Subject: [vwrap] WebSocket / WebGL-based virtual world

From: "Richard L. Barnes" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2010 11:14:35 -0500

Folks on this list are probably better plugged in to this stuff than I am, but in case people hadn't heard: Earlier this week, Katalabs released a virtual world based on WebSockets and WebGL.  

<http://www.katalabs.com/blog/2010/11/30/kataspace-released/>
<http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/12/kataspace-browser-based-virtual-world-built-with-webgl-and-html5.ars>

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From: Meadhbh Hamrick <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2010 09:39:11 -0800

it's cool, for sure, but they're using a proprietary protocol based on
google protocol buffers for their back end stuff. i chatted with
henrik last year and he seemed completely un-interested in
participating in a standardization effort.

at the risk of touching off another flame war (morgaine likes to
violently argue what my motivations were last year) i should just
mention that some of us wanted to develop a protocol to allow
different VW related services to be hosted in different domains.

i would be VERY interested in sirikata if they were to start focusing on that.

but the front-end based on websockets and WebGL is pretty darn'd ossm.

-cheers
-meadhbh
--
meadhbh hamrick * it's pronounced "maeve"
@OhMeadhbh * http://meadhbh.org/ * [email-masked]

On Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 8:14 AM, Richard L. Barnes <[email-masked]> wrote:
> _______________________________________________
> vwrap mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/vwrap
>

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From: Morgaine <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 00:42:52 +0000

> different VW related services to be hosted in different domains.

Please leave personal remarks out of discussions in this group.

Morgaine.

===========================================

On Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 5:39 PM, Meadhbh Hamrick <[email-masked]> wrote:

> > Folks on this list are probably better plugged in to this stuff than I
> am, but in case people hadn't heard: Earlier this week, Katalabs released a
> virtual world based on WebSockets and WebGL.
> >
> > <
> http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/12/kataspace-browser-based-virtual-world-built-with-webgl-and-html5.ars
> >

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From: Morgaine <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 00:51:45 +0000

Thanks for the heads-up on KataSpace, Richard.

We've been aware of the Sirikata group's work over the last year or so,
although it's been mainly at the protocol level.  It's very good news to
hear that they have a WebGL front-end to their work now.  I'll be taking a
good look at this shortly. :-)

Cheers!

Morgaine.

==============================

On Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 4:14 PM, Richard L. Barnes <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Folks on this list are probably better plugged in to this stuff than I am,
> but in case people hadn't heard: Earlier this week, Katalabs released a

---

From: Lawson English <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 03 Dec 2010 08:03:50 -0700

> participating in a standardization effort.
Yesterday, I sat in on a meeting with the imersive Education folk 
concerning their Open File Format, and Sikarata was being touted as a 
potential participant in that part of stndardization.

iED's big thing about optimization is currently the ability to serve  
files from Wonderland servers to realXtend worlds, and presumeably in 
the other direction. This is demoed starting around 7 minutes into this 
video: http://www.youtube.com/ImmersiveED#p/u/0/cMhBiu0YJ3s

The announcement of the file format is here:

http://campaign.r20.constantcontact.com/render?llr=l9v8jddab&v=0012Q4V8GYbFiRVW5S52Wafi9DbYKi8ApYvpFG686SUd4B5TAMcsgez8TsHQyBGOBUtllVn7F83vdrtw7wzMw5mWi3zeu29ak8hSDeywTXeE6QKBh0Ty-BQ6g%3D%3D

> different VW related services to be hosted in different domains.
That's obviously already happening with the iED endorsed worlds, at 
least on the level of demos.

> i would be VERY interested in sirikata if they were to start focusing on that.
  In order to get acknowledge by iED, they had to pledge to work on 
that. That was part of what yesterday's (2 Dec 2010) meeting was about.

I raised the "holy grail" of TP between worlds while maintaining 
identity and hopefully appearance for the avatar, and everyone agreed 
that was the long-term goal.

I can only suggest VWRAP folks get in touch with Aaron Walsh of 
immersive Education and try to coordinate things better.

http://gridinstitute.com/people/aew/

The virtual worlds involved in the iED currently or prospectively are 
OpenWonderland & realXtend/OpenSim and sirikata and OpenCobalt.

Lawson

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From: Morgaine <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 16:18:04 +0000

That looks like an excellent and highly relevant body of work, Lawson,
thanks for the info!

Although VWRAP's initial concern is with orchestrating the access to
services, our work doesn't stop there --- we will need to deal with the
detail of the services themselves as well, at least the most important
ones.  Extensibility of asset data types is one of our most important
requirements, and so part of our work will be to ensure that our asset
services can handle an evolving set of portable file interchange formats.

That makes the work of groups like iED of direct relevance to us, greatly
facilitating interop between virtual worlds by providing a ready interchange
standard.  And the fact that realXtend/Opensim are already on board makes
wide scale portable interchange not just a hope but an existing reality.
That is very promising!

*> The virtual worlds involved in the iED currently or prospectively are
> OpenWonderland & realXtend/OpenSim and sirikata and OpenCobalt.*

Excellent, it sounds like there is good synergy there already.  I agree with
you entirely that we need to be party to this.

Morgaine.

==================================

On Fri, Dec 3, 2010 at 3:03 PM, Lawson English <[email-masked]> wrote:

> iED's big thing about optimization is currently the ability to serve  files
> from Wonderland servers to realXtend worlds, and presumeably in the other
> direction. This is demoed starting around 7 minutes into this video:
> http://www.youtube.com/ImmersiveED#p/u/0/cMhBiu0YJ3s
>
>>  That's obviously already happening with the iED endorsed worlds, at least
> on the level of demos.
>
>
>
>>   In order to get acknowledge by iED, they had to pledge to work on that.
> That was part of what yesterday's (2 Dec 2010) meeting was about.
>
> I raised the "holy grail" of TP between worlds while maintaining identity
> and hopefully appearance for the avatar, and everyone agreed that was the
> long-term goal.
>
> I can only suggest VWRAP folks get in touch with Aaron Walsh of immersive
> Education and try to coordinate things better.
>

---

From: Nexii Malthus <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 23:36:56 +0000

I like what I am reading here a lot. That is some
seriously phenomenal cooperation and advancement. Really awesome that iED
stepped up to link the different virtual worlds together like this.

- Nexii

On Fri, Dec 3, 2010 at 4:18 PM, Morgaine <[email-masked]>wrote:

> Excellent, it sounds like there is good synergy there already.  I agree
> with you entirely that we need to be party to this.
>
>
> Morgaine.
>
>
>
>
>>  files from Wonderland servers to realXtend worlds, and presumeably in the
>> other direction. This is demoed starting around 7 minutes into this video: