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Just a little something we did one day. The sim is at about 1:8 scale so covers 2km x 2km. The Apache interior is a HUD. No physics, just flying the "copter" with a 3D mouse, you could have great fun practicing Apache sniping by hiding behind the trees and then popping up. Only problem was when you caught sight of your avatar looming over the landscape with an equivalent height of 16m!
Had fun over the last few weeks putting together a demo showing how immersive environments can be used to support planning and training for emergency services. The shot above shows a couple of policemen and emergency vehicles outside a shopping centre - our scenario was focussed on a suspect package in the shopping centre. Note that the policeman on the left is an osNPC bot running our osNPC management package which includes simple chatbots functionality (and optional link to Discourse) and navigation (using a topological map).
We also wanted to show how we could downgrade the experience, so as well as plunging the area into darkness (zero illumination, not the false "midnight" setting in OS/SL) and navigating by torch-light (very evocative), we also had our suspect package billowing smoke which made it hard to see avatars even just a few metres away.
All in all we think the demo gives a good idea of how immersive environments can support this sort of work. If you are in or work with the emergency services and would like to see the demo, or see a copy of our 13 minute video of the demo, then please get in contact.
We've finally decided to get a public sim on OSGrid in order to better showcase some of the work we are doing on OpenSim. We have our own internal OpenSim network (nicknamed DadenWorld), as well as individual developer worlds, but to make things more publicly available we decided it was simplest to go with a hosted service from Dreamland Metaverse on OSGrid.
The sim is called Daden Open - you should find it in your map search box on OS Grid. Our intention is not to build a specific island there, but rather to cycle through some of favourite OAR files - perhaps changing the island once a month or so.
To kick things off we've uploaded the refugee camp OAR file we did a few months ago for a trip to the UN. The sim is pretty passive but we've put in a simple information bot, and also showed the sort of question mark task markers we use with PIVOTE in SL and OpenSim to show how tasks might be identified and triggered.
Feel free to head over and take a look, and we'll let you know via the blog when we update the island with a new OAR file - probably you 20 parsec stellar neighbourhood model will be next up.
Looks like the IGI book " Multi-User Virtual Environments for the Classroom: Practical Approaches to Teaching in Virtual Worlds" that we wrote a PIVOTE chapter for is out. The chapter explores the background to authoring learning systems in virtual worlds, why we developed PIVOTE, the PIVOTE architecture and an example use case, and a couple of case studies from institutions using PIVOTE. Rest of the book should be good reading too. Enjoy!
Get your library to buy it here - http://www.igi-global.com/bookstore/titledetails.aspx?titleid=47435
Buy just the PIVOTE chapter as a PDF here - http://www.igi-global.com/bookstore/chapter.aspx?titleid=53498
Finally completed my Empress Marava Far Trader build in OpenSim. The Far Trader is one of the work-horses of the Traveller role-playing game.
The really neat thing is not so much the spacecraft (which I could go on detailing for ages) but what can happen outside it. Since Opensim allows 256m prims, and doesn't place any restrictions on linking distances, you can build a whole (simple) sim as a single object and put it in a rezzer and rez different environments around you or your (static) spaceship - ideal for different sets and when you want to automate things rather than loading manual OAR files (although an LSL controller OAR loader might be nice!).
So you start on a barren planet:
You close the loading ramp on the empty landscape and head for the bridge.
You then head off into space. A touch of a button on the pilots console de-rezzes the world and rezzes the starscape in a 256m diameter sphere (ought to work on a suitable brown-out transition for take-off and landing). So the view out the window changes but more importantly if you don your EVA suit and walk out the airlock you now find:
(need to do a nice jump transition too!)
Then you head down to the starport. Again a touch of a button derezzes the stars and rezzes a whole spaceport ready for you.
I'll work up a few other environments but you get the drift. Quite apart from the role-playing side of this it also begins to make a nice vehicle for STEM based education, sending the students off in their spaceship (or minibus!) and then rezzing different outside every time they open the door.
Full image set at http://www.flickr.com/photos/burdenshaw/sets/72157626207815093/
We started this work before the Japanese Tsunami, but all the coverage really brings it home, and our work on a related project on disaster shelter management in the US.
