Tag: SL Viewer

SL projects update week 9/1: server releases, viewer updates

Posted on by Inara Pey

Server Deployments: week 9

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

Main (SLS) Channel

On Tuesday February 25th, the Main channel was updated with the server maintenance package previously on all three RCs, which comprises the following:

  • Fix for BUG-5034 “If an EM restarts a region and then teleports out immediately, the EM will disconnect just after teleport”
  • Fixed a rare case in which e-mails read by LSL scripts immediately after rez or region change would sometimes be missing the message body
  • Fixed some crash modes

Release Candidate Channels

On Wednesday February 26th, the Release Candidate channels should be updated as follows:

  • BlueSteel and LeTigre should receive an infrastructure update, with no functional changes
  • Magnum should also receive the infrastructure update, and in addition have the server-side AIS v3 code enabled (the code having already been rolled-out to the grid – see the AIS section of my week 7 report). This code requires viewer-side updates to work (currently available as a project viewer), and should Improve performance and reliability when changing outfits (see my AIS reports in this blog).

SL Viewer Updates

HTTP Viewer Promoted

The HTTP viewer, version 3.7.2.286707 was promoted to the de facto release viewer on February 25th. This currently leaves just two RC viewers in the release channel: the Maintenance RC (3.7.2.286708) and the Interest List viewer (3.6.14.285213), both of which should  be rebuilt using the HTTP viewer code base in due course.

Sunshine / AIS Viewer

With only two RCs in the release channel, it is possible the Sunshine / AIS viewer may be moved to release candidate status this week. Given that the server-side AIS code is starting to be enabled on the main grid, this viewer could be on course to reach a release status in week 11.

Group Ban Lists

Baker Linden is currently filing for the server-side code to be deployed to Aditi, which he hopes will happen by the end of the week. In the meantime, he describes the status of the Viewer code as, “testing it for compatibility with old viewers and such. Once that’s stable and I know I didn’t break anything, I’ll start filing for the viewer to become a release candidate.”

Other Items

Region Restart Oopsie

The new on-screen region restart warning, accompanied by a sound and camera shake
The new on-screen region restart warning, accompanied by a sound and camera shake

A slight issue has come to light with the recently implemented new region restart alert, now active in the SL viewer and in the most recent updates to a number of TPVs. Essentially, the sound accompanying the 5-minute countdown (and which is played alongside the camera shake at the top of each minute in the countdown) is actually played in-world rather than locally.

The result is that if there are several avatars close together who are using viewers with the new restart alert code, the noise can either be very loud or something of a mess (particularly if some of those users have opted to set custom warning sounds within their viewer).

The fix is relatively straightforward, and will doubtless be incorporated into an upcoming viewer release. In the meantime, the Firestorm team have implemented their own fix ready for the next release of that viewer due in early(ish) in March, which will be the first version of Firestorm to incorporate the new code.

Pocket Metaverse Users Inadvertently Blocked at Weekend

There were a number of reports over the weekend that users on the iOS Pocket Metaverse third-party client were unable to log-in to Second Life, as a result of their hardware being blocked. This caused a number of forum posts on the subject, such as this one and this one, and some upset on Twitter.

It turned out the client was apparently presenting the wrong information to LL’s servers, triggering the hardware block. On becoming aware of the problem, the Lab immediately set about reversing the blocks, and the matter appeared to be cleared-up by the end of the weekend.

The Pocket Metaverse issue caused some users to complain on Twitter, prompting a resonse from Ebbe Altberg
The Pocket Metaverse issue caused some users to complain on Twitter, prompting a response from Ebbe Altberg

SL projects news week 8/1: server, viewer and log-in issue PSA

Posted on by Inara Pey

My apologies for the late release of this update; things have been a little bit hectic, and I’ve been rushing to catch-up on posts and news.

Server Deployments: week 8 – recap

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

  • As there was no update to the RC channels in week 7, there was no update to the Main channel on Tuesday February 18th.
  • On Wednesday February 19th, all three RCs received a new server maintenance package which comprised the following updates:
    • Fix for BUG-5034 “If an EM restarts a region and then teleports out immediately, the EM will disconnect just after teleport”
    • Fixed a rare case in which e-mails read by LSL scripts immediately after rez or region change would sometimes be missing the message body
    • Fixed some crash modes
Maestro Linden
Maestro Linden

The region restart issue (BUG-5034) was described in part 2 of my week 7 report.

Commenting on the e-mail issue during the Server Beta Meeting on Thursday February 20th, Maestro Linden said:

The other bug fix was for some obscure e-mail issue that Kelly found, where e-mails to LSL scripts would be missing their message bodies under very obscure circumstances. Nobody’s filed a bug report about that happening, so maybe nobody ever saw it regularly.

 In this case you’d see the e-mail, and see the subject but not the body. Or rather, I guess the body would be an empty string … I guess you’d only know if you had sent the e-mail yourself.

 According to Kelly, it would only happen during a very narrow time window as the sim was starting up, so I could imagine most people who saw it once just shrugging after the issue didn’t occur a second time.

SL Viewer Updates

  • The Maintenance release RC was updated on Tuesday February 18th to version 3.7.2.286708
  • The HTTP RC was updated on Wednesday, February 19th to version 3.7.2.286707
  • The Google Breakpad RC has been removed from the release channel, having completed this round of tests.

Group Ban Lists

There’s not much more to report here than last week. Commenting on the overall status of the work at the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday February 18th, Baker Linden said:

I’m in the last stages of code cleanup and ensuring there aren’t any major bugs (which QA will surely find) and I’m wrapping everything up for deployment to Aditi this week (server-side stuff only right now).

 It’s not clear if the server code did reach Aditi, or whether it may appear in week 9. Commenting on the status at the Server Beta meeting later in the week, Maestro Linden indicated the code was “inching closer to Aditi”, and will be available “as soon as we’re confident that the backend host and simulators are playing nicely. If there’s a bug which is definitely viewer-only, that’s not a blocker for Aditi at all.”

Materials Handling

Scripted Control

The ability to control materials (normal and specular maps) via scripts has been an oft-discussed topic in User Group meetings and the subject of MATBUG-359.  The subject was again raised at the Simulator User Group Meeting on Tuesday February 18th, to which Simon replied, “I’ve been looking into that, and hope to get to it soon, but it keeps getting pushed back with other more immediate issues cropping up.”

One of the concerns with scripted control of materials maps in that if manual changes are made to materials too quickly in the build floater, they will often revert, as if the server is unhappy in receiving  too many quick updates. Commenting on this, Simon added:

That’s an interesting point and something we’ll have to look at after doing the basic scripting change.   If it’s somehow worse than the current scripted texture changes, we’ll have to have some sort of throttle to slow it down.

The question was raised on why normal and specular maps appear to work different to diffuse (texture maps), with the server better able to handle fast changes to textures when compared to normal and specular maps. Simon indicated that both normal and specular maps are handled differently in order to minimise the impact of multiple usage.  Expanding on this is terms of scripted control, he went on:

I was just looking at the materials code, and the complication this has compared to regular textures is how materials have their own layer of special data packaging instead of a just a UUID on a face.  I’m not sure yet how script access is going to thrash that data or not.

There also may be something of a cost / benefit issue within the Lab when it comes to adding scripted control to materials – would the potential uses be broad enough to justify the time required to avoid issues of data thrashing, introducing throttles on updates, etc. Hence Simon asked for some specific examples of where scripted control of materials would be beneficial, so he could carry them back to the Lab’s product managers.

Continue reading “SL projects news week 8/1: server, viewer and log-in issue PSA” →

SL project updates 7/3: viewer updates, AIS and misc items

Posted on by Inara Pey

The following notes are taken from the TPV Developer meeting of Friday February 14th, a video of which is included below. My thanks, as ever, to North for the latter. Timestamps relative to the recording are given in braces both at the start of each section and within the text where appropriate.

SL Viewer

Release Viewer Update

[01:20] The Facebook Hotfix RC (version 3.7.1.286557) released on February 12th was promoted to the de facto release viewer on Friday February 14th. Based on the Fitted Mesh viewer code, this viewer has a single fix for a  problem in the in-viewer web browser that made it impossible to login correctly into Facebook. The rapid promotion was made because the issue was seen as obnoxious by those people who have connected their SL and Facebook accounts, and it was felt those who do may want to post Valentines-related messages and images to their Facebook accounts.

HTTP RC

Robbie Monty Linden sports new look
Robbie Monty Linden sports new look

[02:32 and 36:56] As noted in part 2 of this report, the HTTP viewer has been rebuilt using the Facebook Hotfix / Fitted Mesh viewer code to version  3.7.1.286567.

However, it has suffered from the number of RCs currently in the queue, or as poor Monty put it, getting “stuck behind everyone”.  This  viewer has one of the lowest crash rates on record as an RC, and given this, the expectation is that it will be promoted to release status “pretty soon”.

One of the major issues Monty faced with the viewer-side updates was directly related to mesh, and thread race conditions, and he admits that not all of these have been resolved. This is partially due to some of them being  infrastructure-related Heisenbugs, which are time and labour-intensive to resolve. However, they shouldn’t impact the stability of the updates made to date.

Remaining RC viewers

[03:54] The three remaining RC viewers  – the Maintenance RC (3.6.14.285499), Interest List RC (3.6.14.285213) and Google Breakpad RC (3.6.14.285686) are in the process of being rebuilt to the 3.7.1 release code, so updated versions should be appearing in the release channel in the next week (ish).

Project Viewers

[04:23]

  • It is unclear whether the Merchant Outbox project viewer (3.6.13.284731) will move forward or pulled back to have some more work done on it, and it is unlikely to move towards viewer release “any time soon”
  • The Sunshine / AIS v3 project viewer was rebuilt to the 3.7.1 code (Fitted Mesh and the Facebook Hotfix), with a new version (3.7.1.286565) appearing on February 14th. It is anticipated that this viewer will move forward to a release candidate status fairly quickly now that the Facebook Hotfix has been promoted, reducing the number of viewer RC cohorts currently in the release channel.

AIS v3

[05:16 and 14:50] A surprising piece of news passed-on in the meeting was that the AIS v3 server-side code has been deployed across all channels on the Main grid. This initially caused some confusion during the meeting , as there has been no mention of this in any server-side release notes. Nyx Linden queried the situation with the ops tem and received a confirmation that the new AIS capabilities had been deployed to Agni [21:40, via text], but are currently disabled [22:29 via text]. It would seem likely that the capabilities will be enabled once the Sunshine / AIS v3 project viewer moves to release candidate status.

Voice

vivox[07:35] There have been a number of issues with regards to voice in SL, particularly of late. As noted in my week 6 report, there was some recent back-end work carried out which should improve things for those using viewers running with the most recent versions of the voice SDK (SLvoice.exe).

Discussing the matter at the TPV Developer meeting, Oz Linden revealed that Vivox had reached out to the Lab to assist with issues being experienced, and as a result of this underlined the issues with viewers using older versions of the SDK (and which will not see any real improvements to their voice performance as a result). Vivox have requested that TPVs provide details on any older versions of the SDK they are running, and details of specific issues they are encountering, as well as offering encouragement to update.

As a new version of the SDK is due to be released in the near future (hopefully within a couple of weeks), it may prove to be an opportunity for TPVs to update, given it has a number of audio quality fixes and Vivox have offered to assist in dealing with issues being experienced with voice in SL.

In addition to this, Oz is looking to work with Vivox to try to get any new versions of the SDK used by the viewer made available to TPVs at the same time it is made available to the Lab, thus eliminating the need for TPVs having to wait for LL to QA and integrate the package into the LL code prior to being able to merge it into their own code, allowing them to test new SDK releases in parallel with the Lab. These will hopefully include 64-bit binaries of the SDK as well a 32-bit versions.

Group Ban Lists

[48:23] It had been hoped that Baker Linden might be providing an update on the overall status of his group ban list work. However, this was unfortunately not the case, although Oz provided a small update on things, stating that he has been able to sit down with Baker to review the updated viewer code, which is now with QA. Hopefully this means it will be appearing in at least a project viewer in the near future.

Continue reading “SL project updates 7/3: viewer updates, AIS and misc items” →

SL projects update 7/2: server and viewer

Posted on by Inara Pey
Ther Server Beta UG meeting, Thursday February 13th, 2014
The Server Beta UG meeting, Thursday February 13th, 2014

Server Deployments: week 7 – recap

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

  • On Tuesday February 11th, the Main channel received the server maintenance package previously deployed to the RC channels in week 6, which includes a crash fix.
  • There  were no updates to the RC channels.

Upcoming Deployments – week 8

As there was no deployment to the RC channels this week, there is nothing to be promoted to the Main channel in week 8 (week commencing Monday 17th February). However, according to Maestro Linden, speaking at the Server Beta meeting on Thursday February 13th, there will a new maintenance package deployed to the RCs on Wednesday February 19th.

This will include a fix for an issue reported in BUG-5034, whereby if an Estate Manager restarts a region and then immediately teleports out when there are no other avatars in the region, the Estate Manager will be logged out of Second Life just after the teleport completes.

That Estate Managers tend to encounter the issue may be purely down to the fact they are the last to leave a region on a manual restart; there are reports of some being disconnected when teleporting out of a region during a rolling restart.

The issue has been problematic for the Lab to reproduce, and is possibly related to users with higher ping times. The thinking is that the restart is occurring before the avatar is properly reported as having left the region (there is still a child agent present), so the viewer ends up disconnecting. The fix being implemented is to adjust the restart process so the simulator waits just a little longer prior to the actual restart being initiated.

SL Viewer Updates

HTTP RC

Following the promotion of the Fitted Mesh viewer to the de facto release viewer on February 10th, The HTTP RC became the first of the existing RC viewer to be updated to include the Fitted Mesh code and was updated to version 3.7.1.286567 on February 13th.

Facebook Hotfix RC

A new RC appeared on February 12th, with the release of version 3.7.1.286557 on February 12th. This again includes the Fitted Mesh code, but the release is actually to fix a problem in the viewer’s built-in web browser which makes it impossible to login correctly into Facebook.

This puts the total count of current RC cohorts in the viewer release channel at 5, so it is unlikely there will be further RC viewers appearing until this list has been thinned down a little (which does not mean there will be no releases of any project viewers waiting in the works).

Avatar Physics

The arrival of fitted Mesh, which works with most avatar physics (except belly), has led to renewed discussion over issues around problems with avatar physics being so dependent upon viewer frame rates, with the result that lower frame rates can result in wildly exaggerated movement (see both  VWR-25545 (publicly viewable) and FIRE-12386. for details).

Whether or not the issue will be addressed (or can be reasonably addressed) remains to be seen; how many people actually use avatar physics is unclear. However, the fact that avatar physics can be used with fitted Mesh may see a wider use of the former as the latter gains more of a foothold, in turn increasing calls for the issue to be dealt with.

SL projects update week 7/1: server / viewer

Posted on by Inara Pey

News is a little light at the moment., although there are a number of things in the works and yet to be opened to public viewing.

Server Deployments: week 7

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

  • On Tuesday February 11th, the Main channel received the server maintenance package previously on the three RC channels which includes a crash fix.
  • There will be no RC channel deployments, and it is not anticipated that the RC regions will not be subject to a rolling restart.

This means there will be no Main channel deployment in week 8 (week commencing Monday February 17th. However, there should be a new server maintenance package deployed that week.

SL Viewer Updates

Fitted Mesh

The Fitted Mesh RC version: 3.7.0.286015 was promoted to the de facto release viewer on Monday February 10th, complete with a video from Torley Linden.

See my coverage here, and my Fitted Mesh preview article (now slightly dated).

As a result of this, the remaining RC viewers will be updated in due course to match the current release build.

Group Ban Lists

The work on group ban list functionality is going through a further round of internal testing at LL. It is still anticipated that a project viewer will be emerging for testing on Aditi (the Beta grid) in the very near future.

SL projects news 6/1: Server, viewer, SSA and AIS project viewer

Posted on by Inara Pey
Simulator User Group meeting, Tuesday February 4th
Simulator User Group meeting, Tuesday February 4th

Server Deployments: week 6

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

Main (SLS) Channel

On Tuesday February 4th, the Main channel received the server maintenance package previously on the three RC channels, which includes a crash mode fix and a fix for llModifyLand() modifying the wrong location in region, when called in a child prim.

Speaking at the Server Beta meeting on Thursday January 23rd, Maestro Linden described this fix thus:

For example, if a child prim is offset by <8,4,0> from the root prim, then calling that function in the child prim will try to modify the terrain at <8,4,0>  of the region,  which may or may not work depending on who owns the parcel.

The fix is to make it modify the land underneath the child prim (which of course follows the same permissions rules – you can only modify land owned by the script owner.

Release Candidate Channels

On Wednesday February 5th, all three RCs should receive a new server maintenance package, which includes a crash fix.

SL Viewer Updates

Google Breakpad

Google Breakpad reappeared in the viewer release channel as an RC (version 3.6.14.285686, dated January 29th) on February 4th. As per usual, the RC does not contain any functional changes or updates, but contains a Google Breakpad updates and restructures the crash reporting mechanism to support out of process crash reporting. These changes will give the development team more call stacks from crashes more frequently, to improve the triaging and debugging of issues.

HTTP Viewer

The HTTP RC gained a further update on Monday, February 3rd, with the release of  version 3.6.14.286010, although it had been anticipated this viewer might update to the de facto release viewer this week.

AIS v3

The Server-side Appearance “polish” and AIS v3 project viewer, version 3.6.14.285190 was released on Tuesday February 4th. In terms of SSA This includes:

  • Stability and performance improvements for SSA: retry logic, removing redundant requests, detecting various appearance stuck conditions.
  • Code cleanup with the removal of a lot of code related to the old client-side baking framework.
  • Bug fixes, mostly appearance-related
  • Support for AIS v3 (which requires server-side updates.

For more information, see my announcement of the release.

Group Ban Lists

Baker Linden continues to work on Group Ban Lists, commenting at the Simulator User Group meeting on Tuesday February 4th that, “I’m finally finished with (what I think is) the major viewer side changes, so I’ll be getting everything ready this week for a deploy hopefully in the next upcoming weeks, so be ready to test the crap out of group bans on Aditi soon!”