Second Life News Bits 2014-32 #3

Servers

At Thursdays Server Beta UG meeting we learned that a prior JSON fix (BUG-6466) is unwound by this fix. It is a case of one fix breaking something else and aggravating other problems. JSON is JavaScript Object Notation and was added to the Linden Scripting Language (LSL) as a better way to deal with list/array information, a task that LSL is weak handling. Whatever, a fix is in-the-works.

 

Hunk - Found in Lost Eden 2014

Hunk – Found in Lost Eden 2014

The server engineers are working on ‘infrastructure’ changes… a somewhat fuzzy statement. Maestro Linden says a major operating system (OS) is planned and this work is assuring that various system services work as intended with the new OS. I suppose when they are sure things work, they’ll start updating the OS on backend servers.

SL runs on Linux. As best we know some flavor of Linux. Recent changes to the Linux core are performance and security related. The improvements touch file handling, memory, power management, and more. I guess that the Lindens have found some of the changes interesting enough to plan an upgrade.  Continue reading

Second Life News Bits 2014-32 #2

This is the last month before many schools start the 2014-15 classes, which in a round-about way makes it vacation time for families. Lindens are people with families and they take vacations. Those Lindens that supply us with information on the server side of things are on vacation. So, Oz and Caleb Linden are filling in. But, with a few people gone the work seems to have slowed, suggesting not much is happening… happening in the sense work progresses to where we can see change.

Sarawak - 2014

Sarawak – 2014

I think we are seeing the affect of a smaller team working on Second Life™. Previously vacations did not slow the pace of releases by a noticeable amount.

The result is there isn’t much news to write about. I think because of the reduced pace of change you see blogs covering more subjects. I know I am writing smaller blurbs about what is going on, thus the ‘bits’ articles.  Continue reading

Second Life News Bits 2014-32

Viewers

The Group Ban Viewer has been promoted to the main viewer: 3.7.13 (292225). The release notes are here. So, if you own a group and have problem people, you can ban them and they will not be able to get back in.

Otherwise there are no changes to the Linden Lab viewer line up.

Warbug @ Landing Field - 2014

Warbug @ Landing Field – 2014

Dolphin Viewer

A beta version of the Dolphin Viewer  is out, 3.6.99.32369. There is no new information on what is in this viewer. I assume this is just a bug fixed version of the July release.

See: Finally! The first public beta of the new Dolphin Viewer 3! Continue reading

Second Life News 2014-31 #3

Viewers

There is a new viewer in the pipeline called the New Login Viewer. I don’t know much about it or when we will see it on the RC Viewer page. I think this viewer is still running A-B tests with new users. As existing users we probably will not see it until the A-B testing is done.

Tableau 2014 July - Hidden Location

Tableau 2014 July – Hidden Location

Word is the Zipper RC Viewer is having lots of problems on older hardware. Oz says they are not sure at this point if they will continue with this viewer. He recommended that third party developers not merge this code into their viewers. That is a pretty clear ‘stay away’ from this version warning.

There are new versions of the Oculus and Experience Tools viewers. Both are going well. There is no ETA on when improvements from the DK2 may be seen. But, there is work happening in that area. So, I am guessing the Lab has received their DK2 units.

Lots of data is coming back from Experience Tools. There are some problems, but Oz says nothing big. So, that is moving ahead. My guess is we will see more users invited to the Beta or even a public RC Viewer.

The Library Refresh RC Viewer will NOT support Mac 10.6. Once it makes it to being the main viewer, the Lab will stop supporting 10.6 and older Mac operating systems. Otherwise this is the viewer using the newly rebuilt libraries.

Windows 8.1 users have amazingly low crash rates. The Lab is encouraging users to update their operating system if they are  on older OS’s. Especially Win 8 users as the upgrade to 8.1 is free. Continue reading

Bits and Pieces 2014-31

Servers

Maestro Linden is on vacation. Caleb Linden is handling the Server Beta meeting and Oz and Simon Linen were there. No new information on what server updates may be in the works. As all regions are running the same server package, the main channel is unlikely to get any updates and there may be no Tuesday restart.

DryLand - 2014 July - BD, Before the Dry

DryLand – 2014 July – BD, Before the Dry

The RC channels may get a restart and new package, but if they do we currently have no idea what that update may be. My guess is there will be no rollout/restart of the RC channels in week 32.  Continue reading

Second Life News 2014-31 #2

Viewers

Brains and Beauty - Whirly @ Server Scripting 2014-31

Brains and Beauty – Whirly @ Server Scripting 2014-31

The Zip RC Viewer came back Wednesday. This is the fast install viewer. The release notes say there is a fix for the XUI Preview Tool… I think that fix has something to do with previewing user interface changes. It also got all the updates now in the main SL Viewer 3.7.12.

Experience Tools

For the everyday SL user there isn’t much news here. The testing in Beta is progressing. The Lindens are deciding if they need more testing or will move toward ‘experience users’ testing. Currently they are working with experience creators. The Cornfield Experience is a test with the experience users.

The next stage of Beta testing will turn users loose on user created experiences. If there are any serious problems they should turn up during that stage of testing. Continue reading

Second Life News 2014-31

Servers

The main channel gets a rollout Tuesday. It will get the maintenance release that has been running on all three RC channels. This release has a fix for some temporary attachment problems and adds the ‘description’ field to L$ transactions.

Moma Chan's - 2014

Moma Chan’s – 2014

RC Channels

This week there are no new packages coming out. All regions will be running the same server software this week. In this case the RC channels do not need to roll, so no rolls in RC land this week.  Continue reading

Second Life News 2014-29

Servers

Maestro Linden is going on vacation. But, he did post the Deploys post Friday. It is planned that the Experience Tools package will be promoted to the main channel Tuesday, thus making it grid wide by late Wednesday.

Music Concert 2014

Music Concert 2014

There are no noticeable feature changes using the current SL Viewer. One needs the Experience Tools Project Viewer to use the changes provided by the server update. There is no official link to that viewer on the Project Viewers page, yet. Once the beta testing proceeds to Experience User testing we’ll see that viewer appear. For now testing is with Experience Creators.  Continue reading