How does newest Firestorm do with High Sierra?

[Pamela Galli]

I have an iMac with a Nvidia card, with High Sierra OS. Is the newest Bento enabled Firestorm compatible (my policy is if it aint broke don't update it). I am thinking of getting a mesh head and wondering if I should try a Bento one. I am using an older version of FS atm.

[Chic Aeon]

There was another post on this today that seemed to say there were issue. I didn't really read as it didn't affect me but looking back in the posts might be a good idea

 

[Whirly Fizzle]

You should be fine on Firestorm 5.0.11 on High Sierra.
Just install it to test.  If you have problems, the older downloads are always available here: http://wiki.phoenixviewer.com/fs_older_downloads

[Anicha Heartsong]

I've had repeated problems since upgrading from Sierra to High Sierra. I get logged out frequently, often if I have gone off to another desktop / screen in order to work on textures etc in Photoshop. When I flick back to Firestorm to test the texture, I find it has crashed. I tried a clean install of firestorm but that hasn't helped. 

[Alyona Su]

On 2/8/2018 at 12:59 AM, Zipe Kirkorian said:

I've had repeated problems since upgrading from Sierra to High Sierra. I get logged out frequently, often if I have gone off to another desktop / screen in order to work on textures etc in Photoshop. When I flick back to Firestorm to test the texture, I find it has crashed. I tried a clean install of firestorm but that hasn't helped. 

I may be mistaken, though I understand Firestorm is not Mac-native, it's a port over from Windows version. I believe the LL Viewer is Mac-native, so you may have better luck with that one. At least when in a "productive" setting and you're doing actual work in or for SL, rather than just sim-hopping, etc.

I keep both on hand (FS and LL) and the truth is that the LL viewer is way more stable than the FS. I use Mesh Outfitter to manage my outfits and it requires RLV. The truth is if I ever shake off that tool I may just go back to the LL viewer as my main because it seems to me the FS viewer has been becoming more and more unstable over the last few updates. (And this is true in my personal experience on MS Windows version, also).

[Pamela Galli]

FS forced me to update yesterday, and so far no problems with High Sierra.

[Anicha Heartsong]

Alyona, thanks for the advice (even if it took me an age to come back and see it!). I'm still plagued with crashes whenever working in another window on textures and the like, so I'll try the official viewer for a while. I've been away from the SL viewer for about ten years, so it will take some getting used to!

[Alyona Su]

50 minutes ago, Zipe Kirkorian said:

Alyona, thanks for the advice (even if it took me an age to come back and see it!). I'm still plagued with crashes whenever working in another window on textures and the like, so I'll try the official viewer for a while. I've been away from the SL viewer for about ten years, so it will take some getting used to!

No worries.

I will say this in defense of Firestorm and LL devs: Apple keeps app devs on their toes. I've just learned (through a completely unrelated app) that the reason that app must be upgraded is because with High Sierra Apple changed the Core Sound "code" or whatever - so Apple is also making changes to the OS as well.

Of course if a developer is in the Apple Developer program: they are notified of what's happening and when. I'm sure LL is a member of that program, though not sure about the Firestorm people.

My general point is this: I am not finger-pointing at anyone. Computers be complicated stuffs!

As for my own SL-creation workflow: I'll be in world and prep whatever I need to prep (download textures, screenshots, etc.) - then logout completely. From there I'll fore up Pixelmator Pro for example (Photoshop? Really? LOL) and go to town on my textures and graphics, etc. Then when that's done I'll fire up Blender, etc.

I think the thing we've all learned to do is to have multiple (now dozens) of apps all open at the same time and we forget how intensive and taxing those are, even when idle.

And any macOS user MUST HAVE THIS: "Dr. Cleaner" (Free or Pro version)
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dr-cleaner-disk-mem-clean/id921458519?mt=12&ls=1

[Beq Janus]

On 11/02/2018 at 1:46 PM, Alyona Su said:

I may be mistaken, though I understand Firestorm is not Mac-native, it's a port over from Windows version. I believe the LL Viewer is Mac-native, so you may have better luck with that one. At least when in a "productive" setting and you're doing actual work in or for SL, rather than just sim-hopping, etc.

Coming to this very late in the day, I can't comment on relative stability etc as I am not a Mac person at all, but I would correct the confusion here. Firestorm and the Lab viewer both share the same core code (we constantly merge the LL viewer changes into FS alongside out own changes and fixes etc.) The viewers are coded to be cross-platform, but in all cases are compiled natively for the target machines. One of our developers is responsible for generating the Mac builds, the same applies to Linux. At the present time, the lab does not provide a Linux build but we continue to maintain one, work is ongoing to help the lab get the Linux viewer to be part of their release again. One thing that does differ is our release cycle. Firestorm only upgrade a few times a year whereas the lab is far more aggressive with their updates and this can mean that they get fixes into production faster than we do. The flip side of the Lab's policy is that people are force updated and historically the Firestorm users have preferred periodic updates and the option to stay with older versions (typically we support two prior releases). It is always worth reporting issues that you have in the support rooms, as Alyona states there are many variables to consider when things are not behaving, even if your problem is not resolved the fact of reporting it raises awareness and the support staff are pretty experienced at spotting trends which they then raise awareness of.

Edited May 30, 2018 by Beq Janus
minor edit for clarity