Cool VL Viewer forum

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.8 (experimental branch)

The purpose of this release is to get yet closer to the v2 viewer code to ease up the Mesh backport. It however also brings a few new features and benefits from the better v2-like code (with a few minor quirks fixed, not listed here).

New in this release:

• llcommon and llinventory libraries updated to match most of the official v2.7 viewer libraries.
• Curl and c-ares libraries updated and llareslistener implemented in the llmessage library (better asynchronous DNS lookups).
• Inventory system updated (llinventoryicon, llviewerassettype and llviewerfoldertype implemented; llinventorybridge and llinventorymodel cleaned up) to be more v2-like.
  As side effects:
  
  • You can now delete all the stupid and useless system folders created by v2, such as "My Outfit", "Current Outfit", "Favorites", and "Calling Cards" sub-folders to get back your inventory in its clean v1-style state (to delete the calling cards sub-folders, first delete the deepest sub-folder, then delete each upper folder in turn; the root Calling Cards folder of course cannot be deleted).
  • The landmarks are now always full-perms, like in v2.
  • A new icon for unknown inventory item types was also added (since the Cool VL Viewer supports all current inventory item types, you will not see it used for now, unless you got mesh objects in your inventory on the beta grid).
• One potential crash bug fixed in llprimitive.
• DirectChatColor setting implemented (used for llRegionSayTo() and llInstantMessage() messages from objects) and corresponding color selector added to the chat preferences.
• Area Search code clean up.
• Avatar profile floater slightly improved (tooltip on the SL profile picture; description set and aspect ratio combo pre-focused for the full size view of the SL and RL profile pictures).

Enjoy !

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.9 (experimental branch)

The purpose of this release is to get yet closer to the v2 viewer code to ease up the Mesh backport. It however also brings a couple improvements.

New in this release:

• Display names support improved and brought on par with the official v2.7 viewer (also, the "Never display 'Resident' as the last name in legacy names" setting now applies to a much broader range of UI elements, i.e. pretty much everywhere but for avatar search results and a few notifications).
• "Max non-impostors" setting can now be set up to 65 (like in the v2.7 viewer)
• llcommon, llcharacter and llmessage libraries brought even closer to the official v2.7 viewer libraries.

Enjoy !

Here are two new releases of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.25.0.40 (stable branch)

New in this release:

• Updated RestrainedLove patch: fixes a couple of minor bugs, and adds three advanced configuration settings (see RestrainedLoveReadme.txt for details).

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.10 (experimental branch)

New in this release:

• RestrainedLove updated to v2.07.02.03 (see v1.25.0.40 above for details).
• New 'Show "Typing" in name bubbles when avatars type' chat setting (it allows to see whether a resident is typing in chat or not, regardless of their "play typing animation" setting; note however that some text only clients may not send the "avatar is typing" info and some viewers may be configured so to not send it). The code for this new feature is based on Marine Kelley's RLV2 viewer v2.07.01.
• Moved the "Arrow keys always move avatar, even when typing in chat bar" setting to the "Keyboard Options", in the "Input & Camera" preferences tab.
• Added the "Rental" category to About Land floater and land searches.
• llxml library and LLCachedControl brought on par with official v2.7 viewer.
• Got rid of the dependency on boost::signal (full migration to boost::signals2, like in viewer v2).

Enjoy !

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.11 (experimental branch)

The purpose of this release is to get yet closer to the v2 viewer code to ease up the Mesh backport. It however also brings a few improvements.

New in this release:

• Backport of the v2.7 official viewer texture system. Note that part of the backport (especially the part dealing with media textures) was inspired from Shyotl Kuhr's work for Singularity viewer. I also added one new advanced setting ("Advanced" -> "Rendering" -> "Load Textures Progressively") which, when enabled, makes the viewer behave like v2 viewers and decreases progressively the discard level for loading textures (this results in more textures appearing to load at once, but as an aside, they load slower and stay blurry longer). This setting is disabled by default (so that the viewer behaves like former v1.26 versions), and I don't recommend enabling it unless you have a very slow Internet link or enjoy seeing blurry textures for minutes after you teleported in a new place...
• Added a force-reload button (the small round exclamation mark button) in the texture preview floater. This complements the "Reload Selected Texture" ("Advanced" -> "Rendering" -> "Reload Selected Texture" or CTRL SHIFT U) feature I added a while ago but that could only apply to textures set on rezzed objects.
• About Land floater updated to match the one of the official v2.8 viewer (with support for the new avatar visibility and avatar sounds settings that were implemented this very week in the SL servers).
• PRIM_OMEGA, PARCEL_DETAILS_SEE_AVATARS and HTTP_VERBOSE_THROTTLE LSL constants added.
• Linux llqtwebkit updated to v4.7.1, which fixes an issue with URIs and sim names containing spaces in the Showcase search tab (the Teleport button was not working properly with previous llqtwebkit versions). Note also that this is a custom compiled version (with compiler optimization options used) which should prove faster than Linden Lab's.

Enjoy !

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.12 (new stable branch)

This is mainly a bugfix and polishing release, and the first release of the new stable branch (see the latest roadmap update for details about branches).

New in this release:

• Added a parcel icon (a small, stroked eye) in the status bar for the new avatar visibility parcel setting (note: the icon I made matches well the legacy icons, but not too well the v1.2x icons: if you don't use the legacy icons and want an icon matching the v1.2x ones, feel free to send me an icon of your creation ). Also made it so that the legacy icons could be used with the Silver skin.
• Fixed the missing "Bandwidth" and "Packet Loss" labels in the tooltips for the corresponding status bar indicators, and improved the status bar code (speedier, cleaner code).
• Implemented a new PlayChatAnims setting, allowing to either always play the whisper/say (nodding)/shout animations when chatting (default behaviour, like in other viewers), or to prevent playing them on pure emotes ('/me waves in greetings.' is a pure emote, without 'spoken' text by the avatar, '/me waves, "Hello !"' is not a pure emote since the avatar said "Hello !"), or to never play them (useful when sitting on an object that makes your avatar play a low priority animation that the chat anim could override and ruin). The checkbox for this new setting is available in the "Text Chat" tab of the "Preferences" floater.
• Backported from LL's v2.7 viewer a few fixes for potential crash bugs in the renderer (even if I never ran into them) that I spotted while working on Mesh backport.
• Repaired the broken Active Speakers floater (it was broken in v1.26.0.9). See this thread for details.
• Added support code for llTextBox() used by group-deeded objects. See this thread for details.
• Cleaned up all notifications so that the "Never display 'Resident' as the last name in legacy names" setting also applies to them.
• Made it so that the Group Info floater now remembers its last position instead of always appearing centered on the screen.
• Improved the music, media and master volume controls in the toolbar (fully rewritten for speed and correctness, properly differentiating the code paths for each control) and added the music/media URL in the tooltip for the play buttons.
• Made it so that when wearing a male shape, you still can edit the Belly Bounce setting in Physics wearables. Fix by Tank Master and borrowed from the Phoenix viewer.
• Hard coded Qt Webkit version number updated to reflect the actual Qt Webkit version in the About floater.
• Various minor code cleanup and dead code removals.

Enjoy !

IMPORTANT: the v1.25.0 branch is now to be considered deprecated. Please, upgrade to v1.26.0 (which is stabler, faster and implements the latest changes for the new features of the SL grid).

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.13 (stable branch)

Another polishing release (no new "big" feature), but a worthy one !

New in this release:

• Fixed an issue (present in all other viewers, including in v2 !) that made the viewer spend excessive and useless time refreshing parcel textures (counted in the "Region Update" slot in the fast timers console) in more and more inactive regions over time and teleports (one of the reasons why the FPS slowed down over time during long sessions); the speed gain brought by this fix is quite significant (up to 6ms per frame after a few teleports !). Also optimized up the parcel overlay refreshing code.
• Major UI code cleanup to get rid of most (all ?) "Making dummy widget" warnings. Removal of corresponding dead code; proper rewrite of the corresponding various code paths for different floater layouts; added the missing "Take Off" button in the Physics tab of the Appearance floater; re-added a close ("OK") button in the friends floater (was removed from the XML floater definition in old days, around v1.17, IIRC, but the code was still around...).
• Removed the deprecated (deprecated in SL and, AFAIK, never implemented/used in OpenSim) "Group Voting" tab in the group info floater (if you know of any OpenSim grid implementing group voting, please let me know, and I'll reenable it for OpenSim grids).
• Implemented support for the new event URIs (now properly triggering the event details floater) and for the new region info URIs in the new web search results.
• Sped up the world map floater code.
• Fixed the graphics hardware settings not being applied before a restart (was broken in a former v1.26.0 release).
• Backport of a few minor renderer fixes spotted in v2 code while working on Mesh backport.
• Backport of a v2 viewer fix for doubly attached objects in inventory.
• Backport of a v2 viewer fix for land selection glitches.
• Increased to 999 the limits for texture repeats in the build tools floater.
• Improved the llui warning messages to better spot UI code/XML definitions flaws.
• Changed the beta search URL of the new SL search for the release one.
• Updated the OpenGL feature table.
• Got rid of dead code in the Linux "snowglobe" wrapper script.

Enjoy !

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.14 (stable branch)

This is mainly a bugfix release. Update is recommended.

New in this release:

• Fixed a crash bug (introduced in v1.26.0.11) that could occur when starting media playing while the media texture was loading.
• Fixed a long standing bug that made the webkit plugin consume 100% of the CPU power on Linux systems with non-English locale (diagnosis done and bug found by Satomi Ahn). Removed the corresponding work around (plugin priority settings) that I implemented for the Cool VL Viewer. See this thread for details.
• Backported from viewer 2 a fix to another old bug in the selection manager that randomly caused the pie menu to fail to trigger the selected action on avatars (Profile, for example). Fix spotted by Chris, see this thread for details.
• Backport from viewer 2 of a fix to a potential crash bug in agent language region updates.
• Added a setting (available in the "IM & Logs" Preferences sub-tab) to also send the Busy message auto-reply when set Away.
• Added the UUID of primitives behind their name in the reports of the "Selected Texture Info" feature (CTRL ALT SHIFT T), so to allow easily finding out your rezzed objects UUIDs.
• Added the Mono check box to the script preview floater (for scripts edited from the inventory) and removed the corresponding preference from the "Cool features"/"Miscellaneous" sub-tab. Note that unlike the check box of the in-world scripts editor floater which is updated depending on the actual byte code type of the edited script, this check box is actually just a preference (allowing to save the edited script as a Mono or LSL2 script), that does not reflect the current type of byte code used for the script in the inventory (there is alas no way to get this info from the asset server).
• Improved the "LSL Wiki Help..." option of the script editor, making it point by default (i.e. when clicked while no keyword is selected in the script editor window) on the LSL_Portal page instead of the root SL Wiki page.
• Some backports from v2.7 viewer to the OpenGL rendering engine.

Enjoy !

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.15 (stable branch)

This is quite an overhaul of some features that were more or less broken in all v1 viewers (and sometimes still broken in v2). Update is recommended.

New in this release:

• Major overhaul of the media system, with backports from viewer 2 (made by Techwolf Lupindo for Phoenix, with improvements, bugfixes and refinements by me), which should cure most of the outstanding media playing issues that plagued Snowglobe when compared to v1.23.5, and brings the viewer on par with v2 viewers (with the exception of the "media on a prim" feature, still to be implemented). This also brings support for web cookies, and thus OpendID (that cookie used to identify you on SL websites). Updated accordingly the Web tab in the Preferences floater (with a new "Clear Stored Cookies" button).
• Implemented support for web profiles (Can be viewed in the Web tab of the avatar profile or opened from there in a built-in or external browser), with support for the corresponding new secondlife://app/* URIs (IM/Call, Teleport, Map, Share, Pay, and a partial implementation for Picks editing). Also improved the Web tab of the avatar profile (with new "In built-in browser" option in the homepage "Load" button fly-out menu, and a "Loading..." indicator while web pages are loading) and the built-in browser (floatermedia, with a better layout, "Loading..." indicator, trusted web browsing mode, etc).
• Overhaul of the media filter feature, now with session-wide cached DNS lookups to avoid systematic short freezes each time an URL is filtered. Also made the IP lookup optional (disabling it prevents any short "freeze" but lowers the security), with a corresponding setting in the "Audio & Video" tab of the Preferences floater.
• Complete overhaul of the mute list, now with proper filtering (by object Id or name, by owner avatar and group Id or name, and by object name) for all callbacks (inventory offers, script menus and permission requests, URL loading requests, IMs, chat, etc...). Also fixed a bug (still present in viewer 2) which caused a muted object to get their owner muted as well when the said object was offering you an item. In short, muting now actually works in all cases !
• Added the "Dark" skin by JB Kraft, borrowed and adapted from Phoenix viewer (see the Skins tab of the Preference panel).
• Improved the SL grids detection algorithm (now 100% IP based).
• RestrainedLove updated to v2.07.03.03 (with one minor bugfix).
• A few minor bug-fixes and code cleanups.
• The Linux version is now using again an unoptimized QT Webkit plugin, since the optimized one failed to run on some systems (there are still known issues on some rare systems: working on it...).

Enjoy !

Here are two new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.0.16 (stable branch):

New in this release:

• Greatly improved the sims' terrain surfaces update algorithm, avoiding the cases when some neighbouring sims could fail to get updated for a while, or when the sim where your avatar is standing could update too slowly.
• Added the new LSL functions and constants (llSetMemoryLimit(), llGetMemoryLimit(), llSetLinkMedia(), llGetLinkMedia(), llClearLinkMedia(), llSetLinkCamera(), llSetContentType(), llLinkSitTarget(), lAvatarOnLinkSitTarget(), llSetVelocity(), OBJECT_SCRIPT_TIME, PRIM_POS_LOCAL, PRIM_LINK_TARGET, CONTENT_TYPE_TEXT, CONTENT_TYPE_HTML).
• Added the highlighting of the multi-lines, C-style comments (/* ... */) in the script editor.
• Ported v2 viewer's APR pools code (was required for the Mesh backport).
• Fixed a bug that caused the active speakers list to appear empty when the viewer was set to display only the legacy names. See this thread for details.
• Made it so that the selection beam does not render at all when PrivateLookAt is active and you are pointing at an object over 20m away (used to render a beam pointing nowhere in front of your Av, which could be confusing for you and the other residents around).
• Added a "Boxed messages" setting for the chat console (draws the background box around each individual message instead of around all the messages as a big block). This was some dormant (commented out) code, so why not enabling it as an option ?...
• Added more LLCachedControl speed optimizations in the render and UI redrawing paths.
• Added auto-limiting of the prim size in the edit floater (10m max for tree and grass objects, 64m for other objects in SL (the new limit since Mesh is in production on the main grid), 256m in OpenSim).
• Backport from v2 of the way to deal with impostors (the "Max Non Impostors" setting is now actually properly honoured).
• Added the preloading on viewer startup of the floater friends icons.
• Updated RestrainedLove to 2.07.03.04 (one minor change, allowing scripted child primitives of an attachment to lock the latter on your avatar: it was formerly only possible to lock from scripts in the root prim).
• Various minor fixes in the code, spotted during the backport of Mesh for v1.26.1.

NEW ! Cool VL Viewer v1.26.1.0 (experimental, Mesh rendering branch)

This is the same viewer as v1.26.0.16, but with a full backport of the official v2.6-mesh viewer renderer. Since it uses the v2 renderer, it can also do dynamic shadows (v1.26.0 can do it too, but in a much less efficient and reliable way). To enable dynamic lighting and shadows, use the corresponding check-box in the graphics tab of the Preferences floater (option only available in "Cutsom" graphic settings mode). Oh... It also got preliminary support for the new parameters of physical objects (but for now lacks the possibility to set them from the build floater).
It must be considered as an alpha viewer, with potential issues (crashes, rendering glitches, etc) even though, so far, it proved quite stable to me.
Only Mesh rendering was so far extensively tested. The viewer also contains code to handle meshes in your inventory (by lack of a personal mesh to upload, I didn't yet test this, like I could not test wearing meshes on my avatar I could test it with a mesh shirt: it works, but see the issues below). There is for now no support code for uploading/building meshes (because of the use of a closed source library by LL, no third party viewer can upload meshes anyway: perhaps later, when an open source decomposition library will be ready).

Here are the known issues with this viewer:

• The fast timers are broken and incomplete (they miss a whole bunch of new timers dealing with the new renderer, and they are unreliable because of a bug I didn't yet fix just got fixed, fix that will go into 1.26.1.1).
• Sometimes, a few Mesh objects may appear "stuck" in a low LOD (Level Of Details) state: right clicking on the said objects instantly cures the problem, rezzing them fully. Not yet sure where it comes from, but it seems to happen most on the beta grid (where some meshes are reported in the viewer log as transmitting invalid parameters)
• Sometimes, mesh clothes may rez also at low LOD level, and since you can't right-click them, they stay stuck (unless you can rez the said mesh cloth on the floor).
• Basic shaders must be kept enabled, else bad things happen to the avatars (completely distorted shape every few moves). EDIT: problem diagnosed... See this post for details. The work around is to set the VectorizeSkin setting to FALSE, and then the viewer works fine with Basic shaders disabled.
• The code (Qarl ex-Linden's) allowing to select easily tree and grass primitives in v1.26.0 had to be disabled in v1.26.1 since it's incompatible with the new renderer.

Enjoy !

Here is a new release of the Cool VL Viewer, available now from http://sldev.free.fr/:

Cool VL Viewer v1.26.1.1 (experimental, MESH branch)

This release should prove quite functional since it cures, via actual fixes or simple workarounds, the issues identified in v1.26.1.0.

New in this release:

• The fast timers are working again properly, and have been extended to add the new renderer related timers.
• The "Sonic the Edgedog on steroids" issue with avatar meshes has been fixed.
• The issue with meshes objects (either rezzed in-world or worn as attachments) sometimes not loading fully has been worked around via a new "Load Meshes At Max LOD" setting (on by default, togglable in the Advanced -> Rendering menu). This is of course not ideal, since it means loading all meshes at the highest level of detail, thus using more memory and rendering more vertexes when less could be used, but since Meshes are very few on the grid for now, it will do till I find a proper fix.
• More fixes and improvements to the renderer, backported from the official viewer v3.0.

Enjoy !