The Phoenix Firestorm team has released its latest update for OpenSim, part of its plans to have two separate builds, one for OpenSim and another for Second Life, according to a press release on the team’s blog.
The build for Second Life was postponed because pathfinding isn’t ready and Havok isn’t available yet, according to the statement.
This update took almost four months to make and Firestorm’s revitalized quality assurance team thoroughly tested the update’s quality using its new structured test procedures of 100 dedicated beta testers, the statement said.
It uses Linden Lab’s 3.3.3. viewer code base and brings RLVa support up to 1.4.6. The update focuses on new features and tools for builders, scripters and estate managers, more options for legacy V1 features and behavior, and greater flexibility, functionality, performance and stability for all types of users.
For example, the World menu presents two brand new options: the Sound Explorer and the Asset Blacklist. The Sound Explorer displays sound sources within audible range and the list continues to update while new sounds are played. The Asset Blacklist, on the other hand, works with an improved permanent de-render unlike previous releases in which any object de-rendered would reappear in your view when you teleport or re-log.
Perhaps the most significant improvement in this update is the addition to its Preferences section of new Crash Reports and OpenSim tabs. The Crash Reports tab provides an enhanced way of reporting crashes to the Firestorm team while the OpenSim tab is evidence of the team’s commitment to support the OpenSim environment.
In the OpenSim environment, one important element in the Preferences section is the option to Enable Glossy Texture Compression. This is found under Graphics Hardware Settings which allows texture compression during rendering. It can give improved performance and smaller graphics memory footprint.
However, it should be pointed out that the above tabs mentioned could soon disappear from future Second Life flavors of Friestorm given Linden Lab’s requirements around the Havok sub-license arrangement once its new sub-licensing takes into effect.
The Phoenix Firestorm Team is requesting its users to be more patient with their support staff considering the busy nature of updates and releases, the statement said.
It also mentioned its newly updated classes that will teach users how to use all the new features, preferences, options and goodies that come with Firestorm’s latest update.
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