We are getting stealth mode!!!!!

Can't believe no one else has posted it here yet. You can also select WHICH freinds can see you online or map you. God there is going to be one heck of alot of "freinds" on the side now ;

Release Notes for Second Life 1.13.0(5) November 22, 2006
=====================================
Changes:
* Updated Friends UI
** Set permissions for your friends to see you online/on the map
** Conference IM multiple friends by multi-selecting in Friends list
** See who has granted you permission to modify their objects
* New Privacy feature
** New option in Preferences to set whether you show as online in Search
* Estate visibility
** The estate visiblity concept is simplified to just access permissions
** All classifieds, events, etc. within a grid now viewable, regardless of estate
** All regions within a grid now viewable, regardless of estate
** Online status is no longer hidden based on viewability of an estate


Release Notes for Second Life 1.13.0(4) November 22, 2006
=====================================
Other changes:
* Texture asset IDs no longer sent to the viewer unless necessary
* Adding performance logging based on agent frame rate
* A confirmation prompt now appears when emptying inventory trash
* Notecards now support international characters

Bug fixes:
* llGetParcelMaxPrims now takes region bonus factor into consideration
* Time zone (e.g. PST) is once again displayed on the menu titlebar
* "Upload Image" will now ignore multiple clicks to avoid duplicate uploads
* First names which are numbers will now be shown correctly in chat
* Fixed the ability for group owners to remove members from roles
* Fixed a crashing bug with tearing off menus from scripting window
* Fixed a viewer crash when right-clicking on certain objects
* Fixed a viewer crash when changing prim shape

Wow, they snuck that in there!

Good job, finally a "hidden" mode!

I'm guessing that this 'stealth mode' will be great for griefers.

Lewis

Turning the Franklinism on it's ear,

I think I'd be willing to trade some small amount of perceived security for greater privacy and personal freedoms for all.

Only if you have griefers on your friends list..thats all its doing.

I have a 'friend' beginning to give me anxiety rather than grief. This is an excellent move.

It won't help griefers, it just reports you as offline in Find. Probably doesn't effect scripts.


*singing* I've got ninety thousand Pounds in my pajamas, I've go forty thousand French Franks in my fridge, I've got lots of lovely Lira and the Deuchmark is getting dearer, and my dollar bills could buy the Brooklyn Bridge*/singing*

<.< sorry Banking's sig made me do it.

I get "Online Status: Unknown" most of the time anyway...

Maybe if it says they're offline I'll know they're online.


I'd rather just not have my "Jopsy Pendragon is online" pop up on umpteen million screens when I connect and let them see that I'm online if they check their friends list or my profile.

(yes I know I could throw away a lot of calling cards and resolve that problem... but I don't WANT to.)

Lewis- Did you even read the OP before declaring this a griefer tool?

Yes I read it.

Yes, I'm aware of the 'godmode hack' which allows you to stalk anyone, anywhere.

Yes, I'm aware that you won't be able to tell whether someone is online or not, and thus making it difficult to know whether someone who has been griefing you has actually logged out or not.

Lewis

if fixes are the 1st priority then why are there more new features then fixes?

er .. don't give up the day job Strife!

I agree with Luth above, I'd rather be seeing fixes and stability at this point.

Perhaps they could have people working on test suites or a QA harness for the beta grid if not everyone can be fixing bugs.

The godmode hack's been fixed. If the server doesn't recognise you as a "god" it sends no data.

Please tell me how kowing if the dingleberry is logged in or not helps defend against his antics?

That doesn't sound like stealth mode to me. What that sounds like is simply the ability to decide which friends get the message you've come online and which don't. It doesn't sound like they're saying that we can set our online status as invisible or visible, which is actually what many have been asking for and certainly no more complicated to arrange.

Sorry if I don't sound enthused but I'm coming at it from the perspective of a store owner. When I tell my friends I'm working, they say catch ya later. I get most of my interuptions from people wanting to ask me a question and then getting chatty afterward while I'm trying to work and too polite to tell them to go away please.

My friends get it, it's the rest of SL i'm hiding from.

Plus think about it for a second. How many of your friends are really going to be happy knowing that they are the one you don't want seeing you come and go? How many will instead have hurt feelings?

Lie through your teeth, say your doing it to all your friends. Or just say you were experimenting with the new features of the client and it was an accident.

bilbo99: You want me to stay a ResMod, thx ^_^

(Banking's signiture are the words to a monty python sketch that lead into the song lyrics i recalled from the depths of my memory)

Set yourself to busy to prevent people from IMing you


In my opinion those options aren't really necessary, because a "Friend" doesn't need to be restricted in that way. If I don't want someone to see me online, I don't friend them.

If he's logged out, then he won't be bothering you - although of course they can just come back with alt after alt to annoy you anyway.

If they're online... then they can come back and bug you when you aren't watching. Thankfully my avatar detector HUD tells me who's around, which does make life a little easier when people decide to bug you simply because you exist.

Lewis

Well, considering that they could also easily log BACK in and be annoying, etc... I think this adds didlysquat to a greifer's toolbag. Folks have been begging for this for ages, I think this should be celebrated.

Will it be possible to login set to offline, similar to MSN and other IM programs?

It's my guess that letting people "opt out" of friend tracking/online status reporting will have the side-effect of taking a *huge* load off the presence database, thereby helping mitigate the all-too-obvious overloading issues that SL has in that area.

A social fix to a problem, rather than a software fix.

Even tho stability fixes should be #1, this is going to be a godsend. Bravo LL!

Fine, then just consider it a tool for antisocial people, not that we need any more to help those as we have more than enough already.

If someone is a friend, why should you be worried if someone sees you online? If they're the sort of person that you don't want to know whether you are around or not... maybe you shouldn't have made them a friend in the first place.

I value my SL friends, even those I don't communicate with often. Why would I want to pretend I'm not around?

Lewis

*sigh*

Look. Busy sucks. What if you want to talk to the people you're with, but not to other people? What if you don't want to autodecline inventory?

Some people, including me, need to use their friends list for a wider range of people... we can't all be like, if you're not my bestest friend who I don't want to know my every move then you're not on my list. It's not about being anti-social, it's that we have one tool to maintain contacts of all types (please don't talk to me about calling cards). Clients, regular customers, all kinds of contacts. In fact, it will be easier for some to be social with those they choose with this sort of functionality. It's not easy to hold a good conversation when your IM is lighting up everywhere.

The friends system is archaic, primitive. Less functionality than MSN and the like. Some people's second lives may not need this, but many do, and a lot of people have been asking for this kind of thing for a long time. Have no need of it? Fine, just allow every one to see you all the time and you'll never know life has changed. But don't make out like some people don't want and need this.

This rocks.

I think a lot of the controversy comes from the naming. With the new features, it should be named "Contacts". And you could even add more fine-grained control like "muted / no im / no inventory / ...".

Yes you're right. 'Contacts' would be more appropriate. Personally I'd like to be able to split them into categories - friends, business etc in the future, to make the list more manageable.