viewers

[Sandra8675]

 hi everyone...  i hope someone can help me.  is this the official link for catznip please?  https://get.catznip.com/downloads

 and if anyone knows any other nice viewers that are not firestorm.  please let me know. 

ty

 

[LittleMe Jewell]

12 minutes ago, Sandra8675 said:

 hi everyone...  i hope someone can help me.  is this the official link for catznip please?  https://get.catznip.com/downloads

 and if anyone knows any other nice viewers that are not firestorm.  please let me know. 

ty

 

Yes.  To be sure you can always follow the links from the SL Third Party Viewer list:  http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Third_Party_Viewer_Directory

[Rowan Amore]

3 hours ago, LittleMe Jewell said:

Yes.  To be sure you can always follow the links from the SL Third Party Viewer list:  http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Third_Party_Viewer_Directory

I've seen this viewer mentioned elsewhere on the forums.  What's the big deal with it?  I looked at their website and no update on their viewer in over a year.  Even to read any info, they want you to sign up.  Does it have some better features or is it better for pics like Black Dragon?

[Sandra8675]

30 minutes ago, RowanMinx said:

I've seen this viewer mentioned elsewhere on the forums.  What's the big deal with it?  I looked at their website and no update on their viewer in over a year.  Even to read any info, they want you to sign up.  Does it have some better features or is it better for pics like Black Dragon?

It is supposed to have more features  for inventory specifically geared towards those who like shopping a lot.  Otherwise it is extremely similar to firestorm function wise from the research I've done.  People who use cts wardrobe seem to very much like catznip.  And it made by the same  people who made the rlv relay system.  But, the look and fell is extremely close to firestorm.  More than that I do not know....  because it still gets a little confusing for me.  Like i tend to 'prefer' rlv collars by 'peanut 9".  what exact rlv system the catznip people came up with i do not know.

[Sandra8675]

black dragon from what i heard from several people who do use it is that the graphics are beautifully detailed.  many people use it for pictures.  but...  i have been told by many that its difficult to move around inworld.  And because black dragon needs more of your 'graphic card' or depends on your graphic card more than other platforms.  the end result is that your computer can 'crash' more than say other viewers out there who depend 'less' on the graphic card.  but many have told me the customer service/ support is fantastic.

[Rowan Amore]

9 minutes ago, Sandra8675 said:

It is supposed to have more features  for inventory specifically geared towards those who like shopping a lot.  Otherwise it is extremely similar to firestorm function wise from the research I've done.  People who use cts wardrobe seem to very much like catznip.  And it made by the same  people who made the rlv relay system.  But, the look and fell is extremely close to firestorm.  More than that I do not know....  because it still gets a little confusing for me.  Like i tend to 'prefer' rlv collars by 'peanut 9".  what exact rlv system the catznip people came up with i do not know.

It's probably not a new system they created just that they allow it like firestorm.does.  The official SL viewer does not. The Restrained Life viewer I believe was the one made exclusively by and for rlv.  I do know that black dragon, at least last time I ran it, was more like the old.style version.of the SL viewer unless that's been changed.  It would be harder to navigate for newer people who never used the previous type.

As for inventory?  Yeah, mine is beyond hope at this point so no viewer in the world.could help.

[Anna Nova]

Just be aware that if you use these viewers you cut yourself off from Linux, and have to use the Evil Windows or Mac OS - FOR EVER!

Only Firestorm supports Linux.  Only Firestorm isn't EVIL.

Catznip used to support Linux, but went to the Dark Side, like Linden Lab.

[animats]

1 hour ago, Anna Nova said:

Catznip used to support Linux, but went to the Dark Side, like Linden Lab.

Too bad. I run only Linux now. Firestorm for Linux is pretty good. Getting Vivox (the voice system) to work is a headache, though. Vivox dropped support for Linux.

Firestorm for Windows will run under Wine, Linux's Windows emulator. This is needed for mesh uploads. Try Catzip that way.

The SL viewer will not run under Wine. The auto-updater is looking for some Windows feature Wine does not support. It may be possible to get past that, but I don't want to run the SL viewer badly enough to figure that out.

 

[Anna Nova]

29 minutes ago, animats said:

Too bad. I run only Linux now. Firestorm for Linux is pretty good. Getting Vivox (the voice system) to work is a headache, though. Vivox dropped support for Linux.

Firestorm for Windows will run under Wine, Linux's Windows emulator. This is needed for mesh uploads. Try Catzip that way.

The SL viewer will not run under Wine. The auto-updater is looking for some Windows feature Wine does not support. It may be possible to get past that, but I don't want to run the SL viewer badly enough to figure that out.

 

I have run the SL viewer under Wine for Havoc and mesh uploads, but as you say, it won't autoupdate, and it was a while ago.  I confirm that Catznip will run under Wine.  I don't use Voice (spelled: Vice) so lack of Vivox doesn't worry me.  Almost everything useful runs under Linux, why are some, mainly American, software companies abandoning it?  I suspects bribes from Satan's spawn (Microsoft, Alphabet, Farcebook,  and Apple).

[NiranV Dean]

3 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

Just be aware that if you use these viewers you cut yourself off from Linux, and have to use the Evil Windows or Mac OS - FOR EVER!

Only Firestorm supports Linux.  Only Firestorm isn't EVIL.

Catznip used to support Linux, but went to the Dark Side, like Linden Lab.

Why would you ever go to the light side? It's boring.

The dark side has cookies!

[Solar Legion]

Erm, Voice works just fine under Manjaro. Grabbed the AUR package, installed and it ran just fine.

Then again pretty much every dependency it could need to use was already covered by the rest of the audio, video and gaming programs i'd already installed so ...

[Lyssa Greymoon]

3 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

Almost everything useful runs under Linux, why are some, mainly American, software companies abandoning it?

Because it sucks.

[Gage Wirefly]

5 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

Just be aware that if you use these viewers you cut yourself off from Linux, and have to use the Evil Windows or Mac OS - FOR EVER!

Only Firestorm supports Linux.  Only Firestorm isn't EVIL.

Catznip used to support Linux, but went to the Dark Side, like Linden Lab.

Singularity Viewer (which I prefer to use primarily in Windows and Linux) and CoolViewer do also .

[Nick0678]

6 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

Just be aware that if you use these viewers you cut yourself off from Linux, and have to use the Evil Windows or Mac OS - FOR EVER!

Only Firestorm supports Linux.  Only Firestorm isn't EVIL.

Catznip used to support Linux, but went to the Dark Side, like Linden Lab.

 

Kokua is also compatible with Linux.

Latest version is Kokua Release 6.4.7 (64bit) (https://kokua.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/KKA/pages/15237201/Downloads)

 

 

[Gage Wirefly]

1 hour ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

Because it sucks.

Have you or do you even use Linux of any kind? It most certainly does not suck.

[animats]

The problem is Windows 10. Windows 7 was a good standalone operating system. Windows 10 is a client of Microsoft services. With ads. The ad-free version is over US$500.

[Qie Niangao]

2 hours ago, animats said:

The problem is Windows 10. Windows 7 was a good standalone operating system. Windows 10 is a client of Microsoft services. With ads. The ad-free version is over US$500.

Ads? I see one "suggested" app in the rarely-used Start menu (or whatever it's called these days). Granted, mine is a "Home" edition of Windows 10, got by upgrading an old 8.1 installation from I forget how many machines ago, and readily transferred, no muss, no fuss -- such a happy contrast to the (very) old days of OEM-licensed, Hardware-locked Windows XP and its ilk. Anyway, the full retail version (non-OEM) of Windows 10 Home on a handy thumb drive is a whopping $150 Canadian on newegg, so what's this "add-free version" ??

Not that I dislike Linux -- I still use it for a network storage box, with enough ever-updated Ubuntu to run SL in a pinch. But I wouldn't go back to Linux for my main desktop, as I did for years, after I realized system administration makes a sad hobby.

[steeljane42]

3 hours ago, animats said:

The problem is Windows 10. Windows 7 was a good standalone operating system. Windows 10 is a client of Microsoft services. With ads. The ad-free version is over US$500.

Windows 10 is fine. Not perfect, but fine. I do have a pro version (which is not 500$ even if you buy a new license, but it's much cheaper to upgrade older OS to it) of it, though, which is easier to configure. Obviously I did a lot of tweaking to cleanse all that telemetry stuff, disable autoupdates (I always did and will choose KBs I want to install myself. takes a bit of time compared to autoupdating, but that way I get ones I want and when I want)  and other stuff Microsoft added, but can't say I saw a single ad for ~2 years I'm using it.

14 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

Almost everything useful runs under Linux, why are some, mainly American, software companies abandoning it?  I suspects bribes from Satan's spawn (Microsoft, Alphabet, Farcebook,  and Apple).

Too low market share to bother with supporting it. In some graphs it's around 3-4%, for gaming related stuff (steam) it's below 1%. Macs are not doing that great there either, around 3% and I even saw a few games dropping support for both of them this year. Development, support, optimization etc; all needs resources, so given that only a small percentage of already small Linux userbase will be interested in certain products/software, it's just not viable to invest into it. In that sense SL reminds me a lot of rl, niche and just not popular bodies/heads have little to no support simply because they are not worth time to invest in for most creators.

[Coffee Pancake]

On 9/23/2020 at 6:08 PM, Sandra8675 said:

 hi everyone...  i hope someone can help me.  is this the official link for catznip please?  https://get.catznip.com/downloads

Hi, I work on the Catznip Viewer with Kitty and that is the correct website.

On 9/23/2020 at 9:35 PM, RowanMinx said:

I've seen this viewer mentioned elsewhere on the forums.  What's the big deal with it?  I looked at their website and no update on their viewer in over a year.  Even to read any info, they want you to sign up.  Does it have some better features or is it better for pics like Black Dragon?

Catznip is from a feature perspective, entirely Catznip. We do not import code from other viewers (aside from bug fixes). ALL other viewers have a lot of code originally sourced from us (including the official one).

We do not require that you sign up. We do not even have the facility for people to sign up. 

We do big updates to the main release infrequently, the intent being to provide performance and stability. If we feel something isn't ready, we wont release it on main.

Our beta releases are much closer to Linden current headline (such as EEP) and wherever new we're working on. Public betas are the final phase of development before an actual release, so even these aren't updated as frequently as our internal development.

Everything does lag behind a little simply because we're just 2 people and Kitty (who writes the vast majority of actual code) only gets to work on Catznip on her time off work. She's a developer IRL, so coding for work and coding for a hobby sometimes ends up being just too much code. She literally schedules holidays from work to work on the viewer, sometimes I drag her off to binge other things (like minecraft or borderlands) and we don't get a release out as a result - my bad, not sorry.

We spend a lot of time working on performance and testing, fairly confident saying our viewer is the fastest, especially on lower end hardware where every frame counts.

It's not super important to us that everyone use Catznip. What's important is that people find a viewer they like and log into SL.

On 9/23/2020 at 10:12 PM, Sandra8675 said:

It is supposed to have more features  for inventory specifically geared towards those who like shopping a lot.  Otherwise it is extremely similar to firestorm function wise from the research I've done.  People who use cts wardrobe seem to very much like catznip.  And it made by the same  people who made the rlv relay system.  But, the look and fell is extremely close to firestorm.  More than that I do not know....  because it still gets a little confusing for me.  Like i tend to 'prefer' rlv collars by 'peanut 9".  what exact rlv system the catznip people came up with i do not know.

With a couple of notable exceptions (exports, friend manager thingy, 3 bazillion check boxes), Catznip has feature parity with Firestorm. We have signed the havok sublicense so mesh uploads also work.

Catznip has a lot of unique features, it might just take some time for them to become apparent. (Right clicking on things is a good place to start exploring).

We don't add FS (or other viewers) code, so where we both have a similar feature either we did our own take on the idea or our code is in the other viewer (sadly most people attribute a feature to the viewer they saw it in first).

We deliberately don't add options in preferences for everything, go as far to say we try very hard not to add options. Very strong believers in providing a sane accessible experience that works out of the box and that configuration (where actually needed) should be a part of the feature as it's being used. 

The look and feels is much closer to the Linden client (although most of it has been rewritten .. The few places our viewer and LL match exactly are places where we have major reworks planned or in progress - we don't release stuff half done, it's ready when its ready).

RLVa is developed by Catznip and then added to most other viewers including Firestorm. RLVa is the viewer system that scripted devices operate on, we don't make the actual scripted devices).

20 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

Just be aware that if you use these viewers you cut yourself off from Linux, and have to use the Evil Windows or Mac OS - FOR EVER!

Only Firestorm supports Linux.  Only Firestorm isn't EVIL.

Catznip used to support Linux, but went to the Dark Side, like Linden Lab.

We didn't go anywhere, we just found it impossible to continue producing a viewer that met our own standards on Linux. If we're not prepared to use something as our own daily driver, we wont ship it.

A Mac port has been on the cards for a long while, we do now have some actual Apple hardware to develop and test on (and have had a couple of internal builds) but it's older and we're not happy with our ability to do meaningful QC. Things would go a lot faster if our Mac hardware was current

 

[Rachel1206]

23 hours ago, animats said:

The problem is Windows 10. Windows 7 was a good standalone operating system. Windows 10 is a client of Microsoft services. With ads. The ad-free version is over US$500.

Windows 10 Home costs 139 US$ (Pro 199.99 US$) - 3rd party/OEM version typical very low prices or free delivered with either PC or hardware. Windows 10 still free to update if you have a Windows 7/8.x. See this article in Tom's Hardware on how to. Notice student version is free.

I do not see any adds on my Windows 10 Home, which was pre-installed on my ASUS ROG laptop. US only? Anyway, to disable adds, check the privacy settings.

Edited September 25, 2020 by Rachel1206

[Gabriele Graves]

On 9/24/2020 at 7:29 PM, animats said:

Too bad. I run only Linux now. Firestorm for Linux is pretty good. Getting Vivox (the voice system) to work is a headache, though. Vivox dropped support for Linux.

Firestorm for Windows will run under Wine, Linux's Windows emulator. This is needed for mesh uploads. Try Catzip that way.

The SL viewer will not run under Wine. The auto-updater is looking for some Windows feature Wine does not support. It may be possible to get past that, but I don't want to run the SL viewer badly enough to figure that out.

 

Voice works pretty well for me too on Ubuntu v18.04.  Didn't have to do anything special.

[Gabriele Graves]

20 hours ago, steeljane42 said:

Windows 10 is fine. Not perfect, but fine.

My opinion is that even when free, Windows 10 isn't worth it's price.

[Gabriele Graves]

On 9/24/2020 at 11:53 PM, Lyssa Greymoon said:

Because it sucks.

I don't what you have used to get that opinion but what I use every day for literally everything that isn't Android, it works superbly and it puts me in control of my computer.
It most definitely does not suck.

[Gabriele Graves]

20 hours ago, steeljane42 said:

Too low market share to bother with supporting it. In some graphs it's around 3-4%, for gaming related stuff (steam) it's below 1%. Macs are not doing that great there either, around 3% and I even saw a few games dropping support for both of them this year. Development, support, optimization etc; all needs resources, so given that only a small percentage of already small Linux userbase will be interested in certain products/software, it's just not viable to invest into it.

And yet when LL did invest in creating a Linux viewer there were far fewer people using it.  Few people had even heard of it (I was one).  Microsoft was so dominant for desktop/laptops that it just wasn't credible that anything else mattered.  That last part isn't even true any more.  Microsoft develops for Linux now, heavily develops for it.

[Solar Legion]

1 hour ago, Gabriele Graves said:

And yet when LL did invest in creating a Linux viewer there were far fewer people using it.  Few people had even heard of it (I was one).  Microsoft was so dominant for desktop/laptops that it just wasn't credible that anything else mattered.  That last part isn't even true any more.  Microsoft develops for Linux now, heavily develops for it.

The following is my own addition to the post above, not so much a direct response:

Further skewing things, at one point (not sure if it still does this) the Valve Steam Play initiative would report back any Linux user making use of it to play their "Windows Only" games on Linux .... as using Windows.

Now funnily enough part of the "reason" Linden lab dropped support/development for their in house Linux Viewer was due to the "difficulty" of maintaining the Voice module for it. A Voice Module provided to them by Vivox. A Voice module that used a static linked library or two as hard dependencies, meaning you had to have that specific version of the libraries installed for it to function!

That issue really no longer exists, it was fixed by the module maintainers themselves in the last year or so. You no longer need to hunt down and install a specific package for those libraries, keeping it alongside the up to date one used by the rest of the system nor do you need to symbolic link (another workaround) to the up to date version to trick those calls.

Even further - Distribution depending, your software manager may well grab any dependencies you might be missing, provided the package maintainer has them properly listed (something which can be incredibly irritating as in the past a few Viewer developers would put out a direct download from their own sites and just expect you to know what libraries are needed/already have them installed).

Sadly here are still some "Black Boxed" components (proprietary software libraries) such as the Havoc libraries ... 

In any event this all boils down to: If your opinion on the matter is based on what Linux was several years ago, you're woefully out of date and/or listening to spin.