The Video
The last Q&A, Jan 11, was recorded by Chakat Northspring and placed on YouTube. It runs about 2 hours. I’ve covered the parts I found interesting. The video is not edited, that would be a big job, so it is hard for me to sit through. Too much dead air. I am happy Chakat recorded it, as these meetings are not announced until shortly before they start, making it hard to know about them and get there. This seems to be the Firestorm team’s way of avoiding an over loaded region for the meeting.
Firestorm Support
Ed Merryman at Saturday’s Firestorm Questions and Answer secession spoke about their support volunteers. They are not paid. Therefore, they are not assigned shifts. But, they will be trying to provide one-on-one support to those needing help.
A question came up about how a user tells who is an OFFICIAL support person. Ed says you can check the Firestorm Wiki or web site. Good luck finding anything helpful in this regard on the wiki. The Firestorm web site is a touch better. You’ll find some staff names in the selection links on the right named Staff Blogs. You’ll find more names listed on the Support Page, that may be the full list. But, I suspect the wiki list could get out of date.
The most reliable way, if you are using the Firestorm Viewer, is to look to see if the person in question is a member of the Firestorm Support Team group. This group is a ‘closed enrollment’ group. This is a different group than other Firestorm Support groups that have open enrollment.
You have to look in the person’s profile. You probably remember that if you are not a member of the group, you cannot read the membership list.
Also, use the Firestorm Viewer’s LEGACY profiles to easily see whether someone is an ‘official’ member of Firestorm Support. Preferences->General – upper right area of panel, uncheck: Use web profiles by default. Look on the right side of the profile panel. You will see Firestorm Support listed. Otherwise, you must dig through the person’s groups and verify they show the Firestorm Support Team group.
Another way, in most viewers, is to notice the highlighting in chat that denotes a member with moderator rights.
The main support groups are a community effort. Lots of people beyond just ‘official’ team members provide help. Any resident that is a member of the open support groups that hears a question they can answer often jump in and provide it. Members of the support team appreciate the help.
What is NOT appreciated are those pretending to be ‘official’ support people.
Is there an advantage to talking with an ‘official’ support member. Some. They have access to other people in the Firestorm team and they are aware of the other additional support materials.
Next Firestorm Viewer Release
When is the next Firestorm release? According to Ed Merryman: when it is ready.
The next Firestorm release is waiting on Linden code for the new Inventory API’s. These are changes that improve inventory loading speed and reliability. They are changes that are targeted at fixing the last of the avatar bake fail problems.
Fitted Mesh
The next section of the meeting is about Fitted Mesh. I’ve pull at that part out and published it as: Fitted Mesh and Firestorm.
Q&A
About the 20 minute mark the discussion moves into Q&A.
Firestorm Support Classes – These classes are informative and a must for any Firestorm user. The support team holds the classes in a 12 hour window. Their point is to accommodate as many time zones as they can.
Also classes are not held at the same time every week. If you cannot make a class you want to attend, look for it next week. It will be on a different day and time that may be easier for you.
26:00 – Ed on lag in SL, script counting and related Firestorm features…
46:00 – Linux Users? How many non-Linux users would like a 64-bit Linux version? One of the Firestorm Dev team is working on that.
1:10:00 – Neighbor’s microwave oven knocked her off SL each evening. Newer access points are better. Linksys is having problems in this area.
1:12:00 – Intel HD Graphics a problem.
Various questions… nothing we haven’t heard before…
1:56:00 – End