Emerald Viewer Blog

A few notes we would like to share with our users.

First: On Saturday, Jessica Lyon and Arabella Steadham sat down and answered questions on a live broadcast called Rezzed.tv. You can watch the recording of that interview here: http://rezzed.tv/2010/08/rezzed-tv-presents-emerald-your-questions-answered/.

Second: Windows users, please note that if you update to 2587, you may experience crashes on login. We have determined this is a bug related to Windows and how it handles temporary files. Although the 2587 installer no longer contains emkdu, Windows seems to be pulling it from our users’ temporary Windows files. Despite an update we made to our installer which looks for emkdu and attempts to delete it if present, the issue still seems to be present for some users.

To be sure to avoid this, please follow these steps prior to installing 2587.
1/ Using Windows Search, search for emkdu.dll and delete all instances of it.
2/ Install 2587 but don’t launch it yet.
3/ Go into your 2587 install folder, look for emkdu.dll. If you see it, delete it.
4/ Launch the viewer.

Third: We have decided that it will be safer for us to provide our list of requirements from LL as we achieve them. What is most important right now is the preservation of the viewer project and our ability to fulfill the requirements. Announcing the items we have not yet fulfilled may put our ability to fulfill them at risk and thus, put the project at risk.  We will continue to provide you with our requirements as we achieve them.

The following is a list of requirements we feel we have fulfilled so far.

1/ Use open mailing lists or forums for your developer communications. We will all be dedicating more time on our forum to respond to your questions and concerns from this point forward. In the past we have not been dedicated to our forum due to time constraints, this changes now.

2/ Provide a publicly viewable source code repository. We have created a public Mercurial source code repository for our users. This repository is kept up to date in real time. When we make a change to the code, it will be added to the repository. All our users will essentially be able to watch us work and see our code changes and additions from this point forward. http://hg.emeraldviewer.net/

3/ Provide public code commit notices. You will note on our hg repository page, there is an RSS feed button. This will keep our users up to date with all of our code commit messages.

4/ Require each committer to provide real-world identity information to Linden Lab as a signatory to the certification of compliance with the Third Party Viewer Policy. To the best of our knowledge, Linden Lab has the RL information for each and every one of us. We have however, asked LL to verify that they do and anyone they don’t have, we will provide it.

5/ Update your posted Privacy Policy for the Emerald Viewer to specifically describe what user data has been collected or stored by any version of the Emerald viewer that may be used to log into Second Life. For all user data collected or stored, specifically describe in the policy how that user data has been used, displayed or shared. We have updated our Privacy Policy and are waiting for word from LL if it is acceptable. You may review it here: http://emeraldviewer.net/privacypolicy.shtml

We do not yet know if Linden Lab is satisfied that we have fulfilled these items yet. If they say they don’t feel we’ve done enough, we will do more. ADDED< There are two items left to fulfill, we will make them public as soon as we have done so>

We know that we have to earn back the trust of both the user community and of Linden Lab. We understand where LL’s coming from, and we’re working hard to meet their requirements while still maintaining a viable development process for Emerald. We honestly believe it’s the best viewer on the grid, and want to keep it that way. We’ll do what it takes to stay on top, both technically and in the minds of our users.

Sincerely, The Emerald Viewer Dev Team

We have a public BETA RELEASE for our loyal users! Please keep in mind beta releases are work in progress and you’re bound to come across bugs.

Windows beta will be back up shortly, we have some problems with missing files for voice. It appears the wrong file was deleted.. instead of emkdu. Turns out the package uploaded was corrupt, if you had sound or missing voice issues in the windows beta you may need to download a new copy from here and re-install it.

http://emeraldviewer.net/box/Emerald_Viewer_1.5.0.2587.exe

http://emeraldviewer.net/box/Emerald_Viewer_1.5.0.2587_x64.exe

http://emeraldviewer.net/box/EmeraldViewer-i686-1.5.0.2587.tar.bz2

http://emeraldviewer.net/box/Emerald_Viewer_1.5.0.2587_Intel_Beta.dmg

And! We have set up our public HG Repo for source code, complete with RSS feed for commit messages. Always up to date with our work.  http://hg.emeraldviewer.net/

This Saturday 28th August at 4pm, Arabella Steadham and Jessica Lyon wil field questions on Emerald, hosted by Moderator, Phaylen Fairchild.

This is a good opportunity to ask your questions and learn the answers to so many issues that so far have circled the grid and blogsphere.

Come along check for LM here

Emerald Dev Team is currently fielding applications for new Windows, Mac and Linux developers. Experience building the sl viewer or the Emerald viewer and C++ required. Experience with Python, cmake and HG preferred.

Must be able to work in a team environment but most importantly, have the courage to help us bring the Emerald Viewer back from the brink. Please submit applications in the form of Notecards titled “Dev Application” to Jessica Lyon.

Yesterday, the Emerald Development team received a large list of requirements and conditions from LL. Today we met with LL and reviewed all of those conditions for clarification. At this point, I can safely say that we fully intend to address and fulfill ALL of them as soon as we possibly can.

EDIT>We have been asked not to disclose the requirements at this time.< Apparently there was a misunderstanding and we are in fact allowed to disclose the requirements list. As soon as we have finished ironing out the fine details, we will be disclosing this list in the name of transparency. You can expect to see the list here in a few days time.

Although some of these conditions will be very difficult, we feel they are reasonable considering recent events.  Due to that difficulty however, some will take more time than others to fulfill. It is a big list of things that we need to do and we will be providing LL with a time frame on each individual item by Friday. Once we have completed these items to the full satisfaction of Linden Lab, we intend to re-apply for the TPVD.

We feel it is important during this time to inform everyone that although Linden Lab has encouraged the use of other viewers, the use of the Emerald viewer is still a decision that is yours to make. Emerald will not be blocked unless we fail to fulfill our requirements in the time allotted.

Linden Lab has told us that they want us to stop using the emkdu.dll or llkdu.dll files because they are not compliant with the GPL. For those wondering what KDU is, it’s a closed source image decoding library which provides a significant speed improvement over the open source alternative. However, since LL wishes us not to use it, I would like to take a step in that direction as a show of faith to the Lab right now.  I will ask our users to go into your Emerald install directory while you are not logged into the viewer and delete the file named emkdu.dll. The viewer will continue to function correctly however it will be slower. This is only a request from us and not a requirement. Our next release will not include this file.

In the coming days, some of the older versions of Emerald Viewer may be blocked from logging in at our request, this however will not happen until updated versions are made available on our website.

I would also like to extend a sincere apology to our users for all the confusion over the last few days. It has been a very difficult week for us but we expect things should start too quiet down now.

So in closing, I will reiterate, Emerald Dev Team intends to fully comply with the conditions set out before us by Linden Lab, and we plan to do so within the shortest time frame possible. Use of the Emerald viewer is still your choice and Emerald is not a malicious viewer.

Sincerely, Jessica Lyon and Arabella Steadham, Emerald Manager, Communications

The Treet .TV interview on “Tonight Live with Paisley Beebe”, filmed on Sunday 22nd August in which Emerald staff were interviewed, is now available on video, here

As many of you have heard, Emerald was removed from the TPVD yesterday. This removal was a result of recent actions by former Dev member Fractured Crystal. Fractured resigned from the team due to those actions and Emerald Dev Team has undergone a massive restructuring.  We will be re-applying for the TPVD very soon, however there are some rumors and fears I think need to be addressed.

Many people have heard that Emerald is banned or that users will be banned for using the Emerald Viewer. This is completely untrue.

Linden Lab’s Third Party Viewer Directory is optional for third party viewers to apply for and join. It is not a requirement to be on the directory. What is a requirement however is that third party viewers respect the Third Party Viewer Policy http://secondlife.com/corporate/tpv.php. With the exception of the actions of Fractured recently, Emerald has always respected that policy and will continue to do so.

While Emerald is not on the TPVD you can rest assured that this does not mean Emerald will be banned or blocked by LL, and you will certainly NOT be banned for using emerald.

Sincerely, Jessica Lyon

Today, Emerald underwent a complete restructure of the Development Team.

The most obvious result is that there is no specific individual Project Leader – we have determined the best course is to operate democratically and with clear transparency.

This series of events has ocurred because of an intolerable abuse of trust. From today forward, Fractured and Modular Systems will have no association with the Emerald Viewer. Due to his own actions, he was left in an untenable position and was given no option but to resign, which he did.

For users, we anticipate a smooth seamless transition, however if there is a hiccup or two please be patient with us as we move the viewer to its new home.

We ask for your understanding and patience during this time, and ask you to put your trust in this move, as we put our trust into you, the user.

Please contact Emerald Support via the Emerald Viewer group if you have questions. You can also contact any of these people in world:-

Lonely Bluebird

Jessica Lyon

Arabella Steadham

Thank you for your continued support,

The Emerald Rebirth Team

Post Script

As at Sunday 22nd August, 6pm SLT:

The Emerald viewer project and its development team have undergone a massive and necessary restructuring in response to recent incidents caused by the project leader.

This restructuring is designed in such a way as to prevent anything like this from ever happening again.

From this point on, there will be no ONE single person running Emerald Development.

We are all going to be on a level playing field. All decisions, changes, and alterations to any code or anything at all, will be done transparently and democratically.

Part of this restructuring process also involved the necessary removal of the developer who is responsible for these past incidents; as a result Fractured was invited to resign and has done so today.

As of NOW, All affiliation between Modular Systems/Fractured Crystal and the Emerald Viewer have been permanently severed. A new domain has been purchased and we are currently getting our new website online.

The website will be hosted at EmeraldViewer.net and should be online and operational shortly.

Ownership and control of the servers used to host the Emerald Viewer downloads and website have been transferred to Arabella Steadham who will maintain the hosting as a neutral party for the project.

Aside from the downtime of the website, our users should experience no changes that will affect them directly.

Also today, as a result of the incidents in question, Linden Lab removed Emerald from the TPVD. We expected this might happen and have since provided the Lab with information regarding our new changes, structure and goals. We hope to be back on the TPVD soon.

Our two biggest regrets are first and for most that these incidents ever took place, and second, that we failed to take this radical action sooner.

We sincerely hope that these significant internal changes will help us restore some trust and faith from our users and from Linden Lab in regards to the integrity of the Emerald Viewer Development team.

Thank you
The Emerald Team

Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.

I am Fractured Crystal. I have a long history of doing stupid things, but occasionally I did something clever; one of those being the Emerald Viewer project. I had no idea that it would reach a hundredth of the popularity it has; It was merely a way to share useful, legitimate modifications with the world, and something I encouraged others to do along with me.

I honestly believe that Emerald (and other viewers at the time) changed Third Party Viewers forever; that it was a turning point for them, where they went from something that was used by a fraction of people to today, where TPVs are used by the majority of Second Life residents.

One of those stupid things was the oft-discussed emkdu metadata. While it was suggested by others, it would not have been implemented had I not supported it. While I still feel that it was harmless, it is clear that it is not wanted. This metadata has been entirely removed in emkdu and will no longer be present in future releases.

Another, this most recent incident, was the issue regarding the login screen, and the iframes. I am the one who, in my boredom, modified the login screen to include those. I subsequently forgot about it. Obviously, this was removed as soon as it was mentioned in our forum.

I am not attempting to justify my mistakes, merely to explain them. As you might guess, if anyone else had done this, it would be unforgivable, and the same applies to me.

I am voluntarily removing myself from the project. I will be transferring control of the primary webserver to Arabella Steadham as soon as is possible.

To reiterate:

• emkdu metadata has been entirely removed, and will never occur again.
• The login screen issue has been fixed, and will never occur again.
• I am leaving the project.
• The webserver will be transferred to Arabella Steadham as soon as possible.
• At some point in the near future the project will change to another domain, which will be announced here, along with appropriate automatic redirects on the modularsystems.sl site(s).

For what it is worth, I am sorry to those of you who were unknowingly made a part of the login screen incident.