Progress Report

R&R
Let me start by saying it's been a crazy amount of work for everyone getting Firestorm to where it is. After the release of 27000 myself and many of the developers were suffering from what is clinically known as  'Burn out'. We needed some time off... I needed some time off. For me it was about 6 weeks away before I started feeling ready to return to  cat herding, while some others took less, and some are simply enjoying the fresh air of this most wonderful time of year.
But fear not because we are back in gear now and shifting into overdrive!

New developers!
I'll start off the good news with the announcement and welcome to two new developers to our team.
Holy Gavenkrantz  has been a regular code contributor to Phoenix then Firestorm since very early on and I felt it only made sense to draw him in as an official developer. You see... after so many patches from a contributor it begins to only make sense that we ask if that contributor would like to join us. (hint hint)
Then there's  Armin Weatherwax (Arminweatherhax Resident in SL), formerly from Imprudence/Kokua. Armin was the main developer on the Kokua viewer for a long time and when I heard he was a free agent I approached him immediately. Armin really knows his stuff and we're very excited to have him on board with us!
Welcome to the team guys!

OpenSim 
We've recently discovered that Firestorm has become the favorite viewer for other grids. I personally have had a LOT of grid owners approach me asking for improvements to Firestorm in OpenSim. Well, it just so happens that 'other grids' are where Armin excels, in fact I've put Armin in charge of that area from this point forward. In other words, Firestorm is going to extend its focus and improve support for other grids, however I must point out.. we cannot 'offer support' for other grids since there is just no way to stretch our support team out that thin into other grids. But what about the  Havok sub-license terms  stating the viewer cannot connect to other grids while having Havok?  Well we've thought about that and decided we're going to offer TWO versions of Firestorm. One for Second Life with Pathfinding Havok goodness, and one for other grids without Havok. We'll have more news about that soon.

New Release coming
More skins and skin customization improvements, new Windlight effects, Growl, Build floater improvements and options, ctrl/shift mouse wheel for setting custom default cam positions, brought back "remove scripts from selection", LSL PreProcessor!, improved functionality to estate tools, improved mouselook functionality, sound explorer, permanent derender, asset blacklist... loads of bug fixes, improvements and new features! The list goes on and on and on with too many to list! It's all coming folks!
But when.. you ask?  Well, we're getting close to the end of our 4.1.1 release targets which means we're getting very close! However, we're also kind of waiting for LL's pathfinding goodness so we can release with that stuff as well. As usual I cannot give you a release date, but I'll risk saying.. shortly after LL releases their pathfinding stuff, we'll release the next epic Firestorm update!

Things are moving along, it's all happening! Stay tuned!

Sincerely,
Jessica Lyon and the team.

P.S. We hope to see you at our  SL9B  Exhibit!

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Advertising on our MOTD

As I'm sure most of you have noticed we've been promoting the SL9B community birthday event on our message of the day (MOTD) which displays during the login process. The SL9B is a not for profit community event hosted by residents for residents to celebrate Second Life's 9th birthday. This year there are 20 regions generously donated by residents and businesses in SL for the benefit of the community. Linden Lab has chosen to not participate in the event this year... This event still has a few openings for exhibitors, volunteers and performers. Better be quick!

On May 25th we also advertised for a not for profit, live charity concert event where 100% of the proceeds went to help rebuild Joplin, Missouri, a town devastated by an F5 tornado last year. The concert was a live real world concert by TheFollow streamed into Second Life.

Prior to that we advertised the Burn2 event (originally named Burning Man). It was renamed to signify the withdrawal of LL's sponsorship and participation of this long running and very popular community event. It is also a not for profit event hosted by the SL community for the SL community.

You may be starting to see a pattern in what events we advertise for.
- Not for profit, community events organized, hosted and/or sponsored by the community.
- Or charity events that benefit good causes.

The idea behind what we agree to advertise for and what we don't are simple. If it's going to benefit you financially either directly or indirectly (publicity stunt).. we're not going to advertise it. However if it's purely for residents, hosted by residents with no profits or financial benefits either directly or indirectly to you or those involved, we will consider it. We have always been, and will always be.. about the community.

We cannot however advertise religious events or anything that may offend or exclude other races, creeds, cultures or persons. For example, yesterday we were asked to promote Memorial Day and while I support troops all around the world 100%, it is an American event which other countries do not participate in. That makes it exclusionary and not something that qualifies for us to promote.

If you have a community event that you would like promoted on our MOTD you can send a request to jessica.lyon@phoenixviewer.com for consideration. We do not charge for advertising nor will we accept any benefits, financial or otherwise. Though you can expect we may attend your event ;). Please provide your in world name, and details to the event. All events we advertise for are required to have a website we can link too.

Note: we do not promote anything on the login page itself. Just the Message of the day.

Sincerely,
Jessica Lyon

Ok, Jokes over.. now something serious..

Phishing scams in Second Life

There has been an increase in Phishing attempts in the last couple weeks and a lot of people have fallen for them and lost their Second Life Accounts.

Phishing in SL is mainly the act of tricking a user into giving their login and password information through fake yet convincing Second Life login webpages.

Here is how it works. 
- Someone posts a link and sometimes text to entice you to click it, sometimes this can be a friend or someone you know (because they've already had their accounts hacked).
- You click the link and it takes you to what looks like a Second Life Login screen.
- You log in using your SL Username and PW.
- You've just been Phished and given someone your SL Login information. They can now log into your SL account, take your money, destroy your SL Property, delete your inventory.. etc etc etc.


How to avoid being Phished

If you have clicked a link, and it takes you to a login page of some kind, no matter how much it looks real... DO NOT LOG INTO IT YET!

FIRST, look at the URL very carefully. The Linden Lab Login URL is
https://id.secondlife.com/ .
If it does NOT start with https://id.secondlife.com/, then it is not a real Second Life login web page. Do not log into it, and DO file an abuse report on the person who sent the link. From the Help menu,  Report Abuse.

If you are unsure, go to http://secondlife.com and click on the "LOGIN" at the top right. That will take you to the legit login page which starts with https://id.secondlife.com. Log into that page, then follow the link.. if the link still takes you to a log in widget.. it's totally a scam.


If you've already been Phished

Immediately

- Go to http://secondlife.com
- Click the LOGIN link at the top right and enter your login information.
- On the right is a link called "Account" click it!
- Then click "Change Password" and change your password right away.

Please, protect your accounts. Think 3 times before entering your login information. Always check the URL.


Sincerely,

Jessica Lyon and the Phoenix/Firestorm Team

April 1st, 2012

Firestorm Rocks You Band! 

We here at the Phoenix project have all gotten the music bug! So much so that we've decided to quit viewer development and start a back up band for the famous in world song artist; Mankind Tracer!

We recognize that music bands in Second Life are rare, yet extremely important so we feel we can better improve the user experience by playing silly musical instruments than we can with viewer development! Below is a photo link of our first performance with the legendary Mankind Tracer!



We are looking forward to performing wonderful music for you going forward. Now, if we could just find some decent guitars that have good music scripted into them....

P.S. Happy April Fools Day!

The Phoenix/Firestorm Team.

;)

Phoenix AND Firestorm releases!

For the first time ever we are releasing two viewers at the same time. We'll talk about Firestorm FUI first.

Firestorm FUI Beta 4.0.1.27000
Firestorm FUI Beta has a completely new interface which is a hundred times more flexible than previous versions. We've even included an incredible V1/Phoenix skin which hasn't been seen on any V2 viewer until now. We also feel it has better performance and stability than our previous Firestorm builds and hope you enjoy it!

Check out the video first!
We made a video to give you an idea of what you can do with this new interface and especially encourage Phoenix users to have a watch of the video before you update your Phoenix viewers. We think you just might want to switch to this Firestorm FUI after watching it. http://youtu.be/QYaf2NZZmIE

Change log can be found HERE


Important Phoenix Viewer Update 1.6.1.1691
This is a VERY important update!
Most important in this release and a reason you really all need to update is because in version 1600 we missed a very important inventory folder icon for Direct Delivery. LL will be enabling this feature on March 21st and without this update you're inventory window will become "Visibly" broken. 

As well as falling into compliance with LL's new Policy changes, this update goes out with some very important changes, fixes and improvements including the V2 inventory fetch system which makes inventory fetching much faster and more reliable.

Change log can be found HERE


Support note: Please be aware that because we are releasing TWO viewers at the same time our Support team is going to be extremely busy. If you have problems please search our wiki for answers before contacting support. Most of the answers you get from support can be found on our wiki. http://wiki.phoenixviewer.com

Sincerely,

The Phoenix/Firestorm Team.

Interview with LL - The Recording

On Wednesday we had an interview with Oz Linden, Director of Open Development at LL. The meeting was primarily to get answers about the new Third Party Viewer Policy additions. The live stream didn't go so well but we have the recording now! We encourage you to watch it to be informed of what the policy additions mean, how they effect you, the third party viewers you use and it's developers.

http://treet.tv/shows/specials/episodes/firestorm-07mar12

LL & TPV's - The Interview

This Wednesday, March 7th at 3pm SLT. I, Jessica Lyon will be interviewing Oz Linden from Linden Lab about the third party viewer policy additions and related concerns. I will be representing the Third Party Viewer Community and the resident community during this interview, not specifically this project. This is not a Phoenix Office Hour and is very likely a one time thing.

During the first half hour of the show I will be asking Oz questions based on input I've received from third party viewer projects and the SL community. During the second half of the show I will ask Oz your questions providing they haven't already been answered.

The interview will take place in a private region that will not be open to the public, however you will all be able to participate and watch on the live stream here. http://treet.tv/live  Ask your questions on the live stream and they will be forwarded to me, then I will ask them for you to Oz during the second half of the show.

This is a very rare and in many ways historic event that will hopefully answer all your questions and concerns in regards to the new policy changes. The policy affects you! so be informed! Mark your calendars, invite your friends and spread the word.

Who: Jessica Lyon and Oz Linden
What: Interview with Oz linden for clarifications on the new policy additions and how they effect you and the Third Party Viewers you use.
When: Wednesday, March 7th, 3pm SLT
Where: http://treet.tv/live
Why: Because it's important!


Hope to see you on the stream!

Jessica Lyon
Project Manager