Second Life Simulator v1.20.0.83683 Rollout Followup
Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008 at 8:40 PM by: Sidewinder LindenOverview Of Results
The deployment of the new Second Life Simulator v1.20.83683 was completed early this morning. Overall, the process went smoothly, and the general reports we have gotten are positive. We also learned some things in the process, and I wanted to take this opportunity to pass on some information about where we are and what our next steps look like, and to provide an opportunity to hear more feedback on the update.
We discovered partway through the update process that the deploy script in use had not been updated to incorporate a bug fix. I apologize for the inconvenience of having a “no notice restart” for those who were affected by this issue. For the first part of the rollout, simulators were being shut down and restarted with the five minute restart warnings. As soon as this issue was realized, the deploy was halted, we picked up the fixed version of the deploy scripting, and continued from that point.
Some regions have found unexpected behaviors, and as posted before the deploy, we expected that this would happen. Even with a large scale beta test, we still know that we could not test everything that has been built across all of Second Life.
If I could ask for one thing, and only one, it would be “If you see something misbehaving after the update, please do not panic! Report it as a bug - as described below - and we will work through the list and deploy a set of updates over the next few weeks with issue resolutions as soon as we can.”
Many of the issues found have already been addressed and others are being worked on. We are here and continuing to work through issues as they are discovered, so please do not assume that “this is it” - the team is still working through the new issues uncovered by bringing the new simulator to all of Second Life.
Did We Test Everything In Second Life? Is That Even Possible?
As mentioned in earlier blog posts, although we ran an extensive and long public beta program, we know that not every vendor opted-in to participate and not every product could have been tested. Some products have been found during the rollout that are not working correctly, and we are working to resolve issues as we become aware of them.
Please remember that if you find something that does not work with the new simulator, the best way to handle this is to let us know about it. We can and will work to try to resolve issues that we know about, and all I ask is that you take up your part of this process, and report the issue in the public issue tracker at http://jira.secondlife.com.
How Do I Report A Simulator Problem?
- Open http://jira.secondlife.com, and log in with your Second Life login credentials
- Click “Create Issue”
- Set Project to “2 Second Life Service - SVC”
- Set Issue Type to “Bug”
- Click Next
- Type a one-line description of the issue in the Summary line
- Explain the details of the issue in the description section. Please include the following:
- Name, version and creator of any product involved in the bug
- Lo cation where the bug occurs (for instance “Ahern 128,128,0″)
- Set Component to typically Physics, Scripting or Performance
- Step-by-step description of how to make the problem appear (Please assume that we do not know how to operate products that you own, as we may not have seen the particular item before - and i f you can help us to focus on the bug fix rather than learning a product, we can get the fix done faster!)
- Which viewer were you using when you found the bug? (Open About > Second Life…, copy the first text line and paste it into the text box)
- Click “Create” at the bottom of the form
Common Questions and Issues
Q: I’ve heard that there are new rules that govern how prims are linked in the new simulator. Where can I find more information on this?
A: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linkability_Rules
Q: Ok - that linkability rules page makes no sense to me… Can you explain in plain English what the linkability rules are about?
A: (Long one… sorry this is actually the shortest answer I could think of!)
Whether prims are linkable in Second Life has always been governed by formulas. The Havok1 formulas were based on a “cube model”, where things had to fit within the cube to link. The problem with that model is that if you rotate the item on rez - things at the extreme boundaries would fall off and be non-linkable.
The new model is based on a sphere, so that no matter which orientation the item is rezzed in, the previously linked parts will still link.
The rest of the details of “how many”, “of what size” and “how far apart” are mathematical formulae that are by nature inter-related. If I were to simplify them into a sentence or two we’d get avalanched by people who say “well here’s an example that doesn’t match the rule”… which is why I have been less comfortable with a text cliff-notes version.
The bottom line is that things that used to link in the old simulator should link in the new one. If you build something in the new one it might not link in the old one. However that issue now becomes moot as we roll out the new simulator to the whole Second Life system.
Q: I am seeing performance problems on my region that didn’t seem to be present before the update. What could be causing this?
A: There are a few types of operations that seem to cause more performance impact with the new physics engine than the old one. In particular very complex shapes that are rezzed repeatedly and quickly can take more of a toll on performance than with the old simulator.
Products that we have seen create this problem include:
- Some (not all) fish rezzers
- Some (not all) wave generators
- Some (not all) special effects generators
- Some (not all) vehicles, in particular complex vehicles
If you are seeing lower performance on your region after the update, please check the following things first:
- If you are the region owner, click World > Region/Estate… in your viewer. Then click the Debug tab. Click “Get Top Scripts” and then click the column header titled “Time” twice, so that the list is sorted with the highest time at the top.If you see one or a few rows at the top with script times that are much higher than the rest of the entries, these scripts may be responsible for much of the performance impact. In many cases, I have seen one or two scripts be reponsible for a large percentage of the performance issues. Often they are one of the categories listed above.As an experiment, try disabling or derezzing those high script time scripts, and see if the region performance recovers. If it does, please file a jira, naming those scripts and the numeric results, so that we can look at how to optimize for them - or to talk to the builders to have them create an optimized version for the new simulator.
- Watch the “Time” section at the bottom of the Simulator section of the Statistics Bar to see which time components are the largest, and which vary the most. If you see a clear pattern, please file a jira explaining the numbers you see here, along with any script findings above.
In a few cases, we have identified a single scripted item that is causing a performance problem, and been able to optimize for it without changing the product. In others, the product may need to be enhanced to be more efficient on the current simulator.
We know of a few regions that are having performance problems unrelated to a specific script, and are working with them directly to research the issues and find ways to improve performance on those regions.
Q: Why can I not climb up stairs that I could climb up before?
A: The new simulator uses a more realistic avatar climbing model. It uses a location at about the standard height knee point as the height of barrier that is considered to be a “wall” for avatar stair climbing behavior. If stairs are too tall, the avatar will not be able to climb them.
Q: Why are some vehicle very fast on the new simulator?
A: After many weeks of discussions with vehicle builders, it was decided to raise the maximum “script motor speed” in Second Life to 256 m/S. This is far faster than the previous motor limit. In order to “get around” the previous lower limit, some vehicle makers would add impulse pushes to the vehicle, which could force it to go faster than the motor speed setting. Now, with the higher motor limit, you get the max motor speed plus these extra pushes, which in some cases can result in a very surprising top speed.
This is a case where the community spoke clearly in office hours and other discussions, and the builders said that they wanted to be able to do better vehicles in the future, with better motor control, and would live with the idea that some existing vehicles might have speed problems. Some vendors are planning to do updates that will be tuned specifically for the new motor characteristics, and others are release whole new product lines to take advantage of these relaxed limits.
Q: I have some other product that is not behaving after the update. What should I do?
A: The first thing to do in this situation is to contact the vendor who makes the product. In many cases, their current version will work fine with the new simulator, or they are planning an update that is tuned to the new simulator’s behavior.
If the product vendor has an issue or bug that needs fixing in order to get the product working correctly, please encourage them to file a jira to explain the problem, get involved with the development team, attend office hours, or otherwise let us know what the problem is and what sort of resolution would be helpful. The Havok4 team will be continuing to fix these issues for the next several weeks directly, before turning the simulator over to on-going support.
Q: I am a product vendor, and my product does not work correctly on the new simulator. What should I do?
A: Please file a jira describing the problem behavior, and if possible, include a sample simplified script to demonstrate the issue (so that we don’t have to pick through thousands of lines of your code to find the 20 lines that illustrate the bug 
. If sample code is not possible, we will work through the existing product to figure out the issues, but it will take longer to resolve problems this way.
Please attend office hours if you can, so that we can talk directly about any issues and discuss how to best resolve them. Office hours are held at the center of “Content to Hover” on Tuesdays at 11:00-12:00 PST and Thursdays at 17:00-18:00 PST.
Best regards,
Sidewinder Linden
Havok4 Program Manager
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:55 PM
Just wanted to poke ya a little about the C:SI kick bug
It’s not resolved, and we are unsure how to proceed to create a workaround from our end, since the relevant physics rules have changed quite significantly.
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:55 PM
Kudos on the informative post. It must be said you’re very good with blogposts, Sidewinder. Also the additional comments are very much appreciated. So thanks for all that!
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:57 PM
Surprised nobody has mentioned this, but it seems like a MAJOR oversight, The second life GMT clock has been off by about 58 minutes the whole day,
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:58 PM
@2 - Yes, Sidewinder is a model Linden in many ways. In fact, I think the Havok 4 team is a model team as well.
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:58 PM
Sidewinder seems to be the only Linden who actually cares enough to listen to the clients and tell us exactly what is happening - kudo’s to you, sidewinder. And thankyou for the update as to what’s going on…. it’s appreciated. Now if only the rest of the linden team could be as nice….
April 2nd, 2008 at 8:59 PM
for a few hours now not been able to log in or access secondlife.com website… is it just me has this out of the blue? rest of the web works fine..
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:00 PM
Thank you for all your hard work. It mustn’t have been easy.
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:05 PM
“The Havok4 team will be continuing to fix these issues for the next several weeks directly, before turning the simulator over to on-going support.”
Isn’t the Havok4 team bound to resolve all 145+ JIRA reported bugs until around Christmas which is about the time it should take according to the previous fixing rate before turning this to support?
Could you clarify the meaning of your statement “turning the simulator over to on-going support.”? Thanks
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:14 PM
Sit taegets going to be fixed as well? There are times where older sit targets results as sit on without sitting on the pose in questen.
Again Thank you sidewinder being upfront with the problems and the resulted fixes
Usagi
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:17 PM
on the test grid we could build to 4096 meter
why can’t we now ?????
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:19 PM
I don’t know what kind of pot people are smoking these days but I wish I could get some of it, Glow IS scriptable, It’s been scriptable since they updated the servers last RC rollout. It is in llSetPrimitiveParams.
llSetPrimitiveParams([25, ALL_SIDES, 1.0]); // this will turn on glow for the object.
I’ve got lamps and ceiling fans working with scripted glow effect when they’re on and when they’re off the glow effect disables. There’s a bit of lag time between the light going off and glow switching to 0 but it works. Most of the mainland sims have the new server update, if the island your on doesn’t have the new server, ask the person running the island to update.
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:24 PM
Just a comment. Since I downloaded the new version, I have crashed 3 tmes in 2 1/2 hours. JUst letting u guys know.
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:25 PM
Well, this is a showstopper:
http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1531
right now, I’m standing on top of a hollow dimpled sphere which is solid. This has been opened in february and made it to the live grid. Basically I’m at a loss now, and I just made a new vehicle using dimpled spheres in the cockpit…
I’m really at a loss at the moment…
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:26 PM
Is there way to get old viewer back? i updated didn’t know it will change all the world around.. why not keep two viewers i mean most used not windlight one!!! please help i want old one back *cries!!!
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:31 PM
@10 Yvon: The build ceiling will be expanded on Second Life, but will not be active until a viewer update that includes the new build height limit. /Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:37 PM
@10 U M: Sit targeting has been adjusted several times and is where we think it will land. Sit targeting in the earlier simulator was also somewhat difficult, and it turns out that a lot of products would show quite varied sit targeting in different scenarios. /Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:39 PM
@13 Carrah: We’ll look at this issue again. I know that the general topic has been discussed multiple times throughout the project. Regards, Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:41 PM
@13, I’m standing in a hollow dimpled sphere right now, and see no problem. can you give some specific prim parameters, I’d really like to see this for myself. Can’t seem to reproduce it.
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:41 PM
#15 Nelle… Get USED TO IT!
Hahahahahahahahaaa!!!!
– A mind is a terrible waste to thing.
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:44 PM
@darien
try 10×10x10, 95% hollow, .38 start, .55 end
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:47 PM
@20, yes, I see now, if the dimples close in on each other it happens. :\
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:50 PM
i am seeing degraded performance in my sim now since update but alas it is mainland so what do we do i cant touch any of the god items on the sim to see whats causing this and all live help does is restart the sim i asked earlier for help and all we got was we will check on it when we have time still nothing still bad performance along with continued stale money transfers =/ hopeless filing a jira i have posted bugs since last august that havent even been looked at or any help on totally useless
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:55 PM
i downloaded the new version my pc cant handle it….. the link sent me to get the otehr version back but it wont download it can comeone help plz
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:56 PM
@4 Money Pyramid
Shut the f’ up! That has NOTHING to do with Havok or the viewer release. stop spaming the blog posts with your BS pyramid scheme gripes! You’re not any better than a Nigerian scammer.
Sidewinder: Check out a game called Stellar Dogfight, the ships jump off the play field now. Dunno if that’s a bug or feature though. Btw, how much heavier did avatars get? My catapults barely fling you half as far now, I had one that slammed you 1.6 sims away, now it lands at about .8
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:00 PM
Some feedback from a content creator:
* Would be nice to have a little more warning about the Havok update. I’d hoped you would give at least a week or two notice before forcing an update into production. Not all of us can spend countless hours testing their stuff under _every_ havok update. Please especially give significantly more advanced noticed if there are _known issues_ in the update you’re pushing that may require creators to have new versions ready.
* Now that we have Hetgrid, perhaps you can push out updates into production more slowly as to give people time to prepare, react, and give feedback before being forced into something? The way some of the updates are done diminish the value that the content creators create (and thus limit their motivation to make significant investments) as well as the SL consumers faith that the things they buy will be worth something after the next update. Everyone would win if LL would take these things into greater account.
* Please let us know what the priority and ETA is on fixing the known problems with the current release so that we can prioritize ourselves on what to fix/update and what to wait on.
Thanks,
-HG
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:08 PM
can someone please post what is going to be done about the stale money transfers please 3 plus weeks daily solid issues with this 1000’s of unhappy customers please
POST SOMETHING WHATS BEING DONE TO FIX THIS ISSUE WE ARE SCREAMING HERE!!!!!!!!! IS ANYONE LISTENING PLEASE TELL US WHAT IS GOING ON AND WHEN THIS WILL BE FIXED! NOT JUST A DAILY RESOLVE
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:11 PM
@28 Heather: There were 50 office hours, several of which talked about how close the release was. There were 27 blog posts about the project, recent ones being quite clear that the release was getting closer. We labeled the last three builds “Release Candidate” RC1, RC2 and RC3, which is a clear indication that the simulator was “close to release”. We did use HetGrid to run a public Early Adopter program over the course of six months, involving over 600 regions, specifically to allow for work towards the goal of full release.
If you have specific items that you would like to know or discuss prioritization of, please contact me, or preferably attend office hours so that open issues of importance to you can be addressed.
Best regards,
Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:16 PM
Having problem with llSetLinkPrimitiveParams on PRIM_POSITION to move avatar position.
http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1952
The most interesting is that the problem is not affect all sim, but more in random. And it may fix without any update to the Havok4.
And typically that every after upgrade on beta previous time, I got complaint about it from some early adopters. And some-days after, i checked, it is already fine.
What i know this problem should be fix on update dated Feb 13 on SVC-1239. But it may still raise some problems on each next update with random sim.
Sincerely,
Cecilia Zheng
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:17 PM
/me, who knows the skills & time it takes to create great, wonderful, detailed, instructions and explanations, stares in stunned silence at this blog post.
Geeze … No, the Lindens can’t afford to keep this team forever … this team raises the bar way too high. We’re getting tooo dang spoiled!!
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:19 PM
Regarding rolling things like this out more slowly. The ideal thing would probably be to let sim owners update at a time of their choosing either via a web based interface or a button on the estate interface in-world… along with the option to rollback if they find the update causes problems they need to report or react to in some way (much like the way the viewers are now rolled out). One might hope $300US a month for a sim would buy some control over these things.
Thanks,
-HG
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:20 PM
I made my jira bug report - hope you can fix the problem soon! Keep it up and dont listen to the whiners!
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:24 PM
http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-5982
As requested, the Avatar ‘Gliding’ instead of walking problem.
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:29 PM
I have also encountered the hollow dimpled sphere problem today. Yesterday, I was able to pass through the dimple, today it is solid. Kinda wrecks a bit of my build.
Added my vote and comment to
http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1531
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:30 PM
@30 Heather: We have discussed this internally and at multiple office hours with other content creators. We discussed the implications of mixed physics engines during this project. The conclusion of the group was that it would create confusion, be difficult to manage, and require products to be version sensitive, automatically shifting optimizations as the product moved from region to region. It would also require the product manufacturers to maintain multiple code bases, with varied optimizations and increase their testing load in ensuring that the product worked properly across all simulator version currently in operation.
The collective thinking on this at that point in time was that it would create more problems than it would solve to have a long mixed physics engine environment on the main Second Life system for this project. As a longer term goal, and perhaps for other features that are of more contained scope, a more mixed environment seemed to make sense.
Because of the reach, depth and timing of this project, the people involved in the discussions were consistent in saying that we should not run the system for an extended period with multiple versions - other than for a public beta environment with a limited portion of the grid - as we did for the Early Adopter program.
/Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:31 PM
Thank you for the update I am very happy with it =-)
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:32 PM
There seem to be three issues most affecting me:
- Boats sitting too low in the water in some instances, and the Swimmer not, well, swimming.
- Huggers not hugging properly, usually putting one avvie in a “fall” animation.
- Unsits working too well (I think), causing an avatar to not remain in motion on slides.
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:33 PM
@15 Nelle
@24 Mandie
You can download the earlier versions here:
http://download-secondlife-com.s3.amazonaws.com/Second_Life_1-19-0-5_Setup.exe
http://download-secondlife-com.s3.amazonaws.com/Second_Life_1-18-5-3_Setup.exe
If you can’t download, send me a notecard in-world with your email address and I will email the 1.18.5.3 installer to you. I still have it on my PC.
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:36 PM
Hi Sidewinder, is there any indication that a class 4 region would have difficulties with Havok 4 in any way, shape or form?
I’ve heard people mention they had issues in class 4’s that they haven’t had in class 5 Havok 4 regions - I’m trying to nail down anyone with anything reproducible and get it in the pjira.
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:41 PM
Well pretty sure I’ve been reading every blog but I dont remember any warning us that vehicles woud be going faster.
I tested my vehicle on day 1 of Havok4 implementation and I had to turn down all the forward / backward / rotation multipliers quite dramatically.
Fortunately I have not got around to selling my vehicles but if I were I’d be a bit upset at not seeing a BLOG warning of this.
This is one of these occasions where a basic and widespread change would affect almost everybody and justify singling out and BLOGGING in advance.
Please look out for the next one .
PS My FPS is up from 3 to 5 with Havok4 ! Woo Hoo !!!
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:42 PM
@36 Marianne: The boat flotation height issue is being discusssed. We adjusted flotation height for one set of products, and just found out about others that appear to require contradictory handling. The solution to this is not clear at the moment.
Another person mentioned a hugger problem, and when we checked, and had the maker of the product check, it turned out to be an avatar size issue. We have tested several huggers that seem to work fine. If you have one that is not working, please file a jira to explain what is not working with the specific product information so that we can take a look at it.
Unsits are an interesting case technically. If you have a case that can be reproduced, please file a jira on this so that we can see what the issue is on this unsit problem.
Thanks,
Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:43 PM
Quaintly Darling merry me!!! muah!!! muah you are the best!!!
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:45 PM
I had to rebuild my nuclear reactors in the Extropia Core sim. The originals linked under Havok1 but not under Havok4 (the opposite of what the notes above about the new link rules say), and once they became unlinked, the pieces autoreturned because everything but the root prim was off-sim.
Thankfully after a few adjustments they became linkable again. But do be aware that *sometimes* things can be linkable under the old rules but not the new. In this case, there were megaprims involved so I knew they might cause trouble down the road. They’re just scenery anyhow, but I was glad I was able to adjust the distances of the prims and get them linking again.
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:45 PM
@38 Desmond: There is nothing in particular that would cause problems on a Class 4 Havok4 region. The Class 4 servers have less RAM and do not run the simulator quite as quickly, but that is not a basic functional difference. /Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:47 PM
@39 Al: I remember writing the post that explained that we had increased the motor speed, it certainly was published in public office hours transcripts, as well as discussed in multiple office hours. /Sidewinder
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:52 PM
I’m very pleased with the amount of work being done on the servers since the last few months. There’s new updates every other week almost (which can be annoying, but it’s worht it!)
My only complaint is that with each new update, SL requires more grunt..
Which is not something Linden Labs can actually fix
Some of us geeky poor NZ students play this and dont have the best computers
(Did i mention SL combined wiht my 2 dfferent speeds of ram, and SATA internal … and crappy graphics card killed my laptop?
)
Anyways kudos to Sidewinder and the Havok4 team!
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:56 PM
Thanks for the amazingly rapid response Sidewinder - I’ve not submitted anything as I suspected non-Havok 4 issues (garden variety bugs). If I can reproduce anything against Havok 4 you’ll know right away in the pjira.
This has been an *awesome* rollout; the only issues I see across 34 active sims are two instances of delinked prims (and they were pretty iffy linksets in the first place anyway). The one sim that was having trouble staying up in Havok 4 (possibly for unrelated reasons) you guys sorted out somehow in the wee hours - it’s running great now. Congrats to you and the team!
Des
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:01 PM
Heh, good job on the smooth rollout. And kudos sidewinder for knocking down all the whiners who don’t bother to read the blog!
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:05 PM
Sidewinder, do you EVER sleep? >.< hehehe
I’ve got to say, noob as I may be, I am impressed with the H4 rollout. Far fewer bugs than I ever would have guessed for such a massive upgrade. Very nice.
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:17 PM
great job onthe roll out. I have cognative disability (Dyslexia) and my camera view changed. It became a bit more like mouselook in undefinable ways . A lot of others have reported the same. This might reduce many peoples enjoyment of sl without them even being aware of the source of the diffculty, and may lead to customer loss. Can this be addressed?
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:24 PM
I agree 100% with comment number 26 by ONE PO’d RESIDENT! All i see constantly is what new great stuff you are achieveing for people that have brand new computers with very good graphics cards! I couldn’t care less how pretty things look when I can’t teleport, can’t buy things, crash and am locked out of SL for an hour whilst you try to sort out the problems YET AGAIN!
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:24 PM
Well done Havok team, thanks for your attention to all the fine details that didn’t go wrong too
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:43 PM
I’m one of those who desire basic stability over new features and this sounds like it might help with stability while laying good ground for growth. Thanks for all your hard work and excellent communication! LL please take note that your customers appreciate this approach.
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:43 PM
@Sidewinder
* Please also keep in mind that some of us have day jobs as well and can not make office hours during normal business hours.
* Re the roll out, I agree it wouldn’t make sense to have all sims running different versions for extended periods of time. But it does seem to make sense to give people some flexibility in when it happens and if they need to roll back while their issues are resolved. The early adopter process was a big step forward, though not quite the same thing… (my only options as a sim owner are currently, suffer through the early problems, or get a forced update later).
* Regarding warning, yes, I’m aware there were many meetings and blog postings and release candidates. So many so that it becomes time consuming to keep up and test under every version, I believe Havok4 has been in the works pretty much since I joined SL.. it still wouldn’t hurt to give more than a days warning before forcing the final update if that’s how you’re going to do it. (If the blog said, the roll out would happen next week, that would’ve been more ideal to give people enough time.)
* Regarding prioritizing issues, perhaps we can start with the following?
* http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1272
* People riding surf boards are almost completely under water while paddling
* http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1974
* Perhaps it’s also time to look into SL handling repeatedly rezzing the same object better? Considering the hit Havok4 takes now.
* http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1660
* Some people have reported their object falling
* http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-1179
Thanks,
~HG~
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:52 PM
Very interesting post. It concerns 1.20.0.83683 but I found 1.20.0.83892 servers (Selenia). What are the differences?
April 2nd, 2008 at 11:54 PM
@53 In the post below this one.
http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/04/02/rolling-restart-beginning-now/
April 3rd, 2008 at 12:07 AM
I have one region (Kikai Enkai) with serious performance trouble since the H4 rollout (it behaved great before it), and nobody seems to be able to find the problem (Matthew Linden said everything was fine). SIM fps dropping below 10, time dilation to 0.20 every few minutes. And no, no temp rezzers, no high scripts, turning off scripts, collisions and physics doesn’t help either. It’s a brand new open space region with only a 1000 prims on it
April 3rd, 2008 at 12:32 AM
Sidewinder / I first came to SL September 2005 / I have never ~ ever seen such professionalism and dedication as you and your team have provided the CUSTOMERS ( please notice the use of capitol letters ) of this grand experiment know as Second Life. If the rest of LL would look to you and your team as an example of what CUSTOMER Service is all about I believe there will be no stopping SL becoming a De-Facto standard within the emerging Virtual World economy. You all definately deserve a raise in pay, if not a whopping bonus lump sum $$$ reward for your work. I vote the Havok4 team employee’s of the years 2007 / 2008.
I sure hope you don’t burn out on us
JayR Cela :_)
April 3rd, 2008 at 12:34 AM
Sidewinder, i dont normally like seeing comments that pat people on the back, but u really deserve it man. I do think tho that LL posts alot of blogs and to really expect people to read them all is kinda crazy. It would be nice to get the blogs as a IM inworld. Just a thought. But Please to consider releasing a non windlight viewer. I really feel LL underestimates how many residents use laptops, and any laptop under $1000 is not going to have sl look good at all. I have a good desktop to use but i dont know any1 else that uses a desktop except for a couple hardcore gaming friends.
April 3rd, 2008 at 12:40 AM
@53 … 1.20.0.83892 is the rolling restart update that went out in the weee early hours of today whatever today is … my insomnia has worn off … ya’ll have fun …
April 3rd, 2008 at 12:54 AM
Lately I found a lot of people are blaming the current Database issues on the Havok4 rollout. Why is that? We had the same issues before the rollout XD
@57 (Medhue): I did comparison on my laptop and had a better lowest framerate (in stress situation) in WL. The average framerate was better too. My laptop isnt made for gaming, its made for mobile office working btw, it even has a non gaming grade ATI graphics card XD.
Laptop graphics cards usually dont support many things normal pc cards do, and therefore a bit of tweaking is needed. either this, or buy a laptop with a gaming grade graphics card (e.g. GT/GTS/GTX series of nvidia. _NOT_ GS ;)).
You cant just set the slider on medium or high and expect it to work.
@50 (Sal Salubrius):
YOU DONT NEED THE NEWEST HARDWARE TO RUN SL SMOOTHLY.
I mean it.
my “SL machine” is >2 years old, _you cant even buy the parts anymore_ and I have no issues whatsoever running SL with a good framerate (for the geeks: its a one fan cooled silent pc with a lot of passive cooling, and reduced clocking even).
Are you people trying to run it on typewriters?
Nowadays its easy(and cheap) to get a somewhat decent PC to run SL, just dont buy a machine made for running office programs (or waste your OS with malware and bad drivers).
Look at PC games… if a pc game doesnt run on your pc you dont blame the maker either. you go upgrade your system. sometimes a new graphics card or more ram does the job, for prices less than 100USD.
if you need help go to a good PC tech forum, describe your budget and your need (second life, gaming) and they will probably help you, if you ask nicely ;).
April 3rd, 2008 at 12:57 AM
i was camping over the several days and i was never paid for though the owner said i earned it, i spent a good 3 hours of my time earning the 70 dollars at 2 linden per 15 minutes. if i sound upset well i am
April 3rd, 2008 at 1:01 AM
Im wondering about HUGE PRIMS and there impact to the physics engine on havok4 if any? wil they cause any odd behaviour or any added perfromance issues on havok4 or will they just behave like reguler prims i saw some discusion on it a while back but could not find it.
April 3rd, 2008 at 1:04 AM
Hi Sidewinder
First off……………well done and a big big kiss your work is first rate and your blogs outstanding
Love Havok 4 only found a few small problems……scripts not running properly……..solved this by resetting them and all work fine.
One strange thing though….when i hover just above water i slowly start to sink and eventually disappear under the water. This happens when i use my AO and without AO……i saw some else post on th blog yesterday about this problem so maybe you are working on it.
Again big thx sidewinder and the havok team you guys really are the best. Lets hope the rest of your Linden colleagues take notice and learn something from you guys
BIG BIG KISS AND HUG
April 3rd, 2008 at 1:11 AM
**** SORRY FOR SHOUTING, BUT I THINK THIS IS CRITICAL AND URGENT ****
THE GMT CLOCK IS ALMOST AN HOUR OFF and slowly drifting even further away from the correct time, So many scripts rely on the GMT clock for timekeeping, rental periods etc
It has been off for most of the day, I realise this is not a support forum, but this really cant wait for the two to three days typical support turn around and besides I would assume that it is the new sim rollout that broke it.
Thanks
April 3rd, 2008 at 1:46 AM
@62 Sonja, yes, that is happening to me as well and my sim was in the Havok4 early adopter regions, but this “bug” is new.
Thanks for all, Sidewinder. You’re the BEST Linden ever!
April 3rd, 2008 at 1:57 AM
RE: “IT WAS EXTENSIVELY DISCUSSED IN OFFICE HOURS”. I dare say there were about 20 people involved and maybe 100 read about it afterward. PLEASE, if it’s something we should all know, post it in a public place instead of hiding it inside the mess that is the second life website! ALSO: Unless I log off of SL and back on, I will probably NOT know there are new blog posts. IF YOU PUT A WARNING ON THE BLOG NOT TO BUY OR REZ, POST IT IN-WORLD TOO!
Thankies
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:04 AM
@64 Cat i have just noticed that since the rollout of the patched havok server this problem has stopped for me
So sorry sidewinder ignore my last post…..hihi……you guys were qiucker than me……..AWESOME
Hugs nad Kisses all round
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:10 AM
*sigh* Linking continues to be a problem. My Big Rocket on my pad in the SW corner of Extropia Core links just fine, but pieces of it unlink every time the sim is rebooted. One fin returns to my lost and found, and the other just gets deleted.
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:25 AM
Great work Sidewinder, I just put in a salary increase for you and the team.. I will however request you stay on bug fixes for 4 weeks instead of 2.. sowwy ;O)-
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:25 AM
Anyone having transactions issues?
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:29 AM
Detox Watanabe has many good points. Please read his answer carefully.
I’m using Windlight since it was available for testing (months):
- it improved SL performances on my old Windows box (where I keep details at a low level)
- it improved SL experience on my new Linux box (where I keep details at the best level)
About Havok 4 - we use it on Vulcano sim since February. Our chaotic sim is filled with prims, megaprims, scripted objects and more - I can say the new physics engine improved our performances and stability.
Sidewinder, thanks for fixing bugs and answering our questions, we appreciate it.
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:41 AM
I’m having problems with some larger vehicles in that on unsit the av is not pushed out of them as before but stays trapped.
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:45 AM
I absolutely love the new viewer
Well it has some minor bugs but I’m sure that Linden Lab(tm) will fix them a.s.a.p. - The new viewer made me jump in my chair and I did a happy dance - so I’m really shaking my head about all those who just complain and do not add any productive comment in here.
And for all those who complain so badly:
If your PC is “too old” or “too slow” why don’t you just set the your
SL(tm) Preferences to “custom” and tweak your own SL.
I tried it with my crappy Laptop here (3 years old) and it worked
brilliant.
And if this won’t help at all - then I’m wondering how you’ve been
able to be in SL at all.
Since Windlight the framerates actually went up and the overall
performance too.
And the fact that it has to go on is an old law (very old)
It’s called EVOLUTION - or technical progression.
Just imagine you’d still sit at home under your gas lamp reading
a book instead of sitting in front of your “too old” PC whining
about the ongoing progress in SL.
Imagine James Watt wouldn’t have invented the steam engine or
Michael Faraday the generator? (not to menion Thomas Edison here)
And yes… maybe you should start to think about a new PC…
The rest of SL is not willing to stand still just for you guys with your
stoneage PC’s - It has to go on…
Now stop whining - open your eyes and behave like adults and not
like kids who lost their lolly to the big bad sewer beast.
Honestly I’m tired of all those who just complain for NO reason.
(And they are always the same btw.)
If you’re so unsatisfied… why don’t you leave SL and annoy some
other ppl. maybe in RL with your whining?
(Oh my washmashine isn’t working as good as it did in 1803 after
I replaced my stoneage model - not to talk about the change when
I got my new iron after changing from hot stones - and these new
traffic light… they just confuse me… red - yellow - green - that’s
hard to understand - too hard… I want to have my cop in the crossing back….)
Lord of mercy - wake up - or go… or try to change your condition
yourself not always blaming SL(tm) for it.
And yes there were some things which were not really nice in the past
but hey - there were times in SL (remember 2006) which were even worse but SL managed to give us a better einvironment back.
The only thing I really criticize are these Camping bots and Traffic
bots.
No IP adress should be able to run more than 2 Accounts at a time.
Stop these damn camping bots and SL would have some load less
to deal with.
Hey… but anyway….
always remember: There is a RL(tm) out there aswell.
Love and peace to you all and may the Lag be with you
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:51 AM
“The new simulator uses a more realistic avatar climbing model”
lol, thats really neat, i guess many people need to update their stairs ,..but:
how realistic is flying?
it looks like the complete movement (avatar and objects) is less smooth than it was before, hard breaks up to short stopping of movement while speedchange
avatar fly on ground sometimes, fast turning causes crash,
there where many issues the last weeks, but its at a point now, where everything looks like to be overloaded, ….asset server, connection, rendering…
sometimes the ava could not even walk, prims and texture loading takes ages,
teleporting mostly break up, half-transparent textures always need a rebake to
look correct, delay on click-edit prims, …and so on
April 3rd, 2008 at 2:57 AM
Hangglideparty banking is amazing now, however instead of a gradual slow descent, drops like a brick and hovers at 5 meters. I sent the creator a note card and asked if a update was imminent, of course I need to give them time to reply.
However, if he doesn’t reply and isn’t interested in amending the script, do I assume rightly I have a L$4k product that will just not work now?
Other than that congratulations on the new Havoc4.
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:14 AM
@ public enemy “sitting in front of your “too old” PC whining
about the ongoing progress in SL.”
looks like you take over the regular issue comments of LL ….
its always easy to get it back to the user, but the interesting thing is, there
so many different changes in performance sometimes in a single day and i guess,
all users did not change running SL on a vary of old computers.
we are using SL as a collaborative working platform and like to see SL
at least just STABLE in version at it should be. the “EVOLUTION” is years ago
for SL but it where still a nice tool, if we just can USE it.
its a kind of software, you have purchased (if you buy a sim an pay tier)
…on a high price-level.
the first and important message is: make it really work in the current version, and do not fill it up with unproofed try outs. double the asset servers, stable your connections and make just one version number running as it should be!…..as long as you sell SL as a busines and workgroup tool.
(i dont talk about the free basic accounts for gaming)
i am really patient about issues with SL, but i think, i need to know, when i can start to work without apologies which tell me, that MY connection is bad or MY computer is old or MY craphics do not fit
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:15 AM
#60 George..
Comedy gold! Well done that man.
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:17 AM
Seems alot of issues are still not resolved. I’ve been having issues for over 2 months…..
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:41 AM
@59
“Look at PC games… if a pc game doesnt run on your pc you dont blame the maker either. you go upgrade your system.”
1. I never heard of any successful game producer who knowingly commits commercial suicide by excluding a arge part of the potential users from decent performance, as LL does by not optimizing their stuff for ATI.
2. I would upgrade my system for commercial use, But no one who runs a 2 years old systemor a brandnew laptop with a great performance regarding each other task and with something more on her/his mind than making or keeping Second Life running can be seriously expected to spend a dime on upgrading. This would cost, premium accounts costs,land costs, and almost everything else in SL costs more than enough. LL is on the wrong track by raising hardware demands for the benifit of some winded lights and other eyecandy, and you are, too.
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:52 AM
There is a erratic problem with search results maybe due to the update based apparently on a sim basis.
The search all returns the following: “Page Not Available We’re sorry: This item’s privacy settings prevent us from showing you any further details about it. Please hit “Back” and try another link.”
You can reproduce it by looking for anything in Mauve and Hyboria right now, or
search for “sandbox” and click on the first result.
The error privacy settings is rather odd and it looks like it’s affecting many sims at the moment.
April 3rd, 2008 at 3:55 AM
Whilst not specifically relevant to this post, wonder if we coulkd have a SLurl to wher Office Hours are held please, Sidewinder?
Maybe an article linked from the homepage is in order to explain what Office Hours is about? For most of us Basic Account holders (who choose to own homes on rented land, etc), it is now perhaps the only opportunity we have to be in contact with “the Linden family” and I’d certainly be interested to know more about Office Hours!
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:03 AM
WHY IS MEDIA SETTING NOT DEFAULT HIDDEN ???????
NOW EVERYONE CAN SEE ALL MUSIC URLS EVERYWHERE !!!
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:07 AM
Sorry - jsut thought to Google and found a wiki entry but a link on he title screen and/or homepagfe would be good! (Sorry for the off-topic spam, folks!)
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:14 AM
@78
Just out of curiosity, what ATI card are you using?
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:20 AM
V @ 78, <3
Well done you hit the nail on the head, more subtly than my post on the other blog open on the subject ATM.
Quotes and apologises for copying from blog to blog
I just love *sarcasm* those “buy a better… get your self a new… inane comments. All kinda like Mariannetionette saying “Let them eat cake!” attitude! Peasants may be revolting but without them your sims/businesses would be empty/redundant.
Sl should be configured to run on low spec PCs by default, the whistles and bells should be the optional extra you can turn on. I have to wonder how many sign up, try to run the software and give up without a second thought because its so slow and unco-operative?
True many ppl that join SL are not PC literate but Linden Labs should be catering for them, not assuming everyone has a clue what vertex shaders and antriwotsit blah blahs are. You the posters here sitting all smug and smart would do well to remember that it’s them that buy your stuff *when SL allows it* and be a little less high and mighty about things.
Yes my PC is upto spec, I just hate that look down your nose attitude some ppl seem to adopt on the blog
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:21 AM
Hey Sidewinder,
I was shown a new H4 bug tonight, spheres rolling over flat seams. It seems even if the prim edges are buried inside each other at an angle or the edges are perfectly flush to the 3rd or even 5th digit (Via LSL) that slow rolling spheres will bounce on the seams between prims. I didn’t see a JIRA about it so I created one, and put created a gadget that neatly reproduces the bug so you guys can experiment with it.
(http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-2006)
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:26 AM
@28, Yes. Also notice the problem of Avatars ‘jumping’ in place now on Prim surfaces now. If they simply stand in one spot (using an AO assist or not) their feet seem to rapidly shift in random-motion above and below the actual surface-line, as if the code is trying to determine where to perperly ‘rest’ the bottom of the feet (or shoe object). This is minor and you have to zoom in your camera to plainly see it, but it is happening.
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:30 AM
YAY!!! Prospero and Sidewinder and All at Linden Lab … You rock!
… Keep on rocking right along 
… Take care and have a great day! 
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:33 AM
** Heather Goodliffe **
Nice try, heather but will find that when it comes to Havok anything you point out on the blogs will be met with resistance to whatever you reply with. Its like blogging with kids.
“I have a problem…” ” No you don’t!”
“Yes, I have a legitimate gripe” “No not really”
“I spend tons of money here” “Irrelevant”
“Huh What?!!?!?” “NEXT!”
I see problems when LL doesn’t have time to work with creators after a major sim update. This could be financially catastrophic for some. Which is the backbone of SL, Sim owners, who create the **user created content.** SL should have a team set aside to mop up these issues in order to get SL stable again, BECAUSE IT IS NOT, instead of pushing it thru the hellish Jira month by month bug fix process.
Stability was supposed to be what HAV4 was bringing. Hmm, that idea went from “Here is Hav4 enjoy your new stability” to “Here is Hav4… CHOKE ON IT!!! You don’t like it cry to Jira!!!”
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:35 AM
@GMT CLOCK: I am not sure what the few folks talking about are seeing with the viewer clock… I have checked a few times over the last day and it’s been spot on in agreement with both an atomic clock reference and my cell phone (with time offsets considered)… I am not trying to say that you’re not seeing a problem - it’s just that I’m not sure how this difference could happen for only some people. I will check with some folks later today to see if we have any theories on this. /Sidewinder
April 3rd, 2008 at 4:36 AM
@49 Attica: Some camera control code has changed, but I had not thought that the fundamental resting camera angles had changed. I do not understand how this would affect your condition and will contact you to discuss this, as we certainly did not intend to create problems for people with these changes. Thanks, Sidewinder