SANSAR and Open Source

You probably know that Project SANSAR aka SL 2.0, is going to use a proprietary viewer. If we were really lucky, there would be no viewer. The new world would be web ready. But, I get the impression that is out. More and more I think it will be via app only.

ISTE22april2010_006(b)

ISTE22april2010_006(b) by Chris Smith, on Flickr

In any event an open source viewer for SANSAR  is not currently in the cards, at least for the initial release and probably for sometime after the main release. 

A thing about an open source SANSAR viewer came up in this last TPV Dev meeting. Jessica brought up the lack of motivation for a number of programmers working on the Linux viewers, since SANSAR will be closed source.

Oz commented in the TPV meeting saying that from what he has seen, they, the SANSAR team, would not be able to do the things with SANSAR that they are doing, if they relied on open source components.

This means it is very unlikely we will see an open source or third party viewer for SANSAR any time soon.

The Lab has taken the proprietary components they use in the current Second Life viewer and made them into libraries that third parties can use. Which is why we have an open source viewer in SL. That may eventually happen with SANSAR. The door is not permanently shut. But, for now it is.

I can see where that would kill off some motivation.

17 thoughts on “SANSAR and Open Source

    • After reading comments from Kinggoon/goonsquad etc etc. I wish nothing but pain and death to open source supporters. You either have a vibrant content market or None at all. They choose the latter by giving out the client source. There is nothing stopping the thieves now. They can rip mesh rigging and change ownership permissions. Say good bye to scripts being secure as well. The thieves have won.
      https://puu.sh/tpYbR/013bb65771.png

      • Open source has nothing to do whether or not digital content can be ripped.

        Why is it those so willing to hate are so ignorant…

  1. Thank God! Linden Lab, if you are reading this. Bravo! Please keep it closed source. Firestorm team, if you are reading this. Nah Nah Nah Nah, Nah Nah Nah Nah, Hey Hey Hey, Goodbye.

    • lol… that’s a little rude…

      I am a fan of competition. I think that will be missing in SANSAR viewer-dom. That has its good and bad points. I think I’ll miss the choices open source gives us in SL.

    • I want to remind you that many upgrades and features you are using have been possible thanks to open source code. I advise you to study a little of the history of SL…nha nha nha…

      Goodbye

  2. High Fidelity is open source, isn’t it? I think 3rd party viewer devs will be very welcome overthere.

    • It is. We will see developers from SL moving over there. But, I expect some number will stay with SL and OpenSim.

  3. I’m not a fan of all this software as a service junk and in my mind if SANSAR is going to be another America Online kind of thing where the service provider stores and handles all our data then I’m out. If I were ever to host another virtual world / sim / 3D scene I’d want full control over my content and creations. No way in hell I’m going to shell out another $300usd a month for my hard work to succumb to the whim of a hosting provider who changes their policies more times then they change their underwear.

    • From what you are saying, I would assume you have not been following the information coming out on Project SANSAR.

  4. And we want to even try SANSAR why? For the 13 year olds?

    Linden’s current viewer is so flawed that FS viewer is the leader by far. So they think they can produce a new product viewer that will be attractive?

    SL is supported now by a percentage of residents who spend heavily. For SANSAR to succeed they need to convince us to move over , repay for avatar appearance , home decor etc. And with a non -customer responsive viewer ,why?

    And if this closed viewer approach makes the volunteer FS team weaken or close, stick a fork in SL 1.

    Ebbe is gambling the whole company. But 13 year olds probably won’t care.

    • The Lab is not going to pay us to move to Project SANSAR. I wonder where you get the idea they even should?

      13-year olds? Where does that come from?

      As for Project SANSAR succeeding… The Lab is not expecting those in SL to move over for it to succeed. They have repeatedly said they expect a significant number to stay in SL. They are anticipating bringing in new users.

      You may be right about FS Dev’s leaving and FS development stopping. Jessica believes the SANSAR closed viewer is already affecting motivation of Linux developers. But, in general viewer developers are not developing just/only because they like writing code. So, I expect Firestorm to be around for some time.

      All things eventually end. SL has been on a slow downward slide for 8 or 9 years, depending on how one counts. The Lab does something new or Virtual Reality takes the majority of the Lab’s possible new users and ends sooner than later.

  5. Let’s not forget that if it wasn’t for TPV devs collaborating with the Lab the official viewer would be nowhere near as advanced or feature-rich as it is, a large part of what the Lab is offering has only come about because the viewer was open source. Just sayin’.
    s. x

    • I agree. Very true.

      I also understand the Lab is in part doing closed source in the beginning to reduce their work load and allow them more experimentation freedom. They can try lots of what prove to be bad ideas without embarrassment and to keep great ideas away from the competition.

      The Lab’s stand on open source has changed since I started participating in SL. I expect that more positive attitude to eventually move the Proj SANSAR viewer/app to open source. It could be that move will happen too late and dev’s will have moved on to something more fun. But, we can’t know that now.

    • Zero in 3D performance and optimization and zero on the tools used in the Linden labs client. can you cite one piece of source that came from firestorm that ended up in the Linden labs source tree? (If anything people took Linden Lab code and put it into their projects not the other way around)

      Do these 3rd party clients have anything remotely resembling a 3D engine faster than the Linden lab version that isn’t just a re-skinning and adding a few menus here and there?

      Don’t need opensource. Just talented HIRED professional coders with industry history not hobbyists and neck-beards.

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