#SL Server-Scripting News Week 10-11

There is not much happening. The Release Channels had the Inventory Apps Package running. That package is not going to roll to the main grid. So, there will be no roll to the main channel.

llGiveInventoryList()

A change to llGiveInventoryList() began  impacting people last Thursday, as the Release Channel rolls were delayed one day. Those using RLV and selling RLV related products started to encounter problems when in the Blue Steel and Le Tigre release channels.

Server-Scripting Meeting

By Sunday Kitty and Marine, movers and shakers of the RLV features, had found the problem and filed a JIRA. It got lots of community support and scorching flames. By Monday morning the Lindens realized they had broken a significant part of Second Life. The result is this Wednesday, 3/14, the change to llGiveInventoryList() will be rolled back.

This sets Direct Delivery and the Received Items Folder back some degree. Some means of handling llGiveInventoryList() has to be planned and decided on. The Receive Items folder is also undergoing some revisions.

The result is nothing new makes it to the main channel.

This is an example of the current release channel testing process working. The nerfing of llGiveInventoryList() made it through QA and was ready to roll to the main channel. During its time on the release channels a major user case was found. Now it is being corrected. Only a minor part of the grid was affected. Without the release channel process, the problem would have affected the entire grid and everyone would have had to suffer with the problem.

Some things do work as intended.

New Release Channel Roll

There are no packages ready for the release channels. So, there will likely be no new packages running in the RC’s this week.

Encroachment Return

This seems to have been in progress forever. Andrew has written a script to go through the thousands of SL servers and enable the feature. Once activated one will be able to return encroaching prims and mega prims. Previously if the center of a prim was on another’s land, but part of it encroached into your land, there was nothing one could do about it. This feature will now let you return such objects.

Andrew is not sure when they will run the script and activates Encroaching Object Return. He is waiting for input from the support teams on the timing.

There is some trepidation about activating the feature. The Lindens think they have it working. It has been through QA and the RC’s. But, it is only when a feature reaches the main channel that it can be known to work.

The Linden and Mole built roads, trees, ad other public works are believed to be immune to the feature. In limited circumstances all work as they should. But, there is some confusion over whether the bounding box or the physics shape will be used in certain cases. Things are too complex for certainly. We’ll find out when they activate the feature.

In the mean time Andrew is testing.

Networking Fixes

Simon Linden says Kelly and he have been working on code that should be in a Release Channel next week. The package contains internal, low-level fixes for some networking code, so there will be no visible effect except (hopefully) things working a bit better.

“Things” as in the server … there were some edge cases that could tip it over, crash it. The fix should cure some of the regions get stuck and prevent you TP’ing or crossing in or out.

Pathfinding

Andrew is working on part of the pathfinding stuff which relies on a “navigation mesh” chunk of data, which is a connectivity graph + geometry of the navigable zones.

Andrew says, The navigation mesh takes a while to compute… tens of seconds. So he has been working on helping to make sure its computation doesn’t block (stall) the simulator and that it can be downloaded to the viewer.

Andrew says, the server computes the navmesh then the viewer downloads a chunk of data and then renders it. However, the chunk of data is in some Havok-proprietary format… the TPV’s will have to link to some binary library to interpret the data, I think.

llSetKeyframedMotion()

There is some reporting that llSetKeyframedMotion() is failing to restart when a region is restarted. A manual reset is required by the owner. See SVC-7556. The Lindens have not been able to reproduce the problem. If you are seeing the problem add your information to the JIRA item.

Per Parcel Avatar Limits

This is something some people want. If they can set parcel limts they feel they can spread people out in their region and reduce lag. Andrew has been looking at it. His current take is that it is going to be messy, coding-wise server side.

I suspect the Lindens will skip Parcel Limits for now and remain focused on reducing lag and increasing the number of avatars possible in a region.

Summary

It seems a number of Linden plans are being revised. The result is the pipeline of updates and fixes flowing to the servers is a bit clogged. So, we won’t see releases coming as fast as we were.

We have also seen a decrease in the number of viewers being released.

I think this suggests some larger changes are in progress. It may just be that more people are being thrown at the Direct Delivery, which is behind its planned release date.

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