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High Fidelity Release Notes

At High Fidelity, I played a key role in crafting clear, developer-focused release notes for each release of the platform and SDK. I collaborated closely with engineers to document new features, improvements to existing features, and bug fixes.

Below is an example of the release notes from a High Fidelity release.

Beta Release 86​

We released Beta Release 86 on Thursday November 14, 2019.

note

Note: There is a protocol change in this version.

New in v0.86.0!​

  • New "Away From Keyboard" animation: There is a new AFK animation! We've moved away from the squatting animation and have updated it with an "I'm busy on my phone" animation. When you press ESC, your bubble will still be activated and you will automatically be muted.
  • Blend shape support for ARKit compatibility: We've added new blend shapes and add support for up to 10 custom blend shapes with this release. In addition, there are now Controller actions to drive all blend shapes from the input system.

Improvements​

Avatars​

  • Improved avatar eye tracking in 3rd person camera mode.
  • The run/sprint speed for VR mode now matches the run/sprint speed for desktop users.
  • Walking animations experience less foot sliding when starting and stopping by using WASD input rather than avatar speed to trigger transitions.
  • Removed the DDE and FaceTracker Plugins and extended our blend shapes to support ARKit compatibility.
  • Removed "AvatarTransit" log spam that was added in a previous release to debug an issue with avatar walk and jump.
  • Improved verification of avatar ownership over poor network connections to prevent erroneous avatar theft messages.

Create​

  • In the Create Tool's Properties, the 'Cast Shadow' tool tip has been updated and now includes a note that computers profiled to medium or low graphic settings will not render shadows.
  • In the Create Tool's Properties, increased the range for a zone's 'Haze Base' and 'Haze Ceiling' to (-16000 to 16000). Previously, this was capped to (-5000 to 5000).
  • Incorporated an experimental custom shader feature, which allows users to apply shaders to models and avatars.

Scripting API​

  • Added the LODManager.worldDetailQuality type definition to define the level of world detail detail via scripting. Previously, the level of detail was set using a numerical range (0-1), which resulted in inconsistent/unexpected target FPS values.
  • Moved hasScriptedBlendshapes, hasProceduralBlinkFaceMovement, hasProceduralEyeFaceMovement and hasAudioEnabledMovement to AvatarData class.
  • Moved FaceshiftConstants to BlendshapeConstants.
  • Deprecated ToolbarProxy#addButton() and ToolbarProoxy#removeButton() methods.
  • Deprecated MyAvatar.setForceFaceTrackerConnected() method. Use the MyAvatar.hasScriptedBlendshapes property instead.
  • Removed unused FaceTracker and DdeFaceTracker plugins and associated code.

Other Mentions​

  • Changed the initial size of Interface window on launch for Mac computers to 80% of the screen size.
  • Added new option "Headset's default device" as the recommended and default audio device when running in VR mode.
  • Reduced duplicate logging when the audio system detects an invalid configuration.
  • Updated error text for invalidated Marketplace items.
  • Removed Developer > Tests menu from UI.

Fixes​

Audio​

  • Audio components now properly handle system power management notifications.
  • Radio buttons are now correctly selected when using HMD audio devices with High Fidelity.
  • Fixed issue where High Fidelity may not shutdown completely when using an HMD audio device.

Avatars​

  • Fixed a twitch in the head while strafing and moving forward.
  • Increased the blend time between randomly selected talk animations to 20 frames. This fixes a bug where talk animations would "pop" during long periods of talking.
  • When loading avatar bookmarks, avatar entities are now attached after the skeleton has finished loading. Previously, avatar entities may have erroneously been attached to incorrect joints due to old skeleton structures.

Create​

  • Video files played inside web entities are now visible on Mac computers.
  • Entities with the link property set can now successfully be clicked in VR mode.

Other Mentions​

  • Fixed issue where text in the Scripting Console occasionally was not visible on Mac.

Crash Fixes​

  • Fixed crashes in the following scenarios:
    • Calling Recording.stopRecording() while no recording is being made
    • Attempting to switch to the same audio device multiple times
    • Wireless audio devices going out of range
    • Shutting down High Fidelity on Mac with open dialog window(s)