Second Life sets techies on stability
Linden Lab is working to improve the virtual world...
Second Life's developers are working on new ways at making the virtual world more stable.
Linden Lab has revealed its tech group is tackling several areas that it hopes will make the Second Life Grid - the platform which allows users to build their own islands - work more efficiently and reduce technical problems with the service.
Second Life - the business evolution
Click on the links below to see pictures of some of the many real-world businesses that have set up outposts in Second Life.
Toyota
Nissan
Intel
Dell
Cisco
IBM
Circuit City
Sears
Wired
ABN Amro
Samsung
Field Fisher Waterhouse
AOL
Adidas
Nissan
Sun Microsystems
Reebok
Penguin
American Apparel
Reuters
CNET Networks
PA Consulting
Yankee Stadium
Writing on the official Second Life blog, senior VP of global technology at Linden Lab, Frank Ambrose, said the techies are focusing on the intra-grid network, asset storage clusters, central databases and host/transit data services.
He said: "Some areas will be addressed through short-term initiatives, while others will require significant rearchitecture, software changes and new physical hardware."
One element of the Grid being looked into involves the storage of assets - such as uploaded textures, snapshots, scripts and objects picked up by users. The team found these are rarely accessed but take up critical storage space, negatively affecting performance and stability.
The data will now be moved onto different storage mechanisms to avoid pushing the storage clusters too hard.
Another project involves connecting the simulator environment to the Linden Lab databases. The company currently uses VPN connections but as these scale-up poorly, a new approach is being sought.
One of the criticisms levelled at Second Life has been around its interface and usability, which some industry watchers argue are holding back adoption.
Steve Prentice, VP and fellow at Gartner, said: "The user interfaces at the moment are [going from] bad to worse. To me the big challenge really is to lower the barriers entry."
Emerging technology specialist at IBM, Robert Smart, added there are also challenges around accessibility and identity management that need to be addressed. "I think over time we'll start to see more of these browser-based virtual worlds appear because people do want the convenience. To download a big client and install it is a bit off-putting for a percentage of the general public," he said.
Other users, however, are expecting enhancements to the virtual world. David Naylor, a partner in law firm Field Fisher Waterhouse, which has its own office in Second Life, told silicon.com: "I think over the next year we will continue to see significant improvement both in terms of the technology in terms of user interface, graphics capabilities, processing capabilities."