Release Candidate 1.21...

I don't know about you but I always like to try the new Release Candidates as they come out. There's a certain excitement in not quite knowing what you're going to see when you turn it on. Then discovering lots of new features; a new silver skin, rez objects 4000m up, link objects further apart, Windlight as standard.

So I've been trying 1.21 for a few days now and as yet I've found..nothing..not even a new gesture. Generally I don't go looking for new stuff, I just let them find me..a sort of pleasant surprise. However this time I was kind of hoping for shadows, but sadly I was to be disappointed...oh well.

Has anyone actually found any new stuff (I just know someone's going to say 'there's a complete three page list of new features for RC 1.21 on page B56/31 of the Wiki..haven't you read it yet'). For I and everyone else who hasn't read page B56/31 of the Wiki maybe we could start a list here..

Perre..

They said bug fixes and stability are their #1 priority right now. Especially with mono rolling out. I don't think new stuff will start coming until after mono is stable and working well. Just a hunch though based on their statments saying as much.

The Help / About Second Life dialog box has a link to the release notes.

It's http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Release_Notes/Second_Life_Release_Candidate/1.21

Sounds about right..I generally hold my breath with release candidates as they can be a little delicate/prone to the odd crash/unexpected visual features, this one is remarkably sound 'n' solid (in fact I found myself checking to see it was the RC I was using and not the standard)

Perre..

I almost always use the RC's. Most seem better then the standard as they usually have fixes from the bugs in the standard. So it makes sense it would be a little better. However now and again they will screw it up. The last time i had a unusable RC was when windlight was being tested. Then again that may have been a First Look... Now that I remember I believe the First Look viewer is the one they release with new features.


Found it on the download page.
"First Look viewer are optional viewers that provide a 'first look' at new features under development. "

Ah..hahahah..haw embarrassing I've got my RC's confused with my First Looks..this explains everything . Oh well good news is shadows may not be so far away yet!!

Perre..walks away whistling

The tabs in the group chat window are an ugly orange gold color that's really hard to read. When the cursor lingers over one of them, the tab background gets brighter, which greatly reduces the contrast with the white-ish text on the tab, making it even harder to read, and even uglier.

I'm not sure if this tab color scheme is actually new but it sure is rotten.

It would be nice if they had a development road map of things in progress and things planned. Even have status bars and/or even "in progress" "stopped" "dropped" or something like that... Then again maybe they do and they made a blog post last year that no one can find using the blog search that returns less specific results than google does for the same blog.

The one new feature that I am finding indispensable is the ability to drag items from inventory and drop them on the IM window to give them. The damn "Release Keys" button is gone at last and the tools menu is back so that you can reset scripts etc without being in edit mode. Unfortunately I cant use the RC all the time due to several bugs but I have been using it every day for content creation and support then switch back to 19.x to go to events etc.

the edit land tools look way cooler.. and if i didnt keep crashing then i would fiddle around with them more...

the AR thingie has more categories you can report..

and it has the recompile to MONO thing.

I guess we'll still have to sit out a few more RCs before we get to try dynamic shadows, but I can't wait for when they do arrive - they look so great on the demo videos on Youtube they are a must-have! They will totally transform the SL visual experience.

from what I understand this was the main reason for this RC series, the bug fixes could have just as easy been handled with new 1.20 viewers.

another added feature is the abbilety for the viewer to let scripts now where on a prim a touch is made but you can't see that in the interface offcourse.

The server upgrades of last week deployed the mono back end to the servers. For those who have been hiding under a virtual rock, mono is the new "engine" to the lsl scripting language.

There are a LOT of bug fixes, and a few minor new features and changes. (Tool menu item is back. Receiving inventory opens the inventory window, etc.) But the main thing this version does is allow you to recompile old scripts into the new mono runtime, and script in mono.

If you select an object with one or more scripts in it, go to menu item Tools>> Recompile Scripts in Selection, you'll get a choice of mono and lsl.

SL will be switching over to mono, tho, old lsl scripts will continue to work. But if you're not into scripting, you probably won't notice many big changes. Also, since this version is DESIGNED to crash on lock ups, it might be a good one to avoid unless you need the new scripting.

One minor new feature I discovered:

You know how you can set different colours for chat text according to whether it comes from residents, objects, the system etc. Well, now you can set your own utterances to appear in a different colour to everyone elses babble!!! Woot!

SL will be sooo awesome with shadows. There is one small issue though. With shadows it will be VERY obvious that every physical object is hovering above ground. I'm kinda hoping a sollution to that once shadows are released as well, so every car won't be a hover car, and every pet won't be a flying pet

WOW...the ability to moderate group chat!

HOOO!!!
Fixed: VWR-4541: Move the Release Keys button to the World menu

Somethings have been lost in 1.21 also. The consolodated permissions on the edit window are gone now making it difficult to verify the permissions that the next owner will have.

I tried it for a few hours. The only thing I liked about it was less lag and smoother camera maneuvers.

The rest of it wasnt worth the grief; it drove me all the way back to viewer 1.19.

Ahh, but we do know what we'll be getting each and every time.

Broken, unfinished versions of whatever it is they've put out.

Has never failed, yet.

For me RC 1.21.0.95157 introduced a huuuge memory leak again. Something i don't experience in the previous version RC 1.20.14.92115

~So i went back to the previous version after using 1.21 for about a day. i did notice that i could make my own chat text a different colour, i liked that.. but.. didn't like the way out of control memory leak (for me anyway).

Notice under the sculpt map input area there are now both a "mirror" function check box and and "invert" check box.