Open metaverse viewer is a project aimed to package the Second Life(tm) viewer for Linux distributions, its primary goals are
- To only use opensource components and to remove any non-free dependencies
- Correct operation on 32 and 64 bit Linux
- To get the viewer included within Linux distributons
- To improve stability of the viewer
This is achieved by finding issues with in the viewer and providing patches back to upstream (but including them immediately ourselves) and by importing patches from others. Without the delay of the Linden Labs QA process we can apply patches and fixes often months ahead and aadd a few extra features that Linden Labs are currently not accepting. Some of these other issues such as getting the viewer running correctly on Linux and Linux 64 systems have been ongoing for the last 18 months, working directly with Linden Labs their bug reporting, triaging and office hour meeting structures.
Currently we have active packaging projects for Debian and Ubuntu but we are seeking help from others to expand this to other Linux distributions following the fine example of co-operation shown by the Debian Games team in getting multiple distros to work together on common packages
Why the name?
Linden Labs, decided to tighten up on use of its Trademarks. SecondLife is in fact a Linden Labs trademark and there are unresolved issues over the use of this name for a project such as this. So taking the side of caution the package was renamed omvviewer.
The name omvviewer was unfornatutate because of the Open Metaverse Foundation (OMF) and it should be noted that this project is not an Open Metaverse foundation project. We fully support the work and the aims of the OMF and at some point in the future we may even switch over to their meerkat viewer as our upstream source, or offer it in parallel to this packaging of the LL client
Who?
The current developers are
- Robin Cornelius (Debian/Lead developer)
- Aleric (Debian/topgit/bugfixes)
- Terrex (Ubuntu)
- Lanny Bikcin (Arch)
- Techwolf Lupindo (Gentoo)