There are a couple of new… concepts… revealed in the interview.
It is interesting to find out the names of people we know from movies and books are people looking at Sansar. The reproduction of the CES show in Vegas and the creation of Ready Player One are apparently impressive.
CES 2018 – Intel
Ebbe is still saying we are in the very early stages of development. If you have been in Sansar™, you’ll probably agree. I do.
This year will see a shift in the Lab’s focus from developers to consumers. This is the year Sansar will ‘LIKELY’ come out of beta. But, I wouldn’t bet big money on it. We may see it slide into 2019.
There is some interesting news. Not much but a bit.
The Alexy Ivy Viewer was updated in week #2. This is very likely its last update in the RC stream. The next step for Alex Ivy is a promotion to the main viewer.
Oz Linden expects that to happen in week #3. Of course, this depends on not finding any show stoppers in testing.
When Alex Ivy promotes, Oz plans to publish a blog post to encourage people to update to 64 OS. The difference in crash rates is HUGE.
Cold Coffee
The Maintenance Viewer is there…
The Voice Viewer has no known problems. So, it will be the next likely to promote after Alex Ivy.
The 360-Image Viewer is out there… Oz says it is verging on becoming an RC version.
The Animesh Viewer is expected to move to RC status in a couple of months. If you are following the Content Creation UG meetings you know not much new information is coming out. The project is into the ‘make things work correctly’ phase. So, no changes or additions.
The Rendering Viewer is fixing render bugs.
Oz tells us will be a new media update branch. Things like CEF will be getting updates.
Also, another round of tool updates is planned. The Visual Studio version the Lab I suing is 1 version behind.
HTTP, when Alex releases the Lab will be depreciating all non-HTTP API’s. Older viewers not using HTTP will lose functionality.
The Lab will start work on ACI in a couple of weeks. Oz says they plan to fix bad incentives. Some things are calc’s to cost too much and some cost too little. So, they’ll be tweaking the ACI.
No word on a Firestorm release date. But, Firestorm is limiting LoD settings to <=4. Higher values will NOT persist. Plus, they are adding warning and advice not to change because of some notecard advice in the Debug Settings.
Oz says they found backend problems in the group notices system. Partially fixed. Memory leak. Restarting the servers solved most issues.
28:30 – Oz talks about Linux 64-bit viewer. TL:DR – There is one, but it doesn’t work.
EEP – Rider Linden is making the EEP assets. Once done, test regions in Aditi will come up. So, the project is progressing.
Hamlet has an article about Stevie Davros’ enhanced skies. In 2011 Firestorm added a feature that allows replacement of Second Life™ clouds. Thank you for the computer code, Cinder Roxley. Back then Vincent Nacon was creating new cloud images for this feature.
Stevie Davros Dramatic Skies
So, this feature is not new nor limited to Firestorm. JuicyBomb wrote a tutorial NEW CLOUDS FOR SECOND LIFE, May 2013, for those using the Linden Viewer. The instructions are good for any viewer.
Not much has changed since then. I just checked in the Linden Viewer 5.1.0 and there is still no provision for selecting a different cloud texture. So, it is still a manual change.
Warning – Things are changing quickly as this story unfolds. Some blog articles have changed since I started writing… So, if something is different from you expect from reading this… please remember time and change are factors.
We just witnessed a community backlash against the Lab’s heavy handed Intellectual Property Rights protection when Strawberry Singh was order to take down a Second Life tutorial for new users. Now the Lab has ordered Ryan Schultz, the author of Sansar NewsBlog, to take down pictures of the Intel-Linden build in Sansar, Aech’s Garage. See UPDATED: First Pictures from Aech’s Garage, the Ready Player One Movie Experience in Sansar.
Please take it off
It has apparently taken a couple of days for Ryan to reach a boil. See: I’m Taking A Break (1/10). That cuts off my primary source of Sansar news. 🙁 I’m not a daily reader, but more than once a week… Have you tried to find another dedicated to Sansar source?
So, what is going on? Is there a new employee at the Lab trying to make their bones? Someone that doesn’t like Ryan? Some new emphasis on a legal policy?
The Lab has already stated they need to rethink and reword some of their IP protection policy. One would think information about respecting helping those helping the Lab would make it through the company without regard to which project people were working on. It would seem to be a corporate culture thing to cultivate. But, I guess not.
Many of us have over a decade of experience with SL and LL and the engineers and managers. And some a bit with the Lab’s legal and marketing people. We have seen their blind spots and dumb mistakes. The last few years I’ve seen a change in those running SL, which I attribute to experience. The development of mesh was shaky, in not listening as well as they might to user feedback. Material, Fitted Mesh, Bento, and now Animesh are examples of good communication, better than mesh. I didn’t say ‘perfect’. And in that time how bloggers and other fans are treated has matured. At least this last go-around with Strawberry had me thinking so.
But, it looks like the Sansar team is going to have to go through the same learning curve. But, I had hopped the SL experience of the Linden support people, like accounting, legal, marketing…, would carry over. I suppose not, now that I see this second ‘take down’ call.
I think I’ve met Ryan in Sansar. Based on my biases and prejudices I am way cautious trusting him. But, what he has said so far is very basic. Paraphrasing, they asked me to take down these pictures, I took them down, and I’m pissed. Excuse me while I go cool off. So, there is not much room for drama or spin in what he has said. A bit rare for this community.
I do agree with him something isn’t right, or fair if you are still into ‘fair’. Other sites are posting similar images. So, what’s up?
#SansarCensor
UPDATE:Ryan has commented below. Seems the Lab has changed its mind. Images are back up. This is a good thing. My confidence in LL is increasing.
UPDATE 2:Seems problems are not over. More of the story is coming out. See Ryans new(er) post: I’m Taking A Break, which I think is an edit of the original.
Ugh… still fighting something between a cold and flu…
Servers
The main channel is getting a restart but will continue to run version #17.12.01.511131 rolled out 12/12.
All three RC channels with get version #18.01.08.511751. This change is declared to have internal logging improvements.
Worlds 3
Viewers
The Main viewer remains version 5.0.9.329906. We first saw this version as a RC candidate in week #47 as a Maintenance version. It promoted to the main viewer in week #49.
Second Life Alex Ivy Viewer version 5.1.0.511732 – This is an update from 5.1.0.511248 which we saw in week #48.
Second Life Maintenance Viewer version 5.0.10.330148 – Another update. Replacing version 5.0.10.330123 out week #51.
Second Life Voice Viewer version 5.0.10.330039 – Last updated in week #50.
Second Life Project 360 Snapshot Viewer version 5.1.0.506743 – no update since week #27.
Second Life Project Animesh Viewer version 5.0.10.330058 – Last updated in week #49.
Second Life Project Render Viewer version 5.1.0.511604 – has updated from version 5.1.0.511446 released week, #50.
AS of this morning the Wolfpack version of the viewer has disappeared. As this is a version of the main viewer with additional data reporting, I think we can expect it back when the main viewer next updates.
Crap. I’m coming down with a cold… sniffle, sniffle, hack, hack… need more chocolate. So, I’m browsing through the Second Life™ related blogs finding things I think are neat.
