Rainbow Viewers for Virtual Worlds

Linden Lab has done it again, in a pathetic way all old binaries have poofed, other then the 1.23 viewer which is still somewhat "supported". We have seen the same with the sources previously, in almost exactly the same way. No official announcement, just error messages coming up for still existing links. Lame. Shame.

http://my.opera.com/boylane/blog/viewer-1-x-the-sources-that-poofed

Here are the Windows binaries for the older viewers 1.18, 1.19, 1.22, 1.23, in case someone still needs or wants them. Particularly for my netbook viewer 1.19.0.5 may still be of interest .

Secondlife official viewer 1.18.0.6
Secondlife official viewer 1.19.0.5
Secondlife official viewer 1.22.11.0
Secondlife official viewer 1.23.5.0

All these files are supposed to be provided at http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Old_versions, please treat this posting as a backup

Love,
Boy

Hi dears,

I'm not really sure yet if I'd do this or not, so please consider this a purely rhetorical thing, open for ideas, and interest. I've been thinking for very long if and what to do with Rainbow. I've got quite a number of requests from people who asked me to specifically support Opensim grids, which I have to say are getting better and better, and reach a level of usability, like in the old pioneering days if not better... And a lot of requests from SLers came in as well.

So here is the question....if there would be an update for Rainbow, what should it include?

My short list of major updates I could currently imagine plus the ones suggested:
Streaming media fix finally done
Updated RLV done
Multiple Attachements / Linked Items done
Area Search done
Display Names done
Align tool done
Built-in AO done
Jiggly butts and bellies - really funneh done
Some cool stuff - laterz, quite some work
New/updated OpenSim grids - done
Fixes - mostly done
Grid manager - done (login manager for multiple accounts and grids, not hippo)
Fix partial alphas - finally done, that was a nitemare to fix
Multilayer
Environment Presets
Landmark bar from v2
Make it running on Android
anything else

I'm not planning to port anything to any "newer" platform like Snowglobe every 1.x viewer dev jumped to or 2.x even. If any update will happen it will be based on 1.22, thus remaining the last really fast and non-bloated viewer on this planet...or so I hope . And it will be focusing on Opensim grids, not SecondLife.

Rainbow should remain reasonably usable even with current netbooks and any older (<3y) hardware many people still use everyday. An area that was abandoned by everybody else. Carving a small niche bigger, that I already settled in a while ago . If.

Listening for your comments and ideas, if any

Love,
Boy

[Updated] 7 Mar

We all remember the drama around Emerald, Onyx, CDS and there demise. But this seems not to have been enough to encourage LL to make necessary changes, and enforce their ToS. zF RedZone is a very similar system like ModularSystems/Gemini's Onyx/CDS and in clear violation of SL's ToS, particularly section 8.3:

You agree that you will not post or transmit Content or code that may ... invade other users' privacy.

Business as usual here, ignorance from Linden's side and there will unlikely be any change to this. As Psyke Phaeton wrote in SLUniverse, we can not force LL to make changes, but we can evolve as users, it is "our world, our imagination" and we can get rid of the bad apples. Or try at least.

If you still don't have a clue what this is all about, zF RedZone is a spyware system that collects your user and usage data in SecondLife, puts them in an external database out of anyones control, to do all kind of fancy, not working, buggy, flawed and faulty data mining to supposedly identify copybotters, alts, your IP address, your ISP, your neighbour, your address, god knows what. It's obviously a lucrative enterprise, given the price and the amount of deployed aka rezzed RedZones around the grid.

I can not repeat here again what many others have said many times before, it is a black hole . Tons of information are available, please educate yourself and help to educate the ones who still believe in such snake oil. It harms us all, and benefits only one single person, the snake oil creator.

So, having written that, here is what this posting is all about and how to get rid of and kill RedZone once and for all. It's fairly simple, and thanks to http://no2redzone.wordpress.com everybody should be able to make the small changes that render the spyware useless (which it is anyway ) in a blink of an eye.

Just add the following entries to your hosts file

127.0.0.1 isellsl.ath.cx
127.0.0.1 isellsl.com
127.0.0.1 zfire.isellsl.com
127.0.0.1 girlsofthevip.com
127.0.0.1 hamlinpro.com
127.0.0.1 syscast.net
127.0.0.1 media.syscast.net
127.0.0.1 apache2-blow.port-au-prince.dreamhost.com
127.0.0.1 quickware.net
127.0.0.1 www.quickware.net
127.0.0.1 quickware.zapto.org
127.0.0.1 wh0.zapto.org
127.0.0.1 m.sparkgap.info
127.0.0.1 policedepartmentonsl.info
127.0.0.1 sparrowindustries.net

Working hosts for Vista/Win7 (just replace the existing one): hosts

You can find the file here:
WinXP - Win7: C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc\hosts
Linux: /etc/hosts
MacOS: /private/etc/hosts
(to edit the file you need admin rights)

What it does is preventing the DNS (domain name service) resolution of that website, assign your localhost IP (127.0.0.1) to it and keep everything that it wants to send to this site on your own PC.

His main site is using a free DNS service (ath.cx) and can be changed at anytime. So this may not prevent spying on you in future releases. But it should kill RedZone for now. Also he started redirecting traffic to the .com.

Not sure if girlsofthevip.com and hamlinpro.com also belong to him. They look similarly unprofessional at least . But they are hosted at the same IP (76.104.212.177) that points directly to Redzone.

The anonymously registered domains/URLs syscast.net, media.syscast.net and apache2-blow.port-au-prince.dreamhost.com were supposedly used by CDS. They may not be needed anymore. m.sparkgap.info is highly suspicious and might be associated with CDS or a similar tool. Not leaving it to chance, blocked too.

policedepartmentonsl.info appears to be another data collector hidden behind Redzone and tons of popups.

sparrowindustries.net is used by another CDS / Redzone copycat product that works the same way, and is blocked the same way.

How to block Quickware? The newcomer on the block, not much information seems to be available other than the tool does the same as RedZone, supposedly it scans residents, puts them into a database and correlates data to identify alts. Same story, ToS violation. Quickware is hosted in the Netherlands, with a number of domains linking to one IP: 193.93.174.118. So to block this spyware you should add this IP to your firewall blocks. Adding quickware.net, quickware.zapto.org and wh0.zapto.org to the hosts file may not be sufficient here. If someone can provide an update on how it exactly communicates, please do so.

As I wrote there is a lot of more information and discussion around. Just a number of links, in case you want to get more details about it. I also copy the very good combined writeup from a number of people (Free, Samantha, Ann, Elysium, (Thanks!) here that summarizes it all.

"WHAT IS SPYWARE?

Spyware is a type of malware (malicious software) that can be installed on computers, and which collects small pieces of information about users without their knowledge. The presence of spyware is typically hidden from the user, and can be difficult to detect. Typically, spyware is secretly installed on the user's personal computer.

While the term spyware suggests software that secretly monitors the user's computing, the functions of spyware extend well beyond simple monitoring. In an attempt to increase the understanding of spyware, a more formal classification of its included software types is provided by the term *privacy-invasive software*.

Source: Spyware - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


SPYWARE AND SECOND LIFE

A number of Second Life products claim to protect content creators from anyone who may 'rip' content illegally (i.e., copybotters). Many do this in part by detecting the type of viewer in use, and then banning individuals suspected of copybotting from locations where the product is installed.

For this to work "well" they need to collect information on EVERY visitor, copybotter or not, and retain it in a database. Both the collection and retention of that data occurs without your awareness, or consent. Data often includes IPs (Internet addresses), and can correlate alt accounts and resident locations.

For these reasons, we consider such products to be spyware.

Further troubling, there are few to no safeguards on how your data may be used or distributed, and little in the way of recourse from Linden Lab in cases of abuse. And despite the marketing, these systems stop only the most casual of copybotters as they have numerous ways to avoid detection, and they're more likely to rip content from locations and avatars beyond where any "protection" systems are run.


PROTECTING YOURSELF

No method is full proof, but there are a few things you can do to try and protect yourself and your information from spyware in Second Life:

1) Keep Parcel-based Media (Streaming music, Media) turned off in your Sound & Media Preferences unless you know you are somewhere trustworthy. Don't access Shared Media (web-on-a-prim) unless you trust the object or person who created/owns it. These can provide the holes which allow your personal information to be captured.

2) Find out if places you frequent use RedZone, CDS, or similar large-scale "copybot" scanning systems. If they do, you can stop patronizing them. You might inform the owners WHY you won't return until they stop using them, but let's stress they see these systems as an attempt to protect their content, not an opportunity to violate your privacy. They may have little idea how they work and surrounding issues. When contacting them, do so *politely*. Send them this notecard, or direct them to one of these locations for more information:

ZF Redzone, Disclosure of SecondLife Alts. - SLUniverse Forums
GreenZone

3) Learn more about these types of products on your own. Take your concerns to Linden Lab. Consider voting for, watching, and commenting on this JIRA:

https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-24746

4) And spread the word. Send this notecard to friends. Blog about the issue. Knowledge is power.

(The U.S. The Do Not Track Me Online Act, introduced by Rep. Jackie Speier, would direct the FTC to create standards for a nationwide do-not-track mechanism allowing online users to opt out of tracking and sharing of consumer data among businesses. If you live in the U.S., contact your representatives and demand they support this legislation.)

WHAT SPYWARE-FREE MEANS

Content protection and stopping copybotters are important goals. But first and foremost, we believe customers deserve to be treated with respect and dignity. This includes having a healthy concern for your privacy.

Spyware-Free is a pledge that we will never use such a system ourselves. You can shop or hang out here with confidence!"

And some more links for more information. Google is your friend too :

Soft Linden warns Second Life users against Quickware Alts Pro
ZF Redzone, Disclosure of SecondLife Alts
SL Jira VWR-24746 - RedZone Security violates TOS, exposes private information and is being misused
no2redzone
Ban Redzone @ BDSM Institute
RedZone – security, scam, or scraping?
Forceme Silverspar - zf REDZONE

Thanks for reading. Now open your hosts file in your favorite editor and let's get rid of RedZone!
Boy


WARNING: Greenzone is not always able to pick up Redzone, especially the latest versions. Also Greenzone confirmed to run their own list/database, and uses it against others. Based on a no-mod unverifiable script. I therefore can not recommend to use this tool. Links for details: GreenZone gets nasty and confirmation from the author (see Addendum)

Dear all,

You may have heard of the troubles and neverending stories about the Emerald viewer that used an exploit in the Kakadu (KDU) library that they distributed with their viewer to collect user data. LL reacted on this and several other violations and banned Emerald. As a side effect we now also have a discussion about the usage of that 3rd party Kakadu library that seems to get a bit out of control.

As a starter, Chalice posted the following today in SLU from Oz Linden:

Oz Linden: - Use of KDU

Linden Lab does consider use of our existing llkdu.dll in any TPV to
be a GPL license violation, whether or not you distribute it.

- We will shortly be changing our viewer builds such that KDU will not
be in a dll (it will be statically linked).

- We will no longer be distributing a dll containing KDU.

Linden Lab will cooperate with other viewers on closed-source
development of a KDU wrapper that we can share, but only with viewers
developers who can show us evidence that they have a KDU license that
allows them to distribute applications containing KDU.

I don't want to make that long, so let's get straight to the facts. The Kakadu library was developed at University of New South Wales in Aussie land and is marketed by an commercial offspring. It is a JPEG2000 (graphic format) de/encoder and licensed/used by LL in Secondlife.

The llkdu library is used in different versions for Windows/Mac/Linux viewers; and the situation so far was that due the licensing status of SL (GPL) and KDU (commercial) it was not possible to redistribute KDU with a third party viewer. No big deal, as one could simply take the official Linden version, copy that into their viewer installation, and voila, you had accelerated graphics.

What changes now? LL says if a TPV is capable of using KDU in any way, they would consider it a violation of GPL. Which is basically right from the point of view that a TPV binary would link to that KDU library or the library itself would be re-distributed with that particular viewer.

But, the devil is in the details. The KDU library is not, and was never, linked to SL or a third party viewer. It behaves like a black box that accepts commands, and gives the corresponding output back to the viewer, in form of de- or encoded graphics. Just the very same like SL uses ones proprietary (read: not GPL licensed) video or sound driver to display it's output or make some noise .

Legal merrygorounds here. Again, back to the facts. A TPV developer can compile their viewer without having any KDU library present. That clearly means it is not linked, neither dynamically nor statically to the resulting viewer binary. As such it can never be a violation of GPL, as Oz Linden claims in the quoted posting above.

Why is that so? The viewer checks for the presence of llkdu, and if it can find it, it will use and control it via some API interface, which are a handful of commands to import and export data. If the viewer can't detect llkdu it will use openjpeg (which does the same, just slower) instead.

In summary, the llkdu library is not linked to the viewer binary, as such there can not be any GPL violation, and LL has no legal leverage on any developer whose viewer works with any KDU library, either LL's version or any other like emkdu from Emerald.

What does it mean for Rainbow/Cool? Nothing . The KDU library is not linked to the viewer, nor is it re-distributed in any form. The viewers, although no longer updated, are in perfect compliance with GPL and TPV and there is absolutely no risk to use them to connect to SL.

Sorry for the long posting
Boy

Relevant/intersting links:
http://dwellonit.taterunino.net/2010/09/17/no-kdu-for-you-says-oz-linden/
http://dwellonit.taterunino.net/2010/09/19/third-party-second-life-viewer-developers-call-bullshit-on-linden-lab-gpl-violation-claim/
http://imprudenceviewer.org/2010/09/18/regarding-llkdu/

As the new Tattoo and Alpha layers are not supported in OpenSim and alternative grids based on that *yet* you may experiences some weird behavior and/or instability with RV R6 / CV R13 that has Alpha and Tattoo Layer support included. You may also experience some graphical glitches in SL with older textures and outfits. This is caused by the replacement of the previous 4th bump map channel by the now used alpha mask in SL 2.0.

In either case, OpenSim or SL glitches, please use the previous version. That is R5 and R12 respectively. They use the previous 1.x layers and rendering architecture, but are otherwise identical.

"Legacy" 1.x rendering:
http://my.opera.com/boylane/blog/rainbow-viewer-endgame-release-5-the-final
http://my.opera.com/boylane/blog/rainbow-viewer-cool-edition-r12-the-last-r-i-p

"New" 2.0 rendering:
http://my.opera.com/boylane/blog/the-final-final-rainbow-viewers


And one more thing to add, yes these viewers are TPV compliant and you can use them after 30 April without fear.