Busy with RL last week and looks like this week. The Adobe updates that screwed things are not helping.
Costa Bella 4: Fountain
Servers
The main channel is getting an update to version #18.10.25.521081. This version is apparently the same as last week’s version 18.10.19.520868, but with some fixes to the logging. That version was all Internal Changes.
Blue Steel and Le Tigre will update to version #18.11.01.521328, listed as about Land impact/streaming costs
Magnum gets version #18.11.01.521329, with Logging improvements and land impact/streaming costs
From the Server-Scripting UG I hear the Snack Channel will get an EEP update.
Uploading Mesh – Beq Janus has an article on her blog explaining some of the esoteric aspects of understanding mesh uploading to Second Life™. See: Shedding light on Mesh uploading.
🐼 718 🐼 Blueprint Event Uber Event
Beq is working on the Firestorm Viewer’s mesh upload panel. So, now is a good time to be providing her feedback and ideas you think would make the uploaded easier to use or understand.
The article also defines some of the terms in use in the uploader that you may have misunderstood. Some of those ‘the word means… Y but here we are using it to mean X’ type of things.
Lots of interesting news and updates… I’ve combined information from the Third-Party Dev meeting and my regular Tuesday updates. There is normally about two working days between the Third-Party and Server-Scripting meetings. Not much changes in that time. So, I combined them.
Servers
No roll to the main channel. It will continue to run #18.09.04.519319.
The Forum Deploys post says the RC channel roll is to be determined. Rider Linden at the Server-Scripting UG says no RC packages are ready to roll out. We’ll find out Wednesday what actually happens.
Guardians
He did however, provide a new server package update for EPP on the ADITI side.
He said, “It [EEP server update] will address some validations where FS had much larger ranges of values than the lab did.
I’ve dealt with a cloud speed issue that had annoyed me and I forgot to get in before we sent out the preview.”
Oz Linden at the Friday Third-Party Dev UG announced they will be turning off the UDP Asset Fetch API’s in January. Most viewers no longer use them. But, there may be one or two that do… These API’s do not pass through the CDN servers so are slower and add more load to the region and asset servers.
Old viewers will likely break. Old as in like 4 years old.
The main channel has updated to version #18.09.04.519319, labeled a change in logging.
The RC channels remain running the same version, #18.09.04.519319.
Simon Linden at the Sever-Scripting UG meeting said the RC roll is still undecided. That wasn’t noted in the Deploys thread. So…
♥♥♥ LTModa Wedding dress photo contest ♥♥♥
I am not sure, but I think the operating system of the simulators and backend machines have been being updated. Some feel this may have affected various HTTP connections. Simon Linden says this update includes lots of low level updates and changes. So, it is possible.
Viewers
The main viewer is version 5.1.8.518593, since week #34.
Second Life Animesh Viewer version 6.0.0.518949 – Last updated in week #35.
Second Life Bugsplat Viewer version 5.1.9.519462 – Last updated in week #37.
I just noticed a post from a couple of months back on the difference between Catznip Viewer and Firestorm Viewer. Alyona Su provides a good comparison based on her experience. She switched and is now using Catznip as her primary viewer. Not my experience.
Catznip vs Firestorm September 2018 – FS on timer: 00:01:23 @ DD 256m
Those switching to Catznip experience it being faster and less crashy than Firestorm. Remember. Viewers are very sensitive to the computer they run on. What is crashy on one machine may not be on another. Viewer speed in FPS and render time is also sensitive to your hardware and connection. So, Catznip may crash more and be slower on your hardware. But, try it and know. Hopefully the chance is you’ll have good results. If not, well no one will make you use it.
The release of Catznip I last used was Catznip R12 – Dec 31 2017 12:50:12 (64bit) (Catznip Release). Visiting the Catznip website you’ll find R12.0 is still the main release, Catznip R12 – Dec 31 2017 12:50:12 (64bit) (Catznip Release). OR version 12.0.6.180160035. No update since then.
This week has seen discussion on the ARC/ACI values and how broken they are. See the SL Forum thread: Rigged mesh LoD bug. I knew ARC/ACI weren’t all that accurate. But, I thought they were reasonable comparisons. I still believe once up on a time they were. But, in light of this new information I can’t prove that.
ARC = Avatar Render Cost
ACI = Avatar Complexity Index
Comparing ACI in LL, FS, and BD viewers
The purpose of ACI is to influence users and designers to buy and create more efficient mesh content. Something along the lines of Consumer Reports, but free and in your face.
A couple of things have happened that has not only changed ACI’s usefulness but distorted it and pushed us away from its goal. Possibly even making it counterproductive
