Firestorm, SL's Most Popular Viewer by Far, Adds Bakes on Mesh Support

Linden Lab, the highly profitable for-profit company, released Bakes on Mesh, a feature which optimizes mesh-based attachments in Second Life, back in August. It hasn't generated much excitement from the community since then, but it now likely will: Because The Phoenix Firestorm Project Inc., a non-profit corporation comprised of volunteer developers, just released an update to their Firestorm viewer with Bakes on Mesh Support:

The Bakes on Mesh release from Firestorm has been long awaited; apologies for that. This should be considered by all in SL a MAJOR UPDATE, and it is important that all our SL users upgrade to it. This update contains a lot of rendering-related changes from Linden Lab, without which you WILL be running into avatars that look badly broken to you.

The Firestorm viewer is by far the most popular among  active SL users. Which is to say any new Second Life feature created by Linden Lab the for-profit company is essentially unusable unless it's supported by the efforts of a volunteer non-profit. Which is a keen irony worth discussing further! But that's for next week. Meantime, go here for all the updates for the new version of Firestorm.

Comments

[Mondy]

As predicted and expected,every group, forum and blog is awash with confused users and pleas for help from Firestorm users needing guidance, despite BoM being available in other viewers for some time and in the official viewer for testing even longer. Every day the Maitreya groups are asked when their body will be updated with the same response they've had for months "When it's ready".
Some TPV devs knew it would boil down to FS to generate any kind of excitement, if excitement & interest are the right words.

For me it means I can see people properly if they choose to use it and possibly make use of some old items if I choose to use it myself. But..god! If I have to see people walking around with ugly toes because their old system skins don't apply to the feet?...Please wear shoes or boots to cover that up!

[Pulsar]

SLink was ready and did a good job. Maitreya has been caught with their pants down even if Bakes on Mesh was on testing since ages and released a month before Firestorm.
BTW you don't need shoes to fix the toes (and fingers) of your old skins, simply get the excellent kit from League and you are set:
https://ryanschultz.com/2019/10/03/second-life-bakes-on-mesh-truly-a-second-life-for-your-system-avatar-skins-and-clothing/

[anon]

I hope Maitreya doesn't make the mistakes slink did, if that takes longer so be it. We need someone where else to go after slink burns her existing user base with redux awful update.

[Huggz You]

@anon calling B.S on that!

since 2014 i have gotten many new updated bodies with this one being the best yet! all for if i remember? L$2500
So for years i have got new bodies for free! as many others DO NOT provide free updates!!
my LAQ heads never got updates, she wanted me to repurchase the new versions of the Trinity Head after paying L$7800 FOR IT!

The only thing Maitreya has done better is some somewhat subjective sexy advertisements.

[anon]

If you wanted to go back to 2013 and be a system body 2.0 then yes great update.

If you bought and updated to a mesh body because the alphas never work right and here was a great system called alpha cuts. That all the bodies made not just slink. If worn alphas were the greatest thing ever made in sl, then why do all the mesh bodies have alpha cuts? because people hated the worn alpha and being a system avatar.

Slink is calling her downgrade a upgrade and telling everyone to just buy again its your problem. Slink is not adding anything she is just taking away your use of alpha cuts, your use of appliers, removing your ability to target parts of no mod textures, and saying hey better learn gimp/paint shop pro for what used to work before now doesn't.

[Blaise Glendevon]

You can use Bakes on Mesh on all Omega compatible mesh right now. With the bodies that still have alpha cuts. With heads that still take appliers as well. Lord, y'all.

[Simple Lemon]

I don't understand. They think I'm going to wear my old funky classic clothes pasted flat onto my Slink Hourglass mesh body, instead of all my really nice mesh clothes? Why would I do that? I really don't understand.

[Blaise Glendevon]

Applier/layer clothes are excellent for a little added modesty or to wear under a piece of mesh clothing that doesn't lend itself to having a pair of mesh pants added. I'm LOVING some of my old skins from brands that didn't make the jump to mesh, too.

[Whiskers]

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[Blaise Glendevon]

It's really not that hard, if you have working reading comprehension and are willing to ask questions.

[TD Gunner]

@Mondy can you please cd on the ab's for things in SL. It makes you CM's hard to UN for those of us that are not FAM with the lingo. Is it so hard to full type the words?

[Amanda Dallin]

@Simple Lemon. I don't think anyone is going back to system clothes. BoM allows you to use skin and tattoo layers and as Blaise Glendevon has said, modesty clothes that would be skin tight, without all the extra onion skin layers on mesh bodies. The added complexity of current mesh bodies do cause lag in SL. BoM will enable those bodies to reduce their complexity without losing any of their detail.

@anon. I've no idea what you are going on about that alpha layers didn't work. They are far more flexible than an alpha cut hud but of course that depends on the skill of the person making the alpha layer.

[Simple Lemon]

Thank you for your posts. Ok, I get it now. This is not a big deal at all. A few women will be able to wear old skins that they could not wear on their mesh bodies and almost no guys with expensive mesh bodies and mesh clothes will do anything at all. If you want you can now wear classic underpants. As to the system lag that is all on Linden Research not on us residents. Linden Research is a rich company with a huge cash cow called SL and if they want to reduce system lag they certainly could do that. If I have too much on my mesh body I take stuff off to improve FPS.

[OMG]

After trying clothes on my Slink Redux, thinking that Slink could not possibly have made what seemed like an obvious blunder -- I just gave up. No way is the user base is going to stay with what is basically an empty shell, with no features for 2000 Lindens. Just use a Ruth for free. No alpha cuts? Really?

It's like going to buy a car and being offered one you hitch to horses.

I have abandoned Slink -- IMO Redux is unusable.

[Mondy]

@ TF Gunner: re." can you please cd on the ab's for things in SL. It makes you CM's hard to UN for those of us that are not FAM with the lingo. Is it so hard to full type the words?"

What on earth, I've no idea what that all means, CM's? UN?
The only abbreviation I used was TPV which stands for Third Party Viewer, the common abbreviation used by Linden Lab, New World Notes, and almost everyone. There, even typed them out for you instead of using LL and NWN .
If you really couldn't figure out that BoM stood for Bakes on Mesh when that's what this article is about and what I'm replying to, then there's not much I can do about that. I don't use text speak but that's the abbreviation used in SL, capital B, lower case O and capital M.
*LOL* (yes, the LOL is deliberate, means laughs out loud in case you wondered?)