Category Archives: Second Life

Things about SL

Second Life Beta Server UG 2016 w38 – BUG-37692

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We haven’t had much news coming out of these meetings. This week’s meeting was more informative. See the previous article on Forced Sit.

Darkness Prevails

Darkness Prevails

We also heard about BUG-37692 – llRezObject() and llRezAtRoot() peroidically stop responding unless you’re an estate manager. This bug breaks existing content. If you are having a problem with it, you have this weekend (#38 – Sept 24-25) to add your information in comments.

If you think of the shops that have a ‘rezzer’ in store for their products, you can have an idea of the scope of the problem.

Second Life: New Forced Sit Coming

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Yeah… sit down and be quite… probably a sentiment many of us feel in this political season in the USA. However, this new feature will only be a help in Second Life™. It is a new feature in the Linden Scripting Language (LSL), something I haven’t gotten to write about in some time.

A cute little butt to represent a new sit command? I suppose...

A cute little butt to represent a new sit command? I suppose…

Rider Linden was at the Beta Server user group meeting Thursday to let us know what’s in the works. It seems the Lindens are expanding the Advanced Experience Tools feature of Second Life. The idea of Forced Sit seems an odd feature to me, but the oddity comes from the name. Several people have a use for it and I rename it and describe it below. It is about way more than just sitting.

Rider says there will be some new functions that only work within Experience enabled scripts. You can get the full details of what is being envisioned in a Google Doc: Espeon: Forced Sits. (see WARNING below) Overview:

With the advent of Experiences Keys we would like to be able to allow scripts being run as part of an experience to force an avatar to sit in a particular location.  This feature will be useful in an adventure game scenario where an avatar is forced to sit in a trap so that it may sync its animations with the avatar, or in an amphitheater or classroom situation where a presenter wishes for all the other participants to remain seated. This document replaces the previous Scripted Sits document.

We will add at least one new LSL script function that will force an avatar to sit on a particular prim and make adjustments to the existing llUnSit() function to perform the counter action.

I’ll use an example from the game Obduction™, made by the people that made Myst™. They use this type of ‘forced sit’ in every game they have written. In Obduction there is a rail mounted car-type-machine you click on to ride/drive. Once you click a script takes over. It has the avatar open the car, enter, and sit. I believe this is what is being added to SL scripting, LSL – Linden Scripting Language.  Continue reading →

Second Life News 2016 w38

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Servers

This week there was no rollout to the main channel. We did get a new package for the RC channels. All 3 are getting the same package: 16#16.09.14.319788.

The release notes describe it as; Minor internal changes.

Kath 2.0

Kath 2.0

Viewers

The main viewer is now version 4.0.8.319463. Formerly this version was the Visual Outfits Browser RC viewer. The previous version was: 4.0.7.318301.

RC Second Life Bento Viewer version 5.0.0.319688 – Last week Bento was running on a project viewer version 5.0.0.318969. This version is now a RC, Release Candidate, version.

RC Second Life VLC Viewer version 4.1.1.319856 – This version has updated from 4.1.1.318504. I suspect this version has just added the VOB features and some bug fixes.

There are no project viewers this morning.

Summary

We know from various user group meetings there are some changes and improvements in progress. I expect to see a new RC viewer version and possibly a VIVOX project viewer this week. Also, there is a 64-bit viewer in the works. I have no clue when it make make it to Project or RC status.

While it may seem quite, there is stuff happening.

Second Life: Visual Outfit Browser Released

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The Lab announced today that the Visual Outfit Browser viewer has moved from RC to main viewer. See: Visual Outfit Browser is Live!

Linden Lab's Visual Outfit Browser - Sept 2016

Linden Lab’s Visual Outfit Browser – Sept 2016

I like this feature. I started writing about the VOB Viewer in early July of this year.

New Visual Outfits Browser Project 2016-06-07

New Visual Outfits Browser Project 2016-06-07

Learn more about the feature in the SL Knowledge Base.

Access the feature via your inventory. You’ll see a new tab. (Top yellow arrow.)

Unless you have an image already in inventory you’ll need to upload an image to use… that costs L$10. So, I’ll be particular about which outfits I put into the image catalog.

You probably notice it isn’t purely an alphanumeric sort. It sorts outfits with an image ahead of those without an image. It is alphanumeric in the groups of with-images and without-images.

 

I’ve written about VOB before. I also expect to see more articles on it now that it has released. It is intuitive to use. So, I don’t see any point in repeating instructions on how to use it. You can search on ‘VOB” or ‘visual outfit browser’ in the upper right to find my articles.

It will be interesting to see if third party viewers make any BIG improvements.

Hardware: Disk Performance Compared

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I just getting to where I can use my new computer for most of my daily tasks. I am still researching what aspects of the new computer most affect Second Life™ viewer performance. One of the more effective things one can do is look at data storage speed. Here is what I find.

RAM Disk Performance - New Computer

RAM Disk Performance – New Computer

I used Crystal Disk Mark to measure storage performance on both the opld and new machines.

RAM Drive

The above image is the benchmark for my RAM Disk in the new computer. I purchased DataRAM’s RAMDisk software. I devoted 5GB of my 32GB of RAM to a RAM Drive.

It automatically writes the contents of this drive to my Western Digital hard drive at power down. At startup it inserts the data back into the RAM Disk.  Continue reading →

Project Bento Update 2016 w37

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No video this week. I recorded one. But, it is too much of a mess to try and clean up.

Wetcat | The Book of Daniel - Fund-raising event ♥

Wetcat | The Book of Daniel – Fund-raising event ♥

There is a new Bento Viewer out: Second Life Bento Viewer version 5.0.0.319688. This is the one that came out earlier this week. It is in RC stage now. If you login with your ‘old’ Project Viewer, it should automatically update. If you log into the ADITI grid and update you may get a second update when you log into the main grid, AGNI. It will be the same viewer version you already got but, the viewer is confused so it updates again. Some people have seen their viewers update twice.  Continue reading →

Second Life: Bento Wings Kit

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Everyone is excited by the new Bento heads. They are pretty neat. I am also excited about Bento Wings. I have a collection of prim/sculpty wings in my inventory. Some are way gorgeous. But, they are mostly just there, when worn. Project Bento is going to change that. We will be able to animate the Bento Wings in ways not before possible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpGUKowqim8

Damien Fate has a Bento Wings Kit out. See: FATEplay – Animated Wings Template. This is one of those Full Perm with an agreement type things where all the mesh and animation stuff is done. You only need to supply textures.

These show some of what can be done with Bento Wings. I expect some really impressive wings to start appearing.