Seems a server update in November 2018 distorted how Avatar Hover works for Tiny avatars. (BUG-225893) They now float about a foot (0.3m) above the ground.
Tinies Protest the Continuing Second Life Hover Bug!
The Lindens have found the problem in the change to the Bake Service made in preparation for Bakes On Mesh. The fix is in QA and should roll out ‘soon’.
The Tinies pulled off a cute, humorous, and hopefully effective protest. You can read more here, Tinies Protest at Governor Linden’s Mansion. Whether or not the protest was needed… I doubt it. I suspect it bumped the priority for this fix.
We are in the holiday season which is synonymous with ‘no-change-window’. There are no user group meetings this week. So, news is limited and mostly non-existent. No Deploys post. Last main channel restart appears to be 12/4. But, one was reported to have happened 12/11… my detector didn’t notice it. And none since.
Server and viewer versions are also unchanged this week.
Mesh Bodies – Kitsune Shan (URL FB) has a mesh body coming out that is designed to do a good job of portraying thin to chubby with good proportions.
Kitsune also makes tutorials. See Skinning Session (URL FB). While the clicks and keys in this video are not universal, the weighting process is. Kitsume also has 2 YouTube channels; Big Channel and Small Channel.
Scandalize – If you are into fashion you likely know the brand name. Seems they tried to do a gift card thing for Christmas. It went sideways and didn’t work as planned. They published an apology and a sort of workaround.
You can join the |Scandalize| (SLURL) group and get the details from their notices. And you have to be part of the group to get/use the gift cards so… Get it done. Limited time to use the fix.
Windows 7 Freezing – Seems Win7 systems with Malwarebytes are freezing up. Reportedly from Malwarebytes support 12/27±, “This is an issue we are aware of. For some reason, our latest update (Malwarebytes v2.6.1.2711) is causing Windows 7 64bit machines to freeze. Please toggle off the Real-Time Web Protection module for now.”
Revised 1/3/2019 – Hamlet has an interesting article Well-Optimized Alternatives To Resource-Heavy Mesh Bodies For SL touching on the contentious debate going in Second Life as to how much lag mesh bodies are causing. The high polygon count in mesh bodies is the suggested cause of the lag.
Tachinni – Bonnie Dress – @ACCESS Exclusive
We don’t have an obvious resolution to the argument. Nothing the non-techies can grasp. The techies stay out of the argument having learned one cannot argue with the ignorant as it is all opinion for the uneducated.
Recent technology changes have complicated the information on polygon counts and how they may affect your viewer’s performance. One complication is the shift from video card manufacturers bragging about polygons-per-second rendered to frames-per-second and now giga-rays-per-second… Part of the reason for changing metrics is the marketing hype card makers introduce to sell more cards.
Pfaffenthal 1867 is a historically accurate Second Life build of a section of the city of Luxembourg in 1867±. Several in the blogosphere are writing about it being moved to Sansar. (Closing 11/26/2018) Jo Yardley’s article is here: Pfaffenthal 1867 closes its doors in Second Life and moves to Sansar
Pfaffenthal – Second Life June 2015
The reason for the move given in a letter to Pfaffenthal residents is land-cost, the free 4×4 km land in SL would require about 225 regions in Second Life… at US$300± per region… that is $67,000/mo… Free vs $67k…
But space in a virtual world is not just about cost and the amount of building space. SL has value because of people. People will be a bit tougher to find in and attract to a build in Sansar.
Scam – There is a new viewer scam out. No one is quite sure what the scam viewer does. I doubt it is anything you want to find out by experimenting. There are a couple of people taking the viewer apart and looking at the questionable code.
You’ll see the first of the scam in an Instant Message (IM). It is a great promo for a new version of the Firestorm PRO Viewer. It promises ‘No Lag’ even on slow connections, instant loading inventory, faster teleports, instant avatar rez, and faster login. Who wouldn’t want this version of Firestorm?
The Egg Thief
But, it is a scam. There is no PRO version of Firestorm. You are sent to a fake Firestorm site FirestormViewer.pro. The real address is FirestormViewer.org. The fake site provides a download with an embedded virus. Most of the big name anti-virus products detect the problem.
Inara provides information on how to report this IM if you receive one. See her Fake Firestorm.
This is coming along nicely. Simon and Oz Linden have started using it in the AGNI grid. You have to have an EEP Viewer to see the change, but, soon the RC viewer will go main and EEP will be an official feature of SL.
At the Server-Scripting UG meeting I arrived using the Firestorm viewer. The sky looked very different.
EEP Sky no EEP Viewer OCt 2018
Using region defaults I got this odd result. At first, I was trying to figure out what I was last doing that messed things up.
Then Simon explained what had changed. Switching over to the EEP Viewer I could see the new sky with a pumpkin moon.
