…to be processed soon!

Currently we’re looking at a rather large backlog of Volunteer Program Applications. We’ve been going through the process of approving and inviting applicants manually, but we haven’t been gaining much ground. Thankfully, we’ve almost completed tools to help automate the process and as I mentioned, in a previous blog post, we’re bringing in some lovely Liaison Specialists to help us! So if you’ve signed up to be a volunteer you won’t have much longer to wait to find out if you’ve been accepted.

In the process of working on changes to the Volunteer Program, we’ll be disabling the ability to sign up for Help Request. In addition, we will not be inviting Volunteers during the period in which the new Volunteer application processing tool is being enabled and tested. But as mentioned above, when we’re back in action, we’ll be able to get through the existing backlog quickly. Whew! We very much appreciate your patience while we work to help you to help make SL a better place for everyone.

First, let’s get the bad news out of the way…Pathfinder is leaving the community team! Yeah, I really can’t believe it myself. He’s been a crucial part of our little group, and instrumental in helping educators, non-profits and volunteers create innovative, welcoming and helpful spaces and communities in Second Life for a couple of years now. We’ll miss his virtual self at our Monday meetings.

The GOOD news is that Path is charged with very exciting task of setting up a satellite office in the Boston Area! (So if you’ve been considering applying to Linden Lab, but didn’t want to leave The Hub, please re-consider!) As a New-Englander myself I can say, with an accent and without a doubt, that he’s the guy for the job. Luckily, he’ll still be the evangelist and general resource for Education in SL as we expand, which continues to be highly appropriate considering the abundance of educators in the Boston area.

(more…)

3:54pm SL Time - The devs report that the Inventory DB is functioning once again after some tweaking, although the current load is very heavy. In some cases, relogging will help with lingering symptoms.

We’re currently diagnosing in-world issues. Thanks for your patience while we investigate the problem. I’ll post more info here as it comes in.

8:47am SLtime Planned maintenance work is complete. We’re working on restarting parts of the grid that were knocked offline by the work, and expect to open shortly.9:07am SLtime SL is now open once again. Thank you for your patience!

Second life will still be offline from 7am to 12noon SLtime (15:00-20:00 GMT) on Wednesday March 7th, but the previously announced changes planned for the backend are being delayed. Instead, the downtime will be required for network reconfiguration work.

Be here at 7am when I’ll be providing the play by play!

We’re diagnosing an issue related to the database that required a quick shutdown. We’re very sorry for the short notice, but concluded that it was necessary in order to avoid widespread inventory loss. Residents have been logged out and logins are restricted, but the grid is not being taken down so in-progress works are less likely to be affected.

Again, we’re very sorry for the short notice and incovenience, please watch this space for more info as we have it.

11:47am SLtime - Recovery in progress and almost complete.

12:01am SLtime - We’re back…thanks for your patience and support!

From 7 am to 12 noon SLtime (15:00-20:00 GMT) on Wednesday March 7th Second Life will be offline while we update the system.  Changes will be back-end only so no viewer download will be required.  The update will be focused on performance improvements, so there will be no visible changes to the viewer.

Quick summary of the planned changes:
** Improve overall performance of distributed information storage
** Distribute storage of “muting” information to reduce central load
** Reduce communication bottlenecks on busy simulator hosts
** Cache some frequently looked up information on simulator hosts

Per usual, we will work to keep downtime to a minimum.  Which is good, because I get very cranky and tend to bite when I can’t get in-world.

We’ve identified and corrected a problem where, in a small number of cases, classifieds that were set to auto-renew were being deleted.   Fortunately, The majority of those whose classifieds went missing, instead of renewing, were not charged.

We are working on generating a list with the names of people whose ads were deleted and were charged so that they can be compensated for the error. You will appear on the list if you have no classifieds currently running at the price you were charged for. This applies only to classifieds that went missing in the past 7 days.

We’re sorry for the inconvenience caused.

Corrected to emphisize that not all auto-renewed classifieds were deleted and not all deleted classifieds were charged.

Many residents have reported land and L$ purchases failing. We appreciate your patience while we diagnose the issues and will provide updates here in the blog as we have more information.

Update by Jeff: I have found the issue, it is related to another announcement I was planning to make.  For now, I have implemented a fix that I think should work for everyone who is having this issue.  As of 3PM PST, 12/20/06, land and L$ purchases should no longer automatically fail.  There is another issue where your viewer may not update your L$ balance when you purchase Linden dollars- relogging will fix this issue, or check your balance on the website.

P.S. Thanks for the spelling correction.

 [2:36am PST]  Second Life is back up.  Thank you for your patience.

[1:55 am PST] Current database issues result in failed logins, teleports, search and blank profiles. We are working to diagnose the issue and apologize for the inconvenience.