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SECOND LIFE INFO
 What
IS Second Life, anyway?- SL
Policies & TOS (Because I believe in full disclosure)
-
Quickstart
PDF (Quick reference for common things you do in SL)
- System
Requirements (Pay attention folks, they aren't kidding about them!)
Obligatory Statement:
Second Life™ SL™ and Linden Lab™ are trademarks or registered trademarks
of Linden Research, Incorporated. No copyright infringement is intended
or implied. No affiliation save as a user of the Second Life™ virtual
world is claimed.
BUT IT'S JUST A GAME, WHY IS THIS SECTION HERE?
Second Life is a training ground for our imaginations. Are you up to
the challenge?
Second Life is:
- Not a game - but you can play games in it
- Not an MMO - although it's certainly Massive,
Multiplayer and Online
- Not a chat room - although you can chat with people all over the
world
- Not a business platform - although people and companies (such as
IBM) do run business applications or PR outlets in SL
- Not the web - although it's connected to it and shares many features
It's a virtual world, things can happen in it that would never happen
in RL. People can use it as a form of therapy, exploring some of their
past issues and learning to deal with them more effectively. People
who are deaf can talk to people (via keyboard) on an equal basis. People
who are wheelchair bound, or have other pain or movement problems in
RL can walk, run and even dance in Second Life - for hours if they want.
Antisocial people can socialize on THEIR terms (i.e., when they've had
it with people for a while, they can just log off and take a break.)
This section is here because over the last few years, a significant
portion of the online vampire community has been dipping their toes
into Second Life and discovering how much fun it can be (and, in some
cases, how long it's been since they last upgraded their computers...)
Some of us have gotten involved in DJ work, some in clothing design,
and so on.
And, there's even real vampire community outreach centers available
in Second Life now.
OH REALLY? WHERE?
Here's a list - though you'll need an active Second Life account -
and viewer - to actually visit these links:
The Sanguinarius.Org Community Center can be found in the Netherfield
region:
(New location as of May, 2010 - hopefully the LAST move for a while...)
Taleisin Llewellyn's Liber Obscurum can be found in the Athan
region:
House Rosa's Sanctuary can be found in the Belleville
region (New in 2011):
SOUNDS GREAT, SO HOW DO I GET STARTED?
Well, first you need to sign up for a Second Life account. You can
do that [here].
Once you sign up, you're given the option to download what's called
a viewer. This is special software designed to access and display the
virtual world of Second Life.
By default, you will be offered the [official
viewer client], however you may find this has an unacceptable amount
of lag or crashes, or you hate the interface. (Most people gripe about
the interface, so you won't be alone!)
You do have other options available!
Since the viewer was made "Open Source" sometime in 2007,
there are a variety of third-party versions to choose from - you can
start with the [Third
Party Viewer Official Directory] page which has brief notations
of each, and a link to that viewer's home page.
Once you're in Second Life, I *very* highly recommend going through
the orientation center at Caledon Oxbridge so that you're familiar with
how Second Life works. It is THE best orientation center on the grid
that I've seen. (Plus you can get some nifty freebies there that you
can't get anywhere else...) You can reach the Caledon Oxbridge region
via this
SLURL link for older or third party viewers or this SL
Maps link for viewers using the 2.x codebase
My personal viewer choices out of the third-party viewers (TPVs) available
are:
COOL VL VIEWER
Henri has been working on TPV coding for at least 3 years now. Cool
has some rock solid stability, but not necessarily all the nifty neato
features some of the other third party viewers have. It's also reasonably
fast, and very stable.
Cool is available on  Windows,
 Linux
and  Mac,
and you can get it over here, as
well as read the blog. Minor annoyance: site uses frames.
Support
Cool has a forum where you
can ask questions and report bugs.
IMPRUDENCE VIEWER
Imprudence (with a name change coming in the sometime-future) is a
third party viewer that focuses on stable features. There's some nifty
neato features (like auto-reply to IM's) in it that are very handy,
but overall, it just plain WORKS on a wide variety of new and older
systems.
Imprudence is available on Windows,
Linux
and Mac,
and you can get it over here,
as well as read the blog.
Support
Imprudence has a forum
and questions are usually answered within a reasonable time frame. Beta/Experimental
versions are put out mostly weekly (which may be hit or miss as they
try new fixes) but the current production version is always available
too if you find the idea of using betas too risky.
RAINBOW VIEWER
Ideal For users with older machines,
or who multitask with several programs on a regular basis.
Rainbow hasn't been in active development since 2010, but is still
VERY usable in Second Life - especially so if you have an older machine,
or if you usually have several semi-intensive programs running all the
time.
Rainbow is not in the third-party viewer directory, but it doesn't
mean the program is any less functional - the coder just has a disagreement
with the newest third-party viewer policies implemented by Linden Lab,
hence the reason it's not in the directory nor in currently in active
developement.
Rainbow may be downloaded from Boy Lane's blog, and is available for
Windows
and Mac
And you'll need the earlier v1.23.5 SL client viewer as the base; you
can get the Windows
and Mac
versions off the SL
Wiki old versions page.
Support
Best method of support seems to be to leave a note on Boy
Lane's blog.
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