Compiling the Viewer (Linux)

I've updated the self build instructions for Linux to include Gentoo (in addition to Ubuntu and Mint). This isn't a huge change but handy for anyone feeling adventurous and wanting to build the viewer themselves.

http://catznip.com/index.php/Linux_Build_Environment

Catznip R9.0 Release !

This release has certainly been a long time coming and is our single biggest to date, it will also be the last mega update as we move to a new shorter faster release cycle.

The main new feature in R9.0 is the Chat which has been rebuilt from scratch. LL added CHUI, we spent a huge amount of time trying to make it nice only to find the performance with it enabled was unacceptable. As the old chat was removed at the same time we had no choice but to start over. Chat has been reimplemented from scratch and includes many CHUI inspired features.

Inventory searching has been made lightning fast, textures now have a preview tool-tip, script editor got a lot of love with a tighter UI, as you type highlighting for text searches, more work was done overhauling the UI and a new in place updater was added.

From Linden Lab this release adds CHUI (even though we don't expose it), facebook support, fitted mesh, materials, ribbon particles and request teleports amongst others things.

In answer to huge gap between R8 and this release we shelved a lot of things we were working on and started our open beta program. A huge thank you to everyone who got involved, reported bugs and issues, helped find bugs and crashes, made suggestions. This has been so successful that it will form the basis of all releases going forward.

Future releases will be smaller and incremental with more public testing. We hope this will allow up to keep up with Linden Lab, continue to deliver unique new features and make Catznip the most stable Second Life viewer. There is a small mountain of work we did that just isn't polished enough to get in this time, expect to see new things coming through thick and fast as we go forward.

Our priority now is to get a little break, test the hell out of this release and hopefully find a cure to our OS X woes.

Why are you still here ? R9.0 Wiki Page, Release Notes, Download.

Catznip R9.0 to Beta Testers

Catznip R9.0 has been released to beta testers, everyone in the release channel on R8.1 will be getting the update in a few hours time while we finish the release notes and user documentation on the website.

This marks the end of the Catznip R9.0 beta cycle. The Windows and Linux versions are done, OS X will follow and is our priority between now and starting the R9.1 beta cycle.

At the end of each cycle we are moving everyone over to the main channel and anyone wishing to continue in the following beta cycle will have to keep an eye on this blog and the 'Catznip Litterbox' group messages for the beta version.

As of now, all beta testers will be moved over to R9.0 on the release channel.

Those wishing to stay involved are encouraged to continue submitting reports on our JIRA and stay active in the  'Catznip Litterbox'. Download links for R9.1 beta will be published in due course.

A HUGE THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO GOT INVOLVED AND HELPED OUT - YOU ROCK!

Linux Users !

Do you run SL on Linux ?

We get that distribution packages (debs and rpms) are are the holy grail and we're a way off of that for now, we want to know how you use SL. Do you use the installer, system wide or just for your user, do you just extract and run the client?

Get in touch, either here or message Trinity Dejavu in SL.

Updated Avatar Picker & Updater

Following a request on our JIRA to add names to the friends tab of the avatar picker (used for group & friend invites and sharing inventory) [CATZ-116], the following will be part of Beta R9.0.11 and in addition to the second column makes the list searchable and shows on-line friends listed in bold. Much better for people with a LOT of friends.

The built in updater also got some more work, shows progress of the download and resumes should the client be restarted part way though. There is also menu item to manually check for an update. We don't want to do another update to the beta without this in place to avoid future confusion. Really looking forward to this being live.

I want to talk to Linux users and get some feedback ion how they run the viewer and what they would expect an updater to do in practice.

A huge thank you to everyone who has gotten in touch and especially those who have helped out on the JIRA and submitted translations.