-4152 (that ‘parcel full’ bug with vehicle region crossing which is rather common),” he told attendees.

There are apparently more “shinies” being worked on, but they are unlikely to be in this maintenance project, which Maestro describes as “solely bug fixes.”

SL Viewer Updates

The Maintenance RC viewer updated to release 3.6.10.283139 on Wednesday October 30th, otherwise no other changes to the viewer release channel.

There appears to be a closed viewer repository called “343-fittedmesh” with Oz Linden’s name attached to it. Quite what it might be is open to speculation, but the name might carry a possible hint. It has certainly prompted suggestions that the Lab might want to rethink their approach to code repository naming!

Baker Linden: Group Ban List

Baker and Caleb Linden (no, it's probably best not to ask...!)
Baker and Caleb Linden (no, it’s probably best not to ask…!)

“So group ban stuff is progressing more,” Baker Linden informed the Server Beta meeting. He went on:

However with Caleb and Maestro’s magnificence in finding out things I did wrong, we’re still in internal QA.  There are a couple issues that I’m currently working on, and one issue that came up today that I’m going to need some time to think about over the weekend. I’ve already fixed a few bugs however, so it’s still progressing, just much slower than I would have liked. I’m sorry that it’s taking a long time to get out. I’m touching a lot of systems and I want to make sure it’s done properly. I really do appreciate all the patience y’all have with me too :).

 Other Items

Scripted Sound Improvements?

During the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday October 29th, a question was raised about improving scripted sound capabilities with additional functions and parameters (e.g.  “llLinkPlaySound”, “llLinkStopSound” and “llLinkLoopSound”) which would allow for things like a single looped sound for a vehicle’s engine, with the ability to change the pitch of the sound to emulate the changing engine pitch when accelerating or slowing down without the need for multiple sound clips. This has been coupled with a request to make the prim collision sound being a property of the prim instead of the script.

Commenting on the request as the Server Beta meeting, Maestro indicated that Kelly Linden may be looking into things, although details of exactly what with be implemented, and what calls / parameters, etc., will be used is unclear. For the purposes of frequency modulation, viewer side changes will be required for making any adjustments to sound frequency.

Region Relocations

The subject of making it easier to move entire / large region builds from one region to another (so someone who owns two regions can move the contents of one to the other). currently there is no easy way to accomplish this. Apparently, the capability to ” restore to last position” (now only usable if you have rezzing rights at 0,0,0 within a region) was introduced for precisely this reason when the Linden were moving Adult regions to Zindra in 2010. Whether or not a capability to move region builds in this way would be re-introduced is open to debate; it is quite possible it is something that would not see that much use. Those wanting it, however, might want to file a Bug report (and label it “Feature Request”).

SL project updates: week 44 (1): server, viewer, interest list, anti-griefing

Posted on by Inara Pey
Simulator UG meeting (stock)
Simulator UG meeting (stock)

Server Deployments week 44

As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.

Main Channel

There have been no updates to the Main channel.

Release Candidate Channels

All three release candidate channels received the same new server maintenance package on Tuesday October 29th, which fixed some crash modes.

The reason for the RC channel updates being moved to Tuesday is because there was due to be a planned outage on Wednesday October 30th at the time the deployments usually take place to allow some database work to take place. This would have likely seen log-ins blocked for about an hour. However, Simon Linden believes the work has now been postponed for a week – although the recommendation is to keep a check on the Grid Status page – see the original notice for details.

SL Viewer Updates

A new release candidate appeared in the release channel  on Monday October 28th. Version 3.6.10.282997 has no functional updates, but includes an update to the GPU table.

About the GPU Table

The GPU table is used to define your graphics card to the viewer and the default graphics settings which are applied as a result when you first start the viewer (or if you never adjust them).

Graphics cards are defined by classes (currently 0-5), which can be defined as:

  • 0 – Defaults to low graphics settings. No shaders on by default
  • 1 – Defaults to mid graphics settings. Basic shaders on by default
  • 2 – Defaults to high graphics settings. Atmospherics on by default
  • 3 – Same as 2, but with lighting and shadows(now referred to as Advanced Lighting Model in the viewer) enabled
  • 4 – Same as 3, but with ambient occlusion enabled
  • 5 – Same as 4, but with shadows set to “Sun/Moon+Projectors.”

The table is a .TXT file which is located in a viewer’s installation location on your computer. For Windows, this means it can be found either in C:\Program Files\[viewer name] or in C:\Program Files (x86)\[viewer name] (if you are running a 32-bit version of a viewer on a 64-bit system).

It is not recommended that you amend this file in any way, unless you know what you are doing. You can, however, open it and use it to determine which class your viewer falls under, and the default settings it is given.

To make it easier for those wanting to quickly reference common graphics cards, Garvie Garzo has produced a .PDF file of the table. However, do bear in mind that the table is subject to updates (as the release candidate mentioned above demonstrates), so the PDF may become outdated over time. Also, some TPVs have been working on updating the GPU table themselves.

When perusing the table, cards are listed alphabetically by maker, and the first digit following the card name refers to the class it has been assigned to, while the far right column defines the overall family of GPUs the card belongs to (you may find when viewing the table that the columns do not align well).

The settings within the GPU table are subject to some debate, as they are used to determine which graphics cards present a “reasonable” enough performance in order to have ALM enabled by default. Linden Lab consider anything qualifying as a class 3 or above is capable of adequately running with ALM enabled; some TPVs do not agree.

The problem here is how “reasonable” is defined; it’s a subjective term, and everyone will have their own opinions on the matter. As I reported back in week 39 and week 34, the Lab had statistics to show that class 5 cards GPUs (e.g. ATI Radeon HD 7800, 7900, 8900, 8950 + similar, nVidia GTX 460/460SE, 465, 550TI, 580, 660/660TI + similar) actually performed better with ALM enabled than with it off, while class 4 GPUs showed little difference between having ALM enabled and disabled. However, because measurements do tend to be subjective (again, frame rates, etc., can take on different levels of importance depending upon what you are doing in SL), Oz Linden had been hoping to establish a means by which more controlled testing could be undertaken within the Lab; it’s currently unclear how far this has progressed, if at all.

Interest List Viewer

Andrew Linden revealed that the interest list RC / project viewer (however it appears) is now unlikely to debut before November 12th. “There was a performance regression that we’re working on — lower FPS in project interesting,” he informed the Simulator User Group meeting on October 29th, “Probably because it is rendering more objects — more small objects in view get rendered (that’s my theory anyway).”

Andrew Linden: Anti-griefing Work

Andrew Linden
Andrew Linden

Andrew Linden is back working on various pieces of anti-griefing work.

For obvious reasons, he doesn’t want to go into specifics, but he did indicate that he’s looking to address new griefing modes that are aimed at estate managers. He’s also been thinking about ” raising the arms race against landbots”, although he admits he is “still in the planning/discovery phase on that.”

There are a number of other items in his list as well he may well be taking a look at.

Other Items

Slow loading Sculpts?

Some people are reporting they are seeing sculpts loading a lot more slowly since the last set of server-side interest list updates. It’s not clear how widespread this might be or if it is a possible placebo effect. For his part, Andrew Linden felt that sculpts potentially download faster with the interest list viewer code (which, as noted above, has yet to make a public debut), but again he caveated why this might appear to be the case. Andrew indicated he’ll look a little more into this.

Last Owner / Previous Owner

Many TPVs expose details of the “last owner” of an object through the build floater. A request has been passed to make this information, which is stored as a field in the object data, accessible through scripts. Both Simon and Andrew Linden didn’t see why this could not be done, with Andrew stating he’ll see what’s involved and will look to someone to nudge him about it next week.