[Viewer 2.2 Beta has Arrived!]

Regarding:

STORM-86 As a User, I want the ability to double-click on the land I can see  inworld and teleport to that spot so I can move around more quickly and  easily.

I noticed this mentioned in the sprints and daily meeting minutes, but I can't find any clear instructions on how to use this function. Standing on land, and double-clicking on other land in the same sim, causes nothing to happen for me. According to the jiras, it seems that it should work on both land and prim pavement/sidewalks/floors, but it's not doing anything for me. Do I need to enable this feature someplace?

Kudos on "Sit Here", and sidebar tear-offs, and the minimap "get info on this person" fixes. Oh, and that local chat translator is AWESOME. Question: is there a way to get it to work for IMs too?

[Viewer 2.2 Beta has Arrived!]

Hot diggity dog! I have been waiting for this milestone. Congrats SnowStorm team, on your new baby!

Gonna go dl this right now.

P.S. what is the process from this point, to an "official" client release?

[Next Steps for Mesh Import]

http://sketchup.google.com/

[Check here if you want more options]

Wow, people. I'm amazed at the way folks are misinterpreting what I said. Some of it is, I'm sure, deliberate, by people who have axes to grind.

All I tried to do was explain why options should be a last resort. Nowhere did I say we won't have them.

Regarding the various accusations of condescension and not listening to our customers, how about a little reciprocity? I'm trying to have a somewhat nuanced, open discussion, explaining some of Linden Lab's desires and constraints, and what I get in return seems to be an attack because I haven't simply agreed to some hypothetical ideal. I'm listening and trying to engage, are you?

Please, let's assume good intentions here. If we all listen and comment with respect we'll get farther.

 

Q, (I hope you're recovering well),

What you may not realize (I know that LL is a pretty big company) is that SL users, particularly the blog reading ones.. have been hit recently with a LOT of unwanted change. Mass employee terminations (I know you guys are still reeling from that as well), the teen grid merger, display names, the marketplace, and more.. in and of themselves these changes would already represent a massive shock to the status quo. But also this week "Emerald" exploded in flaming shards of drama. So what you're getting is an inordinate amount of heat and dissatisfaction, in addition to the dissatisfaction with viewer 2, all directed at the only person posting from Linden Lab. And you're just unlucky enough to be launching your project right square in the middle of it all.

Over the last few weeks, SL users have asked, begged, hollered and screamed to be heard on the changes we've seen.. some, like myself, are willing to wait and see what happens.. but a large number of users are getting really itchy to yell. While Philip's return promised us a new era of "listening to the customer", SL users are feeling "less heard than ever before". Many of us have had long histories with LL, hearing them say again and again "we want your input" only to proceed with corporate plans regardless of community wishes.

Personally, I'm optimistic about snowstorm.. and was particularly struck by Oz Linden's passion and honesty during the SLCC presentation, when he simply said "don't ask us for viewer 1 back, we're not going back". I get that there's a lot of new, clean components "under the hood" in viewer 2 that makes it much easier to develop for.. but I think that SL users are chafing at an overload of too much customer-facing change, from all sources, too soon. Moreso now that many are facing the imminent blocking of logins from the Emerald viewer.

If the engine of viewer 2 had something more akin to the UI of viewer 1, many of the complaints would evaporate like summer's rain. Very quickly, the snowstorm project, with it's very real potential to integrate user requested "Emerald like functionality" and other requested fixes/changes into the official LL viewer would be seen as the truly amazing acheivement that it already is showing itself to be.

But you can't change history. Like it or not, all the changes in viewer 2 were dropped on the users en masse. People "hate" the new viewer, because they "hate" the changes in the UI. They talk in absolutes like "unusable" "broken" and "tragically flawed". So because it's all been a big unwanted shock, what you'll see is attempts over time to revert behaviors, rather than continuing to develop them forward. The open sourcers will work on third party viewers, rather than doing what you REALLY want, which is working on fixing your viewer. It's the same thing that started all this third party viewer stuff in the first place. When LL pushed an unwanted change in the chat UI on us when voice was released, the result was the first TPV, Nicholaz.. putting out a viewer with the old chat interface.

In the end, there's no winning, except to push gently but confidently forward at this point, and realize that right now, the din from the crowd is just higher than normal. You're not going to do anything for Ll's reputation of "not listening" that way, but stopping to listen to what's being said right now, won't do much for your morale either. Critical listening is required, sifting through the anger and hurt to find out what the real complaints are isn't easy.. and it takes a lot of energy.

But if you do continue forward, and I do think you should do exactly that, as you keep developing features that aren't in viewer 1.23, eventually third party viewer users will return to the fold.. or be left behind.. and slowly but surely, third party viewers will have to adopt the latest sources, or risk being unable to provide the same level of functionality. The real hope, is just the constant turnover of old users leaving and new users joining who haven't seen viewer 1.23 before.

Do I wish you could "stop everything" and give us the old UI back? Yes and no. Yes, I'd like the old UI back, because while I PERSONALLY don't need it, a lot of people are unwilling to adapt to the new UI.. and it's delaying adoption of new functions like shared media, alpha masks, multi-attach./multi-wear clothing, etc... But mostly No, I don't want you to "stop everything" to do it. I've seen some of the things on the SCRUM backlog.. and I'm really quite excited to see things moving as quickly as they seem to be. I know that mesh is coming, and as a member of the beta.. I know that that's some technology that in the end will probably benefit everyone.And delaying that level of awesome stuff, just to go back and rewrite the whole UI system.. is just not a good idea at all.

Unfortunately this is the bed that was made 2 years (or so) ago, when all viewer developments were put on hold while the new viewer (or at least the UI) was outsourced. It was probably a poor customer relations decision "starting over fresh" rather than letting the UI evolve over time.. But as I said, what's done.. is done. The only real issue comes near the end of the year, When mesh will begin possibly entering the main grid.. because that will be another things that 1.23.5 based viewers won't be able to see. At some point, that door will have to be closed, and there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth then too.

The Emerald debacle has ended forever my trust in third party viewers. So for better or worse, I'll be using official viewers from here on out. I, for one, will be eagerly watching the snowstorm project, and am already considering downloading one of the daily builds here soon.. because the changes listed in the daily reports look quite promising.

My question for Oz, which I asked a few days ago in private, I'll point to you now in public.

What is it that we, the users can do, to become productive contributors, partners if you will, to your work in Snowstorm? We have thousands of jira posts that we've made over the years.. How can we properly and politely bring them to your attention, for hopeful resolution and incorporation in future versions of the LL viewer? Is there a process yet in place to say "hey snowstorm guys, look at this" ?

Tell us how to help you make the LL viewer better for all of us.