When does the Havok 4 engine come out?

I know the Beta is out, but when will it be fully implemented into the software? I tried to find an answer to my question online, but was unsuccessful.

Thanks,

Matt

Well beta periods can last a long time till they work out all the bugs (or most of them anyway) so there is not a hard set date for release

I figured. I just didn't know if maybe someone had a ballpark figure.


As well, what will be the major changes with Havok 4? Does it just look better? More stable? other improvements?

Matt

What are you talking about? Havok 4 is ALREADY deployed, all across the grid.

Really? If it is, sorry for the stupid post. I'm new to SL. However, I spent a bit of time of google, an could find nothing saying Havok 4 has been implemented... just a lot of stuff about Beta testing.

Matt

Havok4 is already out. It's an update to the way the physics work on the server, and was rolled out with the server updates last month.
The visible changes are fairly minor (even if some do have a bit of an impact in certain situations), and mostly have to do with inertia as you move across shapes. It has absolutely nothing to do with how anything *looks*, but with how you move.
Some situations which could previously crash an entire sim is now handled, and the whole system is in general faster when it comes to calculating who collides with what and when.
So, stability and less lag when lots of objects move between each other.

I see.

So does anyone know of any other possible upcoming improvements/versions/etc of Second Life?

Depends. Do you count "Lindens introducing new shinies to attract new people instead of fixing old issues, and the introduction of new shinies invariably breaks existing working processes" as upcoming improvements?

If so, expect them at least one a week...

The next big thing is Mono, with talks about it being rolled out within weeks. This, too, is a server update. There is no such thing as a "Mono viewer", despite what other threads here talk about (except for one checkbox saying "Compile to Mono" when editing scripts).

It is a *major* overhaul of how scripts work "behind the scene", giving *much, much* faster performance and more memory available. It *will not* change the LSL scripting language itself.

(Of course there's also the new "Dazzle" look which you can check for yourself in the Release Candidate branch of the viewer. Apart from the hotly debated new blueish look, Dazzle is a step towards being able to "skin" the viewer to your own taste).

Here's some blog posts about H4 rolling out..

http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/03/31/more-stable-second-life-simulator-on-the-way-tastes-great-less-crashing/
http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/04/01/second-life-simulator-v120083683-rollout-completion/
http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/04/02/second-life-simulator-v120083683-rollout-followup/
http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/04/10/simulator-stability-improvement-and-crash-rate-reduction-results/

As others have said, MONO is the next big thing - I think they're shooting for a grid-wide deploy of that next month - which you can read more about here: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Mono .

I'm not sure what's next after that. I miss the Town Hall Meetings where they talked about what's coming up...

I hope they would consider opening up Mono for other programming languages. It has always been sort of the dream scenario with Mono, and it *is* somewhere on the (very distant) horizon, but last I heard, it was not even an actual project; merely an acknowledged possibility.

There's also the "Megaprim Liberation" which Andrew Linden talks about; having tools to support and handle larger-than-10-meter prims (and the associated possible social problems). That would be very convenient, too, but there is no official LL stance on it yet.

Also on the horizon:

The materials project

Shadows

A "Ruth" update

Too bad there are no signs the "Ruth update" will actually extend to an improved avatar mesh.

Now THAT would be a real improvement.

According to another thread here about 1.20RC7, the Ruth update is already here, with "Ruth" now being some neutral, amorphous ball.

Runitai Linden has posted some screenshots of SL with shadows, to which I can only say "DO WANT!!", but I can imagine the outcry of "fix teh bugz!!1!" if LL hints that any sort of development work above a personal hobby project goes into this.

I think I have missed the "Materials Project", though. What is that?

Havoc 4 is why MOST freebie vehicles are now insane to attempt to use.
Havoc 4 is why most freebie (and non freebie) huggers are broken
Havoc 4 is why most movelocks make you walk in place
Havoc 4 is why most flight assists suck now
Havoc 4 is why most weapons don't work the way they used to.

Havoc 4 is GOOD FOR YOU.

I haven't tried my freebie vehicles, but my purchased helicopters work fine.
My free hugger works OK, if the avatars are lined up properly.
My movelock walk problem was fixed last night with an update from Mystical Cookie.
My flight assist works OK, except for an occasional tendency to descend sloooowly.
My weapons work fine. The maker sent out H4 updates promptly.

I'd say, overall, that Havok 4 *IS* good for me.

It's been neutral to bad, for me

- Anything I've bought from Waterworks is borked.

- My hugger is borked

- A couple of my projects are on semi-permanant hiatus, borked into unusability

- The trains and the Dore/Luna trolley, which I loved to ride, are borked

- bouncing stuff is borked a bit, and pushes (even nice ones, like an avatar cannon) are borked a bit

- Bork bork bork

I did not notice any great improvement overall, aside from less sim crashes. That *is* an improvement worth some of the hassle, but I so wish some of the nagging issues had been fixed before the deploy.



This will make being ruthed all that more, um, attractive



I can imagine the blog postings now :-/



I don't have a great deal of information, but I believe it is an update of the materials as defined in tools, as well as adding additional materials such as "water."



Oh ya. But imagine the outcry on dat when everyone's favorite dress/shirt/pants/skin doesn't fit right anymore?

Mari

Huh? I don't use vehicles so have no idea, but most of the hugs I've seen work better and are closer than we could be before. My move lock is better and flight assist seems more responsive too (in the Multi Gadget).

Although I can't fly through things anymore like with the old one.

You can now rez things on megaprims and now they let you do things with them they couldn't in the old Havok too I've read.

But best of all, I haven't seen a sim crash since... Not just good, but WONDERFUL!

you're soaking in it!!

Yeah, I know, punkin'. I have a ton of L$ invested in clothes and skin too. But you know what? I'd eat it all and gladly replace everything for a really major avatar overhaul.

Besides, think of the boost it'd give the economy. Instant obsolescence for every stitch of clothing in SL! Even the freebies. (Maybe *especially* the freebies, since they give the "pay-for" merchants such unfair competition.)

So when Mono comes out, we'll have to be careful who we kiss.

P2

That's a common one. Havok 4 happened to go live during one of Second Life's worst periods in a long time for database problems, so the news kind of got buried.

My experiences with Havok4 are…

Vehicles handle a tad different; not worse, just different.

My flight assist “feels” better, though I have noticed the slow sinking when hovering. I can’t really pin down the difference, but I think the inertia is smoother, making velocity changes less jerky and easier to control. That is probably the same difference I have noticed with vehicles.

I hear a lot of complaints over huggers, but I’ve never actually seen the error. I wonder if there are two types of huggers; one using llMoveToTarget and another using pushes to position to avatar or something. I use llMoveToTarget extensively, and that works as well as always.

As mentioned, megaprims are a lot less quirky, even if they are still not officially supported.

The collision resolution for complex shapes is a *lot* less demanding on the sim. The practical effect of this is probably not all that great; you don’t often hurl twisted tori at each other, except to deliberately annoy the sim. But it is a side effect of the whole “faster, more stable physics calculations” which also reduces sim crashes.

As for actual sim crashes, I don’t have enough of a big picture to really say anything about that, so I’ll have to trust LL on it when their statistics say that the number of sim crashes is considerably down.

There are a couple of new quirks, like the ability to force your avatar into the ground and shoot out at great speed, or a barrage of physical objects pushing you through a solid prim, but those require a fairly elaborate setup.

These are just my experiences, and not meant to challenge others’ observations. So overall fairly neutral, with the long-term possibilities of “bigger, better, faster, more” being the win.

This happens now even without scripted assistance. If you just fly up a bit then go AFK for a minute or 3, you'll come back to find yourself at a lower altitude.

I feel the general consensuses is, H4 is nothing to get too excited about? haha

As a newbie, I feel like Second Life could use a complete overhaul. It has a good community, and good infrastructure, but I think its graphical engine, GUI, models, textures, could all look better. I also think things could be organized/explained better to newbies... I'm pretty savvy when it comes to computers... but even I found SL had a steep learning curve. I can only imagine what it would be like for someone who doesn't know much about computers.

I'm using second life for research for my employer, but based on what Ive seen so far, I would never play it on my own time.

Matt