Tag: SL Viewer

SL projects updates 11/3: TPV developer meeting, March 14th

Posted on by Inara Pey

A TPV developer meeting took place on Friday March 14th. The core items discussed in the meeting are reported below, with timestamps in the relevant paragraphs indicating the point at they are discussed in the video embedded here. My thanks as always to North for the latter.

SL Viewer Updates

[0:01:37] The list of release candidates in the release channel remains unchanged from part two of this week’s projects updates, and as per my Current Viewer Releases page.

FmodEx RC

[0:01:44] The FmodEx Hotfix viewer RC (version 3.7.4.287875), is a fix Monty Linden has been working on, and is described by Oz Linden as:

A threading problem that at least manifests when there are various FmodEx things going on, but is not strictly speaking an FmodEx problem. We think that was a good and important fix, but it doesn’t seem to have done all we hoped it would do yet.

Whether or not this is a fix TPVs would need to implement quickly or not is down to how they have implemented FmodEx.

Voice RC

[0:02:38] The Voice RC is essentially the release viewer with the Vivox 4.6.x SLvoice plugin packaged with it for Windows and Mac. Commenting on in from a Mac perspective, Oz Linden indicated that it does appear to solve a number of issues, such as working with an iPhone headset adaptor, which was an issue with earlier versions, as well as addressing some Mavericks related issues.

[0:11:11] There has been some confusion over the latest SDK supplied by Vivox, in that only the Windows and Mac versions of 4.6.x have so far been supplied; the Linux version is still an older version. It’s unclear as to when the Linux Vivox SDK will be supplied, as this is apparently seen as a “lower priority” compared to Windows and Mac, although the Lab is working on Vivox to try to improve matters. The Lab is also working to try to get 64-bit versions of the Vivox SDK, which could then be made available to those TPVs building 64-bit versions of their viewers.

Interest List RC

[0:41:54] Concern is raised as the number of updates which form a part of the interest list RC viewer, and whether these may leave TPVs with another “CHUI situation” when trying to merge things.  The repository for the viewer has been available since the viewer reached RC status, however, Oz went on to comment:

There’s a bunch of refactoring of things that people decided needed refactoring as a part of the process [and] which may or may not have been strictly needed as [a] part of interest lists; that is, part of the functional change that that branch is doing. Some of it was a new trace capability that’s used in a bunch of places where they wanted to take the measurements they wanted to take about it.

The interest list RC is working its way towards release status ... slowly ...
The interest list RC is working its way towards release status … slowly …

There have been various stability issues with the interest list RC, hence why it has remained an RC rather than being promoted to the de facto release viewer. However, it is now reaching the point where its stability is comparable to that of the other RCs in the release channel – and is actually better than some.

In terms of merges, there is the potential for the interest list viewer to cause TPVs some problems, as there appear to be changes to llCommons and other libraries which are causing issues for those TPVs which have attempted a merge.

Google Breakpad

[0:04:53] The Google Breakpad RC is due to make another appearance, as a “bunch of issues have been wrestled to the ground”, and the hope is that when it does appear in the release channel, it will mark the last round of updates for that particular project, and those TPVs using Google Breakpad are advised to take a look at what the Lab has done.

Overall Status for RCs

[0:04:10] Overall, it appears as if none of the RCs are performing as well as the Lab would like them to be in terms of crash rates. It had been hoped that the FmodEx Hotfix RC would get the Lab back below what Oz referred to as “an acceptable, if not admirable, crash rate”, but it has not done so as yet.However, the other RCs in the channel should see updates released in week 12 (week commencing Monday March 17th), one or more of which may improve the crash rates.

[0:43:56] In terms of what does get promoted next, the most likely candidate will be the RC which shows clear evidence that it is reducing the crash rate compared to current levels across the release and RC viewers.

[0:05:27] In the meantime, because of the volume of RCs sitting in the release channel, the Lab are holding back a number of further RCs,. These include the Project Zipper (faster installer) viewer being updated to RC status, and the group ban viewer (although there are bugs in this which are still being worked upon). There is also likely to be a further Snowstorm RC appearing with a mix of code contributions, again once the number of viewers currently in the release channel is thinned-down a little.

Continue reading “SL projects updates 11/3: TPV developer meeting, March 14th” →

SL projects updates week 11/1: server, viewer, group bans

Posted on by Inara Pey
Simulator User Group meeting (stock)
Simulator User Group meeting (stock)

Server Deployments: week 11

As always, please refer to the server deployment thread in the forums for the latest updates / changes.

Main (SLS) Channel

On Tuesday March 11th, the Main channel was updated with the server maintenance project deployed the BlueSteel and LeTigre channels  in week 10. This contains the following bug fixes:

  • Fixed a bug in which the server release notes link in “About Second Life” would sometimes fail to appear
  • Fixed a bug in which certain objects had incorrect status when crossing between regions
  • Fixed a crash mode.

A question in the forum thread following the week 10 deployments  about the nature of the fix for “bug in which certain objects had incorrect status when crossing between regions” was responded to by Maestro Linden, who explained the fix was limited to what appears to be a single-case issue.

Release Candidate Channels

On Wednesday March 12th, BlueSteel and LeTigre should join Magnum in having support for a new version of the inventory service, AISv3, enabled.  This service requires the use of the Project Sunshine RC viewer.

SL Viewer Updates

On Monday March 10th, the Maintenance RC viewer was promoted to the de facto release viewer, version 3.7.3.287491 (download) – release notes are here.

A new hotfix release candidate appeared on Tuesday March 11th. The FmodEx Hotfix version 3.7.4.287875 (download and release notes) is intended to correct a suspected thread race crasher in the FmodEx audio streaming library.

Otherwise, all other viewers remain as listed in my Current Viewer Releases page.

Group Ban list

Baker Linden, ironing-out viewer-side issues with Group Bans
Baker Linden, ironing-out viewer-side issues with Group Bans

Baker Linden is working to fix issues which were picked-up on during some initial public testing of the Group Ban functionality on Aditi during the Server Beta User group meeting on Thursday March 6th. Those issues already identified with the viewer code can be found here.

Allowing for further testing and scheduling, the current plan is to have the server-side elements of the Group Ban functionality deployed across Agni prior to the viewer code being released in an RC viewer.

Until that happens, the viewer code will either remain as a direct download or may filter into a project viewer at some point once the server code is ready to start being deployed on Agni (there is currently no date as to when this will be).

Currently, the development viewer is available for Windows or Mac OSX or Linux, but the group ban functions will only work on the Aditi test regions such as in Morris (at the Server Beta UG meeting area).

JIRA: Old BUG issues Can be Made Visible

The re-opening of the JIRA occurred in week 10, and at the time, only BUG issues raised after the re-opening would be available to public scrutiny. However, it now appears as if reporters have the option of re-opening their old issues to public viewing if they so wish. Callak Skytower, for example, has made BUG-4427 publicly viewable once more.

Other Items

Group Role Updates

An issue with group roles was raised at the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday March 11th. If a member of a group is assigned a new / additional role, the update occurs server-side, and is reflected in the Group floater for the owner / officer (or whoever is empowered to grant roles), but the change is not reflected in the Group floater of the person who has been granted the new / additional role until such it as they either re-log or are sent a re-invitation to join the group.

This has not been a cause of major concern, possibly because there is little in the way of role re-assignments occurring in groups on a daily basis. It is not currently clear as to whether the matter will be addressed, although there was general agreement that updates to role assignments should require something like a relog in order to be seen in the Group floater.

My thanks to mona Eberhardt and Rex Cronin for the meeting transcripts.

Sunshine viewer updates reach RC status, new Vivox RC

Posted on by Inara Pey

On Wednesday March 5th, two new release candidate viewers appeared in the viewer release channel, bringing the total number of RC viewers back up to five, with more still sitting in the queue and yet to be seen, together with some project viewers as well.

Sunshine Release Candidate

The Sunshine RC (version 3.7.3.287158 – download and release notes) contains the latest updates related to Server-side Appearance (Project Sunshine, hence the viewer’s name), which comprise two key elements.

The initial AIS v3 updates are aimed at further improving the reliability of SSA baking, including issues where
Part of the Sunshine viewer updates is aimed at improving the reliability and performance of the  baking process & resolving issues, including those where an avatar’s appearance may appear to be stuck

The first of these is a code-clean-up / polish which includes the removal of a lot of the old avatar baking code from the viewer, as this is no longer required for Second Life, and the removal of a number of redundant viewer requests related to avatar baking operations. In addition, the code has performance and stability improvements and bug fixes, all designed to further improve avatar baking, such as dealing with conditions where an avatar’s appearance may appear to be stuck.

The second part of the update – which is related to SSA – is the support for the Advanced Inventory System version 3 (AIS v3). This is a set of changes which are being made both to the viewer and to the simulator software. Currently, the simulator code is only available on the Magnum RC, and will be progressing to the other RCs and the Main channel in due course. However, the viewer code is compatible with both the “new” simulator AIS v3 code and the current AIS v2 code, so this release candidate can be used freely across the grid.

The functions initially being deployed with AIS v3 (server and viewer) are mostly related to improving the reliability of outfit changes, which should also improve performance and see a drop in failure rates once the AIS v3 simulator code is fully enabled across the grid, and the necessary viewer code merged into all viewers.

Longer-term, AIS v3 has broader goals, as Don Linden explained at a TPV Developer meeting back in October 2013 (see the section titled Advanced Inventory Service (AIS v3)). These are (in part) aimed at giving more control to the viewer about what it wants to do with the inventory without necessarily having to go through the simulator when working with one’s own inventory or the Library inventory; the viewer will communicate directly with the inventory service. However, certain capabilities will remain unchanged; avatar-to-avatar inventory transactions will still be handled via the simulator, and it will still not be possible to copy personal items to the library folders, for example.

TPVs will be integrating this code so that their users will benefit from the SSA improvements, although the release of TPV updates with the code may take a little longer where there is s need to avoid the removal of the “old” avatar baking code to maintain support for OpenSim users.

 Voice Viewer Release Candidate

vivoxAs many who routinely use voice will be aware, there have been issues with voice for some considerable time, some of which were exacerbated recently with the release of the Vivox API  4.5, updates used in recent versions of the SLvoice.exe plugin which did not play well with earlier versions of SLvoice.

Whirly Fizzle and Ed Merryman produced a couple of videos demonstrating the issues, one of which is included below.

As I recently reported, Vivox reached out to Linden Lab to help resolve many of these issues, and a starting-point for this work was seen as getting all viewers updated to the latest version of the Vivox API (4.6.x). This release candidate viewer (version 3.7.3.287288 – download and release notes) includes the updated API in the SLvoice plugin, and is aimed at improving voice reliability and performance as well as hoping dealing with some of the significant issues users on Mac Mavericks have been experiencing.

To encourage TPVs to integrate the Vivox updates into their own offerings, the autobuild packages for generating the new voice modules for the viewer have been made available to TPVs, allowing them to test new voice builds alongside LL rather than having to wait for the Lab to build, test and release new voice plugins.

It is also hoped that once built, the new modules will be binary compatible and have no related viewer code changes, potentially allowing TPVs to offer the updates directly to their users who prefer to run older versions of a viewer, thus allowing them to (hopefully) resolve their voice issues without being forced to update their viewer if they’re not ready.

If you use the official SL viewer, and you have been experiencing problems with voice, you may want to manually download and run this RC if you haven’t been selected to receive it as part of the RC testing.

Related Links

SL projects update week 10/1: server, viewer, JIRA

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

Server Deployments: week 10

As always, please refer to the server deployment thread in the forums for the latest updates / changes.

Main (SLS) Channel

On Tuesday March 4th, the Main channel was updated with the infrastructure update deployed the RC channels  in week 9.

Release Candidate Channels

On Wednesday March 5th, the three RC channels should be updated as follows:

  • BlueSteel and LeTigre should receive a new server maintenance project which contains the following bug fixes:
    • Fixed a bug in which the server release notes link in “About Second Life” would sometimes fail to appear
    • Fixed a bug in which certain objects had incorrect status when crossing between regions
    • Fixed a crash mode
  • Magnum will remain on the same version as week 9, which comprises the infrastructure update and enables support for a new version of the inventory service, AISv3.  To make use of this new feature, login with the Sunshine Project Viewer.

SL Viewer Updates

The Merchant Outbox viewer appeared as a release candidate (version 3.7.3.287344) on Monday March 3rd. This viewer addresses some of the problems affecting some users when using the Merchant Outbox, as specified in the release notes and my report here.

A new Snowstorm viewer is expected to surface in the viewer release channel as an RC the near future. Among other things, this should contain STORM-1831, which is designed 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. The server-side support for this was deployed at the start of 2014, and the viewer code,  contribution from Ima Mechanic with help from Oz Linden,  has been a little held-up in making its way through the Lab’s QA process. However, referring to it at the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday March 4th, Oz indicated the code is now on the “home stretch”.

JIRA Re-opening

There is still no news as to when this week the JIRA will be re-opened. There is also a question as to whether the re-opening will allow all reports to be viewed by anyone, or whether it will only apply to those reports filed once it has been reopened. Note that this is currently a question over the re-opening, not an actual official statement from the Lab. We’ll doubtless learn more once the necessary changes have been made to open-up the JIRA system once more.

Other Items

llSetKeyframedMotion: object stalls and autoreturn defeats

Prior to his departure from the Lab, Andrew Linden was approached by Talarus Luan about issues with llSetKeyframedMotion. Essentially, a number of issues have been reported with objects (such as vehicles) using the function, including:

  • SVC-7556 – Objects with llSetKeyframedMotion() stop running after region restarts (Talarus’ issue)
  • SVC-7787 – Objects using llSetKeyframedMotion() can defeat a parcel’s autoreturn if they travel to and from another parcel
  • BUG-1624

Responding to the issue of SVC-7556, Simon Linden said, “suspending in the middle of KF motion and resuming with that huge time jump sounds really ugly. I haven’t tried it, but if you want to code for that, it might be best to detect the region restart event, reset the position and re-start the key frame motion.” In terms of the Lab dealing with it, he admitted, “given the other things that need attention, it’s not likely to get to the top of the list soon.”

With regards to SVC-7787, his news was in a similar vein, “That is how parcel timing is designed … it measures the current time in the parcel, so if you leave and come back, it’s reset. So there’s a loophole there, yes … and I don’t think we’ve come up with a good alternative. “

Merchant Outbox viewer reaches release candidate status

Posted on by Inara Pey

Even with Direct Delivery being the norm now for SL Marketplace deliveries, some SL merchants are still experiencing problems with the Merchant’s Outbox functionality. To help deal with this, the Lab issued a project viewer at the start of January 2014 which included a number of fixes for some of the issues being encountered.

On March 3rd, this Merchant Outbox viewer moved to the viewer release channel as a release candidate viewer – version 3.7.3.287344. The core issues addressed by this viewer are listed in the release notes as:

  • ACME-1219 Merchant Outbox viewer crashes on Exit on Windows 7
  • ACME-1220 User needs to click OK twice to dismiss Merchant Outbox notification
  • ACME-1221 Merchant Outbox Initialization fails with 404 error with new account in Merchant Outbox viewer
  • MAINT-2287 Merchant Outbox panel unusable and unrecoverable if outbox folder disappears
  • MAINT-2301 Send to Marketplace from Merchant Outbox says it fails when it doesn’t
  • MAINT-2452 Merchant outbox with genuine failure “409 conflict” causes all further imports to fail
  • MAINT-3319 Merchant outbox: Second Life 3.6.8 (282375) build – results when user has a merchant outbox misplaced in inventory.
  • MAINT-3320 Viewer crash when deleting trash which contains Merchant Outbox

(Note that while JIRA links are given, they will result in a permission violation warning until such time as the JIRA is re-opened, which is anticipated for later in week 10.).

So, if you have been encountering issue with the Merchant Outbox, and while it may not solve all woes, it might be worth giving this release candidate a try. Hopefully, with the release of this RC, the code should also now more readily filter through to TPVs in the coming weeks / months.

Zipping through the viewer installation process

Posted on by Inara Pey

secondlifeThe Lab has released a curious new project viewer on Wednesday March 26th.

Project Zipper (currently version 3.7.2.286810 is designed to speed-up the viewer installation process. A blog post on the viewer has also been released, which reads in full:

As we continue to work on improving the Second Life experience, one challenge we’ve been tackling is the length of the Viewer installation process. No one likes waiting, and now with Project Zipper, you don’t have to!

With the project Viewer available today, there’s really only one thing different – the installation is super fast. Rather than waiting for install to complete, you’ll quickly be in Second Life doing what you love.

Try out Project Zipper with the project Viewer here.

This is still a project Viewer, and if you find bugs while testing it out, please let us know by filing them in BUG project in JIRA.

To try-out the new installation process, I opted to run a clean install of the current release version of the viewer (3.7.2.286707) and a similar clean install with the Project Zipper viewer, and carry out a rough-and-ready timing between the two. I starting the stopwatch on clicking the Install button, and stopped when the Start Second Life Now prompt appeared. The results were:

  • Second Life release viewer 3.7.2.286707: 35.6 seconds
  • Second Life Project Zipper viewer 3.7.2.286810: 16.4 seconds.
the installer run faster, but don't expect to see any differences in the familiar on-screen messages
The installer runs faster, but don’t expect to see any differences in the familiar on-screen messages

Nothing has physically changed in what you see during the installation process, but the faster time is pretty clear (at least on my system – YMMV depending on CPU, disk speed, etc).

This seems to be an odd change to make, and I can’t help but wonder if it is indicative of something else coming down the pipe. Time will tell on that.

Those wishing to try out the project viewer, which I believe should be fully up to par with the HTTP updates in the release viewer, can do so by following the links above in the quoted LL blog post, or below.

Related Links