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Second Life
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Second Life support has now been added to Zuild.net!
To try it out, create a new profile in your Zuild.net account area, and select Second Life. From here you have options for auto-sync'ing to Zuild.net your "second life" or "first life" profile or both!
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If you have a Linden Home you have probably noticed a control panel cunningly placed on an inside wall of your house. Today these panels will be enabled, allowing the home owner to use the Linden Home Control Panel -- a web page that you can use to configure various aspects of your Linden Home.
Since the launch of Linden Homes on February 17, we've seen nearly 13,000 people take up residence in a Linden Home. The response we've seen to the program so far has been beyond even our expectations, leading us to double the number of homes that we originally made available. And there are more to come! Our early homeowners love having a home base from which to explore the online world, and a safe, private place to entertain and socialize -- all for no additional cost beyond a premium membership.
One piece of early feedback we got from a large number of Residents was the desire to be able to customize their houses more. Partly in response to that feedback, we've now turned on our Control Panel feature, giving you a range of options for making your home your own.
The exact changes you can make will vary depending on which house you have, but will include features like lighting, curtains, and texture choices for the various surfaces of your home. Want a different roof texture? Just click! Need to change the color of the living room wall? Click again! We're hoping that the Control Panel will evolve over time to give you ever more functionality, but to begin with we need to test the basics -- hence this is a Beta. If you have any problems using it, please do let us know.For full instructions on using the Linden Home Control Panel, click here.Once the Beta period is over, and the Control Panels are proven to be working reliably, we will work on packaging up these scripts and explaining how they work so that Residents can take advantage of the technologies we have developed for this project in their own homes and estates, and no doubt extend them in ways that we haven't even dreamed!Lastly, as promised, the base textures for the various themes will be made available to all Residents today. At each of the different Hub areas you will find a box of textures for that theme, so if you want the Elderglen textures, please visit the Elderglen Hub! Texture kiosks for each theme are available at the following SLurls:
We look forward to seeing what you come up with, and finding more ways to help you settle into Second Life. Welcome Home!
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 I'm very happy to announce that, as a core feature of the new Viewer 2 Beta, Second Life Search has been redesigned inside and out to make finding the people, places and content you're looking for easier than ever before. We've revamped the interface, overhauled what's happening under the hood, and refocused our work on Web-standard tools and methodologies that have not only improved our ability to bring you more relevant search results, but also made us faster on our feet as a development team. And, we've been building a first-class Search team--from Yahoo!, eBay, Google, and Amazon--to bring the best of search and advertising services to Second Life. We've been hard at work improving Second Life Search, and we're excited to share some of the work that we've recently completed in conjunction with the new viewer.
Second Life Search, as part of Viewer 2, now includes:
- A New and Improved User Experience: The first thing that you'll notice about search in Viewer 2 is that it's got a whole new look and feel. We've reorganized the interface to be more intuitive and to use filtering and sorting techniques common to search on the Web. We've also cleared away some of the legacy UI found in Viewer 1.23 to create a clean hierarchy of information and actions. One of our biggest goals in this redesign was to make the search interface more inviting for new Residents while still preserving many of the search options that current Residents had become accustomed to. For example, in the Viewer 2 Beta, there is now only one location for conducting a "Places" search (rather than a tab and a filter as found in Viewer 1.23), and that "Places" search can be filtered and sorted to achieve similar results as in Viewer 1.23.
- A Robust Search Infrastructure: We've also redesigned the search infrastructure to be more robust and nimble. These changes, although maybe not as immediately visible, are a major step forward as we work towards innovating more rapidly and being responsive to Resident feedback. Previously, Search was hard coded in the XUI language of Viewer 1.23; now, search uses HTML on top of Django Web services and can be developed independently of Viewer 2. This gives us greater speed and flexibility as we develop additional search features, advertising products, and bug fixes.
- Google Search Technology: As we all know, Google's relevance algorithms are the defacto industry standard on the Internet. In Viewer 1.23, the Google Search Appliances (GSA) served results to the "All" and "Group" search tabs for years. For Search in Viewer 2, we have expanded our use of the GSAs, and they now provide the first set of results for most search types. (Advanced search users can still access Linden Lab's proprietary search tools through category filters and sorts.) Google alone cannot provide the best results for Second Life Residents, however. So, the Search Team is continually adjusting how the GSAs work in order to provide the highest quality, most relevant results within Second Life.
- Enhancement to Classified Advertising: Second Life business owners can benefit from a significant change to classified advertising within Second Life Search. Now, we can place classifieds alongside more searches, and advertisers will have a better opportunity to be found by relevant buyers. In Viewer 2, potential ad exposure (i.e., the number of search requests that serve ads) will increase to 100% of initial searches, whereas in Viewer 1.23 classified ads were only shown alongside search results in the All and Group tabs. Additionally, we have increased the number of featured classifieds from nine to 12 on the Search homepage (which appears when you click the magnifying glass or type CTRL-F).
The bottom line is that the new Second Life Search benefits everyone within the Second Life economic ecosystem--most importantly business and Residents--as it plays a crucial role connecting inworld buyers and sellers. The more that Second Life Search can help Residents, particularly new Residents, find compelling content, communities and experiences, then the higher the probability they will be come active, long-term Residents. Plus, more Residents mean more potential customers for inworld businesses. So, go download the Viewer 2 Beta, try the new and improved Second Life Search and let us know what you think.Searching Tips To browse the features in the Find window (including Search, Destination Guide and Classifieds), click the magnifying glass icon in the Search field at the top right of the Viewer 2 navigation bar. To initiate a search, type a keyword in the Search field on the Viewer navigation bar.  Once you've initiated a search from the Viewer navigation bar, the Find window will open with an initial set of relevance-ranked results. You can then narrow your results with Category filters and organize the list with Sorting options. Your search terms are now carried from one category to the next, with no need to re-type!Further Reading:Resources to Help You Learn Viewer 2And, if something breaks or you're really stuck, then contact Support and we're happy to help. Edit to Post:- For more details, visit the Search Release Notes wiki. We'll update this for each release with highlights of what got done and a list of known issues we are working to resolve (e.g., "Events and Land Sales are not easily browsable or searchable in current UI").
- Thanks for your feedback in the comments. I've posted a summary and responses below.
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Check out Shared Media on YouTubeThe Viewer 2 Beta is finally here, and with it comes a whole host of amazing improvements and new features. There’s so much to be excited about that it’s impossible (and unnecessary!) to pick a favorite. But -- if I really had to pick -- I’d choose Shared Media, since I'm the Product Manager for Shared Media. So, let me tell you about it.Shared Media Brings the Web Into Second Life
Second Life Shared Media, a new Viewer 2 capability, makes sharing standard Web-based media in Second Life easy and seamless. It enables content creators to make more compelling, interactive experiences. Basically, Shared Media brings the Internet inworld. For the more technically inclined, what this means is that you can now put media textures on any prim in Second Life. More specifically, the viewer uses WebKit to create a fully interactive, dynamic texture from a Web URL. This even includes support for Web-browser plug-ins, like the Adobe Flash Player. And, you can place dozens of them on the same region. (We still don't know what the upper limits are. I'm sure that you'll let us know.)
A World of New Experiences and Businesses PossibleBy seamlessly integrating the Web into Second Life, Shared Media unleashes a new wave of creativity and new business opportunities. Imagine the richness of a SL store with interactive signs and displays. Think about Flash-based games, theaters, and innovative Web-based services appearing inworld. Display your Twitter feed on the front of your house! (Okay, don't.) Build a HUD to read your email inworld. Interact with walls that encourage graffiti or use your signature to sign guest books. Educators and their students can now interact in even more immersive classrooms. For the enterprise community, online collaboration tools (such as Google Docs, EtherPad, Webex, and Acrobat Web Connect) combine with the power of Second Life to make working inworld much easier and more powerful.You're in Control of Shared Media
Viewer 2 introduces a new UI for controlling Shared Media. Shared Media authors have the option to offer a 2D menu bar (similar to a browser-like URL bar) that will appear in front of a Shared Media object when any Resident mouses over it. Also, a new Nearby Media control will enable Residents to more easily control what media is allowed to play.Web Skills Will Drive New Inworld Building TechniquesThere are also new Second Life build features for Shared Media: assigning URLs to objects and faces, controlling auto-play, auto-scale, size settings, etc. With Shared Media, SL building now extends well beyond SL into the vast and varied skill set of Web development. Suddenly, skills like PHP, SQL, ActionScript, Apache and FMS can be used to create compelling inworld content. Flash and Flash Media Server (FMS) become particularly useful tools for creating animated, interactive Shared Media that can be kept in sync. Flash media server hosting services, such as Influxis, offer low-cost hosting.Synchronicity is Content- and Context-Specific
Behind the scenes, Shared Media is different. Second Life always stays synchronized for all Residents. That is, the simulation takes place on our servers, and each person's viewer renders their perspective on that simulation -- everyone is looking at the same thing. Shared Media, on the other hand, can look different to different people -- sometimes. Everyone’s instance of the Shared Media is always presenting the same URL. However, not everything will stay in perfect sync unless the content is specially designed to do that. For example, a simple Web browsing session will keep the pages synchronized, but not the position of the scroll bars. We may both be looking at the same Web page on the same inworld object, but I might be looking at the top portion, while you might be viewing what's below the fold.
Consider a URL that doesn't always serve the exact same page, perhaps a Web page that displays a random background color each time it loads. If an inworld object's surface displayed that page, I might see a green background while you might see a blue one. Even more striking: if an inworld object's surface was pointed at a site with user login like Gmail, you and I could both log into it, and we'd be looking at our own inboxes, not at each other's. What’s really cool is that sites that are specifically designed for synchronous collaboration, like EtherPad, for instance, will stay in perfect sync. So if it's the intention, it is possible to design content that uses a back-end server to stay perfectly synchronized in all cases. In short, synchronicity is content- and context-specific, making possible a world of new applications and interactions.
We Look Forward to Your Feedback and Creations
With this release of Shared Media, we’re just at the starting line; we need your feedback. Please post your thoughts and experiences on Shared Media to the . And if you build cool stuff and want to share it with us for inclusion in a Shared Media Showcase, please let us know in comments.
Ok, enough reading about Shared Media. Go download Second Life Viewer 2, now in beta, and try it out!
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Viewer 2 Beta Has Arrived
Today, we're excited to announce the launch of Viewer 2 Beta, the next generation of Second Life viewers -- combining an easy browser-like experience with shared media capabilities -- providing what we believe is the best experience yet for accessing Second Life, and a new option to choose from among Viewer 1.23 and other Third Party Viewers. We looked carefully at the experience design of other successful social media and technology platforms--such as the web browser, Facebook, the iPhone, Twitter, etc.--and the key elements that enabled them to reach mass adoption. You'll see much of that thinking baked into new Viewer 2 experience design. Our primary goal was to create a more consumer-friendly viewer--an imperative to bring in a new wave of Second Life Residents. After all, more people in Second Life means that there will be more amazing content, more customers to purchase virtual goods, a thriving economy, more friends and communities, and we can do even more to improve the experience. All very good things for all of us.
Viewer 2 Introduces a More Intuitive User Experience
Viewer 2 has all of the capabilities of Viewer 1.23 and more; it has just been reorganized into a more intuitive user experience. In fact, it's chock full of cool features. Once you learn your way around, you'll definitely appreciate:
- A browser-like navigation bar with forward and back buttons. You can even save favorites and review your teleport history.
- A sliding right-hand panel that surfaces the most frequently-used features and makes managing your profile, contacts, groups, landmarks, inventory, and appearance easy.
- Improved Search, powered by Google Search Appliance technology , makes it easier to find friends, places, and cool stuff to buy.
- A superior alternative to invisiprims for non-human avatars. In Viewer 2, a new wearable type, called Alpha Masks, allow you to "mask out" parts of your base avatar to make entire body parts disappear.
- And, you'll enjoy the new contextual help to help you acclimate to the new viewer experience.
Those are just a few highlights. There's much more! We'll be going into more depth on many of these features in future blog posts.
Viewer 2 Brings the Web Into Second Life
Yes, you heard that right. Shared Media™, a standard capability in Viewer 2, makes sharing standard Web-based media and content in Second Life easy, and enables content creators to make more compelling, interactive experiences. Content creators can now place Web pages, video, Flash content, and other web media, onto any surface in Second Life. We expect that Shared Media will inspire a creative renaissance in Second Life as Residents explore more immersive and integrated inworld experiences and business opportunities such as gaming or theaters. And, for enterprises using Second Life as a work environment, Shared Media allows everyone to more effectively collaborate and share documents. We'll be publishing a blog post tomorrow focused on Shared Media--so keep your eyes peeled for that.
It's the Little Things, Too
While much of the focus on the new viewer will be on the design and marquee features like Shared Media and Search, there are lots of little improvements that should be sources of delight. Customization. Favorites. Inspectors. The right-hand panel. The notifications tray. The clickable names and SLurls in notifications. Icons for Residents. Outfits. Recent conversations. The notifications well. Clickable URLs. Selecting SLurls in the navigation tool bar. Global audio controls. Quick access to your audio preferences. Improved performance on the map. And, view controls with presets for over the shoulder and "What am I wearing?"
And a Lot Under the Hood
Search and the Home panel are web content. That means that we can continue to make updates to the content, design and interactions without forcing you to download a new version of the viewer. We believe that this will make a big difference for new users, because the content in that panel will help users discover the richness and depth of Second Life. Since it's web content, some of our recent acquisitions in the web space may soon be making an appearance--watch this space. We also focused on performance and stability. In fact, we believe this the most stable beta that we've ever released.
But, it's Still Beta
And that's why we're putting it into your hands now. So, put it through its paces, stress test it, and give us your feedback in the .
Getting Started
Viewer 2 is different enough from Viewer 1.23 and a few minutes perusing the Quickstart Guide will save you the frustration of "How do I do this?" or "Where is that?" Contextual support also available now within the viewer itself. If you're chomping at the bit to get going, then here are a few "high nails" that can help you get up-and-running quickly in Viewer 2.
A couple of features you may be looking for:
- Camera Controls: Located on the Bottom Bar, labeled "View."
- Voice Controls: The "Speak" button is now located right next to the nearby text chat entry field. Sound preferences can be set by clicking Me > Preferences in the menus at the top, then clicking the Sound tab.
- Moving Around: Located on the Bottom Bar, labeled "Move."
- Teleporting: You can teleport a number of ways:
- Double-click a Landmark in the Places Panel in the Side Bar.
- Type a Region or Landmark name in the location field in the Top Bar and hit enter.
- Paste a SLurl into the location field and hit enter.
A few handy tasks:- Sharing Inventory: To share Inventory, start a Conversation (IM) with the person you to share an item. Click the "Share" button in the Conversation window which pops open the Inventory side panel. Then, drag the Inventory item over to the Conversation.
- Pay L$ to Someone: There are two quick ways to do this: A) Right click on the person, then select "Pay" from the context menu. B) Click "Pay" in the Conversation window. The "Pay Resident" floater will appear. Choose the amount you wish to pay and then click "Pay."
But Where is My <Fill in the Blank>?
We tried to balance the needs of existing Residents with the general consumer, and made some dfficult choices like replacing pie menus with context list menus -- a broadly used design feature in most consumer software. If some of these changes are important to you, then the good news is that you still have choice.
The Choice is Yours
We celebrate and encourage viewer choice. When it ships in its final form, Viewer 2 will become the primary viewer, included in the registration flow for all new Second Life Residents, but there are many other third-party viewers based on Snowglobe, our open source viewer, that are designed for Residents that have specialized needs and requirements. Viewer 1.23 will continue to be available for the foreseeable future and we will continue to support it as long as it makes sense.
A Word about Third-Party Viewers
We're also announcing the Viewer Directory and the Policy on Third-Party Viewers. The Viewer Directory is a list of third-party viewers for Residents with specialized interests or viewing needs, such as languages that we do not support or additional navigation and accessibility features. To apply to add a viewer to the Viewer Directory, the software developer must be a Resident in good standing, and self-certify that the viewer complies with the Policy on Third-Party Viewers, which prohibits griefing, fraud, theft of passwords, and infringement of intellectual property. It is important to note that we will not tolerate malicious viewers that violate our policies. Enough said on that topic. To learn more about our announcement, read today's blog post on the new directory and policy.
Snowglobe, our open source viewer program, will release later today. Snowglobe 2 is based on the Viewer 2 Beta code base. If you're a third-party developer interested in Snowglobe 2, visit our wiki page where you will find information and the downloads.
Resources to Help You Learn Viewer 2
And, if something breaks or you're really stuck, then contact Support and we're happy to help.
This is Only the Beginning and We Want Your Feedback
We're excited about what you'll experience today and we're only at the beginning. There's so much more that we'll be adding to Viewer 2 in the coming months. And, one of the most exciting things for folks at Linden, is that the Viewer 2 code base will enable us to improve the product at a much faster pace than ever before. So, that's where you come in. We need to hear from you! Participate in the and share your experience and suggest future enhancements. And, if you find a bug, then please log it in PJIRA. Then, go tell your friends! If you Twitter, then use the #SLViewer2 hash tag.
So, go download Viewer 2 here and try it out. We hope you like it. UPDATE: We've posted a few answers to the most frequently asked questions we've seen in the first two days of the Viewer 2 Beta launch. And if you need more help, head over to the Viewer 2 section of .
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