Viewer Skins/Starlight
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Important! |
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Use caution when installing these skins, as modifications to your installed software files are not officially supported by Second Life support |
| By: | Hitomi Tiponi |
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| Viewer Version: | 2.3 - 2.4 |
| Information: | Starlight 2.3.1 - 2.4.2 |
| Source: | Various |
| Image: |
About
This skin is designed to give more choice, and hopefully improve the usability and promote usage of Second Life Viewer 2.
It consists of a number of previously published viewer tweaks - produced by various residents (see credits in the downloaded 'Read Me' file) together with a continual addition of new ones. In addition there is a slight reskinning to give the interface a lighter feel (with a wider choice becoming available in versions for Viewer 2.2 onwards). It should hopefully benefit those people who have no wish to edit the XML code themselves, yet wish to benefit from a number of tweaks made by other residents, without using a third-party viewer.
The major changes that StarLight makes are listed here.
NEW! StarLight 2.4.2 works with Viewer 2.4 Beta - try out the latest version of Viewer 2 with all the StarLight tweaks
Downloads
It is VERY important that you always use the version of StarLight for the appropriate viewer release. Always use the appropriate version from the table below of all supported versions.
ALWAYS DOWNLOAD A NEW VERSION OF STARLIGHT IF YOU SWITCH VERSIONS OF THE VIEWER
StarLight is normally updated here within a few hours of Linden Labs issuing a new version of the Viewer
| StarLight Release (click to download) | Designed for Viewer 2 Release | Date Added | New Features / Notes |
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| StarLight 2.4.2 | Viewer 2.4.0 Beta 1 & 2 (2.4.0.215891 & 2.4.0.216393) | December 3rd | Two new 'light' skins, improved 'preferences' and panel opacity |
| StarLight 2.3.1 | Viewer 2.3.0 (2.3.0.214726)* | November 17th 2010 |
* Main Viewer downloaded from the Linden Lab web-site is in bold - to see which version you have look in "Help->About Second Life" in your Viewer
StarLight for Viewer 2-based TPVs
Versions of StarLight are also available for:
- Kirstens Viewer S20 - usually integrated with the Viewer
- Catznip - all StarLight themes integrated with the Viewer
- Restrained Love Viewer - 'Original Orange' theme of StarLight integrated as default skin for the Viewer
Discussions, information, support and questions
To discuss StarLight and get news of changes/versions/bugs etc. please visit the Viewer xml and Skinning Forum.
StarLight is assembled by Hitomi Tiponi - she may be contacted through the aforementioned forum, in-world or by a message on the SL forums.
Major Changes to the Standard Skin
- When defocussed, floater windows, have a near-invisible background
- Sidebar reduced in size and does not slide the chiclets/buttons along the bottom bar - from release 2.2 the undocked windows are resizable to a smaller size than Viewer 2 allows.
- Choice of three colour schemes - Orange, Teal or the new Nostalgia Blue (giving a feel of the 1.* interface) - and more to come.
- Comprehensive Shadows and Local Lights settings in "Graphics"
- Reformatted Profile panels for your own and other profiles
- Three additional Preferences panels - change the behaviour of the notification toasts, enable double-click teleport and lots of other "UI", "World" and "Rendering" preferences.
- Several UI components made semi-transparent, and resizable smaller than the Linden skin allows.
- Better formatting of tabbed IM window (tabs larger and no icons in them)
- "About Land" and "Sky Editor" buttons added to Navigation Bar
- Draw Distance slider added to Navigation Bar (between 32 and 512/992 metres, depending on version)
- Options added to the menu ('XStreet', 'Grid Status', 'My Uploads', 'My Useful Features')
- "Inventory" Button added to bottom bar
- Resize marker for bottom bar to make it more obvious (from Kirstens Viewer)
- Camera control made smaller than the standard version (similar to the Kirstens Viewer approach but smaller)
- Ability to create 100% transparent prims
- Minor tweaks to the skinning and usability (resizing columns, increasing glow, realigning text etc.)
Known Bugs and Issues
- Only working fully with English language version of the interface
- Draw distance slider appears on screen during mouselook and may produce a minor shadow effect on some widgets near top of screen
Installation Instructions
INSTRUCTIONS FOR WINDOWS AND LINUX USERS
- Log out of Second Life Viewer 2, if you are using it.
- Go to the \skins directory of the directory you use for Viewer 2 - this is usually under \Program Files\Windows\SecondLifeViewer2.
- Rename sub-directory "default" to "default_backup".
- Add "starlight" to the \skins directory and rename "starlight" to "default".
- To uninstall simply delete the "default" sub-directory and rename "default_backup" back to "default" again.
INSTRUCTIONS FOR MAC USERS
- This will create a folder called "starlight", but this folder contains another folder with the same name. It's this second nested folder you will need to drag to your Second Life Viewer 2/Resources/skins folder (explained below).
- Find the Second Life Viewer 2 application in your Applications folder.
- Right click on the Second Life Viewer 2 application icon. You will get a menu.
- Choose "Show Package Contents" from that menu.
- Open the "Resources" folder, scroll down and open the "skins" folder.
- Make sure you are not actually running Second Life Viewer 2 as you do this.
- Rename the "default" folder to "default_backup".
- Drag the nested "starlight" folder (the one inside the other "starlight" folder which was created when you unzipped the file you downloaded) into the "skins" folder.
- Rename the "starlight" folder to "default"
- To uninstall simply delete the "default" sub-directory and rename "default_backup" back to "default" again.
All these instructions are contained in the 'READ ME' files that comes in the zip package.
Recent Changes
Changes to 2.4.2 from 2.3.1
- Two new colour schemes with a 'dark on light' approach - Silver Blue, and Silver Pink
- Numerous alterations to the 'Preferences' panels to give an alternative to the LL reorganised panels
- Numeric values added in various 'Graphics' preferences settings
- Option provided to select colour name tags for friends and avatars with matching or mismatching name tags
- Detached side-panels are also adjusted by new floater opacity controls - and local chat remains opaque
- Item in menu now points to 'Marketplace' instead of 'Xstreet'
Changes to 2.3.1 from 2.2.3
- Added ability to add a Calling Card when clicking on an avatar (thanks to Kitty Barnett)
- Enable forcing on of antialiasing in computers with GPUs that LInden Lab do not think supports it
- When available will colour the tags of Friends blue/green and avatars with a different display name light orange
Changes to 2.2.3 from 2.2.2
- Further additions to the preferences panels
- Ability to build 100% transparent prims
Changes to 2.2.2 from 2.2.1
- Smaller undocked panels and minimap permitted
- Draw distance slider has maximum increased to 992
- Minor formatting changes
Changes to 2.2.1 from 2.1.8
- Now available in 3 colour schemes
- 'Sky Editor' accessible from navigation bar
Changes to 2.1.8 from 2.1.7
- Greater transparency on floaters when defocussed
- Numerous 'under the skin' changes to enable easier skinning in future
- Fixed a few minor errors in LL code
- Fixed three bugs
- Option to alter degree of avatar head movement added to the 'UI' preferences panel
- Minor formatting/textual changes
Changes to 2.1.7 from 2.1.6
- Draw Distance slider recoded
- Full length sidebar extension no longer covers toast notifications
Changes to 2.1.6 from 2.1.5
- Three extra tabbed panels in Preferences controlling more functions of the viewer
- Separation and reformatting of Second Life and Real Life details in the "Profile" tab of People
- New "My Profile" and "Edit Profile" panels
- Optional extension to place the Sidebar on the left-hand side of the screen
- Draw Distance slider widget moved from navigation to menu bar so it remains visible when other bars are closed
- "Create New Notice" button replaces confusing "+" on button for Group notice creation
- UI Size moved to Graphics preferences panel (as in Kirstens Viewer)