Phoenix Viewer 1.5.2.1185 Released Review

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Today (8/2) the Firestorm-Phoenix team released a new version of the Phoenix Viewer. The announcement says a new griefer-crasher fix has been added along with several bug fixes. The full list is in the release notes. I’ll cover the ones I find interesting.

Phoenix Viewer Download and Release Notes

Blocking Phoenix

The rumor persists that Linden Lab will block Series 1 viewers. It doesn’t seem to matter how often the Lab says they won’t. Some rumors say all V1 viewers will be blocked. In general those rumors come from people misunderstanding what has been said and what will happen.

Rate of Change Continues to Climb

Most Series 1 or alternately labeled V1 viewers will never render mesh. The changes needed to a V1 viewer to accommodate the mesh render pipeline are massive and complex. It is easier to just start over with V2 code and add V1 features. Adding V2 features to a V1 viewer require extensive rewriting and are time consuming, which is why we see the V1 viewers fallen farther and farther behind the V2 versions.

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New Login Screen Arrives

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Opensource Obscure has been warning us a new login screen was coming. It seems to be here. It came up in my SLViewer (2.8.3) this morning.

You can see what appears on the new screen here: http://viewer-login.agni.lindenlab.com/

The old screen can be seen here: http://secondlife.com/app/login – that may soon redirect to the new screen.

The New Splash Screen

Older viewers may still use the old splash screen and some Third Party Viewers (TPV) will too. The rumor is the URL redirection will at some point be set to allow the new splash screen on older viewers.

Some TPV’s will switch over from their own screen. Some will likely create custom splash screens.

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Major Linden Oops

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Tateru in a post on Dwell On It tells about the Meeroos account being blocked. This is the fulfillment  account used for all the Meeroos orders in Second Life. So, for now the provider of Meeroos is screwed.

Seems this was an enforcement goof. Similar Meeroos account names were being opened by those hoping to scam on Meeroos somehow. In an effort to remove those accounts the enforcement team got the real one.

See: Meeroos master account blocked by Linden Lab. All Meeroos stores offline

That has to hurt.

Privacy

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If you think Google was a problem for you with its pseudonyms policy you have no idea what is in store for you.

HR 1981 is in process in the US House of Representatives. This will require ISP’s to log all activity on their networks and retain it for 18 months along with all the personal information they have on you in their accounts records. A search warent is not needed to access and study the records. What your date with that hunk reviewed by a bureaucrat?

If you are a US citizen call your Representative and ask that they oppose this bill.

You can read more about it here: Is Congress’s ISP-Logging Bill A Violation of the Fourth Amendment?

 

Imprudence-Kokua News

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The head of the Imprudence-Kokua Viewer Project, Jacek Antonelli, is… retiring. He has posted an announcement to that effect in the Kokua and Imprudence blog. See: Moving On.

It is difficult to predict how the Kokua-Imprudence project will change after his departure. I am not involved in the inner circles of the team… or for that matter even in the outer circles. I’m just another fan of the Imprudence viewer. So, I can only speculate. My guesses would not even be well informed.

Whatever becomes of Kokua-Imprudence I wish Jacek Antonelli all the best and thanks for all the fish.

Second Life Mesh Update Week 31

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Today’s meeting had a good turnout, about 37 people. Of course with that turnout comes a number of people that have not been regularly attending and the newly frustrated without a clue that want to have things fixed. I’ll skip all that boring stuff and get to the interesting items.

Mesh Cost

For many this is the only issue left with mesh. Mesh cost is complex. New mesh builders that have yet to learn the tricks and complications of Prim Equivalency (PE) are shocked that some factors of mesh can cause cost to double, triple, or more.

Mesh Meeting

The Script Hit

The thing one has to consider is which of the three primary cost factors, Streaming, Physics, or Simulation weight, is controlling your cost. Your PE is going to be the highest of the three. Adding a script can affect the objects tier cost. However, adding a script only affects your Tier Cost when the objects Simulation Weight is the controlling factor. So, one has to consider all the factors to get the best PE/Tier cost.

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