Sie sind auf Seite 1von 22

Second Life

A Technical Seminar Report on SECOND LIFE Submitted in the partial fulfillment of the requirement for the award of the Degree BACHELOR OF TECHNOLOGY in INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY of JAWAHARLAL NEHRU TECHNOLOGICAL UNIVERSITY HYDERABAD

SUBMITTED BY V.Ushasree [07D41A1219]

2011 DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SRI INDU COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY HYDERABAD

Dept of IT

Second Life

CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION
2.

SECOND LIFE - THE CONCEPT HISTORY OF SECOND LIFE TEEN SECOND LIFE

3. 4.

5. ECONOMY
6.

POLITICAL ISSUES & LEGAL ISSUES KEY CHARACTERISTICS

7.

8. TECHNOLOGY
9.

ARCHITECTURE OF SECOND LIFE ADVANTAGES REFERENCES

10. 11.

Dept of IT

Second Life

1. Introduction
In order to get a better understanding of virtual worlds in general, and Second Life in particular, it is important to touch briefly upon the development and character of Second Life. Virtual worlds have existed ever since human beings started dreaming. In a dream, one enters a world that may appear real, but which is not. Dreaming is an individual experience; by talking about a dream this individual experience becomes a shared one. Thus, telling stories can generate a collective image among its audience. Information and communication technologies have given virtual worlds a new character, with stories being exchanged simultaneously. On the Internet, for example, virtual communities are formed in virtual space, which anyone with a computer and an Internet connection can access. Due to improved calculation capacity and larger data streams, this virtual reality can foster more inhabitants while, at the same time, it starts to resemble physical reality more and more. Online games such as World of Warcraft are not exactly like the physical world we live in, but sufficiently realistic to draw the player in. In these virtual worlds it is possible to create one collective reality, in a way dreaming could not and storytelling only partially. In addition to these games, Second Life offers a platform without a narrative element, where a social environment is created as it is in the physical world by the inhabitants themselves. Prim Attack, an in-world developed game Second Life. Second Life is a virtual world where one can interact with the environment. This environment is made up of quite a realistic graphic representation of our physical world. The graphic component is only constrained by the individual users computer capacity and data streams. The first thing a new visitor sees is a modifiable puppet, called an avatar, which enables you to move through the virtual world. With this avatar, you can fly, teleport, or walk to practically any place within Second Life. Moreover, you can meet others, create objects, go to parties, buy kitchens and, through the introduction of commerce, earn money in a currency called Linden Dollar. Second Life is exceptional insofar that all of the content, such as clothing, cars, movies, houses, games, etc., is designed by the inhabitants; it offers a special tool for developing objects (cars, UFOs, flowers, vending machines, road surfaces, computers), which Linden Lab leaves up to the inhabitants. In Second Life some things are possible; others are not. Flying and teleporting are not possible in the physical world, but they are in Second Life. On the other hand, tactile experiences such as touch are not (yet) possible in Second Life. Second Life is divided into two parts, one for children and one for adults. Although exchange takes place to a certain extent, the two parts are essentially different. There are laws, too, in the shape of TOS (Terms of Service) and

Dept of IT

Second Life

community standards. These laws are nothing more than a code of conduct and Linden Lab claims not to want to get involved in politics or security.

Second Life Facts:


Open to the public: 2003 Beginning of rapid expansion: spring 2006 Number of inhabitants: May 2006: 165,000 September 2006: 780,000 November 2006: 1,700,000 Turnover in Second Life among inhabitants September 2006: US$ 6.4 million Number of fulltime enterprises September 2006: 3100

The chart shows two possible curves. In reality, the expansion of Second Life resembles (exceeds) the most extreme one (shown in red).

Dept of IT

Second Life

2. Second Life - The Concept


Second Life is a whole new society that exists only in cyberspace. What this shared 3-D space offers is wide open----anything is possible. It will grow and evolve and become what the inhabitants make of it. We figure that: Some people will want to explore----see all there is to see and keep up on whats new, Some people will want to use this new world as a place to meet new people, socialize and network, Some people will want to build and create buildings, monuments and attractions, as well as new clothes, textures and accessories for others to see and use, Some people will want to build an empire----start a business and make money to expand their holdings and support the artists and craftspeople who build their castles and summer homes, And, many people will find new and different things to do in this new and different world. We look forward to being surprised. Use Your Strengths Everyone is different. Everyone has their own strengths, skills and creative prowess. Some people excel in architecture. Others in scripting. Others in creating textures. Others in avatar fashion design, sound design, social design (organizing events and throw in parties) or new areas that we havent thought of yet. You are a part of the creation of a new world. We value your strengths and personality, and expect them to help us grow and develop Second Life. Stretch a little, challenge yourself and learn new things from the others. But use your own strengths. Updates There will occasionally be updates to the viewer program. When there's an update, you'll be notified when you try to log on, and instructed to go to the Second Life Website, sign in and download the latest version of the player. Hours Second Life is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We will periodically bring the system down as needed for patches and maintenance, but your access time is unrestricted. Second Life Starter Guide 3/19/03 Things to do in Second Life

Dept of IT

Second Life

Right now, when the world is fresh and new the main things to do in Second Life are: Explore Meet others with similar (or new) interests, network, make friends Participate in social events Participate in deadly battles in the Outlands Participate in various contests Create things and places others will want to explore Experiment with scripting Create textures and sounds out-of-world, and upload them Collaborate with others to build something big Start businesses that charge for Second Life products or services Much more that we havent even thought of yet----but you will. Your Avatar

Your avatar is your representative in Second Life. Your avatar may be male or female, and you can customize it in almost limitless ways. You can change your avatars appearance quickly and easily and as often as you like. When you see other avatars, their names will appear above their heads. When others see you, theyll see your name above your head (but you wont see your own name). You can attach things to your avatar, to make it even more original (and functional). The objects that you attach may be scripted, so they can function in different ways, for instance, jet packs for faster travel, guns for games, etc. Your avatar has a health rating only while in the Outlands, where the dangerous games are, and in other places where damage has been enabled. If your health rating reaches 0%, then your avatar is (temporarily) dead, and will be teleported to your home location and healed. You can easily avoid these dangerous areas if you prefer.

Other People-----Meeting and Communicating A big part of the Second Life culture is communicating and sharing with others. Theres an open chat system for communicating with others nearby, and a built-in instant messaging system for private and group conversations. You can also use sounds, animations and gestures to add to your communications. There's also a

Dept of IT

Second Life

powerful search tool that lets you find other people or groups with similar interests. Second Life Starter Guide 3/19/03 Top Tips For Newbies As a newcomer to Second Life, there are a few things that you should be aware of so you can progress quickly while avoiding making any faux pas (isnt that what my dog has?) and causing yourself or others problems: Learn by copying: look at other peoples work, copy textures, analyze others' scripts, etc. Delete your unused objects (and get your money back!). Use physics and light sparingly (they put a heavy toll on processing power----and cost you more). Dont upload copyrighted textures, graphics, characters or text. (No movie posters, pictures of Elvis, etc.) Dont build malicious objects. Objects that follow other people around are cute----but annoying after a while. Use sound sparingly. Dont be the neighbor with the annoying barking dog. Know the difference between public chat and Instant Messaging. Keep private conversations private----but dont reveal any important private information (like ATM PIN #s) at any time in-world. Use your Inventory to store things you may want later. It doesnt cost to store things there, and its almost unlimited in size.

Dept of IT

Second Life

3. History of Second Life


It has been reported that Second Life (SL) evolved as an idea by former Linden Lab CEO and founder Philip Rosedale (Philip Linden). He envisioned this vast green, continuous landscape, distributed across multiple servers and went on to build it. While dreaming of virtual worlds since his childhood, Rosedale first thought of connecting computers via the internet and creating a virtual world in 1994 and then in 1999 founded Linden Lab. Andrew Linden stated that Linden Lab (LL) was started as a hardware company geared towards the research and development of haptics. Haptics were subsequently abandoned due to heavy patent concentration. They needed a virtual world to go with their hardware, and so in 2001 they started building what became Linden World and, later, Second Life, the 3D virtual world with user generated content, where users could interact with each other in real time. In this early state, Linden World wasn't open to the public, very gun focused and it's avatars were made out of prims (so called Primitars). The video beneath shows how the world looked back then and how users could interact with it. LindenWorld was renamed into Second Life. "Originally, during the Alpha period, the grid was known as Lindenworld. As we were getting ready to launch the Beta, we decided we needed a name that would convey the expansiveness, involvement and complexity we hoped would characterize this world as it grew. We started by debating the merits of a 'place' name versus a 'descriptive' name. We believed a place name would give people a sense of destination, and possibly some added layer of meaning. And we thought a descriptive name would help people understand this new concept of a shared, 3D collaborative space." "We had a lot of ideas for place names --- one of my favorites was Sansara, which was not only euphonic, but had an interesting meaning in the original Sanskrit, meaning roughly 'ever changing world'. Ultimately, though, we chose to go with a descriptive name, and looked at many derivatives of Terra, Viva, and life. We kept coming back to Life2, and then landed on Second Life as more interesting, more evocative and more what we hoped the world could become as it evolved and grew to be as big as life." On March 13th, 2002, the first Resident (Steller Sunshine) joined Second Life and the public beta started seven month later in October. The grid consisted of 16regions, the first one being called Da Boom, which might be a reference to the Big Bang of the virtual world. Da Boom, as well as the other early region additions were all named after alleyways in San Francisco. This was a nod to Linden Lab's original location on Linden Street. The original San francisco regions, from November of 2002, included Clara, Clyde, Da Boom, Federal, Freelon, Hawthorne, Minna, Natoma, Ritch, Shipley, Stanford,

Dept of IT

Second Life

Stillman,Taber, Varney, Welshand Zoe.

While population and land slowly grew, Linden Lab released Second Life in June 2003. Back then, it had neither a currency nor where Residents able to teleport. It was in the end of 2003 when the Linden Dollar was introduced and the LindeX currency exchange followed about two years later.[3] In order to restrict simulator usage, a tax system was introduced which required every Resident to pay a weekly fee, depending on the prims they had rezzedinworld. This system was easy to trick, by just packing all prims into the inventory on pay day, and rezzing them again one day later.[4] The first trailer of Second Life was downloadable in 2003 and is shown beneath. The first Linden official blog post was made on October 4th, 2004 on the Official Second Life Blog. The first Telehubs were created in 2003, in Version 1.1.0, pay to teleport. In late 2005 Linden Lab removed most telehubs on the grid. While in the beginning, the whole financing concept of Second Life based on payed memberships, the focus was soon shifted to land sales. Residents became able to acquire and rent land, which became also a business model for some Residents themselves.

Dept of IT

Second Life

Linden Bear to celebrate the 1,000,000th Resident On May 1st 2006, Second Life Resident Anshe Chung was featured on the cover of the U.S. magazine BusinessWorld and reported to be the first person becoming an Real Life (RL) millionaire due to Second Life business. This story brought great media coverage and pitched the population growth further. On October 18th, 2006 at precisely 8:05:45 PST, the 1,000,000th Resident joined Second Life. A special Linden Bear was created to celebrate this milestone. The client was open sourced in January 2007 and Residents were asked to take part in the Architecture Working Group (AWG), to be able to influence it's development. The AWG had it's first meeting on September 13th, 2007. On April 13th 2007 Linden Lab announced the Removal of Ratings in Beta. On May 21st, 2007, the windlight rendering were announced and became part of the regular release in client version 1.19.1 on April 2nd, 2008. With the introduction of this feature, the graphics of Second Life improved dramatically. On February 22, 2008, Blue Linden announced on the official Second Life blog that there would be a new set of city style sims, namedBay City. Bay City opened for viewing on May 8th, 2008, and on May 24th, 2009, Bay City content package was released to residents. Philip Rosedale announced to step back from CEO in mid March 2008 and introduced new CEO Mark D. Kingdon (M Linden) one month later. Philip is still an integral part of the company and became chairman of the board. First Grid TP on July 8th, 2008, start of the Open Grid Public Beta July 31st in the same year. Mono was launched in August 2008 as part of the 1.24 Server deploy.

Dept of IT

10

Second Life

On January 20th, 2009, Linden Lab announces that it acquired the SL online marketplaces OnRez and XStreet SL in order to merge and integrate them in the SL service. In March 2009 Linden Lab started a project to create a new continent especially designed for adult content which came online in October 2009. The Adult policy went live September 15, 2009. In August 2009 Tom Hale gave a tour of the new Second Life 2.0 viewer due to be launched sometime in 2010. Back in June 2009 SL Massively posted a sneak preview post on the new user-interface. On January 29th, 2010, Linden Lab acquired, Avatars United. Avatars United, is a social network for users of multiple virtual worlds to connect. On February 9th, 2010, Linden Lab launched the new Second Life Forums. The Second Life Forums have been transitioned to the integrated Clearspace software. The old vBulletin forums will be archived. On February 23rd, 2010, Linden Lab announced the new Second Life Viewer 2.0 Public Beta on the Official Second Life Blog. Viewer 2 went out of beta and was launched as the main viewer on March 31st 2010. On June 24th, 2010, Mark Kingdon (M Linden) stepped down as CEO of Linden Lab.Philip Rosedale has been named interim CEO, and CFO Bob Komin has assumed the additional role of COO. On July 22nd, 2010, Philip Linden announced that Burning Life will be renamed to BURN 2.0 starting this year. http://www.burn2.org will be the website for news and information about this unique community event. On September 23rd, 2010, Linden Lab has announced that Avatars United will be shut down on Wednesday 29th September 2010. On October 13th, 2010, Jack Linden announced that Mesh Import Beta Starts Today on the test grid called Aditi. On December 23rd, 2010, BK Linden announced that Rod Humble is the new CEO of Linden Lab..

4. Teen Second Life

Dept of IT

11

Second Life

On February 13th of 2005, Linden Lab offered "amnesty" for the under-aged, in case they'd be beta testers for their new Teen Second Life (TSL). During all this time, Second Life was only open for Residents older than 17 years. Beeing 17 or younger resulted in a ban. The Residents were transfered to the so called Teen Grid (TG), which is exclusively for teens and were no communication with the Main Grid (MG) is possible. However, the Teen Grid was only open within the staffs office hours. During the first few months of TG Beta, the grid was restricted to those that were given an invite by an existing Resident or Linden Lab. Teens counted down to 1000 Residents on December 21, 2005 On January 1st, 2006, the TG opened 24/7. In March 2006 Global Kids was the first educational organization to enter Teen Second Life, opening an island. On December 24th, 2006 Eye4You Alliance Island was opened in Teen Second Life. Eye4you Alliance island closed on 12th July 2009.As of January, 2007, Linden Lab started to host TG Office Hours in Teen Second Life.On March 17, 2007, Blue and Philip Linden hosted a townhall meeting on GK island about past, present, and future of TSL.During 2007 there was problems for teens registering outside of the US WEB-734 because of a server issue. After January 2009 this issue has been fixed.On June 25th, 2008, at 2pm SLT, Torley Linden came to do a 1 hour long special TSL Q&A session with Teen Residents at TG Multimedia Stage. On July 3rd, 2008, M Linde n came to the Teen Grid and hosted a TSL special speech about Second Life 5th Birthday.In early 2009, the TSL Mentors 2.0 program was shut down by Linden Lab.As of 2009, Teen Second Life has around 50,000 Residents and over 200-300 concurrent online Residents on average online. There are 203 Teen Grid regions, however only around 130 are open to Teens.For Second Life 6th Birthday in 2009, SL6B Teen region from Teen Second Life was moved over to the Main Grid and was attached to the SL6B regions. The theme this year for both SL6B and TSL Teen was The Future of Virtual Worlds. As of 2010, the Teen Grid has 93 Mainland regions, 7 residentowned estates, and 97 educational/project estates. At any given time, there is around 2,000 teens who have been active over the last 30 days. The usual TG concurrency is about 350 residents. In February 2010, the TSL Forums was integrated into the new Second Life Forums. Teens and Adults will now share the Forums. On March 16th, 2010, Green Fun on the Teen Grid. On August 14th, 2010, Philip Linden announced that the Teen Grid would be shut down. On August 20th, 2010, Terrence Linden announced that the Teen Grid will be shut down on 31st December 2010. On December 29th, 2010, Global Kids hosted a Youth Forum on the Teen Grid Merger inworld. Teens Express Concerns, Hopes and Plans at Forum on Second Life Teen Grid Merger.

5. Economy

Dept of IT

12

Second Life

Second Life has an internal economy and internal currency, the Linden dollar (L$). L$ can be used to buy, sell, rent or trade land or goods and services with other users. Virtual goods include buildings, vehicles, devices of all kinds, animations, clothing, skin, hair, jewelry, flora and fauna, and works of art. Services include "camping", wage labor, business management, entertainment and custom content creation (which can be broken up into the following 6 categories: building, texturing, scripting, animating, art direction, and the position of producer/project funder). L$ can be purchased using US Dollars and other currencies on the LindeX exchange provided by Linden Lab, independent brokers or other resident users. Money obtained from currency sales is most commonly used to pay Second Life's own subscription and tier fees; only a relatively small number of users earn large amounts of money from the world. According to figures published by Linden Lab, about 64,000 users made a profit in Second Life in February 2009, of whom 38,524 made less than US$10, while 233 made more than US$5000. Profits are derived from selling virtual goods, renting land, and a broad range of services. The Linden can be exchanged for US dollars or other currencies on market-based currency exchanges. Linden Lab reports that the Second Life economy generated US$3,596,674 in economic activity during the month of September 2005, and as of September 2006 Second Life was reported to have a GDP of $64 Million. In 2009 the total size of the Second Life economy grew 65% to US$567 million, about 25% of the entire U.S. virtual goods market. Gross Resident Earnings are $55 million US Dollars in 2009 - 11% growth over 2008. In March 2009, it was revealed that there exist a few Second Life entrepreneurs, who have grossed in excess of 1 million US$ per year.

6. Political Issues & Legal Issues

Dept of IT

13

Second Life

Real-world legal issues involving private property and IP piracy are beginning to arise from the virtual world known as Second Life, as two recent developments illustrate. At the Fortune magazine blog Legal Pad, Roger Parloff tells of Anshe Chung, Second Life's first virtual millionaire. This is not Monopoly money, Parloff writes, explaining that Chung's Second Life holdings have made her real-world wealthy, "i.e., someone whose holdings in a make-believe world are legally convertible into genuine U.S. currency worth more than $1 million." (Read her announcement of how she parlayed $10 into $1 million.) How does her achievement raise legal issues? Parloff explains: Some online game companies have attempted to prohibit, through click-through agreements, the real-world buying and selling of online property created by players, which the companies maintain remains the company's intellectual property. ... Second Life, on the other hand, openly authorizes and facilitates exchanges between its currency and real-world currencies, so that particular legal issue does not arise. Still, you might ask whether [Second Life developer] Linden Lab is courting legal liability if its servers should suddenly go down one day, destroyed, say, in some real-world earthquake, leaving Second Life denizens devoid of "property" or at least expectations in which they've invested so much real time and money. Meanwhile, in a Business Week article, The Dark Side of Second Life, Catherine Holahan discusses the increasingly vexing problem of piracy within Second Life, in which users copy others' characters, objects and buildings, "potentially eroding the value of people's virtual property." In fact, she writes, piracy is just one aspect of a larger "crime wave" sweeping the virtual world and causing many users to demand "an official system of law and order." The piracy problem, in particular, has Second Life users "plenty worried," she writes: Andrea Miller, a Las Vegas marketing director who co-owns the Panache clothing store in Second Life, says she is concerned about her creations getting ripped off. She closed her store, which handles about 20,000 Linden dollars a day, in protest of what she believes is a lack of sufficient action by Second Life's creators. "You believe your work will be protected," says Miller. "But it's just not. It's disheartening." These virtual disputes may lead to real-world lawsuits, Holahan suggests. But there is also pressure on Second Life's developer, Linden Labs, to come up with its own procedures for dispute resolution. The site's creator, Philip Rosedale, told a recent "town meeting": "Longer term, Second Life is going to have to develop its own law or its own standards of behavior."

7. Key characteristics

Dept of IT

14

Second Life

3-D Terminology There are some terms in 3-D technology that youll run across in Second Life and in this document. Objects An object is something created in Second Life. Objects are made out of primitives (see below) and can be just about any shape, material or appearance. Objects can have physics and/or scripts assigned to them for added functionality. Primitives Primitives are basic 3-D shapes, like cubes, cones and cylinders. Primitives can be resized, reshaped, hollowed out and otherwise modified, then combined and connected to make more complex shapes and objects. All building starts with primitives. Textures Textures are the visual patterns applied to sides, or faces of primitives or objects. Depending on how its designed and where you put it, a texture can be thought of as wallpaper, a paint job or even a sign. Textures in Second Life need to be in the form of a graphic file in either .TGA (Targa) or .BMP (Bitmap) format, set to 24bit colordepth. Camera In 3-D graphics, scenes are generated from a particular viewpoint or location, known as the camera. Think of yourself as a movie director when building in Second Life, with the ability to move the camera around in the world to get the best shot. Axis (Plural: Axes) Everything in a 3-D world----including the real world, can be located in space by three numbers, one on each of three axes. Remember making graphs in math class? This is just like that, but with depth. The X-Axis goes from left to right on the computer screen. The Y-Axis goes from bottom to top of the computer screen. The Z-Axis goes from the screen straight back into the monitor, providing the illusion of depth. Sounds simple. But theres a little more to it. Since Second Life is full 3-D, and you can look at anything from any angle, things get turned around. When a primitive is created, it is assigned X, Y and Z axes. These axes stay consistent with the primitive----not with the screen. If you rotate the primitive, its axes rotate along with it.

Dept of IT

15

Second Life

Axes come into play for more than just positioning, especially when you get into joints (moveable connections like wheels or hinges). Second Life Starter Guide 3/19/03 10 Building Tools The basic tools that you will use in Second Life to build things are: Focus----Take control of the camera to view objects from any angle. Move----move a primitive or object around. Edit----Move, resize, or rotate an object. Create----Make a new primitive. Land----Modify the land in Second Life, raising, lowering or flattening as needed to prepare it for building. Link----connect two or more primitives into a single object. Make Joints----connect two primitives with a moveable connection. There are many variations and additions to these basic tools that well get to later on. But if you understand just these few simple tools, youve made a good start. Scripting A very powerful feature of Second Life is the ability to add a script, or small program, to an object. Scripts can turn simple objects into interactive experiences that impart information, play sounds, move or just about anything. The scripting language has been designed so even non-programmers can make simple modifications and customizations. (For instance, a door may have a script so it opens with a password. It will be easy to modify the door script to the password of your choice.) Well soon (if not already) have a Beginners Guide to Scripting with LSL (Linden Scripting Language) ready for download on the Second Life Website. Many Ways to Get Help There are three main ways to learn more about Second Life: 1. The online help system, 2. Downloadable Documents (like this one), and 3. The Forum and Message Boards To access the downloadable documentation: 1. Go to: http://www.secondlife.com/ 2. Click on the Current Residents Login button. 3. Log In. 4. Point to Downloads and select Guides and Tutorials from the drop-down menu. To access the message boards: 1. Go to: http://www. secondlife.com/

Dept of IT

16

Second Life

3. Log In as a resident. 4. Point to Community and select Forum from the drop-down menu. Second Life Starter Guide 3/19/03 11 Reporting Errors, Problems and Asking Questions Since this is new and very complicated software development, and is constantly being changed, updated and expanded, it wont work perfectly all the time. Please let us know about bugs, problems and anything else that makes Second Life less than wonderful. When you have problems, the program isnt working right or other things happen that you think someone ought to know about, please file a bug report. To do this, select Report Bug ... from the Help menu. You can also report bugs and other problems on the Forum. Feature suggestions are also welcome. Theres a special discussion board in the Forum for suggesting and discussing new features.

8. Technology

Dept of IT

17

Second Life

Second Life comprises the viewer (also known as the client) executing on the user's personal computer, and several thousand servers operated by Linden Lab. Client Linden Lab provides official viewers for XP / Vista / 7, Mac OS X, and most distributions of Linux. A third-party version is available for Solaris and OpenSolaris. The viewer renders 3D graphics using OpenGL technology. Since the viewer is open source, users may recompile it to create their custom viewers; modified viewer software is available from third parties. One such example is the Nicholaz Edition. This viewer, produced by Nicholaz Beresford, includes bug fixes developed outside Linden Lab that are not in the Linden Lab code. More recently a client known as Phoenix, created by a group of residents who previously made their own clients yet have since banded together to work as one, has become popular among the user base of Second Life due to the large number of features they have added to the original client. An independent project, libopenmetaverse, offers a function library for interacting with Second Life servers. libopenmetaverse has been used to create non-graphic third party viewers, including SLEEK, a text browser using .NET Framework, and Ajaxlife, a text viewer that runs in a web browser and TextSL a text client inspired by the Zorkadventure game that allows users who are visually impaired to access Second Life using a screen reader. In February 2008 a partnership between Linden Lab and Vollee was announced. In May, Vollee launched an open Beta trial for a Second Life mobile application that lets Residents travel and communicate in-world by logging in from a handset using an existing account. The service, introduced for free, requires downloading a thin client to a 3G or Wi-Fienabled handset. As of June 2009, it seems Vollee no longer exists as their web sites are no longer available. However, there now exists an iPhone application called Sparkle by Genkii which allows users to login to various virtual worlds, including Second Life. While the application does not provide a 3D virtual view of the world, residents are able to view their contacts, chat in IM or local and teleport to other locations. A special beta client is available, which has been updated and used for software testing by volunteers. The beta client connects to a "beta grid" which consists of a limited number of regions mirrored at regular intervals from the real grid. The mirroring process overwrites any changes made on the beta grid, and thus actions taken within it are not stored by the servers; it is for testing purposes only.

Dept of IT

18

Second Life

Server Each full region (an area of 256x256 meters) in the Second Life "grid" runs on a single dedicated core of a multi-core server, Homestead regions share 3 regions per core and Openspace Regions share 4 regions per core, running proprietary software on Debian Linux. These servers run scripts in the region, as well as providing communication between avatars and objects present in the region. Every item in the Second Life universe is referred to as an asset. This includes the shapes of the 3D objects known asprimitives, the digital images referred to as textures that decorate primitives, digitized audio clips, avatar shape and appearance, avatar skin textures, LSL scripts, information written on notecards, and so on. Each asset is referenced with a universally unique identifier or UUID. Assets are stored on Isilon Systems storage clusters, comprising all data that has ever been created by anyone who has been in the SL world. Infrequently used assets are offloaded to S3 bulk storage. As of December 2007, the total storage was estimated to consume 100 terabytes of server capacity. The asset servers function independently of the region simulators, though the region simulators request object data from the asset servers when a new object loads into the simulator. Each server instance runs a physics simulation to manage the collisions and interactions of all objects in that region. Objects can be nonphysical and non moving, or actively physical and movable. Complex shapes may be linked together in groups of up to 255 separate primitives. Additionally, each player's avatar is treated as a physical object so that it may interact with physical objects in the world. As of 1 April 2008, Second Life simulators use the Havok 4 physics engine for all in-world dynamics. This engine is capable of simulating thousands of physical objects at once. Linden Lab pursues the use of open standards technologies, and ses free and open source software such as Apache,MySQL, Squid and Linux. The plan is to move everything to open standards by standardizing the Second Life protocol. Cory Ondrejka, former CTO[52] of Second Life, has stated that a while after everything has been standardized, both the client and the server will be released as free and open source software.

OpenSimulator Main article: OpenSimulator

Dept of IT

19

Second Life

In January 2007, OpenSimulator was founded as an open source simulator project. The aim of this project is to develop a full open source server software for Second Life clients. OpenSIM is BSD Licensed and it is written in C# and can run underMono environment. In 2008 there were some alternative Second Life grids which are using OpenSimulator. The graphics, the Linden Scripting Language and the Havok physics enable the simulation of various real or imagined machines and devices. There are many light houses, some with detailed Fresnel lenses. Steam punk buoyant airships are common. There are combat weapons systems. A large part of the Linden Scripting Language Guide describes the features available for modeling vehicles. Popular uses of this include cars, boats, motor cycles and airplanes. Manned vehicles have advantages, but there can also be autonomous or remotely controlled vehicles. A major obstacle is region (sim) crossings, which unlike cell phone handoffs, are a problem, to users, even at walking speed.

9. Architecture Of Second Life


Architecture in Second Life (3D virtual world from Linden Lab) for RL and SL architects please tag with : SL-Architecture Architectural design involves the manipulation of space, volume, texture, light, shadow, and abstract elements in order to achieve an aesethetic end.

10. Advantages

Dept of IT

20

Second Life

In 2003, the world was introduced to a revolutionary new client program called Second Life. This internet based, virtual world, is actually a, next generation, social network service, that enables its users, known as residents to interact through identities called Avatars. In Second Life, the residents can do everything that people do in the real world that is meet other residents, explore their world, participate in various activities, indulge in trading and services, socialize, amongst other things. It must be understood that, though many people regard Second Life as a game, it is not so. There are no points, objectives or levels. Moreover, it is now being seen as an opportunity for marketers to add potential value to its business and in ways and means that are not possible using the traditional means of marketing. Its a whole new way of customer interaction. Here are a few benefits of Second Life that are changing the way people do business. You can share your real-time experience People who use a website to promote their business interests will realize the importance of this advantage. A website is at best a channel that offers one-way communication. However, Second Life offers its users the benefit of using different kinds of media channels and that too at one go. For example, an avatar, who attends a virtual meeting can chat with another avatar, which is a part of the same meeting and watch the same video the other is watching. A new promotional marketplace There is a convergence of all sorts of communication channels in Second Life. This means that various companies have created various products and concepts that are very difficult to showcase, using the traditional forms of media. Moreover, these products and services can not only be seen but also be experienced by the potential customers in this virtual world. For e.g., visitors to Second Life can make their way to Dell Island, wherein they can enter a huge 3-D dell computer, and are shown how the different parts of a computer operate. More importantly, after having a look at these inner workings, if visitors have some queries, then there are virtual representatives who are on hand to answer them on an immediate basis.

The training and recruitment advantage

Dept of IT

21

Second Life

Various companies are using Second Life as a training ground for its employees. Training series are being conducted in a virtual world to make trainees understand the finer points of various applications, software, hardware, engineering tools, methods etc. Not only this, this virtual environment is being used to conduct job interviews on a real time basis. Extensive coverage and accessibility As its environment is internet-based, Second Life has a global reach; this essentially means that its one of the best places to hold teleconferences and meetings. There are many companies that have used Second Life for various activities like: Web-Casting Product Announcements Group gatherings Press releases Product Launches Events in conjunction with partner companies There are numerous other potential benefits of Second Life, but the whole environment is still being developed and is still quite experimental in nature. As it evolves, Second Life will provide even more advantages to its users.

11. References
http://secondlife.com/developers/mapapi http://www2.kumc.edu/netlearning/SLEDUCAUSESW2005/SLPresentationOutli ne.htm http://homepage.mac.com/acrider/SL/SpaceportAlphaTalk-SV3.mov http://muve.gse.harvard.edu/ http://www2.kumc.edu/ http://homepage.mac.com/acrider/SL/ http://www.globalkids.org/olp/ http://www.simteach.com/blog http://llk.media.mit.edu/papers/dig-manip/

Dept of IT

22

Das könnte Ihnen auch gefallen