Open Source Virtual Reality Spreads Out

by Sam Dean - Oct. 14, 2008Comments (3)

There is an interesting piece in iTnews today about a group of researchers using a wireless open source virtual world to teach language learning to students, including allowing them to practice. "Dubbed ‘Realtown’, the newly-developed wireless environment incorporates a virtual supermarket, schools, pharmacy and bank, as well as background sounds that may be enabled to increase the environment’s realism," says the story. Realtown is actually just one of many applications of the open source framework DIVE though, which stands for Distributed Interactive Virtual Environments. Here's what it's all about and a look at some other open source virtual reality efforts.

The Realtown virtual environment for teaching language is being used by Mexican engineering students among others. It's based on DIVE, an open source virtual reality framework initially developed by the Swedish Institute of Computer Science in the 1990s. DIVE runs on Linux, Solaris, Windows and other platforms.

As the DIVE site notes, "DIVE applications and activities include virtual battlefields, spatial models of interaction, virtual agents, real-world robot control and multi-modal interaction." You can check out some of the images of various applications here and videos here.

Of course, when it comes to virtual reality, the first name that comes to mind for many people is Second Life. As we covered recently, Second Life has increasingly been waking up to open source contributions to its virtual world. Developers are using OpenSim, which is an open source server for hosting virtual worlds, to enhance Second Life, with IBM and Second Life's Linden Lab working in tandem on interoperability between OpenSim and Second Life.

For much more on OpenSim and open source virtual world efforts, check out Tish Shute's blog.


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3 Comments
 

Hi Sean, Thank you for your interesting post on Realtown and your mention of Ugotrade (the link needs a little adjustment though as it has /blog added to it, which is not correct!).

Yes, I am really excited about the new era of open source virtual worlds that is just beginning. Open source, open protocols, and open standards (using existing Web 2.0 standards where possible) is allowing the integration of virtual worlds into Web 2.0 frameworks so a new ecosystem of mashups can develop that will significantly extend the reach and possibilities of both environments.

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Hi Tish, sorry for the previous link that went to your blog but didn't pull up the stories. I should have checked the link. :( Good to see you here on OStatic. I fixed the link, and I'm going to keep up with your blog. Btw, I'm Sam, not Sean. :)

Sam

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Thanks Sam! And likewise I will be following OStatic. Up to now many developers have stayed away from virtual worlds because the relatively isolated (from the web), monolithic form of early Virtual Worlds didn't lend itself to the development of killer apps. But now virtual worlds are being broken down into open source basic building block technologies - a set of services that can be composed into various kinds of mashup, there will, I think, be a new flowering of interest from developers....

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