personally i would like to see some work on Avatar Advanced Scripting (avatar as a "bot" aka RLV) if it can be done cleanly.
also a viewer that has a builtin Single Region Test Sim would ROCK. On Sat, Nov 9, 2013 at 3:38 PM, Taoki <[email protected]> wrote: > Although I've used Second Life and Opensim for more than 6 years, I'm still > uncertain where the "open virtual worlds" system based on them is going, and > the direction Opensim might take in relation to SL. Especially since during > the last years Linden made a lot of major changes, but Opensim doesn't seem > to have gotten more popular or attractive to main grid users. This > uncertainty kept me from spending as much time in SL and the free grids, and > spending more time seeking answers and looking for alternatives. Although > such matters were probably discussed a lot in the past, I'd like to get into > the things I'm looking to clarify, and also mention what I believe in case > it might be helpful for future development plans. > > SL and Opensim are two different projects developed by different teams, each > going in its own direction more or less. The Second Life viewer is a client > for Linden's virtual worlds system (capable of connecting to other grids if > modified) while Opensim is a virtual worlds server not officially intended > for a specific client. Yet for the purpose to be achieved, they both need > each other. SL doesn't have another open-source server, Opensim doesn't have > another reliable client. Realistically speaking, neither of the two matters > will likely change: Linden might never open-source their SL server, and > Opensim won't have an own client written from scratch that has all of SL's > features and quality. > > Linden proved they don't care about Opensim, so things will likely not > change on the viewer's end. What jumps to my attention is that apparently, > Opensim is still waiting for something that will likely never come. Although > custom SL viewers are the only usable clients, Opensim still goes for a > "general purpose virtual worlds server" and avoids being labeled as "a > server for Second Life", while hesitating to get its own official viewer > based on SL. While at some point I believed an independent structure could > work, I now think there are too many technical implications for such to be > possible. > > Unlike simpler systems (like http, where Apache doesn't care if it's being > accessed by Firefox or Chrome) something of this complexity needs a precise > client - server design. If the server lacks features in the client, the > client will have dead parts. If the server has more features than the > client, it will eventually get slow bloated and confusing. Both the server > and all viewers accessing it need to revolve around a fixed design and set > of features, otherwise you'd have things only some avatars can see or use in > your sim. A different virtual world for example might not even use our > concept of primitives, could have voxel terrain instead of heightmaps, and > its own scripting language (like Lua) over LSL. Opensim wouldn't be able to > take it under its wing while staying compatible with SL, since the > technologies couldn't intersect or be compatible across viewers. It's like > intending a dedicated server for first person shooters to run Unreal > Tournament, Quake, DayZ and others at once. > > More technically, this is why I believe a non-SL viewer will never exist: > First of all, everything would have to look almost the same, since we > wouldn't want those using the SL viewer to see something different than us. > Terrain, primitive shapes, texture effects (transparency, shiny, bump, > glow), avatar meshes (customized body, clothing, skins, attachments), the > sky (day / night cycle and windlight settings), LSL functions with > client-side effects (llSetText, llTargetOmega, etc) would all need to match. > Once the world looks fine, you'd need to implement tons of other unique and > complex features... such as media and web pages on prims, main map and > minimap, the text and voice chat systems, and so much more. The details and > eye candy would need attention too, such as a GUI and shaders (for HDR, > shadows, depth of field) that can rival SL's. Even if someone had the time > and energy to do all this as a FOSS application, they'd end up with a > reverse-engineered version of the SL viewer that has little differences... > meaning they wasted months doing something that's already there. In the end, > any client for Opensim could only be Second Life, even if rewritten from > zero and under a different name. > > Considering this, I'm curious why it's better for Opensim to aim at being a > general platform, rather than simply a server for the SL technology. And why > the dev team doesn't create an official Opensim Viewer based on the latest > version of SL, while of course allowing custom viewers like Firestorm to > work too. Is OS still intended to work with other designs, and why / how? > Does it risk distancing from SL viewers at some point, in hopes of a viewer > written from scratch? Or does it intend to support a collection of different > virtual world programs somehow? Also, what would happen if third party > viewer developers ever got bored of supporting Opensim? > > This is not to say what must or mustn't be done, since I'm far from having > the knowledge and position to decide such things. But sticking to just SL > and being closer the development of its viewers is something I thought would > be a good initiative. I still feel that a change is needed, and that Opensim > isn't reaching its full potential for some reason... which made me wonder if > among other problems, some might have similar concerns about Opensim's > colder relationship with viewers, and the lack of something specific > officially intended to work with it. > _______________________________________________ > Opensim-dev mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/opensim-dev -- Robert L Martin _______________________________________________ Opensim-dev mailing list [email protected] https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/opensim-dev
