Downloads

Template:Needs Translation/de Template:Needs Translation/es Template:Needs Translation/el Template:Needs Translation/fr Template:Needs Translation/he Template:Needs Translation/it Template:Needs Translation/ja Template:Needs Translation/ko Template:Needs Translation/nl Template:Needs Translation/hu Template:Needs Translation/no Template:Needs Translation/da Template:Needs Translation/sv Template:Needs Translation/tr Template:Needs Translation/pl Template:Needs Translation/pt Template:Needs Translation/ru Template:Needs Translation/th Template:Needs Translation/uk Template:Needs Translation/zh-Hans Template:Needs Translation/zh-Hant

Important: This page is not maintained by, or endorsed by, Linden Lab. To download the latest official Second Life Viewer releases, please visit the main download page. For a list of third-party viewers that have self-certified compliance with the Policy on Third-Party Viewers, please visit the Viewer Directory.

Linden Lab Viewers

The following viewers are available on the official Downloads page:

• Second Life Viewer (a.k.a. the official Viewer, regular Viewer etc.)
• Release Candidate Viewer
  • Not always available
  • As the name says, these are candidates to become the next release (of the Second Life Viewer)
• First Look Viewer
  • Not always available
  • "Provide a 'first look' at new features under development" before those are ready to get into a Release Candidate or even a release
• Beta Grid Viewer
  • Only available when a new feature that is being tested on the beta grid requires a new viewer
  • Usually, you can use any viewer you like to connect to Aditi, the Preview Grid
• Snowglobe Viewer
  • Linden Lab's own "fork" of the Second Life Viewer
  • Quicker inclusion of third party contributions than in the Second Life Viewer
  • Review of contributions and QA done by the open source community (some Residents have commit access)

Third-party Viewers

Important: As previously announced, Linden Lab introduced the Third Party Viewer Policy. That policy is part of the Terms of Service updated on April 30, 2010

Third-party Viewers are those which have been created by developers not working for Linden Lab. These Viewers offer altered or additional functionality compared to the official Second Life Viewer.

The Extended FAQ states that it is okay to create and distribute third-party viewers as long they adhere to the respective licenses for code usage and server usage.

The code itself is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL), which governs modification and redistribuition of the source code. Use of Linden Lab's servers will still be governed by the Second Life Terms of Service and the Linden Lab Policy on Third-Party Viewers. The latter is being revised, so please consult the FAQ until a more final version is available.

Note to authors: If you make a viewer available make sure to include platform, version numbers and dates.

click the boxed arrows to sort on columns

Name	Type	First release	Latest Release	Status	W	M	L	i
#AjaxLife	Text		2008-09-15	Active	X	X	X	X
#Cool VL Viewer	Graphic	2007-11-16	2010-10-02	Active	X	X	X
#Combat Cubed	Graphic		2010-06-16	Active	X
#Emerald Viewer	Graphic		2010-04-19	Blocked	X	X	X
#Emerald Viewer, Frequency Edition	Graphic		2009-09-25	Discontinued		X
#Hippo OpenSim Viewer	Graphic		2010-04-24	Active	X		X
#Imprudence	Graphic		2010-08-28	Active	X	X	X
#Kirstens Viewer	Graphic		2010-08-30	Active	X	X	X
#METAbolt	Text	2008-04-15	2010-09-26	Active	X
#Meerkat	Graphic		2009-09-06	Discontinued	X		X
#MetaPay for iPhone and iPod Touch	Text							X
#Milk Release Client	Graphic		2010-01-20	Inactive		X	X
#Nicholaz Edition	Graphic		2009-09-07	Discontinued	X	X	X
#omvviewer	Graphic		2009-03-27	Active			X
#omvviewer-light	Text		2009-08-25	Active	X		X
#Onrez Viewer	Graphic			Discontinued
#Phoenix Viewer	Graphic	2010-09-04		Active	X	X	X
#Radegast	Text		2010-07-28	Active	X		X
#Rainbow Viewer / Cool Viewer	Graphic		2010-04-24	Discontinued	X	X	X
#RealXtend Edition	Graphic		2008-07-28	Active	X
#Restrained Love	Graphic		2010-09-05	Active	X	X	X
#SLeek	Text			Discontinued
#SLiteChat	Text			Active	X	X	X
#Snowglobe, Frequency Edition	Graphic		2009-10-17	Discontinued	X	X	X
#Sparkle IM for iPhone and iPod Touch	Text							X
#TEKSTUFF Viewers	Graphic		2010-04-20	Active	X
#Touch Life for iPhone	Text							X
#Toxic Viewer	Graphic		2010-03-04	Discontinued	X
#Whisper (SlXSLChat)	Text		2010-05-09	Active	X	X	X

Graphical Viewers

Cool VL Viewer

Description

This viewer was created and is maintained by Henri Beauchamp (This viewer was formerly known as the "Cool SL Viewer" and its first public release was v1.18.4.3, released on 2007-11-16). It combines elements of several of the other viewers, as well as extra features, bug fixes and extra patches, all very carefully tested.

It puts emphasis on high UI coherency from one version to the other (meaning no bad surprise for "old timers") while staying in sync with Linden Lab's official viewer features (it's not a fork which would get outdated with time), high stability and reliability, and a high reactivity to new patches and bug fixes provided by the Open Source community.

An "old" v1.19 (legacy renderer) branch is also maintained for the benefit of "old" computer users, which also gets most of the essential features of newer viewers back-ported to it (Mono scripting and adult compliance, for example). An experimental branch (Cool VL Viewer v1.25), based on the code of Snowglobe v1.5 is also available.

The Cool VL Viewer is TPV policy compliant. Please see its TPV TOS.

Extra Features

• Reverses many of the unpopular interface changes, restoring separate friends and groups floaters and reinstating the packet loss and bandwidth indicators, the old toolbar and buttons layouts, the old/normal commands layout in the pie menus, the "All(old)" search tab, the old style (name-sortable) "Groups" search tab, the "Fly" button in the movement controls floater, and optionally reinstating the old, more visible, status bar icons and/or tracking dots in the mini-map, and the old chat history floater (without chat input line). Also fixes some UI regressions (missing buttons in some floaters, or visited landmarks tracking in inventory for example).
• Implements the "RestrainedLove" API (formerly known as "RestrainedLife"), based on Marine Kelley's reference patch (switchable and disabled by default).
• Allows to configure the date and time formats to match your locale or personal preferences (including with optional seconds for chat and IM timestamps).
• Allows to wear/remove attachments and clothing items on double-click in inventory.
• Allows to optionally prevent notifications to show and be logged in the main chat.
• Allows to disable typing sounds.
• MUD/MUSH/MUCK/MUX style "poses" (i.e. you can type ":" instead of "/me " to emote), and OOC double parenthesis auto-close (i.e. you can type: "((phone, BRB" and it will show as "((phone, BRB))").
• Allows to hide the "Master volume" when not needed in the panel overlay (and the "Release Keys" button for v1.19.2).
• Allows to build large prims (up to 256m in any or all dimensions) on OpenSim (not on SL, because of server-side limitations).
• Improved friends list floater (with info about what your friends allow you to see: tehri online status and/or their position on the map).
• Improved build tools floater (smaller increments in several parameters, extra "slice" parameter for some prims, transparency up to 100%, check box toggle for drag distance limit, adjustable number of decimals in Object tab for the position/size/rotation parameters). Also allows to set the "invisible" texture from the texture picker (for invisi-prims).
• Improved texture preview floater (with aspect ratio combo).
• Improved notecard floater (with Edit menu and Search/replace feature).
• Improved mini-map with panning, larger zooming range, specific symbol for avatars above 1024m (work around for a limitation of current server and viewer versions), etc...
• Improved beacons: can filter beacons based on owner (you, others or anyone), can highlight attachments, can dissociate non-object sound sources, can keep beacons "always on" even when the beacons floater is closed.
• Allows to export and import objects you own and created as XML files (for backup and restore purpose, or to transfer objects from one grid to another).
• Allows to connect to all existing grids (and not only LL's) from the login screen.
• Allows network bandwidth over 1500Kbps (and up to 8000Kbps).
• Allows to save/compile scripts present in the inventory as Mono scripts.
• Allows to teleport to double-clicked locations on screen.
• Allows to sit anywhere "on the ground".
• Allows to adjust the Z offset (height above the floor) for playing animations (v1.23 and v1.25 branches only).
• Allows to cache the inventory in the background after login (for faster inventory operations).
• Allows to preview animations on your avatar prior to uploading them.
• Implements a group titles floater.
• Implements a radar floater.
• Implements a teleports history floater.
• Implements a "Worn" tab in the inventory floater, and a search/filter by item name, description or creator.
• Implements "speed rezzing" on login and TPs.
• Implements an object "area search" floater.
• Implements the newest LSL functions, highlighting them properly (with tooltips) in the script editor and allowing to compile them.
• Allows to ignore (and not only decline) friendship and calling card offers.
• Allows to change how minimized floaters are stacked (top/bottom, bottom/top, left/right, right/left, fraction of the screen width to use for the stack).
• Shows avatar keys in profile (in "My notes" tab).
• Shows the avatar true height in the appearance floater.
• Renders properly objects worn on the illegal attachment points defined in some hacked third parties viewers.
• Provides full support for the new Alpha and Tattoo wearables ! (full implementation for v1.23 and v1.25 branches. The partial Alphas do not render properly in the v1.19 branch: ok for full body parts Alphas).
• NEW: Provides inventory item links support ! (v1.23 and v1.25 branches only).
• NEW: Provides multiple attachments per point support ! (v1.23 and v1.25 branches only).
• Implements various backports for the v1.19.2 version (Mono compilation support, adult searches and compliance, build and TP up to 4096m, bulk set permissions, TP on double-click on LM in inventory, edit terrain "force" setting, security fixes, etc).
• Many bugfixes by Henri Beauchamp, Nicholaz Beresford, Gigs Taggart, Blakar Ogre, McCabe Maxsted and others.
• More minor features and improvements, to be discovered on the website...
• All switchable extra features easily configurable via a "Cool features" tab in the preferences floater.

Links

• Website: The Cool VL Viewer homepage
• Message board: Cool VL Viewer forum
• Linux viewer: see the The Cool VL Viewer homepage for files and installation instructions.
• Windows viewer: see the The Cool VL Viewer homepage for files and installation instructions.
• MacOS X viewer: See Hyang Zhao's site for files and instructions.
• Source code: The standard Linden codebase is used, with the addition of the patches listed and linked to on the homepage.
• Screen shots: Key features and screen shots

Version and timestamp

• Version : 1.23.5.31 (stable viewer with Windlight renderer)
• Date : 2010/10/02
• Status : Active.

• Version : 1.19.2.90 (stable viewer with legacy renderer)
• Date : 2010/08/22
• Status : Active (bug and security fixes only, no new feature developed).

• Version : 1.25.0.8 (experimental viewer based on Snowglobe v1.5.0)
• Date : 2010/10/02
• Status : Active.

[Back to the list]

Emerald Viewer

Previously known as "Greenlife Emerald Viewer" - changed to just "Emerald" in October 2009.

Description

This is a home-brew viewer which adds new functionality to the viewer with the intent of easing the user's interaction with the environment. It's developed by multiple people. Versions for Windows, Mac, and Linux are released.

While Emerald has been listed in Linden Lab's Third Party Viewer Directory, it has recently been removed due to controversy over the actions of certain involved developers. As of September 8, 2010, Emerald Viewer has been blocked from logging into Second Life.

Extra Features

• Avatar Scanner
  • Full sim range (detects over 1M in the air)
  • Shows name, age, payment info, current activity.
  • Land and estate commands for ejecting/banning multiple avatars at once
  • Buttons to open profile, IM, teleport to or track selected avatars
  • Ability to chat radar info (keys) to boost lsl radars
  • Ability to display chat notifications for entering sim, exiting sim, entering chat range, exiting chat range, entering draw distance and exiting draw distance respectively.
• RLV API Implementation (off by default)
• Different login page
• Ability to open and display the owner and location of objects that IM you
• Teleport to positions by double clicking
• Option to disable progress screens (teleport, login, and logout respectively)
• Clothing layer protection (prevents sending of individual clothing textures to other clients, ensuring they can't copy the clothing)
• Customizable IM auto-response system, including giving inventory in the response
• Fly can be set to always enabled, even with Admin menu closed
• Can turn your avatar 'visually phantom'
• Allows ground sit anywhere
• Can enable the attaching of objects in inventory by double-click
• Can block object sit-on-click
• Chatbar as a command line for rezzing platforms, teleporting to coordinates or sims, or teleporting to particular heights.
• Various crash fixes
• Free uploading of "temporary" textures (sim-local and disappear on relog)
• Notification when a friendship ends
• Detection of cooperating alternative viewers
• Shows object last owner in build floater
• Scripts are compiled to mono by default in agent inventory
• Inventory is fetched in background immediately on login
• Group info can be accessed in about land, even if group is not deeded
• Profiles show agent key
• More minimap dot colors, blue for lindens, grey for muted, and purple for friended lindens
• Build Floater Enhancements
  • More object choices (from the drop down that lets you change a cube to a sphere)
  • More precision information (5 decimal points)
  • Ability to set all prim parameters without changing shape (easy prim torture)
  • Ability to easily change sculpt stitching
  • Can set transparency to 100%
  • Can set texture repeats above 100
• Can turn off the typing sound
• Teleport History Floater
• Animation Info Floater
  • Shows you all current animations being played on your avatar
  • Allows you to stop, or revoke permissions of animations you do not want
  • Ability to detect owner of the animations being played, as well as their name
• Included the 1.23 Bulk Permissions Setting
• Option to block the 1 click auto sit
• Multiple custom skins

Links

• Website: http://www.modularsystems.sl
• Direct download link: http://bit.ly/4C5QfE or http://modularsystems.sl/downloads.html
• Online Support: http://modularsystems.sl/wiki/
• Source code: http://bit.ly/4C5QfE or http://modularsystems.sl/downloads.html

Version and time stamp

• Version : 1.23.5.1634
• Date : 04/19/2010
• Status : Blocked

[Back to the list]

Hippo OpenSim Viewer

Description

The Hippo OpenSim Viewer is a modified Second Life viewer, targeted at OpenSim users. It allows building up to a height of 10,000 m, scaling prims up to 256x256x256 m and other exciting features. More specific OpenSim features are under development. The last developer blog commented: Releasing Hippo OpenSim Viewer v0.6.3. This release adds a Windows uninstaller and small changes to comply to the Linden Lab Policy on Third-Party Viewers.

Availability Is currently available for Linux and Windows.

Links

• Website: http://mjm-labs.com/viewer/

Version and timestamp

• Version : 0.6.3
• Platforms:
  • Binary available for Windows and Linux
  • Source available (unspecified)
• Date : April 24th, 2010
• Status : Active + updated

[Back to the list]

Imprudence

Description

From the Imprudence Manifesto:

“The primary goal of Imprudence is simple: to greatly improve the usability of the Viewer. In particular, there are 3 aspects of usability that we intend to address:

• Approachability. Improving comfort and ease of use, especially for new or non-technical users.
• Efficiency. Improving speed and ease of common tasks and workflows.
• Satisfaction. Improving the emotional effect of the software on the user.

This is not to minimize other aspects of usability, such as reliability, accessibility, or internationalization/localization. We recognize their importance, but lack the expertise to properly address them. We welcome people with such expertise to join the project and help.”

Note: Due to licensing issues, this viewer does not ship with the proprietary SLVoice module and its associated files. These can be added back from the official client for those needing voice. Instructions for adding voice chat support are available on the Imprudence Viewer wiki.

Extra Features

Check the Features page on the Imprudence wiki for the most up to date features list.

• Countless user interface improvements and bug fixes
• Content Backup (export and import objects, scripts, and avatar shapes that you created)
• Minimap Radar (minimap has a built-in "avatar radar" to tell you who is nearby)
• Enhanced Minimap (better zooming, panning, double click to teleport)
• Restrained Love (RLV) API Support
• Double-click Teleport and Autopilot
• Build Math Expressions
• Windlight Toolbar (quick access to windlight presets and graphics settings)
• Grid Manager, with built in support for alternative grids like OSGrid, ReactionGrid, 3rd Rock Grid, and more
• Search Inventory by Creator or Description
• Inventory Quick Filter (quickly filter inventory to show only notecards, or only clothing, etc.)
• Worn Items Tab (shows what you are currently wearing)
• Unread IM Count (shows how many new/unread IMs you have)
• Middle-mouse Paste for Linux
• Confirmation dialogs to prevent accidents (no more accidently teleporting home!)
• Restore to Last Position (rez objects at their previous position)
• Offer Teleport button in the IM window
• Double-click to wear attachments in inventory
• "Phantom Avatar" Mode
• Asset (Texture) Browser
• Animation List
• See object's Last (previous) Owner
• Ground Sit Anywhere
• Hide Selection Outlines (hide the laggy and distracting glowing outlines when building)
• Choose Default Chat Channel
• Includes stability improvements from Nicholaz

Links

• Website: http://imprudenceviewer.org/
• Download: http://imprudenceviewer.org/wiki/Downloads
• Forums: http://imprudenceviewer.org/forums/
• The Imprudence Manifesto: http://imprudenceviewer.org/wiki/Manifesto

Version and timestamp

• Version : 1.3.0 RC2
• Date : August 28, 2010
• Version : 1.2.1
• Date : November 26, 2009
• Platform: Windows, Linux, Mac
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

Kirstens Viewer

Description

This is a Hybrid Viewer based primarily around SVN trunk,snowglobe trunk and render-pipeline , its specifically aimed at High End Systems (photography and film makers). The viewer also has additions and UI changes from Kirsten and others such as Niran's UI mods.

Major Features

• Custom Viewer 2.0 UI - Ability to use custom skins
• Custom Deferred Render Pipeline
• Global Illumination, Projected textures, SSAO, Touch Glow etc
• Modified Camera Controls
• Post Process Effects, Including Anaglyph 3D shader
• Multi wearables - Multi Attachment System
• Extra Windlight Settings and Enhanced Environment Controls
• Ability to control visual elements such as Hover text
• Enhancements to Build Controls, planar textures , transparency.
• Extra Controls for shadows,viewer,performance,global illumination

• Higher Framerates on supported hardware.

Version and timestamp

• Version: 2.1.0 (35)
• Date : 2010 August 30
• Status : Active

Links

Homepage / Forums / Downloads: http://www.kirstensviewer.com/ Source SVN: http://sourceforge.net/projects/kirstensviewers/develop Commit History Trac: http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/kirstensviewers/

[Back to the list]

Restrained Love

Description

This viewer, codename "RestrainedLove" is an attempt at enhancing the experience of people who practice BDSM in Second Life. It is used jointly with simple scripts made to use its features in-world, such as making an attached object undetachable, preventing chat and such. An API (Application Programming Interface, a text file) is provided so that every content creator can create their own scripts to interface their own items to the viewer and use its features.

Extra Features

• Attachments can be made undetachable
• Chat and IM prevention on demand, with exceptions if needed
• Teleport and sit-tp prevention on demand, with exceptions if needed
• Editing and Rezzing prevention on demand
• Adding/Removing clothes on demand, + force remove clothes and force remove unlocked attachments
• Force sit and prevent stand up (even after a relog) on demand
• Manual (by IM) and automatic (by script) version checking
• Force attach objects and outfits
• API for content creators
• And more...

Links

• Website: Marine Kelley's blog on Blogspot
• Direct download link to the Windows viewer: Download for Windows (Executable and readme)
• Direct download link to the MacOS X viewer: Download for MacOS X (Executable and readme, courtesy of Mo Noel)
• Direct download link to the Linux viewer: Download for Linux (Executable and readme, courtesy of Loom Kish)
• Source code and text API : Download (Text files)
• API as a wiki page : API (Wiki format)
• Specification to interface cages and furnitures with the viewer through the use of a relay : Relay Specs (Wiki format)

Version and timestamp

• Version : 2.1.2.2 , Standalone version
• Date : Sept 5, 2010
• Version : 1.22.1 , compiled on SL official viewer 1.23.5
• Date : 02/25/2010
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

Toxic Viewer

No Longer In development.

https://dcs.sourcerepo.com/dcs/tox_view/

Source only now as it is not actively developed.

[Back to the list]

Emerald Viewer, Frequency Edition

Description

This viewer is based on GreenLife Emerald Viewer, but includes a couple of modifications.

Added Features (compared to GreenLife Emerald)

• Busy-on-lost focus: Allows resident to automatically switch to busy mode after a set amount of time, _after_ the viewer window lost focus (good for people who have other work to do, and want to ensure that other residents know why their IMs remain unanswered)
• custom tags on a per-avatar basis: add keywords to residents' group/name tag hover box
• display group/name tags in individual colours (per avatar)
• display payment info and age in name tags
  • friends always coloured yellow
  • muted people always in grey
  • all others in a chosen colour out of 7 options
• grey out groups, which have been chosen not to be displayed in your profile

Removed Features

• IRC client
• experimental Utility Stream
• Client detection (conflicts with the aforementioned use of name tags)

Availability Emerald Viewer, Frequency Edition is currently available as Intel-only OS X binary, and as full source code for OS X, Windows & Linux.

Version and timestamp

• Version : Emerald Viewer, Frequency Edition, 1.0.2 (based on GreenLife Emerald 1.23.4-673)
• Platforms:
  • Binary available for OS X 10.5+ (any volunteers for Windows/Linux?)
  • Source valid for OS X, Linux, Windows
• Date : Sep 25th, 2009
• Status : Discontinued as of November 8, 2009, download no longer available

[Back to the list]

Phoenix Viewer

Description

Phoenix viewer is a fork of the well known Emerald Viewer, created to keep the emerald features alive after the LL block on the Viewer. This is not Emerald renamed, Phoenix is a New project, with a new team, new goals, objectives, procedures and full transparency in all they do. Starting out where Emerald left off at version 2587, Phoenix Dev's have already made alot of progress in finding and fixing bugs as well as creating some new features. Currently Phoenix is running snowglobe 1.5.1, with it's most recent release being 1.5.1.225. Phoenix is on the LL Third Party Viewer Directory

Extra Features

• Avatar Scanner
  • Full sim range (detects over 1M in the air)
  • Shows name, age, payment info, current activity.
  • Land and estate commands for ejecting/banning multiple avatars at once
  • Buttons to open profile, IM, teleport to or track selected avatars
  • Ability to chat radar info (keys) to boost lsl radars
  • Ability to display chat notifications for entering sim, exiting sim, entering chat range, exiting chat range, entering draw distance and exiting draw distance respectively.
• RLV API Implementation (off by default)
• Different login page
• Ability to open and display the owner and location of objects that IM you
• Teleport to positions by double clicking
• Option to disable progress screens (teleport, login, and logout respectively)
• Clothing layer protection (prevents sending of individual clothing textures to other clients, ensuring they can't copy the clothing)
• Customizable IM auto-response system, including giving inventory in the response
• Fly can be set to always enabled, even with Admin menu closed
• Can turn your avatar 'visually phantom'
• Allows ground sit anywhere
• Can enable the attaching of objects in inventory by double-click
• Can block object sit-on-click
• Chatbar as a command line for rezzing platforms, teleporting to coordinates or sims, or teleporting to particular heights.
• Various crash fixes
• Free uploading of "temporary" textures (sim-local and disappear on relog)
• Notification when a friendship ends
• Detection of cooperating alternative viewers
• Shows object last owner in build floater
• Scripts are compiled to mono by default in agent inventory
• Inventory is fetched in background immediately on login
• Group info can be accessed in about land, even if group is not deeded
• Profiles show agent key
• More minimap dot colors, blue for lindens, grey for muted, and purple for friended lindens
• Build Floater Enhancements
  • More object choices (from the drop down that lets you change a cube to a sphere)
  • More precision information (5 decimal points)
  • Ability to set all prim parameters without changing shape (easy prim torture)
  • Ability to easily change sculpt stitching
  • Can set transparency to 100%
  • Can set texture repeats above 100
• Can turn off the typing sound
• Teleport History Floater
• Animation Info Floater
  • Shows you all current animations being played on your avatar
  • Allows you to stop, or revoke permissions of animations you do not want
  • Ability to detect owner of the animations being played, as well as their name
• Option to block the 1 click auto sit
• Multiple custom skins

Links

• Website: http://www.phoenixviewer.com
• Direct download link: http://www.phoenixviewer.com:3000/projects/phoenixviewer/wiki/Downloads
• Online / Support and bug reporting: http://dev.phoenixviewer.com:8080/
• Source code: http://hg.phoenixviewer.com/

Version and time stamp

• Version : 1.5.1.225
• Date : 09/11/2010
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

Meerkat

Goals

• To create a fully GPL viewer (no proprietary dependencies)
• To encourage a community of developers that will submit patches for prompt integration
• To have the freedom to make the sort of changes that Linden Lab has traditionally been unable to integrate (translation patches, refactoring, fixing intentionally crippled features, changes that touch many files)
• To retain compatibility with Linden Lab's grid and protocols, present and future
• To implement a loosely coupled cross-grid functionality that requires no central authentication authority.

Extra Features

• Log out and back in without quitting
• Loosely coupled intergrid teleport -- In Process
• Most of the other changes common to third party viewers

Links

• Website: Meerkat Viewer (note: the Meerkat site is down)
• Direct download link: Download versions of this viewer
• Source code: svn checkout http://meerkat-viewer.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/ meerkat

Version and timestamp

• Version : 0.2.x
• Date : September 6, 2009
• Status : Discontinued, website offline. Source and binary downloads still available on google code (see above).

[Back to the list]

Nicholaz Edition

Description

These are Windows viewer based on SL builds with a focus on stability, usability and performance (see Installation.txt for homebrew disclaimer). Mac and Linux variants are available through other open sourcers (links on the website).

Extra Features

• Improved stability
• Lower memory footprint
• GUI redesigns
• Workarounds for common annoyances (Group IM Filtering, "Release Key" button, etc.)
• see this entry for an overview of different versions

Links

• Website: Nicholaz Beresford on Blogspot
• Direct download link: Download versions of this viewer
• Source code: Look at the download site for the source-xxx-zip files in the respective folders and see the readme.txt inside the archives

Version and timestamp

• Date : 09/07/2009
• Status : Discontinued

[Back to the list]

Onrez Viewer

Description

The Onrez viewer was made by the Onrez company in connection with a Second Life themed story on the high tech forensics based TV show "CSI: New York".

Extra Features

• A back and history button for teleports
• In-viewer web browsing.

Comment The source code for this viewer is closed source.

Version and timestamp

• Status : Discontinued, download no longer available

[Back to the list]

Rainbow Viewer / Cool Viewer

Description

Based on the offical SecondLife sourcecode licensed under GPL2, this speedy Metaverse Client can connect you to a huge variety of exciting Virtual Worlds! It incorporates a lot of improved, new, up- and backported features and fixes that make the fast and rock stable RV/CV the client of choice for many users.

This viewer includes many patches and changes from a lot of different people and sources which I am very grateful to be able to use. Credits are given to everyone I know, in case I missed someone I sincerely apologize.

Thanks to Henri Beauchamp who laid the foundation for this viewer with his Cool SL Viewer. Special thanks to Winter Ventura for the Cool Viewer logo and Jacek Antonelli and Peter Stindberg for the Rainbow Viewer logo :). And to all the others who helped and supported me, especially the people involved and behind Imprudence!

Some incomprehensive list of features

A major improvement is an up-to-date OpenGL implementation that especially helps users plagued by ATI's Catalyst drivers but also leads to measurable improvements of overall graphics performance by 30...100% compared to the official viewer; depending on your system. Rainbow Viewer features the current user interface whereas Cool Viewer spots the leaner cleaner and more configurable legacy UI. It's all about choice :).

• New 1.22.12.0 code baseline
• CV's legacy User interface with a clean, simple and userfriendly layout or Rainbow Viewers current official UI, you choose!
• Improved Graphics rendering, especially for ATI users (measured >1/3 faster than the official viewer)
• Alpha and Tattoo Layer support from SL 2.0
• Updated tested list of Virtual World grids
• Marine Kelley's RestrainedLove (off per default)
• Full Adult Compliance
• Redesigned and "up-ported" search functionality, probably the best search in any viewer nowadays
• Jiggly Bewbz :)
• Temporary texture and animation upload
• Better inventory search for content, description and creator
• Low lag radar and AV management tools
• Viewer skinning
• Object and Shape export/import, limited to creator
• Bulk permission editing
• Last owner display to track content theft
• "Worn" tab in inventory
• Double click to wear attachments
• Enhanced building tools
• Flexible Sculpties
• Large Prims (currently only for Opensim grids due to SL limitations)
• Maximized Network Bandwidth
• Flexible Grid selection at login for SL and all OpenSims
• Teleport History and speedy doubleclick teleport
• Avatar UUID in profiles
• Features tab in Preferences for easy switching of features
• Optimized latest OpenJPEG 1.3

...and a large number of other goodies and stability fixes that improve your overall experience. Too many to mention here :). Please check the Release Notes for details.

Links

• Website: Rainbow Viewers for Virtual Worlds
• Direct download link: Binary versions on Google Code
• Source code: Sources on Github

Version and timestamp

• Rainbow Viewer 1.22.12 R6
• Rainbow Viewer Cool Edition (Cool Viewer) 1.22.12 R13
• Rainbow Viewer Netbook Edition v1.2 (speedy pre-Windlight 1.19.0.5)
• Date : 24/04/2010
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

RealXtend Edition

Description

The realXtend viewer is a heavily modified version of the Linden Lab's Second Life client by a partnership of two Finnish companies, ADMINO technologies and LudoCraft.

The successor to the realXtend viewer is Naali (release 0.3.1 on 21st September 2010, download from http://code.google.com/p/realxtend-naali/downloads/list).

Extra Features

   * Second life compatibility mode for use in SL and Opensim worlds
   * Teleports between realXtend and Secondlife

Links

• Website: http://www.realxtend.org/
• Direct download link: http://www.realxtend.org/downloads.html
• Source code: http://sourceforge.net/projects/realxtendviewer/

Version and timestamp

• Version : 0.4.2
• Date : 09/24/2009
• Status : Discontinued, replaced by Naali.

[Back to the list]

Snowglobe, Frequency Edition

Description

This viewer is based on Linden Lab's Snowglobe Viewer, but includes a bunch of modifications, some of them custom-made, some adopted from other viewers (Emerald, Meerkat, Cool SL).

Snowglobe: Frequency Edition -- Features

Some highlights:

• Kitty Barnett's RLVa 1.0.4e.
• Radar client / Avatar List
• Teleport History Floater
• Double-Click Teleport
• Double-Click Inventory Actions
• Inventory Quick-Filter
• Custom Tags for Avatars with Colours (and Payment Info/Age)
• Z-axis Offset Change to avoid Sinking into the Ground
• Option to disable Progress Screens (Teleport, Login, and Logout respectively)
• Show List of alt Avatars upon Login
• Detection when someone starts a new Instant Message (allow to optionally steal Focus)
• Avatar Height displayed in "Edit Appearance" Floater
• Sit anywhere Functionality
• Instant Inventory Loading on Login
• Slider for Drawing Distance/Graphics Remote
• Camera Zoom up to 1024m
• Show Age in Days in Profile Floater
• Free uploading of "Temporary" Textures
• Unpublished Groups greyed-out
• busy-on-lost-focus
• added Busy-Mode shortcut

We are currently working on more features.

Links

• Website: http://www.sfreq.org/wiki/snowglobe/Releases (find binary & source code there)

Version and timestamp

• Version : Snowglobe:Frequency 1.2.0 (based on unreleased Snowglobe 1.2.0, SVN trunk 2834)
• Platforms:
  • Binary available for OS X 10.5+ Windows, Linux
  • Source valid for OS X, Linux, Windows
• Date : Oct 17, 2009
• Status : Discontinued on January 21, 2010

[Back to the list]

omvviewer

Goals

• To create a fully GPL viewer (no proprietary dependencies)
• To enable easy building of the source code on various Linux distros including 64 bit distros
• To Get the viewer packaged with in Linux Distros

Packages available (32 and 64 bit)

• Debian Lenny
• Ubuntu Intrepid
• Arch
• Gentoo

Extra Features Various extra features found in other viewers, UI changes are kept to a bare minimum as this is a packaging project not a code base fork. Stability fixes are given high priority.

Links

• Website: Project page
• Source code: Source details

Version and timestamp

• Date : 27/March/2009
• Version : 1.22.11
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

Combat Cubed

Description

This client is aimed mostly at the SL Military, but sports quite a few interesting improvements that make it worth taking a look at.

Originally known as Vertical Life.

Major Features

• Enhanced Look & Feel, for example flexible camera movement
• Prototype Script API, secure and parallel
• Slimmed down for FPS combat
• Identification, Friend versus Foe, mostly under the hood now but soon exposed

Links

• Splash: http://bit.ly/cXOcDX

Version and timestamp

• Version: 1
• Date : 2010 June 16
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

TEKSTUFF Viewers

Description

The TEKSTUFF viewers are created to enable Youtube movies on TEKSTUFF media screens inside Second Life. The TEKSTUFF viewers are slight modifications of already available viewers like the regular SL 1.23.5 viewer and the Emerald 1634 viewer. Apart from that, the Emerald based viewer is fixed so it can be used in Opensim grids as well.

Links

• Web presence: http://www.tekstuff.net/

TODO

• Make a Linux viewer
• Make a Mac OS viewer

Major Features

• All the functionality of the viewer it was based upon (LL 1.23.5 or Emerald 1634)
• Will allow you to view Youtube movies on TEKSTUFF media screens
• The Emerald based viewer can also be used in OpenSim grids (texture loading is fixed)

Version and timestamp

• Version: 1.23.5 (LL & Emerald)
• Date : 2010 April 20
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

Milk Release Client

Description

This client is aimed at development of all kinds, thrown together by Project Neox. Focusing on advanced non-profit development of Second Life and various features to whom content creators would find suitable.

TODO

• XStreetSL shopping UI client-kiosk
• Compile Linux and Mac OS X builds
• Multiple link object texturing, via name
• Completion of 3-Dimensional Mini Map
• Region Statistics notifications before teleports

Major Features

• Rendering options for individual avatars
• Secure Voice-chat usage
• Extensions in avatar editing
• Additional Attachment points

Version and timestamp

• Version: 1.23.5
• Date : 2010 January 20
• Status : Discontinued and won't be available for download.

[Back to the list]

Text-Only Viewers

AjaxLife

Description Browser based Second Life client, created by Katharine Berry. The only web-browser client which made it a lifeline for residents who could not use a full graphical viewer, or who could not download other text-only clients because of limitations such as corporate firewalls.

(Now running again!)

Links

• Website: http://ajaxlife.net/

Version and timestamp

• Version: 0.6.1.2
• Date: 2010/05/21
• Platform: Platform independant
• Status: Active

[Back to the list]

METAbolt

METAbolt is a Second Life TPV Directory listed Text Client (http://viewerdirectory.secondlife.com/listing/show/listing_id/118)

Description

METAbolt is an SL text client. It is light weight and cross grid, which means it will work in Second Life as well as other grids that are based on OpenSIM. METAbolt is Open Source so it's free...it is built ground up using libopenmetaverse and it is not a modified version of the official SL viewer. Currently METAbolt is only available for Windows platforms.

METAbolt is ideal if:

• the graphical viewers are not allowed at your work place
• you have a low powered computer that has difficulty running the SL viewer
• you have a low speed internet connection e.g. dial up/ISDN
• you need to run multiple alts at the same time for land security, modelling, group management functions etc
• you can't or don't want to run the SL viewer all the time but need the ability to stay online for communications or other reasons

Features

Too many to be listed here! Here are just a few:

• Ability to mass distribute products, objects, scripts etc
• Ability to start multiple instances for different alts from a command and/or batch file
• Fully ACCESSIBLE and also compatible with accessibility client applications such as JAWS for visually or otherwise impaired SL users
• Auto log-in upon SL disconnect
• Built in Machine Translation with 16 language pairs
• Auto spoken language detection
• Emoticons on chat & IM. Feature can be switched on/off
• Detailed user preference settings
• Auto clothes changer
• Send/receive group notices
• Ability to wear and take off clothing, shape, skin and objects
• Sophisticated AI (Artificial Intelligence)
• Radar which shows nearby avatars with distances. The distance can configured to any level via application settings
• Radar has single click icons for IM, profile, worn attachments, friendship offer, turn to, follow, go to, freeze, eject, ban of selected avatar on radar list
• Teleport history with ability to save any location as a landmark as well as Teleport with one click
• Mute list of avatars and objects
• Ability to disable Group IMs and Group Notices
• Auto-sit upon login optional fuction
• Ability to relay IMs to Twitter in real time
• Ability to use/display local or SL time
• Fully functional SL like "About Land" with "return of objects" feature on selected avatar/s
• Functional Profile viewer where you can edit your details
• Advanced IDE for developers to develop in LSL, C#, SQL, Java, XML and many others with context help, tooltips, snippets and more
• Ability to create, edit, save scripts and notecards to inventory as well as Hard Drive (only the ones you own)
• Picture viewer to view textures and snapshots in detail with the ability to rotate and save to Hard Drive (only the ones you own)
• Full chat & IM logs (features can be switched on/off)
• Music player with album art and lyrics
• Media player capable of playing ANY internet based content specified in land media (providing you have the necessary software installed on your machine)
• Movement direction buttons
• Mini map with ZOOM capability on chat screen for a "single click" access
• Large/main map with icons that show other avatars on the same level as you, above you and below you with a "click and teleport" feature on the map
• SL search on Events, Places, People and Groups
• Advanced auto update features which you can configure to your liking
• Object Manager: Detailed object information (including child objects and task inventory), stats and powerfull search function which also offers the ability to edit Permissions on objects you own (this is also available via the inventory)
• Group Manager plug-in for sending direct group invites (optional)
• Uses low computing power and bandwidth
• Displays advertising from various partners
• One-to-One quick technical support via METAforums
• Plug-ins & extensions are supported from developers. As well as DLL & EXEs, uncompiled classes can be developed in C#, VB and Java and dropped in as an extension

Links

• Website: http://www.metabolt.net/
• Wiki: http://www.metabolt.net/METAwiki/
• Download: http://www.metabolt.net/download.asp
• Source code: http://www.metabolt.net/download.asp (includes plug-in/extension sample project)

Version and timestamp

• Version : 0.9.33.0 (BETA)
• Date : 26/09/2010
• Platform: Windows Only
• 32bit & 64bit versions
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

omvviewer-light

A Text client for the 3D Metaverse

Description omvviewer-light is a text client for the 3D Metaverse including SecondLife, written from Scratch (but using the libomv library for protocol handling). It's GUI is created in Gtk# which is cross-platform making this the only current Text client that is still active and cross platform. Tested on Linux (32/64 bit) and Windows (not 64-bit windows).

Features To many to list here in detail please see the project page below but in summary, Full inventory control, Full Chat/IM/Group IM's. Object search and interaction. Realtime local maps. Parcel displays. Read and Edit NoteCards and Scripts. View profiles. Friends Lists etc .....

Links

• Website: Project page
• Source code: Source details

Version and timestamp

• Date : 25/Aug/2009
• Version : 0.48.0.6
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

Radegast

Lightweight client for connecting to Second Life and OpenSim based virtual worlds

Description

Radegast is feature rich GUI client. With it's full support for all communication within a virtual world (chat, IM, group IM, friends conference) it's ideal for situations where full 3D client is less than ideal solution, for example, an office environment, too slow a machine and similar.

It's written using libopenmetaverse, and it runs on any platform that supports .NET/mono. Its being actively tested on Windows and Linux.

Features

• Chat (local, IM, group, friends conference)
• Inventory (allows manipulation, deletion of the items, moving them around, sending to other people by dropping item on their profile)
• Ability to wear/take off clothes and attachments from the inventory
• Backup of all scripts and notecards from the inventory
• World map (works on all grids)
• Object finder - list objects nearby, sort them by distance, name, see details
• A.L.I.C.E AI chat - turn it on in tools menu and have fun with automatic responses to chat/IM generated by a built in Artificial Intelligence
• List of all avatars in a region (radar), and those within 300m in nearby regions
• Movement controls
• Support for activating gestures from the inventory
• Avatar appearance - others using 3D client will see you appear correctly, and will not be able to tell that you're using a text client
• Streaming music
• Accessibility improvements for blind and visually impaired SL'ers
• Text-To-Speech for reading out loud incoming messages
• Speech recognition for controlling UI and entering text in chat
• Experimental voice support for local chat
• Partial RLV support
• Manipulation of object contents, notecard and script editing
• Group management
• On Windows, support 3D view of in-world objects
• Command line interface (type //help for list in the main chat console)
• TPV compliant and listed in the official viewer directory.
• Command line options that allow (among other things) to automatically login using supplied credentials
• In-world sounds

Links

• Website: radegastclient.org
• Downloads: Downloads
• Nightly build: Zip Archive Windows Installer
• Source code: Source bundle. Instructions on how to build Radegast from source can be found here.
• Report bugs/request new features: Issue tracker
• Documentation: Wiki

Version and timestamp

• Date : July 28, 2010
• Version : 1.22
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

Whisper (SlXSLChat)

A light-weight yet feature rich text-only Second Life client

Description Whisper is a text-only Second Life client that comes in two parts. The client is written in Java (so it can run on many platforms). The client connects to a "transport", which is written in C# and uses LibOpenMetaVerse. The idea behind this architecture is that if you don't like the client, you can write your own and not have to worry about implementing the Second Life protocol yourself. The entire project is open source and published under the GPLv3 licence.

Features

• Public chat
• Instant messaging
• Group chat
• Search/join/leave groups
• Search for avatars
• Image retrieval
• Profile retrieval
• Notifications / popups as you would get in Second Life (e.g. group notices, balance changes, inventory offers)
• Teleportation (home, to area within current sim, to nearby avatar)
• Nearby avatar tracking on map of Sim
• Autopilot navigation to nearby avatars
• URL highlighting
• Encrypted traffic between client and transport
• Transport can be run anywhere, the client connects via TCP/IP
• Client only sends MD5 hashed password to transport
• On Apr.20, 2010, SlXSLChat has rebranded to “Whisper”.

Links

• Website: Whisper
• SourceForce Project Page: Project Page

Version and timestamp

• Date : May 9, 2010
• Version : 1.3
• Status : Active

[Back to the list]

SLeek

First text only viewer ever, mentioned for completeness, not actively maintained anymore. MetaBolt is based on SLeek.

[Back to the list]

SLiteChat

A Lite IM/Chat Text-only Client for Second Life

Description SLiteChat (pronounced "slight-chat") is a completely open source text-only IM/chat client for use with Second Life. Use it to talk to your friends without having to load up all of those heavy graphic goodies. Useful for those at work times. :-)

Features

• Communicate in-world with people on your friends list. Full adding/removing and search for Residents supported.
• Group chat is supported (however at this writing you cannot leave a group or search for to join).
• Local chat and IM history is supported.
• Can log into other grids.

Links

• Website: Project page
• Source code: Source details

[Back to the list]

Sparkle IM for iPhone and iPod Touch

Second Life Chat and IM on your iPhone or iPod Touch

Description iPhone and iPod Touch based Second Life Client, developed by Genkii. The only native client available on the iPhone. Connect over 3G, Edge or Wifi to Second Life for a easy and fast communication in SL on the go.

Links

• Website: http://sparkle.genkii.com/
• iTunes AppStore: http://bit.ly/6DRS2

[Back to the list]

Touch Life for iPhone

iPhone Client for Second Life

Description

Touch Life allows you to log into Second Life anytime from your iPhone or iPod Touch.

Features

• Instant Messaging - Initiate or respond to individual or group IM's.
• Chat - Converse with nearby avatars.
• World Map - View sims, teleport, search or use landmarks.
• MiniMap & Who's Nearby - Zoom in, move & turn, see who's nearby.
• Inventory - View notecards & pictures, give & accept items.
• Profiles - View profiles, make payments, teleport, befriend.
• Groups - View groups, join & leave, send invites.
• Search - Find people, groups, places, regions, and more.
• Photos - Snap pictures and upload as textures.
• Much More!

Links

• Website: http://www.pocketmetaverse.com/
• AppStore: Open in iTunes

[Back to the list]

MetaPay for iPhone and iPod Touch

Send L$ with a simple to use and free iPhone App.

Description

MetaPay is a simple and fun way to send Linden Dollars from your iPhone and iPod touch for FREE! Out with friends and want to pay your part of the tab but have no cash? Use MetaPay to send L$ to your friends in Second Life® instead. Or use it to send L$ for any in-world use without firing up the full Second Life® client.

Links

• Free in the AppStore: Open in iTunes

[Back to the list]