Preview of Second Life 1.13.2(7) up on the Beta Test Grid
Monday, January 15th, 2007 at 3:39 PM by: Joshua LindenWe’ve updated the beta test grid with a preview of Second Life 1.13.2(7). Viewers can be downloaded from the beta test grid page.
NOTE: There is a known issue in the 1.13.2(7) beta affecting users of MacOS 10.3.9 - viewers are disconnected on region crossing. We know the cause and are actively working on the issue. We will post an update when available.[UPDATE: We have a fix for the MacOS 10.3.9 issue. Go to the beta test grid page and you'll see that Macintosh users can download 1.13.2(8). It's a Mac-only fix, so we are not posting updated viewers for other platforms.]
Release notes with changes since 1.13.2(5) follow…
Release Notes for Second Life 1.13.2(7) January 15, 2007
=====================================
Bug fixes:
* Alt+Tab no longer activates the menus
* Menu no longer converts mouse hover into focus
* Menus now only show access key underlines when menu is invoked by the keyboard
* Double-clicking within an object’s inventory now sets focus to the opened floater
* Hover tip for llMessageLinked() now lists LINK_ROOT and LINK_THIS
* Fixed incorrect sizing of button images in several floaters
* Purging an item from the trash now closes any associated preview windows
* Attempting to delete (not purge) an item from the trash no longer changes selection
* Fixed a bug where objects could not be reattached after being dropped
* Fixed viewer crash when deleting a playing animation
* Fixed viewer crash when opening/closing textures in object contents
Release Notes for Second Life 1.13.2(6) January 12, 2007
=====================================
Bug fixes:
* Fixed estate ban failing if more than 63 names are on the list
January 15th, 2007 at 3:46 PM
This is all great. But can you fix the main grid first and maybe let us have it more or less bug free for a while before you bring in a bunch of new ones?
January 15th, 2007 at 4:05 PM
So nothing in this upcoming patch to address the grid’s inability to handle load above about 21,000 concurrent users, just more rearranging of deck chairs?
Is there any ETA available on when we might start seeing updates which address the problems the grid has when more than 21,000 of us are in-world?
This is not to say that I don’t appreciate the bug fixes, but it is hard to appreciate them when you can’t walk across a room due to latency, or TP, or (in the case of half of yesterday) search.
January 15th, 2007 at 4:19 PM
Well, progress on the viewer shouldn’t be criticized - IIRC, they’ve explained before that not all staff work on server-side stuff. (Just throwing people at the problem would probably be rather counterproductive, when I think about it.)
But yeah, acknowledgment and reassurance of progress about the apparent overloading issues would be nice to see.
January 15th, 2007 at 4:49 PM
Yes, lets add more frosting and say screw the cake itself..
January 15th, 2007 at 4:53 PM
Work on reducing the database load has been ongoing. While we shipped some of the planned 1.13.2 work early last week, we do more changes scheduled to go out with this release and more that will be rolled out transparently while the grid is live, probably next week.
These changes are often hard to spot in the change log - weeks of work can turn into a single line item like “Improved search performance” because, at the end of the day, there should be no change to the in-world experience beyond one class of problems going away. But rest assured, we’re working on them.
January 15th, 2007 at 4:58 PM
Thank you!
January 15th, 2007 at 5:03 PM
Just turning on the texture SimCaps feature will make a big difference in the DB performance. That was scheduled for last week, but with the problems that appeared, it was pushed back. I’m anxiously awaiting that feature. In fact, it may already be in the “First Look” client - there is an option under “Client->Render” called “HTTP GET Textures”. I’m not sure if that’s SimCaps at work or not. Can a Linden respond to that question?
January 15th, 2007 at 5:16 PM
I am too, Buckaroo.
Aside from the rearranging deck chairs, i agree with you, however progress does take time, and takes alot of work, patience is a virtue.
Anyhow, enough of my babbling on
January 15th, 2007 at 5:27 PM
“sim-caps” requires both server side and viewer side changes. The option in the First Look build is a no-op at the moment, since it works against the main grid which does not have sim-caps enabled. (And there are other protocol mismatches so you can’t point the First Look build against the Beta Grid either, sorry!)
January 15th, 2007 at 5:29 PM
OK - Thanks for the clarification, Joshua. Any idea when we can expect the Texture SimCaps to be implemented on the main grid?
January 15th, 2007 at 5:54 PM
Joshua - I know this seems like a little thing, but really, how can pants (yes, trousers) still be broken? How does one go about breaking pants anyway? I guess more importantly, can we expect pants to be fixed sometime soon? Heck, even bell bottoms are better than this
Maybe I should join the chorus and complain about my shoes up my backside when crossing a sim, but I just can’t get over TIGHT PANTS!
Thanks muchly.
January 15th, 2007 at 6:23 PM
We’ve just posted 1.13.2.8 which has a fix for the MacOS 10.3.9 issue (logged out on region crossings). No update to viewers on other platforms.
@Buckaroo Mu:
Texture download over HTTP via capabilities will be enabled “when it’s ready”.
@Gillian Waldman:
Yes, we’re aware of the “tight pants” issue. It’s up there on our high priority list of non-”OMG the grid is dying!” issues, albeit somewhat below the “shoes up your backside” issue.
We believe the issue is caused by a glitch in either texture compositing or texture decoding. Clothing parameters get encoded into image data and composited into clothing textures. If something goes awry in that pipeline you can end up with this sort of artifact. Sometimes it’s subtle, sometimes it’s obvious.
January 15th, 2007 at 6:36 PM
client does look better here joshu.
But but we need a load test to see if its as good as it appears.
January 15th, 2007 at 6:38 PM
I swear I wrote the japanese client is still not fixed? why was this deleted?
January 15th, 2007 at 6:42 PM
Okies - thanks for the response on pants (I laugh everytime I bring this up). As long as it’s on the list somewhere, I’m happy…
Too bad I can’t get my significant other to wear skirts, because that might only be slightly less unattractive than his current pants
Good luck on the upgrade.
January 15th, 2007 at 6:58 PM
Sigh, you still have to know the first word in a group’s name in order to search for a group. For the many groups that that start with “Second Life” you have to type Second Life and then the third word to find them. This is not how a search system should work. Perhaps group information should be made available for searching through third parties, just as events can be searched much more effectively at eventful.com than they can be in the SL search system.
The way the underscores on menus work is still pretty funky. Tap the Alt key to make the menus show the underscores. Thne move the mouse cursor into the menu option area and the underscores go away. That’s annoying. Go ahead and click on a menu option like Client. The underscores don’t show, but the letters that would be underscored still work. etc. So one can still use a letter to activate the options shown on the main menu, one just can’t see what if anything the letter keys will do at that point.
I suspect the customers of retailers investing in SL as a shopping tool and the executives of companies attempting to use SL as a productive chat system and the students of educational systems trying to use SL as an educational medium won’t find the SL menu system to be working the way that menus in their browsers or word processors or email programs or any program in the world other than Second Life work.
January 15th, 2007 at 7:15 PM
[...] (more…) [...]
January 15th, 2007 at 7:40 PM
I could not purchase items for some reason…..
January 15th, 2007 at 10:52 PM
@Usagi Musashi:
We are actively working on the font issue. It won’t make it this release, however.
Also: purchasing items - there’s a known bug with purchasing items in 1.13.2 by Right Click and selecting Buy - the purchase never occurs. We will be fixing this before the release. If you’re seeing a different issue, please provide more details!
January 16th, 2007 at 1:12 AM
Is there any plans to fix the Gesture Save bug that has STOPPED the making or editing of any gestures for over a month now?
It was listed as a fix that was upcoming last week but we know that update was held back. Will this be fixed with the release of the next viewer or before as in “live fixes”?
January 16th, 2007 at 2:08 AM
Maybe its a good ideaa to post a public categorized issuelist so everybody can read for them selves if issues are already known. and what the status of the fix is. This saves the lindens from alot of questions. And lessens the frustration abit.
Join the Second Life User Group if you want the grid to be better!
January 16th, 2007 at 2:18 AM
“Abyss Spire Says:
This is all great. But can you fix the main grid first and maybe let us have it more or less bug free for a while before you bring in a bunch of new ones?”
DERR, these patches are to fix things on the main grid. So Lindens stop working on all upgrades, patches, bug fixesetc, except teleports & fixing the water I suppose till the Blog people say it’s ok.
January 16th, 2007 at 2:29 AM
Thanks kath. I know you’re right. But i love second life and i guess my comment was posted in the heat of the moment. Its been a frustrating couple of days for me as the only time i can get online is during the periods when everything has been overloaded. I just want things to work and recently i’ve become very cynical about updates as they seem to me to always cause more problems. Maybe i’m being overly negative but thats just how i feel at the moment.
January 16th, 2007 at 2:53 AM
Joshua thank you very much for the update.I keep you posted……
January 16th, 2007 at 3:55 AM
So you are working on the database load but… this isn’t fixing the database issues, that is only delaying them. IMHO you need to change the whole database system to something that is actually able to hold and manage the permanently increasing database and number of accesses instead of trying to only lower the load.
Sure, this would need that you shut down the grid for longer but i’m sure the mayority of the paying customers of SL would accept this when this means we will have a stable game after that.
January 16th, 2007 at 4:25 AM
Well hell yes, menus are funky at least on a Mac. Type in any accent like standard eg Option-C for cedilla on a UK keyboard and you also get a menu drop down.
That’s when it decides to work. In half the places it doesn’t put a character. You know there are toolbox routines you are supposed to use for Window handling, editing behaviour, keyboard mapping and the like….
What’s interesting is you would have foisted version 5 on us, except for the bug, now it’s version 8, so doesn’t that kind of prove you’re rushing these updates out too fast without proper testing?
January 16th, 2007 at 4:42 AM
@Isandra Willunga (or anyone wanting to listen):
1. Using texture download of HTTP will decrease the load, and be faster (along with sim caps when ready)
2. The database load is caused by protocols (and of course, yes increased residents)
3. The MySQL db cluster that LL use is being scaled
4. MySQL is perfectly capable
5. Most of the “bugs” and problems seen are due to load issues - which are being worked on
So the whole “change the db” comments, or “fix it” or “get a decent db” are not relevant.
Besides, changing the DB would require a massive overhaul and wouldn’t be practical.
See http://www.mysql.com/why-mysql/benchmarks/eweek.html which gives a performance graph - a little old, yes, but you can clearly see MySQL is capable.
Everyone relax…. it’s in hand
January 16th, 2007 at 9:38 AM
@Isandra Willunga:
Someone famous once said something that I’ll paraphrase as: “The most efficient database query is one that you don’t run” - that sums up a lot of the work that we’re doing with databases by caching query results in various parts of the system so that they don’t even need to be run. Additionally, we are actively in the process of moving several services and queries from single hosts to distributed sets of hosts.
When we say “lowering the load” we’re speaking generically - not just trying to ratchet something down from 80% to 60%, but eliminate an entire class of issues by making a query’s frequency drop into the level of noise and/or distribute it across multiple systems.
It’s time consuming to do these not because the grid is up but because of the time required to investigate the source of a pain point, determine the best approach for solving it, write the code, review the code, tweak the code, then start testing the code. Taking the grid down wouldn’t help that process go any faster.
@Precursor:
I don’t mean to single you out, but several of the things you say aren’t terribly accurate.
1. Textures over HTTP will decrease the load on the simulator processes, but should have no net effect on DB load.
2. A “protocol” is a standard for communication, and has nothing to do with DB load. DB load is caused by queries (um, which is what a database does). This does obviously increase as the number of residents and the size of the grid increases. The trick is to eliminate unnecessary queries, reduce the time necessary to run queries, and distribute queries across multiple hosts.
3. Simply adding more databases is not the only approach necessary to address load issues. But yes, it’s part of it.
4. You’re absolutely right - MySQL has thus far proven capable. At this point we don’t believe that changing the underlying implementation does anything to help long term growth. E.g. switching to another platform that was 4x on all metrics would only help for 8 months, after which we’d need to do all of the same query reduction and distribution we’re doing now on top of MySQL.
5. Network issues have been as problematic or perhaps more problematic over the last few weeks than database issues. They’re certainly jockeying for first place in my mind.
January 16th, 2007 at 10:27 AM
Thanks, Joshua, for being up front with all of us about the backend/client issues. It’s a refreshing bit of face-to-face communication that seems to be sorely lacking as of late.
It’s interesting that you mention simulator load is affected by texture loads. Would switching to HTTP texture loads allow the sim to “hand off” a lot of this work, instead of managing (I presume) a bunch of dowload handles for each agent?
January 16th, 2007 at 10:30 AM
All fix’s are good, well done to all.
Any update on when Gesture creation will be fixed?
January 16th, 2007 at 10:35 AM
I assume that some of the caching of db queries will be done out of crontab or similiar: i.e. running a query every 5 minutes on something that isn’t going to change much (most popular places comes to mind), instead of every request.
There’s a lot of work that can be saved by figuring out what doesn’t need to be queried for every hit. I have to assume that I’m preaching to the choir, and that the right people are already on this one (and if not, well then that would be bad
To the MySQL naysayers - shh, be quiet. Just because some people hit their thumb with this database hammer doesn’t mean it’s a bad tool to use. It’s the right choice, and much bigger/badder deployments out there use it to great effect.
January 16th, 2007 at 11:57 AM
Joshua,
When you release the new build, will any of the features of the First Look client make it in? Will this disable the first look client? I’ve been using that exclusively since you released it, due to the 33% framerate improvement just from turning VBO on and smoother turning. I tried going back to the old client, and well, it seems actually PAINFULLY SLOW to use now.
ETA on the pipeline changes becoming a reality as opposed to a first look? (Please tell me if not this patch, there will be another first look soon after the patch.
)
January 16th, 2007 at 12:04 PM
Thank you for being so responsive here Joshua.
Can you tell us if/when the water problems will be fixed? This bug has been around for a long time now.
January 16th, 2007 at 12:06 PM
Hey folks - sorry if I go quiet on this thread. I’m wearing the “Release Manager” hat so I’m spending the bulk of my time making sure we get the right thing out the door at the right time, and that means a big time crunch. Otherwise I’d compete with Torley for chattiness here.
@Fenrir Reitveld:
You hit the nail on the head - handing off download of textures from the sim to another process will help sim performance. That said, everything is still running on and mediated by the same host, so we’re not expecting dramatic changes. More moving parts but they’re simpler… a good trade off, but I wouldn’t expect anyone to notice.
@Strollerweb Market:
Gesture creation should be fixed in 1.13.2. Can you hop on the Beta Grid and confirm?
@Maklin Deckard:
As soon as possible after 1.13.2 is out the door we’ll refresh the First Look download to be compatible. There might be a delay of a few hour but we’ll get it out ASAP, and the prep work for that is under way now.
January 16th, 2007 at 12:09 PM
@Persephone Milk:
The water bug is addressed in the First Look viewer, so please try that out.
This is one of those bugs that was introduced by the fix to another bug. The correct fix required some re-architecture which was already in place in the First Look viewer. So we’re anxious to get as much feedback about the First Look viewer as possible to get it ready to become the mainline viewer, hopefully as part of the next release.
January 16th, 2007 at 1:02 PM
Regarding the First Look viewer: I found the movement very smooth, with a high frame rate, but it seems to have severe problems with the texture display. Textures stay blurry until one stays at the same spot for a longer time. When they finally load, 512 x 512 seems to be the maximum resolution; 1024 pixels textures are only displayed at best quality when you zoom very close onto a prim and wait 1-5 minutes.
I appreciate the performance gains, but not on cost of display quality. It’s quite hard to read shop displays with small text sizes now. Also, the “keep it blurry until a high resolution is really needed” philosophy makes it hard to quickly scan vendors in a shop or mall, since the textures are often too blurry to be recognized or deciphered.
Another First Look viewer issue: shiny surfaces with black color aren’t shiny anymore, just plain black without any reflection.
January 16th, 2007 at 1:20 PM
hello I am Middleman
January 16th, 2007 at 3:31 PM
Thanks for replying to blog comments Joshua! It goes a long way toward letting us know we’re being heard, and helps stop the spread of misinformation. Much appreciated.
January 17th, 2007 at 7:15 AM
The first person viewer, in regards to the waterbug, is no option.
The textures stay vague for ages and the waiting takes all the joy out of SL. Also transparant textures go black for a long time, so the seagulls on my island are big black devices that rotate untill i fly up to them, stare at them for 5 minutes in full zoom mouseview.
I hope we can keep using the old viewer, i rather have the waterbug on my island and keep the ability to shop then have water on my island and needing to take out a day to find an item in the shops.
The water bug has a QUICK fix that i can make a signpost for, the big black rotating devices in the sky.. i can hardly expect each visitor to go up and stare at each seagull for 5 minutes……
Nice framerate in the first person viewer, but who needs to see UGLY 40x per second if you can see BEAUTY 20x per second ?
~Respect,
Trail.
January 17th, 2007 at 7:27 AM
Well, the beta sure is promising I crash every time I try to go on the beta grid….the download bar finishs….then I crash immeadiately…I’ve done a clean reboot and nope,……crash ola……5 times ……
January 17th, 2007 at 8:13 AM
I have tested the First Look Viewer on my computer. And I do say I like it. It has alot nicer feel to it then the other client. I have a older computer, we all use what we can afford right. Well thats what I can afford … old. heh. (400 Mhz , 16 MB Graphics Card, 512 MB RAM). And I find it silly people complain about heavy lag =P. Its called modify your prefs to match your computer =). I run with very little lag. The First Look Viewer performs even nicer on this old machine. So it is a welcomed client.
Thank you =)
- Sieben Ochs
January 17th, 2007 at 9:52 AM
@polysilox Apogee:
If you have tried the First Look viewer and VBO rendering is enabled in Advanced Graphics Preferences (it may be enabled automatically depending on your system configuration), then run the normal Second Life viewer you may experience such a crash.
Any chance that that’s what you’re seeing? We need to post a note about this.
January 17th, 2007 at 1:31 PM
preview grid is screwed again with the endless loop of thinking a newer version is available when it is already installed.
Observations from when I was able to get in before you intentionally killed preview today:
1. the preview grid was under loading conditions similar to having 25000+ logged in to main
2. all of the same defects are still present. Virtually nothing has been fixed.
Unable to move
linden has disappeared for many accounts
those with money cannot buy from prim vendors
nothing in inventory will load
avatars are invisible
nothing scripted works
gigantic lag spikes exactly like in main are constant
secondlife is useless
linden labs has demonstrated they have zero competency in configuration management and is incapable of a simple activity called a rollout.
linden labs has again demonstrated they do not have any actual software engineers on staff and instead employ hackers willing to work for pizza and beer while they play well engineered games until the boss comes around at which time they throw up various code editors and look like they are busy arguing over the various questions on the mensa exam.
good job. the potential investors will be amused.
January 17th, 2007 at 2:19 PM
managed to get a connect to preview. all avatars are invisible. the most odd thing is the absence of information on the menu bar after the region, coords, and rating. just a dash followed by nothing. Also, when the version download thing was happening the required version was a series of periods.
January 17th, 2007 at 4:14 PM
While getting the main grid back up and open was occupying our time, it appears as though the central database used for the Beta Test Grid got into a terribly bad state.
The Beta grids are much, much smaller than the main grid and often do not have exactly the same configuration (e.g. one host instead of a cluster for some services).
Time permitting, I’m attempting to get the beta grid back into a usable state.
January 19th, 2007 at 6:09 PM
Major issue with this new feature or bug when you single tap the Alt key that enables the top of the screen menus. This makes building & looking around very annoying & those of us that are skilled with using the zoom tool constantly don’t need the menus being selected by accident when only trying to zoom in & out. Another annoyance this creates is when you don’t realise that the menus have been selected after doing a lot of “hold Alt+Zoom”, when you try to walk you are selecting menus instead! This must be removed (bug) or change to a key of it’s own. If this is a feature, how about a preference setting?
November 18th, 2007 at 6:05 PM
UCFtCF Test myfunction comment