SecondLife Preview 1.8.0(0) now open!

SecondLife Preview 1.8.0(0) now open!

The Preview grid is now open for testing. You will need to download a new viewer from http://secondlife.com/downloads/preview.php.

Second Life 1.8.0(0) Dec 2, 2005
==================================
Major Features:
* Point-to-point teleportation is now available in Second Life
- Residents may teleport freely to and from locations they are allowed to access
- The landing point on a parcel is determined by the location set by the land owner with the About Land > Options > Landing Point > Set button
- If no landing point is set on a parcel, the resident will be delivered as close to the location specified on the map as possible.
- Estate owners may choose whether to allow teleport via point-to-point or Telehubs
- The Z coordinate is honored; teleporting (or logging in) to your Castle in the Sky will now put you directly there!

Minor Features:
* Ripple effect for water can now be turned on in the Graphics preference pane
- Ripple water uses the graphics card's pixel shading to create more realistic looking water
- The functionality will only be available for machines with cards supporting pixel shading
- Turning on this feature will cause viewer FPS to drop to some degree, so it is not enabled by default

Scripting Changes:

** New LSL functions:
* llMapDestination(string simname, vector position, vector lookat)
- Shows a given location on the map.
- Works in attachments, or during touch events.
- The "lookat" value is currently not in use, but will be in a later version
* llAddToLandBanList(key avatar, float hours)
- Add an avatar to the parcel ban list for the given duration.
* llRemoveFromLandPassList(key avatar)
- Remove an avatar from the parcel pass list for the given duration.
* llRemoveFromLandBanList(key avatar)
- Remove an avatar from the parcel ban list for the given duration.

** Changed LSL functions:
* llAddToLandPassList(key avatar, float hours)
- Avatars can now be added to the parcel pass list with no time limit by passing 0 as the hours parameter.

** Future LSL functions:
* llTeleportAgent(key avatar, string simname, vector position, vector lookat) (?)
- Teleport an avatar at a location (requires agent permission)

Known Issues:
* Teleport should fail if you will be routed to a telehub farther away than your destination
* Agent should be positioned at the same relative height to the ground after arrival at destination

Yes! This sounds like it's exactly what I was hoping for!
No more waking up falling from 500 meters because I disconnected from my airfield!

Another much requested function!

While you're about it, add a "Create Landmark" button on the map, so when you bring something up on the map you can save it for later. This ps particularly important when you're trying to look for shops for some product. It's much better to build a list of landmarks and go to in turn than to go back to the map every time.

This would be really nice for simulating non-linear space.

Erm, why? What if the destination is a "castle in the sky" (see above)?

Refering to the "Agent should be positioned at the same relative height to the ground after arrival at destination" bug this is to do with if you set an elevation of say 500 and then increase the height of the land, now although this would break your sky tp, if you were on the ground and didnt have this and it didnt adjust relative to height if you set the point and raised the height of ground the avatar could be trapped underground etc. although dont exactly quote me on that as i havent had time to test it but seems the most logical use for a relative to ground arrival.

I REMEMBER THIS FROM 1.5

AND I MISS IT SOOO VERY MUCH

Count Me On this one too

We had ripple water before. It looked horrible, and only worked on older (pre 5000 series) Nvidia cards. The new effect is much better. Unlike the old effect, it doesn't look like the tide going out and returning. There seems to be actual rippling and highlights.

I downloaded the preview but I am having trouble logging in. Am I supposed to be able to log in with the same name and PW as my regular SL? When I use them it says login failed. Do I need to create a new avatar to try the preview? and if so would my account be charged for having an alt?

Thanks.

has anyone tried stacking a few physics cubes?

Major volume error.. BUT I DONT' CARE THE WATER IS COOL (if I could see it)

So when is 1.9?

Indeed. My card supports pixel shading, but the waters surface is completley invisible for me. Its an absolutley amazing visual effect!

What card? and hopefully you bug reported it

Hey, folks, read some science fiction... Larry Niven, Alfred Bester, there's zillions of stories about teleportation and one thing that becomes quickly obvious is that as soon as you have arbitrary P2P teleportation into people's homes the whole feel of a story changes... and expecting EVERY landowner to set their "Stepping Disks" by the time P2P opens on the main grid is naive.



Make that...



And give as possible landing points the special values "anywhere" or "any landmark", ... and scripts owned by the owner or an officer of the owning group would be exempt from this requirement.

That way P2P will spread slowly through the world as people set their landing points, and little clusters of prim parcels won't turn into surprise landing points where people aren't expecting them.

Argent said it!

THE STARS OUR DESTINATION

Does the ripplewater require certain version of pixelshaders to be supported on a graphics card?

It does this on both my Ati Mobility Radeon x700 and my Radeon 9800pro. For the x700, I'm using the driver package that came with it(there's no updated drivers for it from what I've seen). My 9800pro, on the otherhand, has the latest catalyst drivers. I've reported both. This is starting to look like an nVidia-centric feature.. *cough*

Okeydoke let's put the pieces of this puzzle together.

So far... I've heard from peeps who have GeForce 4 Ti cards... those have pixel shaders 1.1 support. They have not been able to see ripplewater.

Next! I hear from you, who has a Radeon 9800 Pro, which has pixel shaders 2.0 support. Which, the GeForce FX also supports. But you can't see the ripplewater.

I'm wondering what the missing pieces are here?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_computer_games_that_require_Pixel_Shaders

Pixel shader 3.0? Thats complete overkill for this feature. I guess its intended for 1% of the population on sl Okay, perhaps I'm exaggerating, but hell, Hl2 and bf2 don't use 3, and how far ahead of sl are those games? Theres a thing called backwards compatability, too.. If this is true, it means having the box avaliable for both my cards is a bug unto itself.

Also, the GeforceFX's 'support' was hardly worth calling it that. It sank like a brick with directx 9 and pixelshader2.

May be a bug. Let's dig deepah.

I think I've heard from Resis who have GeForce FX cards who've gotten it to work... anyone here on like a 5200, 5500, 5600, 5700, 5800, 5900, 5950, etc. who can see ripplewater?

ATI Radeon 9800 here, and the water is invisible for me also. Just as an added point, wasn't it supposed to be turned off by default? Because mine was on by default.
Also noticed a few patches whilst flying around where Time Dilation fell to 0.25 and Sim FPS to 40 or lower.
P2P worked well from what I tried out.

Hmmm... that's unusual, so you can check that box on and off but it doesn't show up? I would think if it doesn't appear, it should be grayed out.

I have a Radeon 9800 Pro, and I see the water just fine.

"Theory at 2 points off the starboard bow, sir!"

"LAUNCH TORPEDOES!"

I heard someone with a nvidia 5600 having it working, also funnily someone having it working on a ati9600 but not a ati9700 i confirmed the not working on my 9700mobile, but works on my nvidia6800gt

Thanx for the additional info, Nathan and Dyne.

Sounds like something very mixy...

Yes Torley, I can check the box to enable or disable it. It was enabled by default, and I had to turn it off just to see the water.

Those that have ATI cards that are seeing it fine, which drivers are you using, and what settings do you have? Or is it also possibly related to type of PC we are running on as well? Because there seems to be some inconsistency between those that can see it and those that can't, and obviously not purely based on our gfx card.

---------------
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: RADEON 9800 PRO
Manufacturer: ATI Technologies Inc.
Chip type: RADEON 9800 PRO AGP (0x4E4
DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)
Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_4E48&SUBSYS_00021002&REV_00
Display Memory: 128.0 MB
Current Mode: 1280 x 960 (32 bit) (85Hz)
Monitor: Plug and Play Monitor
Monitor Max Res: 1600,1200
Driver Name: ati2dvag.dll
Driver Version: 6.14.0010.6571 (English)
DDI Version: 9 (or higher)
Driver Attributes: Final Retail
Driver Date/Size: 8/30/2005 21:42:53, 238592 bytes


Which settings do you want?

When i first turned ripple on with my ati x800 PRO PCI-E(R423) it worked, when I turned it off and back on the water vanished. Upon restarting the program the water reappeared.