AYAstorm

Second Life® Monthly Technology & Community Report July 2026

by

Another month… You likely noticed I’ve been writing more, more blog posts. And I have some Second Life projects under way. All of them involve using AI to create or explore how to do things I haven’t done before.

The majority of this report is an AI collection of what has been reported in various places this month.

SL Computer Update
Computer Update via Nanites

Official SL Platform Updates

  • July 10: Simulator release 2026-07-10.29110850825 deployed. Key fixes included ad-hoc chat session failures, P2P chat initialization timeouts, mesh upload charging issues for Premium Plus residents after region crossings, perpetually cloudy avatars after region crossings, incorrect mesh/texture upload fee estimates, and llSetText() corruption with certain UTF-8 strings. Region state-saving reliability and several crash modes were also improved.
  • July 13: Follow-up simulator build 2026-07-10.29122504250 rolled out with additional refinements from the same development cycle.
  • Mid-July (approx. July 14–15): Hotfix deployed across simhost channels addressing a capabilities-granting bug that could take out entire simhosts. Described as a partial but important mitigation while a fuller fix was prepared.
  • Late July: Simulator channel work continued toward the “Mango” update (RC channels) and the subsequent “Nectarine” release (targeted late July/August). Lua scripting support remained on a tentative path for a later “O” simulator update (possible late August/September).

Read more

Second Life® Viewer Comparison

by

Just 3 viewers. More about my curiosity about AYAstorm than a real PSA.

I am surprised how much slower AYAstorm is than Firestorm. I did notice AYAstorm includes OpenSIM support. Maybe that slows it down, but I doubt it. I tried to get AI to give me some idea of how much OS support might slow the render/FPS. That was pretty much a dead end. What little I could get from AI suggests what I already surmised, it is the render pipeline accounting for the difference. But there is no solid evidence that is the case.

Note, this test is not useful for comparison to earlier tests, at least for the Ground Level test. I have changed my front yard. Adding trees and grass and stuff has changed the render cost. The green Room (now orange), Nelsonia, Arapaima, and Warehouse 21 tests should be comparable.

I put some effort into making sure the Graphics settings are the same for all the tests.

AYAstrom Render
AYAstrom r31.2 – Render Test

Read more

Second Life Technology Report – June 2026

by

This is a busy month with Pride celebrations and SL23B. Lots to see and do.

Official SL Platform Updates

  • June 8, 2026: Linden Lab announced fee adjustments, including reduced land tier prices for many Private region types (effective June 15), lower minimum L$ purchase fees, changes to LindeX transaction fees, and increased Premium membership subscription fees (effective for new/renewed subs from July 8). These aim to make land more affordable while expanding membership value.
  • Ongoing: SL23B celebrations (June 18–July 19) highlighted platform aspects through “Meet the Lindens” sessions, including discussions on engineering challenges like performance/rendering, OpenGL-to-modern API transitions, region crossings, WebRTC voice, and upcoming Lua scripting.
SL23B - Funky Monkey Temple
SL23B – Funky Monkey Temple

Simulator / Grid Updates

  • June 12 & 25: Simulator releases with routine maintenance and rolling restarts.
  • Grid Stability: Multiple rolling restarts. L$ transaction issues around June 25–26 (investigated and fixed). World Map region name display issues in some TPVs addressed.

Read more

AYAstorm Viewer for Second Life®

by

I was reading a New World Notes article that mentions a JuicyBomb article about a viewer named AYAstorm. Wow. Never heard of it. I read Juicy’s AYAstorm article. Interesting.

OH WOW!

I find this viewer fixes the alpha glitch I have been working around for a couple of DECADES. OMG!

What is the ‘alpha glitch’?

AYAstorm Firestorm Comparison
AYAstorm and Firestorm ViewersComparison

You can see the glitch in the images at C & D.

The top two images were captured using AYAstorm. The bottom two using Firestorm 7.2.4 (beta/preview).

Notice how the hair renders at A & B and compare to C & D. If you look at D you’ll see the hair transparency is causing the wall to render on top of the painting. Not as clearly but the same at C.

At A it is transparency on top of transparency. Both A & B render the hair and transparencies correctly.

In like 20 years no one fixed this problem. Yay! We now have a fix!

Read more

Pages: 1 2 3