tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-340277312024-03-14T01:49:59.729-05:00Livin’ La Vida SegundaExperiences in Second Life—a FansiteMelissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.comBlogger1472125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-40920306639767402982016-01-05T19:18:00.000-06:002016-01-07T08:53:06.083-06:00Hoping for a quick return<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For a few days now, I've not been able to access Maggie Bluxome's blog. The domain name isn't up for grabs, so I hope it's just a temporary issue. I'll check from time to time.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">UPDATE: Hooray, it's back! </span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-48326444850655619062015-11-28T19:54:00.001-06:002015-11-28T19:54:20.408-06:00Mesh Clothing Update<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mesh clothing is proving to be more subtle than I thought.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I signed on today to look around for some modest fitted mesh clothing, and discovered two things:</span><br />
<ol>
<li><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">My legs had disappeared!</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">My shoulders and elbows were no longer peeking through the top of the dress... and seeing Sofia Zabaleta's beautiful work as it was intended was a joy. It's a good thing I don't have it in real life, or I'd walk around running my hands over the soft fabric<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">.</span></span></li>
</ol>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I reapplied the o<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">mbre tights (a ni<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ce <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">pair with<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> olive green fading to white that mat<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ches the </span></span></span></span></span>dress beautifull<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">y)<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> and poof, the dress went south again. There's something about the two that keep them from working and playing well with one another, which is a shame. (The other shame is that I <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">have<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">n't</span> figured out how to get the sand<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">als to work with the tights, either.<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> I guess that's understandab<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">le, since the shoes come with the<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ir own fee<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">t.) Once it all works, it will be great; it's just getting to that point.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> </span><ol>
</ol>
Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-44667211328581974852015-08-08T20:02:00.000-05:002015-08-08T20:02:02.670-05:00An amazing online resource<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the things I would give almost anything for is access to Oxford University's Bodleian Library. It holds eleven million items (oops! almost twelve million; there's a total on the "about" page). You can't check anything out, and in fact you must agree to this declaration before admisssion:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>I hereby undertake not to remove from the Library, nor to mark,
deface, or injure in any way, any volume, document or other object
belonging to it or in its custody; not to bring into the Library, or
kindle therein, any fire or flame, and not to smoke in the Library; and I
promise to obey all rules of the Library.</i></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That's the English language version of the declaration, one of many translations. The original is in Latin. (The prohibition of smoking is a later addition.)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now I am delighted to link to the <a href="http://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/">Digital Bodleian</a>, which makes some of the collections of the library viewable online. My blink rate has shot up, because one of those collections is the Arthur Evans archive of drawings made at the excavations at Knossos. I would like very much indeed to think that our wanax, Aeneas Anthony, has heard of the Digital Bodleian and is happily perusing those documents and drawings.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Some" is technically correct--goodness knows how long it would take to process all those artifacts--but it gives the wrong impression, because there's an amazing variety of things to see and study. By all means, go there and explore.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><i> </i>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-22286642756521908142015-08-02T20:05:00.003-05:002015-10-26T20:48:19.617-05:00The story so far...<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I've been in world this weekend a lot more than I have for a very long time, and with help from Foxbean, I'm making some advances.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First, <a href="https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Foxbean-FitBoobs-Sanira-v10/7454592">Foxbean's Sanira 1.0 breasts</a>. They are beautiful. I think I will turn the jiggle down some, but it's a joy to have it. They are fitted mesh, so of course I spent a little time wondering where the heck the size adjustment is when the whole point is that the torso slider controls it! Having it bounded is a little sad for someone like me who always wants to turn the knob to 11, but... they are so breathtakingly beautiful, and have so many other advantages, that I don't hesitate. (Besides, it's not as if I don't still have what I have used in the past.)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(UPDATE: I should remind myself that breast size is not the only slider that affects fitted mesh breasts. That would make a good video, especially if it showed the effects with and without clothes.) </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Second, the <a href="http://sl-maitreya.blogspot.com/2014/12/maitreya-mesh-body-lara.html">Maitreya Lara mesh body</a>. It is beautiful, too, especially at the slender settings I want--no invisible pony riding for me--and plays well with Omega, as do the Sanira breasts. (I double-checked. The linked blog post says it works with materials as of 3.0, and the current release is 3.4, so when I want to go the <i>Goldfinger </i>route or be chrome-plated, the body shouldn't get in the way.)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> The body went on easily, as did the breasts. I have been away so long I'm having to relearn parts of the UI, so I expect things will become easier with time. I also greatly appreciate the convention of having purchases appear as a bag when you wear them, with the folder you want delivered when you touch the bag. No muss, no fuss, no need to rez on the ground and hence no need to go to a sandbox just to open your purchases. OTOH, when you're doing NSFW avatar adjustments, you need a dressing room. Thanks to those who provide such things!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I still need to get shoes, but the main thing was to be presentable so I could explore, even if barefoot. I bought a teal peplum sweater dress from Gatherings, and set to work.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Some issues:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Remember how Tangos, if you make them too big, are transparent in a region under your arms where what at smaller sizes are up against your torso are now off to the side? Well... at least until I manage to edit the breast clothing layer texture, you can see that region--it's not transparent, but it shows the top texture not stretched out and looking differently lit. I'm not sure whether it will always be possible to adjust the texture to minimize that issue.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">fitted mesh is supposed to fit your avatar, but when I bend my arms, my elbows stick out through the top. That may be because I have my arm length cranked to avoid the infamous "T. Rex avatar" effect.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Looking closely at my legs, I see little transparent triangles. I think they're around my knees. That may be because I have my leg length cranked to 100. (I have several heroines, and Svetlana Pankratova is one of them.)</span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm sure things will improve... especially once I can materialize at an adult sandbox long enough to put clothes back on after "wearing" the demo shoes I bought so that, I thought, the bag would materialize on my arm, seemed to take said clothes off. I think the lesson from that is that, with very rare exceptions, don't wear things, add them. More news as it happens.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-9063426535376452932015-08-01T21:37:00.001-05:002015-11-30T20:40:13.317-06:00Another beautiful travel blog<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">"El mundo es como un libro abierto, quien no viaja sólo ha leído la primera página".<br /><br />(The world is like an open book--whoever does not travel has only read the first page.)<br /><br />That appears by the "about the author" portion at the bottom of a beautiful travel blog, <a href="http://bitacora-viajera.blogspot.com/">Bitacora Viajera</a>, mentioned in a recent post in New World Notes.<br /><br />The article says the blog is "bilingual", but I would say that it's much like Caminante de Sueños, both in style and in being not bilingual but nonlingual. The photos of the sites featured speak for themselves. Both blogs are more than worth your following.<br /><br />(Just what does that title mean, anyway? My Spanish vocabulary isn't that great so I had to look it up. Una bitácora is a binnacle--and now we see that my English vocabulary may not be that great, either; I had to look binnacle up, too! A binnacle is a post in a ship to which a gimbal-mounted compass is attached. As an adjective, viajero or viajera means "traveling" (thus "los Wilbury viajeros"--yes, "Wilbury" rather than "Wilburys". In Spanish, you don't pluralize the family name). So, a "traveling binnacle", a guide to your journeys in Second Life.)<br /><br />P. S. Apologies to my long-ago Spanish teachers for the translation. Unlike Spanish, English forces a gender on one ("he who doesn't travel..."), and "whoever" was the cleanest PC version I could come up with.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-23794839155598246642015-07-30T20:02:00.001-05:002015-07-30T20:02:48.712-05:00I hope I know the answer to this, but...<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We are now in the world of fitted mesh clothing, which if I understand it follows the "bones" in the avatar (which term isn't really accurate. because some of those bones don't correspond to any bones in an actual human body but are added so mesh clothing will fit better, but that's not important right now).</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If that's true, then what I seriously hope is true is this: that a knee-length skirt will be knee-length whatever the sliders on your body and legs are set to, and ditto for an ankle-length skirt. If you know me, you know I want to be as leggy as I can, and that has made for difficulties with skirts. I have had to either cause a scandal in Caledon when my slider settings keep my ankles from being decently covered or tediously stretch the strips of virtual cloth that make up skirts... and for mini-skirts, oh my!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Is my thinking correct? I will end up taking the plunge and finding out by experience, but if you know the answer I'd love to hear it. Thanks! </span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-15738015445019400872015-07-27T18:37:00.006-05:002015-07-27T21:13:18.303-05:00The view from under the bus<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">From the tools and technology blog: <a href="https://community.secondlife.com/t5/Tools-and-Technology/An-Update-on-Linux-Viewer-Development/ba-p/2932036">"An Update on Linux Viewer Development"</a>.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">For now, I'll try third-party viewers for 64-bit Linux and see how they do. </span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-70423044271969337142015-07-26T05:48:00.002-05:002015-07-26T06:37:58.958-05:00I am so behind, part N+1, in which we do a lot of happy dancing<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First and most important: <a href="http://shaynakorobase.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-return-of-foxbean.html?zx=a4f4249b4dc6a7f0">The Return of Foxbean</a>! Thank you, Shayna Korobase, and thank you so much for the link, Maggie Bluxome (whose <a href="http://maggiebluxome.com/">blog</a> points you at all the goings on in the SL busty world)! The impossibly lovely and talented Foxbean Liebknecht has come out with new fitted mesh breasts, Sanira v1.0.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fitted means they work with physics, and hence can jiggle. They also work with Tango appliers and, I am overjoyed to say, Omega appliers. If, like me, you have been SL subpetric for some time, you should know that Omega, the work of the folks at <a href="http://lovenlustdesigns.blogspot.ca/">Love N Lust</a>, is an attempt to bring sanity to SL fashion, which hitherto has been a maze of products with appliers that may or may not work and play well together. (For more on Omega and what it means from the point of view of designers as well as customers, read the joint blog post of Shayna and Stacia Zabaleta of Gatherings, <a href="http://gatheringssz.blogspot.com/2015/01/omega-is-win-win.html">"Omega is a Win-Win"</a>... and politely ask makers of mesh bodies, body parts, and clothing to make their work Omega-friendly.)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The first-linked post from Shayna has photos--and I have to admit that from some of them I was a little worried. I thought of that wonderful compliment from Miss Blackflag for a photo in the Minoan Empire:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">you know, one thing that i like about you is that even though your
breasts are a bit out of the standard norm, you take the time to make
them look like they have actual gravity to them, instead of them being
just big balloons floating on your chest. </span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and was concerned... but then I took a look at the photos at <a href="https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Foxbean-FitBoobs-Sanira-v10/7454592">Foxbean's SL marketplace page for the Sanira breasts</a>, and was relieved. (*blush* Sorry, Foxbean, I know better than that.)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, now it's more pressing than ever; I must find a good Omega-friendly mesh body, and ditto for clothing. (The breasts I've already bought.) Photos when I have them.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">UPDATE: Speaking of happy dancing, as I type the hours are counting down to 2:00 p.m. July 26, 2015 SL Time (GMT - 7, also as I type), when the fine people of Brightflame Hollow will have <a href="https://expansiveenterprizes.wordpress.com/2015/07/25/celebrate-release-of-foxbean-saniraspecial-event-at-brightflame-hollowjuly-26th-2-4-pm-slt/">a special event celebrating the release of Foxbean's Sanira breasts</a>.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-20587204945195280632015-07-14T18:34:00.002-05:002015-07-14T18:34:25.925-05:00Rational Discussion of SL on TV? We can hope...<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">An episode of Dr. Phil that aired on the day I write this dealt with gaming addiction. I'm happy to say that at least in the clip embedded in <a href="http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2015/07/dr-phil-second-life.html">this NWN post</a> about it, the discussion was refreshingly rational. I'll have to watch the whole thing.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-53969654115258733932015-06-08T21:02:00.001-05:002015-07-27T17:44:34.350-05:00Lady Triệu<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I'd like to ride storms, kill sharks in the open sea, drive out the aggressors, reconquer the country, undo the ties of serfdom, and never bend my back to be the concubine of whatever man." --Lady Triệu</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She's called Vietnam's Joan of Arc, assembling forces to resist the Chinese state of Eastern Wu in the third century A.D. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lady Triệu cut quite a figure, according to some accounts:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"...a woman from the Cửu Chân commandery named Triệu Ẩu assembled people and attacked several commanderies (Ẩu has breasts 3 thước [1.2 meters] long, tied them behind her back, often rides elephants to fight). Dận was able to subdue [her]. (Giao Chỉ records only write: In the mountains of Cửu Chân commandery there is a woman with the surname Triệu, with breasts 3 thước long, unmarried, assembled people and robbed the commanderies, usually wearing yellow tunics, feet wearing shoes with curved fronts, and fights while sitting on an elephant's head, becoming an immortal after she dies)." --from <i>The Complete Annals of Great Viet</i>, mid 15th century</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Two centuries after the Trung sisters, another young woman, Trieu Thi Trinh, took up the same challenge. Although she, too, failed to dislodge the Chinese, the legends that grew up about her tell us much about both the dreams of Vietnamese women and the fears of the men who fought, followed, or heard of such women in following centuries. According to a late eighteenth-century account, for example, Trieu Thi Trinh was nine feet tall, had three-foot-long breasts and a voice like a temple bell, and was able to eat several pecks of rice and walk five hundred leagues in a single day. Yet she was also said to possess a beauty that could shake the soul of any man." -- from <i>Vietnamese Tradition on Trial, 1920-1945</i>, David G. Marr, 1984</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There's a temple dedicated to her, and many streets in Vietnamese cities are named for her.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I never learned much about the history of Vietnam, and definitely not about Lady Triệu. It would be interesting to try to create a Lady Triệu avatar. </span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-42470812664300421122015-01-18T18:15:00.001-06:002015-01-19T13:35:37.298-06:00Wow. Just... wow.<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I am now seriously impressed with what one can do in Second Life.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You really should watch the following video--switch it to 720 and go full screen. It shows off Angel Manor Estate, which makes serious use of "materials".</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It starts with what, if you don't look very closely, seems to be a shot of a man at a monitor showing Second Life as it was... cheesy, low-res, vaporous unrezzed avatars interminably hovering... but when the virtual camera pulls back, you realize it's showing on a monitor in a much different Second Life. Varnished woodwork and metallic ceilings, hardwood and marble floors. Fade out... and then fade in to a misty sun-dappled woods. After touring it, back to the outside of the manor through the seasons, and once again into the building to view the rooms, the furniture, a lunch gathering at a very ornate table laden with food, a theater, and on...</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's not perfect. One of the hardwood floors looks like the varnish is coating it to a considerable depth--for a second I wondered if we were on water. And of course, we humans are a lot pickier about recognizing humans than we are inanimate objects, so the gentleman, while quite good looking, doesn't <i>tromp</i> my <i>oeil</i> as much as the surroundings.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That said, it is utterly breathtaking. Metallic objects in Second Life have in the past required independent twin I-beam suspension on your disbelief--either they had painted-on highlights, or like some Indian jewelry in my inventory, were set to glow. The metal in Angel Manor Estate looks like metal. There's plenty of detail that is probably there thanks to bump mapping, and hence nowhere near the burden on your system or on SL that would otherwise be required.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Many, many thanks to Kaya Angel for this video. I hope that it won't be long before all of SL is as amazing.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Watch and then pick your jaw up off the floor.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/l7PBTr4aeJ0?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">UPDATE: Hereunder is a video of the manor from three year ago for comparison. The inspiration is there, but constrained by the SL rendering of the time.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/XJZpXTlfP78?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-73204739697999893522014-12-26T06:20:00.002-06:002014-12-26T12:11:48.911-06:00New (to me)<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I went Googling to see what's going on in the breast attachment world. (Sad to do that rather than going in-world and searching, but I suspected that the trend to Marketplace-only sales thanks to SL's outrageous land prices is still underway.)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With the fitted mesh option open, I went looking for "mesh breasts". Sure enough, there are several sources of fitted mesh breasts. (There are also non-fitted mesh breasts out there--you can scale non-fitted meshes, but the fitted ones are controlled by the relevant avatar sliders. I'll have to try both kinds, of course!)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I must say <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOPYxozqY-A">the video for the Cherry Bomb fitted mesh breasts</a> is very impressive. My only quibble with it is the way the model's hands are positioned over the breasts at a couple of points; as a potential customer I don't want things hidden. Responding to avatar sliders is a wonderful thing; I like having control over buoyancy and cleavage. OTOH, will the size slider give me the size I want? I know me; the answer, of course, is "no", but it's a matter of tradeoffs. After all, fitted mesh allows jiggle.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't wish to slight other makers or products, but I will say I hope that they come out with videos as well.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Is it my imagination, or is Tango compatibility the main, if not only, breast attachment support new clothing has nowadays?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A surprising amount of other things showed up in a marketplace search for mesh breasts, much of which I was happy to see--AOs that mentioned breast attachment compatibility as a selling point, clothing and hair... and, oddly enough, a set of mesh additional arms if you want to release your inner Hindu goddess. (I have the two "Kali" sets; they don't move, but they're nice when you want ten arms. If only I hadn't read about the thousand-armed goddess of mercy, I might be satisfied... :))</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-43594531941990490292014-11-29T10:11:00.001-06:002014-11-29T10:11:18.417-06:00Lucidscape -- learning from SL?<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By now you may well have heard of <a href="http://lucidscape.com/">Lucidscape</a>, but just in case...Lucidscape is an attempt to create the metaverse that looks like it's trying to avoid aspects of Second Life that keep it from scaling. To demonstrate scalability, they simulated ten million participants on an 800-server cluster. The "participants" are a mixture of movable but largely stationary emitters and constantly moving drones that the emitters control and communicate with and which are constantly communicating across server boundaries.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">(One could very well argue that one of those aspects is user-created content--people can and do create things without concern for efficiency--but that's too important a feature to forbid; on the page they say "<b>the [emitters and drones] were purposefully crafted to be inefficient</b> [emphasis in original] in the same manner we average user-written code may be.")</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I especially like this:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We are a team of developers who are passionate about creating a future
where massively multi-user virtual reality is pervasive and everyone can
participate in a Metaverse which is:
<br />
<ul>
<li><strong>Free and open source</strong> so everyone may add their own worlds to the Metaverse the same way anyone can run a web server today.</li>
<li><strong>Devoid of any form of centralized control, free of gatekeepers and censorship under the guise of curation</strong>. Because if anyone can tell you what you are allowed to do in it, then it is not the real Metaverse.</li>
</ul>
</blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I hope to see more from them.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-43798679141203556582014-10-14T20:09:00.001-05:002014-10-14T20:09:57.486-05:00Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes...<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A lot has been going on, and keeping me away from the grid. I hope that's over.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">More layout changes as I can get them in--the way out-of-date Ubuntu version countdown is gone, as I can't find one for Utopic Unicorn. (Sigh.)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On to what might be more important (OK, it doesn't take much importance to do that):</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> this JIRA entry, </span><a href="https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-9203?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels%3Aall-tabpanel" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">VWR-9203</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. Curiously, it has recently been marked as fixed. Does that mean we'll get flexible sculpties someday, or does "fixed" just mean that top men are working on it. You know, Top. Men. ...so that it won't ever happen?</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-87748446377488423622014-07-15T20:47:00.001-05:002014-07-15T20:47:43.099-05:00Google+ changes its name policy<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm happy to say that Google+ has announced that they will no longer place restrictions on the name you can use. <a href="https://plus.google.com/+googleplus/posts/V5XkYQYYJqy">Details</a> on the Google+ Google+ page.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I hope this settles the matter once and for all. I've been on Google+ as Melissa Yeuxdoux for some time, but I've hesitated to link my blog to my Google+ presence (so that, for example, my Google+ feed includes links to blog posts) after reading about some Blogger blogs that went away over "real name" issues. I'm hoping the link will be safe now.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-15833540755471705742014-06-25T21:19:00.001-05:002014-06-25T21:19:09.717-05:00(N+1)th Life?<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's part of a statement that Hamlet Au received from Linden Lab and posted <a href="http://the%20next%20generation%20virtual%20world%20will%20go%20far%20beyond%20what%20is%20possible%20with%20second%20life%2C%20and%20we%20don%27t%20want%20to%20constrain%20our%20development%20by%20setting%20backward%20compatibility%20with%20second%20life%20as%20an%20absolute%20requirement%20from%20the%20start./">an article</a> about on <i>NWN</i>:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19.5px;">"Linden Lab is working on a next generation virtual world that will be in the spirit of Second Life, an open world where users have incredible power to create anything they can imagine and content creators are king....</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19.5px;">The next generation virtual world will go far beyond what is possible with Second Life, and </span><strong style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; line-height: 19.5px;">we don't want to constrain our development by setting backward compatibility with Second Life as an absolute requirement from the start."</strong></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What comes to mind at that news?</span><br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osborne_effect">The Osborne Effect</a>: how much effort/$ are you willing to invest in something when you've been told something far better is coming?</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Will they support <i>both</i> kinds o' computers--Windows <i>and</i> Mac? While it's still a sore point that Linden Lab has never provided a 64-bit Linux version, it has provided a 32-bit Linux version for a long time, for which I am extremely grateful. That said, it would be really nice if they'd come out and say "yes, we will support Linux for this new virtual world", <i>especially</i> given that it will at least initially be closed source. (For that matter, did you hear about the improvements to graphics in Android "L"? I hope you're targeting capable tablets and smartphones, LL.)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can we be anonymous in the new world as we can in Second Life? I hope that is the case; Ebbe Altberg tweeted "Yes, we clearly want to... let you bring you [sic] identity and friends across", which gives me hope.</span></li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What comes to my mind the most, though? <b>Sheer delight!</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How many times have I quoted Fred Brooks here? At least twice. Let's bump that number.</span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Plan to throw one away. You will anyhow. The only question is whether you deliver the throwaway to your customers."</span></blockquote>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of course, backwards compatibility would be nice... but Second Life looks crude compared with other 3D environments. Every so often you see a link to a video of avatar configuration in a game that makes Second Life look pathetic in comparison, both in simplicity and power of UI and quality of avatar. Creators shouldn't have to find obscure bugs that they can take advantage of to do things SL's creators didn't envision or even wanted to forbid.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Bless the creators of Second Life for their ingenuity and skill--but they deserve an environment they don't have to fight. I will cheerfully give up inventory if I can have better.</span></div>
Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-7671706289617277112014-05-11T16:55:00.001-05:002014-05-11T16:55:02.288-05:00Textures not taking?<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Gatherings has a lovely new (to me, at least!) blue suit, so I bought it. It comes with heels and cute glasses (now I have to go looking for a pencil-behind-ear attachment :)), and all was going well... until it came to the trousers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">They were gray.... or were they just not rezzing completely? Rebake textures... rebake textures... no change. Put on a different pair, and they rezzed. OK, take them off. Off they went. OK, put them back on. They sort of went back on. I could see what were intended to be cuffs... but they were textured like me. OK, sign off and back on... and they were gray.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I guess I'd better go back and look at the poster--but I can't believe the trousers are intended to be gray. Strange.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-43201621292068092012014-05-04T14:50:00.001-05:002014-05-04T14:50:36.348-05:00New graphics card<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Things have been tight, and I'd not upgraded anything since adding a 120 GB SDD. Still running with a 2.8 GHz Athlon 64 x4 630 "Propus", an AM3 socket CPU that you can't even get now. It's sneaking up on its fifth birthday (though I ordered mine about a year after it came out), making it ancient in computer years.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the past week or so, though, I have upgraded my graphics card. I was using a PNY card with 1 GB of RAM and an nVidia 560Ti GPU; PCI Express 2. It's a HUGE card, 8.25 inches long. While the cute little Micro ATX case that I use claims to be able to fit a 10.5" card, I'd not even try, and I'm amazed I managed to fit this one in. It's power-hungry; it has two 12V power connectors in addition to pulling 12VDC from the PCI Express socket, and the size and additional cables impede air flow, which a Micro ATX case seriously needs. It's the most expensive computer component I've bought for many years, at $250.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Its replacement is an EVGA card with 2 GB of RAM and an nVidia 750 Ti GPU. Fortunately PCI Express 3 will work with a PCI Express 2 slot, but I'm losing throughput because of it. It is only 6.7" long and doesn't need the extra power connectors, so the air flow is much better. It cost 40% less than the 560 Ti card--$150.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The new card made for a bit of fun installing, because it has the new "Maxwell" chips, and one either has to directly install the proprietary driver that knows about Maxwell or add a repository with that driver packaged. I chose the latter (if by some strange chance you're reading this and are the person who set up the PPA, bless you!). If, like me, you decide to do a new Ubuntu install at the same time (don't ask...), do <i>not</i> tell it you want it to pull in proprietary drivers at install time; it won't get the right one, and towards the end of the install, the screen image will be stretched vertically and you won't be able to see what you're doing!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's in and running, and running quite nicely. I have to put my ear within five inches of my computer to hear fan noise. Maxwell isn't the highest performance GPU out there, but it's excellent for performance per watt consumed.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-60259148291204883112014-04-26T11:19:00.000-05:002014-04-26T12:08:31.660-05:00More travails for 64-bit Linux users<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I should have realized it earlier.</span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ubuntu, back in 13.10, got rid of ia32-libs. I had my nose rubbed in that this morning after a somewhat rocky transition to 14.04 (the rockiness was my fault). The claim is that ia32-libs was a "huge hack" and you should instead pull in the individual ia32 packages you need. How do you find out which ones? Run </span><span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b>ldd</b></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> on the executable.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After being silly and trying to run it on the shell script that you invoke to run Second Life (not much point to that!), I peeked down into the bin directory and...</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b>melissa@storge:~/SecondLife/SecondLife-i686-3.6.8.282367$ ldd bin/do-not-directly-run-secondlife-bin </b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>linux-gate.so.1 => (0xf775b000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libopenal.so.1 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libalut.so => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libpthread.so.0 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpthread.so.0 (0xf771f000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libcollada14dom.so => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libfreetype.so.6 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libfreetype.so.6 (0xf7680000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>librt.so.1 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/librt.so.1 (0xf7677000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libhunspell-1.3.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_program_options-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_regex-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_context-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libgobject-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgobject-2.0.so.0 (0xf7624000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libglib-2.0.so.0 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libglib-2.0.so.0 (0xf7518000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libGLU.so.1 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libGL.so.1 => /usr/lib32/nvidia-337/libGL.so.1 (0xf740d000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libX11.so.6 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libX11.so.6 (0xf72d9000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libfmodex.so => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libGLOD.so => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libSDL-1.2.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libgdk-x11-2.0.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libgthread-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgthread-2.0.so.0 (0xf72d5000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libexpat.so.1 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libexpat.so.1 (0xf72ac000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libssl.so.1.0.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libcrypto.so.1.0.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_thread-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libfontconfig.so.1 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libfontconfig.so.1 (0xf7270000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_filesystem-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libaprutil-1.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libapr-1.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libstdc++.so.6 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6 (0xf7186000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libm.so.6 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libm.so.6 (0xf7140000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgcc_s.so.1 (0xf7123000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libc.so.6 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libc.so.6 (0xf6f73000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>/lib/ld-linux.so.2 (0xf775c000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libz.so.1 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libz.so.1 (0xf6f59000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libpng12.so.0 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpng12.so.0 (0xf6f31000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libffi.so.6 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libffi.so.6 (0xf6f2a000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libpcre.so.3 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpcre.so.3 (0xf6eec000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libnvidia-tls.so.337.12 => /usr/lib32/nvidia-337/tls/libnvidia-tls.so.337.12 (0xf6ee6000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libnvidia-glcore.so.337.12 => /usr/lib32/nvidia-337/libnvidia-glcore.so.337.12 (0xf49cf000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libXext.so.6 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libXext.so.6 (0xf49bc000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libdl.so.2 => /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libdl.so.2 (0xf49b7000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libxcb.so.1 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libxcb.so.1 (0xf4995000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libXau.so.6 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libXau.so.6 (0xf4990000)</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace; font-size: x-small;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libXdmcp.so.6 => /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libXdmcp.so.6 (0xf4989000)</b></span></div>
<div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">
<br /></div>
</div>
<div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">
The lines of interest have "not found" at the end...</div>
<div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">
<br /></div>
<div>
<div style="font-family: 'Liberation Serif';">
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libopenal.so.1 => not found</b></span></div>
<div style="font-family: 'Liberation Serif';">
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libalut.so => not found</b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libcollada14dom.so => not found</b></div>
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<b style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></b><span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b>libhunspell-1.3.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_program_options-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_regex-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_context-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libGLU.so.1 => not found</b></div>
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<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libfmodex.so => not found</div>
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<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libGLOD.so => not found</div>
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<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libSDL-1.2.so.0 => not found</div>
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<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libgdk-x11-2.0.so.0 => not found</div>
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<b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0 => not found</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libssl.so.1.0.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libcrypto.so.1.0.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_thread-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libboost_filesystem-mt.so.1.52.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libaprutil-1.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>libapr-1.so.0 => not found</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This has its good points--had we had to do this, or known to do this, or (ahem!) <i>someone at Linden Lab who gives a darn</i> done this from the start, we'd have known from the start what we were missing, installed it, and not have sat in the limbo of "why does everything but streaming audio work?" for years. Or rather, we would if we did something like</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><b>cd [wherever you keep SL]<wherever keep="" the="" viewer="" you="">/bin; find -type f -exec ldd {} \; | grep "not found"</wherever></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">so we get them all; like Pokemon, you gotta.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the other hand, we now get to potentially do this for each 32-bit program we want to run, and have the additional issue of working back from individual libraries to the packages to install.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Or you just say the heck with it and install all the 32-bit libraries.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Or...people could make actual 64-bit versions of the viewer. Some do, and to them all I say thank you; I'd hug you if I could. Now, if only Linden Lab would...</span></div>
Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-26498197623270909122014-03-21T03:45:00.000-05:002014-03-21T03:45:16.208-05:00Someone send this link to Linden Lab...<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From the nVidia blog: <a href="http://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2014/03/20/opengl-gdc2014/">"NVIDIA, AMD, Intel Explain How OpenGL Can Unlock 15X Performance Gains"</a>. An enticing quote: "the techniques presented apply to all major vendors and are suitable for use across multiple platforms."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The blog post has a slide show; check it out.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-70188050312507886152014-03-06T20:57:00.000-06:002014-03-06T20:57:07.543-06:00"Howls of derisive laughter, Bruce!"<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I just deleted some spam email... I saw the first line, and it said something about loving my photo on Facebook.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Facebook?! In the immortal words of the Philosophy Department of the University of Wollamalloo, "Howls of derisive laughter, Bruce!" With Facebook's policies, it's the last place I'd ever sign on. *plonk*</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-46621929597514750972014-02-26T20:39:00.004-06:002014-02-26T20:39:43.610-06:00Wise beyond her years...<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Marianne McCann posts an insightful open letter to SL's new CEO: <a href="http://marianne.secondlifekid.com/2014/02/25/dear-ebbe/">"Dear Ebbe"</a>. (And it took me until now to get the reference...)</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-17746154577027492782014-01-31T05:23:00.000-06:002014-02-04T06:48:01.640-06:00RL inspiration<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From the January 29, 2014 <i>New York Post, </i>"Meet the gal with the longest legs in NYC", about Brooke Banker, a 26-year-old model who is 5'11" tall with 47" legs (measuring from heel to hip):</span><br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7atR-dcj-ew/UuuAtgPX1BI/AAAAAAAABoE/42V9OsdhuFs/s1600/brookecover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7atR-dcj-ew/UuuAtgPX1BI/AAAAAAAABoE/42V9OsdhuFs/s1600/brookecover.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Apparently Russia crowned Anastasia Strashevskaya "Miss Longest Legs" earlier this month; she has 42" legs. (Alas, I have not been able to find her total height.) That was followed by Alexandra Robertson in England, 6'1" with 47-inch legs, and now Ms. Banker.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I would think that legginess involves proportion as well as length, so that Ms. Banker (0.662 leg length/height ratio) outdoes Ms. Robertson (0.644). </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My goodness--being two-thirds leg by height! Could Ms. Banker create a similarly-proportioned Second Life avatar?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Actually, I think she could. I will have to make a point of figuring out my avatar's leg length/height ratio. I do like to twist the knob to 11, and the avatar stretching animations do most of their stretching on the legs. How far can one go?</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LEli2ob8QkI/SYrn-mSfJII/AAAAAAAAAyQ/Lmh4anaQokw/s1600/SupersizeMe_003crop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LEli2ob8QkI/SYrn-mSfJII/AAAAAAAAAyQ/Lmh4anaQokw/s1600/SupersizeMe_003crop.jpg" height="320" width="191" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">UPDATE: Svetlana Pankratova still holds the record, 6'5" tall with 4'4" legs, and thus a leg length/height ratio of 0.675.</span></div>
Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-5390203863378697112014-01-24T22:32:00.000-06:002014-01-24T22:32:08.670-06:00What next?<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Things are happening. One is depressing; the other just makes me wonder.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/24/yahoo-acquires-will-shut-down-browser-based-virtual-world-gaming-startup-cloud-party/">Cloud Party has been bought by Yahoo, which is going to shut it down</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sigh. I'm reminded of the days of Ziff-Davis buying computer magazines in order to shut them down. Cloud Party had great promise, and I'm very sad to see it go.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now for the one I'm not sure of: Rod Humble is stepping down as CEO of Linden Lab. Who will replace him? That's a very good question.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34027731.post-69637473203293455202014-01-06T20:37:00.003-06:002014-01-06T20:37:49.492-06:00Passing the Torch<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The January 2014 <a href="http://busted-magazine.com/i"><i>Busted</i> magazine</a> marks the passing of the torch. The lovely and talented Maggie Bluxome has stepped down as senior editor, and Rachel Swallows has taken on the job. The new issue, I assure you, shows that the magazine is in good hands.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I look forward to what is to come from <i>Busted</i>, and I wish Maggie all the best with whatever she takes on. You're an amazing lady, Maggie.</span>Melissa Yeuxdouxhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13847500926977004133noreply@blogger.com0