The Phoenix is Dead!

Last night in Second Life I had to finally abandon using the wonderful Third Party Viewer Phoenix because the recent changes on the Grid performed by Linden Labs has make the old viewer very unstable on a number of Sims. This is something I have been putting off to the last possible moment as I’ve never got on well with newer classes of Second Life Viewers because of the new interfaces I never been able to get on with.

But in the end it has been well worth waiting to the last minute to change my viewer as in the meanwhile the team which originally created Phoenix have done more development on it’s replacement Firestorm making it now one of the more usable new generation of Second Life Viewers.

So now once again I have the fun of learning to use a new viewer but at least it’s pedigree is a good one so I am hopeful I get the same experience of Second Life as I got with the Phoenix Viewer.

Please Note: If want to view my Second Life Journal then go to the Journal of a Spectral Traveller.

Please Note: If want to view a Second Life Wikipedia then go to the Encyclopedia Umbra Machina.

The Reports of Phoenix’s Death have been Greatly Exaggerated

Well it seems by popular demand from the harden users of the Phoenix Viewer, a Third Party Second Life Viewer, that the Phoenix Project Team have had to create a Mesh enabled version of the Phoenix Viewer contrary to their original plans. I am not surprised by this as Phoenix Viewer has to be one of the best Second Life Viewers out there and a large majority of mid to long term Second Life Residents do not like the newer generation of viewers based on the newer Linden Lab Second Life Viewer.

This is not because the Second Life Residents are stick in muds but frankly the newer generations of Second Life Viewers front ends are far from user friendly and not easy to use. My personal view is these front ends are very messy to use and frankly ugly. I am still mystified just why Linden Labs and the Third Party Viewer Projects changed the front end from the older more traditional front ends which were far more easier to use and most definitely more slick and functional still.

I have every faith in the Phoenix Project Team that they can create a Mesh enabled Phoenix Viewer which will be, if it works, welcomed by the hardened fans of Phoenix with open arms. My personal opinion is the Phoenix Project team should of really concentrated on the Phoenix Viewer first as after all other Second Life Viewers like Singularity have gone down the line of keeping their original front ends and implementing Mesh behind it.

So the reports of Phoenix’s death have been greatly exaggerated and once it’s Mesh enabled version hits Second Life it will be the best Second Life Viewer once again!

Just for everyone who want to find out more about the Phoenix Viewer visit their home on the internet: http://www.phoenixviewer.com/


Please note: If want to see my second life journal then go to the Journal of a Spectral Traveller.

Just How Subtle Second Life Residents Have to Be!

Linden Labs seem to be deaf to it’s residents complaints about their new V2 and V3 viewers not being user friendly or stable and continue to update it regardless of these complaints. Just how subtle do the residents have to be considering now the large majority of Second Life residents use third party viewers like Phoenix and Singularity!

Even the creators of Phoenix have had to modify their old Phoenix Viewer to cope with mesh because of it’s popularly because of it’s performance and usability which are not present in the newer V2 and V3 Third Party Viewers including Firestorm.

Simply put people do not like the newer generations of the Second Life Viewers both Official and Third Party as they are far from user friendly and look terrible. They certainly do not do Second Life and Linden Labs themselves justice.

Linden Labs please start to listen to your residents and make the front ends of your Official Viewers a lot more friendly and stop flogging the dead horse of V2 and V3!

As a final comment on Jessica Lyon who commented in a blog post on the Phoenix Web site that putting Mesh into the Phoenix Viewer as like ‘a diesel engine from a school bus and fitting it into a ford pinto’ frankly I disagree if you created the Viewers correctly in the first place!

What might be idea if you actually separated the front end of the viewers from the actual back end a standard modern way of programming which is extensively used in the world of Linux hence why there are so many distributions out there!

It may be hard work for both for Phoenix team but would be well worth the effort as users like myself would really appreciate a real choice of front end of the Second Life Viewers!


Please note: If want to see my second life journal then go to the Journal of a Spectral Traveller.