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Boy Lane :: Cool Viewers for Virtual Worlds

Odds and Ends from Another Life

Solid Gold

Sunday, 21. December 2008, 13:14:25

[Update 6th May 2009] New build 1.19.0.5 R58. New in this release: Latest RestrainedLife 1.17.
Here comes the most stable, most usable, most feature rich and rock stable viewer for virtual worlds around. And it just has been updated once again.

It is the Cool Viewer in the long established version 1.19.0.5 R58. Clean, fast, efficient and rock stable. It has all the latest security updates, bug fixes, feature add-ons, and of course it has Marine's latest RestrainedLife. It can only be gold after 58 releases (!). And I call it Solid Gold :smile:.

As always you need to install first the official LL viewer (that's an older version!):
1.19.0.5 (non Windlight renderer):
http://download-secondlife-com.s3.amazonaws.com/Second_Life_1-19-0-5_Setup.exe

Then download the latest Cool Viewer installer of the same version as the LL viewer you've installed just now:
http://coolviewer.googlecode.com/files/CoolViewer_i686_1_19_0_5_Release_58_exe_xml_only.exe

Run the installer and select your install path (here usually "C:\Program Files\SecondLife" and install CV into this folder and replace all existing files.


Please start CV with the included Cool Viewer.lnk shortcut, but take note that you may have to adjust the properties to match where you've installed the viewer.


In case you have problems with updating an existing/older version, please follow these steps:

Assuming you already use a SecondLife viewer, otherwise you would not be here , you should follow the following steps.

1. Make sure your hardware/software is ok

If you crash, something may be wrong with your PC, like a for instance a faulty memory module. Could also be some virus. So I suggest you run a full system check first for hardware and software. I remember Everest (http://www.lavalys.com) was a good free utility but there are many more out there. Also run a virus and spyware scan.

2. Always do a clean install

If your computer is ok, you should do a fresh installation. Get the official LL viewer running first. That means do first a complete uninstall of your Secondlife viewer. Afterwards delete all files in your "user_settings" folder. That you can find here:
WinXP: C:\Documents and Settings\<you>\Application Data\SecondLife\
Vista: C:\Users\<you>\Appdata\roaming\secondlife\
Please also check for .xml files in your <avatar name> folder in the same directory and delete them.

Now install the official LL Secondlife viewer and get it running properly.

3. Install the Cool Viewer

To install the Cool Viewer, you need to get the CV archive with the same version as your Secondlife viewer you just installed. Extract the complete archive over your installed viewer. You can use for instance WinRAR or WinZIP which are common tools on almost every PC. Guess the internal Windows ZIP should work too. Replace all files, not only the SecondLife.exe. If you still don't know how, unpack the CV archive to a temporary folder and copy all (!) files manually into your Program Files\SecondLife folder. You will be asked if you want to overwrite existing files. Answer always "yes".

After all, start the Cool Viewer with the included Cool Viewer.lnk shortcut. You may want to replace the shortcut in you Start Menu with the new one too.


Source archives (GPLed):
http://coolviewer.googlecode.com/files/src_1.19.0.5_58.tar.gz


Enjoy!
Boy

Bloodlines - A pest and rip-off Pyramid Selling scheme!New official Cool Viewer 1.22.11.0 Release 3 with new RestrainedLife 1.16.1

Comments

Anonymous 23. December 2008, 05:50

Jannae writes:

My client crashes when I click on the friends tab. Maybe I should do a fresh install (I copied and pasted 1.19.0.5 R42a over the previous version). At present I am using Nicholaz's viewer until I get time to sort this out.

boylane 23. December 2008, 09:00

You should not copy and paste but extract and overwrite :smile:. A fresh install is always a good idea. Hope it works.

Please make also sure you start CoolViewer.exe, not the older SecondLife.exe. Names have changed.

Anonymous 23. December 2008, 20:35

Jannae writes:

Fresh install did the trick : )

Anonymous 24. December 2008, 21:18

Anonymous writes:

R42a crashes for me immediately. The main window doesn't appear. I am using XP with a dual core processor.

I deinstalled SL, deleted the settings directory, installed Second_Life_1-19-0-5_Setup.exe and then R42a.

R42 is working fine.

boylane 25. December 2008, 06:23

Probably you did not extract and replaced all files with the ones from the archive. You need to copy not only the .exe but all .xml files over the existing ones. Then start the viewer with the included CoolViewer.lnk shortcut.

If you use the old SecondLife shortcut it will crash too, may be the other reason.

Anonymous 25. December 2008, 16:03

Anonymous writes:

I used the old shortcut - that's problem. Thanks :-)

Anonymous 31. December 2008, 07:27

Anonymous writes:

I'm really new to this sort of thing, what with the extracting and overwriting. I think I got the hang of it, but when I try to extract the files to my second life folder it gives me a big list of access denied errors. Could you please tell me if there's some really dumb mistake I'm making, and how I should fix it? ^_^

Anonymous 2. January 2009, 05:12

felina fullstop writes:

I am getting the same errors as anonymous above me ...is it vista?

Felina

boylane 3. January 2009, 14:13

I don't use Vista but I suggest you log in with admin privileges to copy and replace files.

Anonymous 4. January 2009, 07:12

Pamber writes:

Hi,
Just tried installing your viewer and it tries to load.. but won't do a thing. I did notice the version of sl has changed. Is that a problem? Do I need to use the older version you mention above?

boylane 4. January 2009, 09:23

@Pamber

You need to use the same version of the SL and CV. That is either 1.19.0.5 or 1.21.6.0. They are linked to together in the "Current Releases" posting or for 1.19 you find it in the first posting here. Install the official SL viewer first, then extract all files of the CV over it and replace all files. That's all :smile:

Anonymous 7. January 2009, 12:00

Carnal Aristocrat writes:

I'm trying to use CV 1.19.5 with the 1.19.0.5 release of SL.

After following the instructions, all looks fine until I try to log in. CV starts up and once I get logged in, CV just closes and disappears. Any idea what I'm doing wrong?

If it helps, my OS is Vista and I have a channel (-channel jabroni) entered in the original SL icon so I am not forced to upgrade. Oh, I've also fresh installed numerous times, restarted my computer and so on with no luck.

I like how 1.19 only uses 200 MB of RAM. Plus I want to click on the prettiful CV icon when I is the mood to be abused. xD

Thanks ahead of time for any ideas you have about my problem, Boy Lane.

boylane 7. January 2009, 17:27

May be some .xml file that was not overwritten with the CV version. Vista sometimes prevents that. Also make sure to start CV with the included Cool Viewer.lnk shortcut. The channel should not cause a problem.

I don't have Vista so I can not test it, perhaps someone else could try if all works?

Anonymous 8. January 2009, 01:18

Anonymous writes:

Boy,

First time I've encountered problems. Release 11 has a new EXE, no? My problem is that when I run SLV with CV rel 11 installed, my FPS crashes to around 4.4-4.6 and my CPU usage rockets to over 50%.

I have a quad-core 3.73Mhz CPU with 4Gb RAM and dual Ge Force 8800 GPUs witha Gb of RAM between then (512Mb each)

By comparison, running SLV 1.21.6.99587 on its own clocks at 34 fps, while running it with Release 10 of CV clocks at 20fps.

In both caes, CPU % never exceeds 20-22%.

Have reverted back to Release 10 for the present.

Anonymous 8. January 2009, 01:19

Inara Pey writes:

Sorry... the above kept giving me a 504 error when trying to post with my name

boylane 8. January 2009, 02:32

@Inara

You can try to rename CoolViewer.exe into SecondLife.exe, but I don't see how this could make a difference. It's pretty much the same build as R10 with some additional patches. Both are compiled with the same libs under VS2003.

I will try if I get something similar. Using 175.19 driver here, thats the last working one without the palletized textures problems.

Anonymous 8. January 2009, 15:16

Tex writes:

I installed and ran coolview... my question is why I can't get the open chat tab in my communication window. It is not there. IM tabs are available but not the 'open chat' one. Please advise if I installed wrong or if this is a setting i can turn on somewhere. I did find where i could at least watch the local chat but then actual typing field bar is not there. I still had to go to the bottom of the screen and open the typing bar for any open chat communications.

boylane 8. January 2009, 15:42

@Tex

There is no Communicate window in Cool Viewer. You have separate Chat and IM tabs as it was in the old UI. They behave like the bloated communicate feature, but are separated for better usability and control.

To get the Chat window with a input typing field you simply need to go to Preferences, Cool Features and unselect "Use the 'old style' chat history window". Then restart and click on Chat / History.

Anonymous 9. January 2009, 20:39

Skillwar writes:

Thinks about switching to your version...which one should i get 1.19.0.5 or 1.21.6.0. ??

BuccaneerBraveheart 9. January 2009, 23:22

I am presently using the Nicholaz eye candy viewer, on an old win XP system that has 3ghz, 2G ram and nvidia 7300. The Nickolaz EC works great
(ver 1.94). When I tried the Cool Viewer (ver 1.96) the frame rate jumps off the cliff(1 or 2 FPS) using nvidia driver 175.16. Why I can't get past the old viewer 1.94 is driving me mad.


Any help? Thankyou!... Buc

boylane 10. January 2009, 06:35

@Buc

I made some tests and could partly reproduce a low framerate. However only at the first start of the viewer. The second and subsequent starts gave me the full FPS. This was tested with an just updated 177.15 driver (Lenovo laptop).

What I then did was installing the RC on that machine. This wiped out my whole Application Data/Secondlife folder with all settings inside. Bit strange behaviour previous viewers did not show, but obviously the Lindens also know that old settings may screw things up.

After this I had to reconfigure also the 1.21 and 1.19 viewers and bingo, no more slow down.

So if you experience low FPS, please completely delete the whole Secondlife folder under Application Data (back up your avatar folders first if you have logged chat and IM's you want to keep).

boylane 10. January 2009, 06:38

@Skillwar

The 1.19 has no windlight renderer, that should make it better suitable (faster) on older hardware / slower graphicscard.

If you have a machine up to date I suggest to use 1.21, the graphics look better. But there are certain issues with slower loading of textures compared to the 1.19.

Why don't you try both, you can install them in parallel in different folders.

Anonymous 13. January 2009, 08:50

Nakita writes:

When opening preferences in 1.19 I get the following message:
The following required componentes are missing from cool:
date_format_combobox combo_box
time_format_combobox combo_box

Nakita

Anonymous 13. January 2009, 09:25

Nakita writes:

Hi Boy

I did a complete reinstall as you described on the downlaod page. I can run 1.19 (with the problem described above), but I do not manage to make V1.21 R12 work.

I could flawlessly use the R8 8-Dec build before. The R8 relases even continued to run for several days with the files of R12 applied (as I did not realize, that you changed the name of the main application).

Any ideas what else I could try?

Nakita Kaul


P.S.
Please do include the Rxx into Halp -> About

Anonymous 13. January 2009, 09:48

Nakita writes:

Addon to above message:
- Second_Life_1-21-6-99587 by Linden runs perfectly.

I did try the RC for 1.22 as well. Same problem.

Nakita Kaul

boylane 13. January 2009, 09:50

@Nakita

You probably missed to overwrite some files. There has been a change in R44 and R12 introducing a new handling of date/time formats. It's not enough to just copy the .exe into the existing directory. Please try to extract the archive again and replace all files. You should get a prompt / warning from Windows when doing so.

Anonymous 13. January 2009, 18:45

Nakita writes:

I deleted the whole installation directories and restarted installation from scratch. Someone told me I might have a graphic driver problem. I found a description that comes close to the experience I had a few hours after writing the entries above. http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=76090

However reverting to my old drivers did not help (nor the other ideas described in this discussion): 1.12R12 crashes. Is there a log or something to track such errors?

Nakita Kaul

boylane 14. January 2009, 02:04

Hi Nakita, no, that doesn't cause crashes, only partly black bodies when you use newer drivers that do not support palletized textures.

Please do the following:
1) Uninstall Secondlife
2) Delete the Secondlife settings folder completely (backup chat and IM logs first)
WinXP: C:\Documents and Settings\<your account>\Application Data\SecondLife\
Vista: C:\Users\<your account>\Appdata\roaming\secondlife\
3) Install the official viewer, make sure it works
4) Extract the CV archive and replace all files with the ones in the archive
5) Start CV with the included Cool Viewer.lnk shortcut

Anonymous 14. January 2009, 16:31

Nakita writes:

Hi Boy

I did this time EXACTLY as you wrote (well, basically this is the same as I did last time, but then I removed the XML's in ...\ApplicationData\Secondlife after I found problems and used my own Shortcuts (adapted for R12)).

SecondLife.EXE (LL) will run perfectly.

CoolViewer.Exe CRASHES immediately after the SecondLife-Window goes to fullscreen. I am not able to enter name ans password.

SecondLife.Exe (LL) still runs perfect after that. So I decided to change the language from System German (my locale is SwissGerman) to English.

I restarted the CoolViewer. Still crashed.

I rebooted the system to make sure, that no old had stuff had remained in memory....

I restarted the CoolViewer. Still crashed.

Is there a way I can further investigate what moment the crash occurs? I did found this in SecondLife.log:
2009-01-14T16:14:26Z INFO: LLShaderMgr::loadShaderFile: Loading file: shaders/class1/avatar/eyeballF.glsl (Want class 1)
2009-01-14T16:14:26Z INFO: LLControlGroup::saveToFile: Saved to C:\Documents and Settings\sup\Application Data\SecondLife\user_settings\settings_1.21.xml
2009-01-14T16:14:26Z llxml/llcontrol.cpp(494) : error
2009-01-14T16:14:26Z ERROR: LLControlGroup::getRect: Invalid rect control FloaterStatsRect

I downladed Restrained Life Viewer for Microsoft Windows Version 1.15.2 (needs SL 1.21.6 to work) Posted on 12/13/08 by Marine after that. It runs (with this ugly Userinterface, sighs…) but after a few minutes I loose the ability to show invisible objects with Ctrl-Alt-t. So I'm not luck with that too…

If you have no further idea what to look for. I could revert to R8. I did not have actual problems with this release.


Kind regard, Nakita

P.S.
- I did not yet reinstall the the latest graphics driver.
- RC of SecondLife 1.22 (LL) runs fine, Cool Viewer 1.22 crashes too…
- I used 1.19R44 yesterday. This starts fine and RLV is enabled (some stuff testing it and giving status message after logon). BUT: some restrictions (e.g. NoIM) did not work! And yes: I did reset the RLVR…. and the usual things you try in such situations

boylane 14. January 2009, 16:59

Nakita, when SL and RLV still works it means you did not replace the files with the ones from the CV archive. You need to overwrite all .xml's!

These are all for english only, please try that.

Anonymous 14. January 2009, 17:15

Null writes:

I was wondering if anyone could confirm/deny this:

After a few tests, I've noticed slower object load/Texture load times in the newer 1.21.6.0 R12 Version of CV compared to the older 1.21.6.0 R8.

After a few clean installs of both clients, deleting my SL application data folder with each install, and making sure each had the same options enabled on first load, I'm definitely seeing slower loading of objects and textures in the R12 compared to the R8 version.

Any ideas what could be happening?

PC Specs In case you need them:

Windows XP SP3
Intel Core2Duo 2.66Ghz
4 GB DDR2 1066mhz Ram
Nvidia 8800 GTS 512mb
Forceware 175.16 (I know I'm not using 175.19, the difference as I've seen is nil)

Anonymous 14. January 2009, 21:07

Henri Beauchamp writes:

@Null

There has not been any change to the textures and objects rendering between the two releases you are citing.

Perhaps Boy used a different compiler or different optimizations.

I can see no difference in speed under Linux...

boylane 15. January 2009, 01:57

@Null

I had a similar effect before at the first start. It was somehow related to old settings. You can check that with the framerate in the statistics window. What I think helped was to delete the Applications Data/Secondlife folder (what the RC automatically did during installation). But I'm not sure if it also changed some settings in the registry. Afterwards it worked fine. If you try this please make sure to backup your chat and IM logs first.

NakitaKaul 15. January 2009, 15:25

Hi Boy

Thanks for your help! The problem was finaly simple to resolve: Usually my WinZIP always extracts with 'Use folder names' set True. So I never check this and you do not realize it when extracting. This flag was cleaned out (I do not know why) and so, the whole stuff got copied into …\Program Files\Secondlife\

Astonishing: CoolViewer 1.19 was installed the same way. And it did run – at least well enough so that I supposed the problems were implementation problems…

Concerning German: After the correct installation I erroneously had German on once and it did run. Maybe not all stuff will work correct, but it would be a mistake to assume that it does not run at all.

Last comment:
Boy you write: "… when SL and RLV still work it means you did not replace the files…" If it is really true that both progams can not coexist in the same folder, then I prefer the old way of naming: My CoolViewer.EXE ws named 'SecondLive.EXE. So please change that back OR delete SecondLife.EXE. It's just more secure this way, as there will be a problem when a user starts Secondlife by means of Start -> Programs.

Nakita Kaul

P.S.
The driver problem (http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=76090) will be resolved in 1.22! https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-7957 Shame on LL: solution was published 26-Jun-2008… They could have included that in a later version of 1.21 too…

boylane 15. January 2009, 19:09

@Nakita

I'm happy you could fix all and got it running.

Regarding the naming, there is a simple issue with the trademark of "Secondlife" that does not allow to use this without explicit permission. I therefore removed all direct references to "Secondlife" and "SL". I know it's impractical but nothing I can change.
http://secondlife.com/corporate/brand/trademark/

Anonymous 17. January 2009, 00:43

Anonymous writes:

I have a different problem here than these cats. After installing the 1.19.0.5 viewer, I extracted the CV archive as described. Loaded the viewer via the provided link. The CV loads up fine. I'm able to connect to the grid. No problems there.

However there is one major problem for me. This http://i40.tinypic.com/27y4y9v.jpg

Scultpy maps load corrupted, or messed up looking. I've had this same issue with Nicholazs' BE Viewer as well. Only difference is, your viewer doesn't crash the second these sculpties start to load.

I don't experience this problem with the Windlight Featured viewers. But I would prefer using the 1.19 based viewers if I could, since they ran much faster for me.

My set up is: P4 3.0 GHz CPU, 2GB RAM, ATI Radeon X1650 Pro, Dual Booting on XP Pro/Vista Home Premium/Ubuntu (Hardy)

I get the same problems on both xp, vista. I haven't tried it on Ubuntu yet.

boylane 17. January 2009, 03:53

Yes, I've seen this before with pre-windlight viewers such as Nicholaz and earlier CV's. It's not exactly related to the viewer but to your ATI graphics card/driver.

Please try first to update to the latest catalyst version. If that doesn't help people suggested to turn down the texture memory in graphic settings to 512MB. Another possible solution was to set RenderVolumeLODFactor in Debug settings to a higher value like 4.

I had a lot of problems with a X800 card before and moved to the nVidia camp. So I can't verify if that really fixes it.

Anonymous 17. January 2009, 07:19

Anonymous writes:

I'm using 1.21.6 R12, and when names are blocked it seems like 9 out of 10 people are called "Someone", making it impossible to follow conversations. It also remembers them between logs. My wife is always "Someone" as is my sis, the two people I spend most of my time with.

Another thing: when I'm prevented from standing I can't TP, even if I'm not sitting on anything. This TP prevention is immune to exceptions. Is that the expected behaviour?

boylane 17. January 2009, 07:24

@Anonymous

Yes, that's how it works when you are blocked :smile:. Dummy names are given randomly.

For details about different features please have a look at Marine's API:
http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/RestrainedLifeAPI

Anonymous 17. January 2009, 11:14

Null writes:

@boylane

I mentioned I did in fact clear the application data folder with each install, which I made sure to mention in my first post. Also, my frame rate was fine, it was object "pop in" that was horrible. This does give me a few ideas of what it could be, going to start ripping through system services and NOD32 and see if something became screwy. I've had weirder things happen before, thanks for the help though.

Added note: not using NOD32 2.8, which is the cause of a lot of game problems, running 3.0. Though never know, I intend to check that too, it could always be a simple mistake on my side, especially with the R12 using its own EXE now.

boylane 17. January 2009, 11:33

@Null

In fact the deletion of the app settings happend when I installed the RC. It automatically deleted the whole folder without warning. There may be also some registry settings it changed, but thats just a guess.

As I said I could reproduce some slowdown, I got it fixed, but I can not reproduce what fixed it besides the installation of the 1.22.5 RC.

Slow texture load is a major issue in 1.21 and 1.22 viewers. Many people have problems, have a look at http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-8503. Parts of it were fixed in the latest 1.22.6.0 RC. You may want to give that version a try (first post in my blog).

Anonymous 17. January 2009, 17:08

Anonymous writes:

The names aren't chosen randomly each time. They are saved between logs for me. I've been name blocked for several days now and every time I've logged in everyone has had the same dummy name, and there are way more Someones than the rest of the names combined. The API doesn't go into any of the detail I asked about.

boylane 17. January 2009, 17:36

Well, that is a RLV feature. Although I have the source I'm not going to re-engineer it. Please contact Marine Kelley for ideas of improvement. CV incorporates RLV but doesn't change it to be compatible. I will tell Marine next time we talk, so she can have a look at it too.

Anonymous 17. January 2009, 19:42

Henri Beauchamp writes:

@Anonymous

For a given avatar, the name will be the same over sessions (i.e. they are *not* chosen randomly).

In fact, the displayed name depends on the actual avatar name length. Radomizing the name won't be logical as even if some avatar was not introduced to your own avatar, your avatar shall be able to recognize him/her next time they meet: it is therefore consistent to use the same replacement name over sessions.


Also, there are only six replacement names ("A resident", "An individual", "A person", "Some people", "Somebody" and "Someone"), so in crowded places you will for sure find several avatars with the same replacement name.

boylane 18. January 2009, 03:19

And in the end the reason to hide names is to hide names. You should not actually know who is who :smile:. Thought this was therefore random but Henri is correct, it depends on the length.

Anonymous 18. January 2009, 04:06

Anonymous writes:

Huh... well, I think that's kind of silly. I know names are supposed to be hidden, but I should be able to tell which messages are from different avatars. Last night I was in a group of about a dozen people where just about everyone was "Someone" and this made it impossible to even understand what they were talking about (pronouns became meaningless). I think way more dummy names should be used. I know this is something to mention to Marine, but her blog doesn't have comments and I am currently incapable of reaching her in-world. ;)

boylane 18. January 2009, 06:08

I think it would make sense to fine tune the name assignment a bit, not only based on the length of the name. Not a big effort to change. Perhaps we will have it in 1.16 soon :smile:.

Anonymous 19. January 2009, 02:33

Anonymous writes:

I think the renaming in this release (1.21.6 R12) went a little further than intended, referring to the Second Life service itself as Cool Viewer, and not just the viewer, as indicated by this error message:
"Unable to connect to Cool Viewer.
Despite our best efforts, something unexpected has gone wrong."

boylane 19. January 2009, 03:16

/me laughs

Nice side effect. But I think we can live with that. Probably Nicholaz viewer's would give you a similar message.

I did not invent this trademark BS but we have to live with it. I'm trying not to be vulnerable there.

Anonymous 19. January 2009, 03:41

Anonymous writes:

Out of curiousity, if one wanted to change that name to something else, without breaking TM rules of course. Say... Shmecond Life. Is there an xml one could edit to do so? :P

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