I logged in today to find my avatar ruthed¹ and yes, he was wearing a purple shirt and red pants but there was something strange about it. My ruthed avatar was tall for a ruthed avatar look.

The surrounding area also looked strange and different. Almost all of the textures didn’t load making everything looks sad and gray. Am I still in Second Life?

Fortunately, I wasn’t in Second Life. The avatar you saw is indeed my avatar but that photo wasn’t taken in-world Second Life. The photo or snapshot was taken in-world OSGrid.

OSGrid is like the Open Source version of Second Life’s grid. It uses OpenSim, an Open Source version of Second Life’s server or simulator code. OSGrid is pretty much like Second Life, what you can do in Second Life you can do it also in OSGrid although many features are still underdevelopment and OSGrid also uses the Second Life client. If you have Second Life installed then you can use that to login into OSGrid.

With Open Source projects like OpenSim and OSGrid, the ability to manage and operate your own region or sim is becoming closer and closer to the public’s reach.

Other Open Source Grids:

• OpenLifeGrid
• DeepGrid

These grids, together with OpenSim, are still work in progress so don’t expect any stability from them but you can try any of them. You don’t need to download any viewer if you are just planning to visit in-world. Second Life’s viewer will work just fine. Instructions are available from their websites.

1. a term used when the default avatar appearance loaded instead of your real avatar