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Today we are releasing a new Release Candidate, 1.20 RC12. If you have already been using the Release Candidate (RC11), you will be required to update to RC12 with the latest bug fixes. But, the Release Candidate is always an optional series of viewers that you may choose not to use — or use side by side on your computer with the main viewer which is always offered on our Downloads page (or get.secondlife.com).

As I mentioned in the last RC announcement, we are currently developing code which will enable you to switch the User Interface between the classic grey color or a lighter Dazzle theme (as requested in VWR-5059). But this feature is not yet tested and ready to be released. In the meantime… we are releasing RC12 with the thread monitoring “watchdog” again disabled. Also, we have also eliminated the proposed change to Snapshot behavior that appeared in RC6– in which Uploading a Snapshot would crop your screen to enforce a powers-of-two dimensions.

Please continue to report any new issues in the Issue Tracker and be sure to set “Affects Version/s” to “1.20 Release Candidate”.

To get started with the new Release Candidate, visit the Test Viewers download page (Note: use the links at bottom of page, under Test Viewers)!

Release Notes for Second Life 1.20(12) July 2nd, 2008
=====================================

Fixes:
* Fixed: VWR-7178: ‘Upload a snapshot’ cannot take full screen snapshot; limited to square images
* Fixed: Allow the –set option to be specified multiple times on the command line
* Fixed: Disable the thread monitoring (watchdog) in settings again for the Release Candidate

Localization Fixes:
* Fixed: VWR-7086: floater_buy_land.xml still contains messages regarding First Land

The Hippos return!

We are now accepting nominations for the second annual Linden Lab Innovation Awards. Also known as The Hippos, these awards honor open source community members who have had the most significant impact on the Second Life viewer project over the last year. Who are these folks? They are C++ developers who have submitted more than 200 patches that have been incorporated into the main Second Life viewer in the last twelve months. They are people with varied talents and backgrounds who have done an enormous amount of work documenting protocols, triaging bugs and contributing to the development of the viewer in countless ways. Linden Lab thanks all these contributors, and we look forward to honoring the community superheroes who are making the Second Life viewer project a success.

This year, we are honoring open source contributors in five categories. If you’d like to make a nomination, read about the work of current nominees or learn more about the Hippos, then please read on.

HOW IT WORKS

= Nominations =
If you would like to nominate open source community members for a Hippo Award,
then please
* sign in to the JIRA issue tracker and add the nominee’s Second Life avatar name as a subtask to the appropriate category (below), and
* write a comment about what their contribution was and why you find it to be exemplary. Please cite JIRA issues, wiki pages or other examples of the contribution wherever possible.

Nominations are open from now through 2008 July 8 at noon PDT.

Additional notes:
* Although the issue tracker has a voting feature, winners will not be selected by popular vote but through the jury process described below.
* Please create only one JIRA issue per nominee per category. You are welcome to second a nomination by commenting on the JIRA opened in that nominee’s name.
* People may be nominated in multiple applicable categories.

== Eligibility ==
* Nominees are eligible to win if their contribution was made between 2007/07/01 and 2008/06/30.
* Linden Lab employees and family members are not eligible to win.

== Judging ==
These are juried awards, and winners will be selected based on a point system used by the judges. The judges panel will be comprised of Linden open source team members and developers.

= Categories =
Nominees should exhibit not only a great track record in their respective categories but also exemplify core community values of collegiality and respect.

Visit the JIRA links below to read a description of the category and make nominations.
* Best Documentation MISC-1301
* Best Project Organizer MISC-1302
* Best Contribution MISC-1303
* The Jesse Malthus Award for Best Community Influence MISC-1304
* Contributor of the Year MISC-1305

We have redefined some of the categories from last year and added a new one in order to reduce overlap and increase coverage of the breadth of work coming from the community.

= Awards =
Award winners will be announced in early September. I’ll be sending another message with the exact date, time and location of this event. You can see last year’s award announcement on the blog.

== Prizes ==
The 2007 Hippo Award winners received a rent-free parcel on the open source island Hippotropolis for one year and a gift of Linden dollars. The Contributor of the Year also received a Macintosh computer. Based on feedback from the 2007 winners, we’ll be making some changes to the prize types and distribution this year, though the overall value of the prizes will be similar. A later announcement will detail this year’s prizes.

P.S. By the way, if you’re not familiar with the hippo meme, the hippo has long been “the mascot” of Second Life. In the early days, Linden service announcements on the public forums would often feature the dramatic doings of super-powered yet secretive hippos who kept the grid safe from bugs released by evil gnomes. It seemed an appropriate icon for the open source project.

- - - - -

The LINDEN LAB INNOVATION AWARDS are for entertainment purposes only and have no monetary or other value. LINDEN LAB, LINDEN RESEARCH, and SECOND LIFE are trademarks or registered trademarks of Linden Research, Inc.

Today we are releasing a new Release Candidate, 1.20 RC11. If you have already been using the Release Candidate (RC10), you will be required to update to RC11 with the latest bug fixes. But the Release Candidate is always an optional series of viewers that you may choose not to use — or use side by side on your computer with the main viewer offered on our Downloads page or http://get.secondlife.com.

This new, more robust Release Candidate (RC11) brings the total to some 39 fixes for crashes in the viewer since the start of this 1.20 cycle!

Many of you asked for the Dazzle theme to be optional, and we are glad to tell you we have rearranged our plans and resources to now work on just that. We had wanted to do theme switching originally, but had been focused on stability. We realize now we don’t want Residents to opt for the older viewer just to keep the classic look– where you would continue to suffer from bugs that have been fixed in the newer viewer. See the Update below!

This Release Candidate (RC11) has four new crash fixes and a solution to one major source of memory leaks. We also repaired the broken sounds on the Mac PowerPC. And we have fixed the UI layer from appearing in Snapshots on some systems. Thank you for your patience while we investigated these elusive bugs!

TIMELINE UPDATE: We are pleased at the progress from the Crash Hunters project so far… RC11 brings some firm gains in stability. Of course, we are always evaluating the best focus of our engineering for the viewer given your concerns about crashes, bug reports, and feature requests. Adding all the feedback to the mix, we have decided to extend the Release Candidate cycle FURTHER! We would now like to direct more development on the first stages of the Skinning project (this is the UI flexibility that brought a new Dazzle look to the viewer). To start, we are now developing a solution to VWR-5059 - “Ability to switch between the new/old theme” - and will ship that before finalizing the official Second Life Viewer 1.20.

• Therefore, in the coming weeks please look for a couple other iterations of this Release Candidate, but perhaps not as frequently. We will deliver an RC12 and RC13 before finishing this 1.20 Release Candidate cycle.

In the meantime, please download and try the freshly minted RC11 viewer. Continue to report any new issues in the Issue Tracker and be sure to set “Affects Version/s” to “1.20 Release Candidate”. Please visit the Test Viewers download page [NOTE: use the links at bottom of page, under Test Viewers/Release Candidate Viewers] to get started!

Fixes:

* Fixed: VWR-7730: Sound / UI Sound broken on Mac PPC RC 1.20.10
* Fixed: VWR-7614: Snapshots show user interface when “Show Interface In Snapshot” is un-checked
* Fixed: VWR-7679: Interface also shows in screen_last.bmp
* Fixed: VWR-2633: Some groups can’t be accessed from Communicate window and only show in profile
* Fixed: VWR-6889: Unable to leave group when role has no allowed abilities
* Fixed: VWR-5895: slowly rotating llTargetOmega child prims stop rotating when you move away
* Fixed: VWR-6828: Character > Show Look At / Show Point At don’t work
* Fixed: VWR-7682: Typo on Teleport Failure dialog
* Fixed: VWR-6800: Eliminate memory leaks in llcharacter/llmotioncontroller.cpp
* Fixed: VWR-2051: Regular viewer freezes since update to Voice viewer
* Fixed: VWR-5697: RC 1.19.1 crash on startup with Vista UAC enabled
* Fixed: VWR-7723: crash on LLImageGL::setSubImage line 780
* Fixed: crash on LLViewerImageList::removeImageFromList
* Fixed: crash on LLViewerImageList::updateImagesUpdateStats
* Fixed: crash when creating many default boxes
* Fixed: changing to and from Fullscreen view using Alt+Enter shortcut causes viewer to crash/hang
* Fixed: Load the initial avatar outfit earlier in the startup process to avoid Ruth effect at Orientation Island
* Fixed: Add the new TRANSPARENT_TEXTURE constant’s target texture to the inventory Library of 1.20
* Fixed: Search > Places tab results are displayed in white text
* Fixed: Media URL Set > Cancel button does not cancel
* Fixed: 1.20 viewer reports GeForce FX5200 card incorrectly
* Fixed: Viewer does not remember the last grid if last grid is AGNI
* Fixed: Cursor missing from search fields until after text has been manipulated
* Fixed: Fix the URL used by crash_logger for pre login crashes
* Fixed: The viewer’s crash logger needs to trim very long SecondLife.log files before sending.

Localization Fixes:

* Fixed: VWR-7731: Bad Japanese translation of “Select tool”