 |
| |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="ProjectWonderland" |
|---|
Home | Changes | Index | Search | Go <-- This creates the navigation links to : Home | Help | Index | etc. --> | | | | |
>
> | Release 0.4 Roadmap - completed | | | | |
>
> | PreviousRoadmap2008 | | | Release 0.5 - December 2008 through Summer 2009 - Major Architectural Improvements | | |
-
- Make changes to core JME code
- Add listeners to transform changes
- Optimize rendering
| |
<
< |
-
- Create MTGame - Adds threading and processing model to JME
| >
> |
-
- Create MTGame - Adds threading and processing model to JME
| | |
- Design and build new avatar system
| | |
-
- For general user interface construction
| |
<
< |
-
- Import 3D models in Collada format, including direct import of .kmz models created with Google SketchUp
| >
> |
-
- Import 3D models in Collada format, including direct import of .kmz models created with Google SketchUp
| | |
-
- Dynamically add cells (eg, microphone, audio recorder, PDF Viewer, Firefox browser) to world using a palette
- Move, resize, and scale cells using in-world tools
| | |
-
- Manage modules
- Manage world snapshots - enables world persistence across server restarts
| |
<
< | Dev1 & Dev2 - January 2009 - Completed | >
> | Dev1 & Dev2 - January 2009 - completed | | | These two developer releases included:
- Many of the core API changes
| |
<
< |
- First version of MTGame and JME integration
| >
> |
- First version of MTGame and JME integration
| | |
- Basics of the new module system
- First version of the web administration UI
- Initial world assembly tools
Dev3 - February 2009 | |
>
> |
- Preliminary avatars
- Embedded Swing
- Preliminary HUD
- World persistence across server restarts
- Backup and restore of world data using snapshots
- Cell palette for dynamic addition of cell types
- Basic cell properties dialog
- Modules
- SVG whiteboard
- audio recorder
| | | | |
<
< | Dev4 - March 2009
Dev5 - April 2009 | | | | |
<
< | Dev6 - May 2009 | >
> | Dev4 - March 2009 | | | | |
<
< | Dev3 - February 2009 | >
> |
- More complete avatar implementation
- New default world
- Easy import of Google SketchUp .kmz models
- More complete HUD
- WebDAV content repository
- Security APIs
- Authorization framework
- Placemarks
| | | | |
<
< | Release 1.1 and Beyond | >
> | Dev5 - April 2009 | | | | |
<
< | The vision for Wonderland going forward is to make it the best possible environment for collaboration, be it for business, education, commerce, or entertainment. Our focus is on features that will enhance how people communicate, work together, learn together, and play together. Features that we will consider for future releases include: | >
> |
- Foundations for federation
- Simple avatar chooser / configuration tool
- Server-side shared x11 applications
- Preliminary scripting
- Authentication implementation
- Module sandbox
- User list
- Simple text chat
- Modules
- PDF Viewer
- VNC Viewer
- Documentation Viewer
| | | | |
<
< | Previous Roadmap | >
> | Dev6 - May 2009 | | | | |
<
< | PreviousRoadmap2008 | >
> |
- Bug fixes and clean-up
- Performance tuning
- UI testing
0.5 End-User - June/July 2009
- All the features from the dev releases tested
- End user documentation
- Developer tutorials
Release 0.6 - Monthly Releases August - December 2009 - Enhance Core Features
- Full scripting
- Simple federation user interface
- Load animated models
- Integration with physics engine
- Integration with external security systems (OpenSSO)
- Private voice chat
- Module Central web UI
Release 0.7 and Beyond
The vision for Wonderland going forward is to make it the best possible environment for collaboration, be it for business, education, commerce, or entertainment. Our focus is on features that will enhance how people communicate, work together, learn together, and play together. Scenarios that we will consider focusing on for future releases include:
- Improving the content creation tool chain
- Distributed teamwork
- In-world meetings
- Conferences and other medium to large events
- Teaching and learning
- Simulations and scientific visualization
- Social networking worlds
- 3D web
- integration with existing web infrastructure
- Interoperability
|
| |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="ProjectWonderland" |
|---|
Home | Changes | Index | Search | Go <-- This creates the navigation links to : Home | Help | Index | etc. -->
Project Wonderland Roadmap and Release Estimates | |
>
> | (UNDER CONSTRUCTION - February 2009) | | | This document contains the Wonderland Roadmap. The dates included here are estimates of when we hope to have functionality complete. Please keep in mind while reviewing this roadmap that the core team of developers on this project are situated in a research lab without documentation, testing, Q/A and other resources typically associated with a product organization. This is a living document that will be updated periodically as our thinking evolves and as we develop a better understanding of how long it will take to implement different aspects of the system. | |
<
< | For a detailed set of release plans, please visit: http://wiki.java.net/bin/view/Javadesktop/ReleasePlans. | >
> | For developer-focused release planning, please visit: http://wiki.java.net/bin/view/Javadesktop/ReleasePlans. | | | | |
<
< | Release 0.4 - June 2008 - Feature Release based on 0.3 | | | | |
<
< | Starting at the beginning of 2008, two Wonderland efforts will be going on in parallel. We will be fleshing out platform features as well as developing new Wonderland applications. This work is being done based on the 0.3 code base. The items listed below should be completed by around June. This work, which is already in progress, is happening in parallel with the three major architectural changes described in the 0.5 release section below. As soon as the 0.5 work is far enough along, we will port all 0.3 and 0.4 features to the new architecture. | | | | |
<
< |
- General
- Basic meeting recording
- Preliminary 2D world builder
- In-world object placement
- User-defined placemarks
- Enhanced web UI for managing Wonderland in hosted environments
- Audio Features
- Enhanced telephony support (ability to carry out-worlders around world; dial-in)
- New audio cell types - microphone, cone of silence
- Personal volume control for all audio sources
- Applications
- Video player
- Video from web cams (standard view, video panorama)
- PDF Viewer
- VNC
- Music in Wonderland
| >
> | Release 0.5 - December 2008 through Summer 2009 - Major Architectural Improvements | | | | |
<
< | | >
> | Note: This release involves major code changes to the system, so there is substantial risk that the dates of this release will slip. | | | | |
<
< | Release 0.5 - Fall 2008 - Major Architectural Improvements | >
> | This version of Wonderland represents a major rewrite of the system. As such, 0.5 is being broken down into a series of monthly developer releases which began in December 2008 and will culminate in an end-user release sometime over the summer. These releases are intended to give developers access to the new code base and features as quickly as possible so that applications built using the 0.4 code base can be ported and new applications started. | | | | |
<
< | In parallel with the feature work going on in the 0.3 branch, three major architectural changes are in the works. The first is a re-design of all the major APIs. This should dramatically improve development going forward, although will require some porting of existing features in the short term. The second change is replacing Java3D with the more modern jMonkeyEngine (JME) scene graph. This change will also involve making some core changes to JME to better support Wonderland features. The change is needed for a number of reasons. There are features in JME that will substantially help to upgrade the look of Wonderland including render-to-texture and multi-pass. Additionally, there is an existing and growing tool chain around JME, including a Collada loader, which will be a huge benefit to Wonderland content developers. The third major architectural change is replacing the existing inflexible avatar system with a modern state-of-the-art avatar system that includes new bone models, advanced skinning features, and some inverse kinematics for avatar posing. The new system will substantially improve the expressiveness of the avatars and will support a wide range of animated avatar behaviors. This release involves major code changes to the system, so there is substantial risk that the date of this release will slip. | >
> | There are three major changes in 0.5 and many, many smaller changes. First, all the basic Wonderland APIs are being re-designed. The API changes should dramatically improve development going forward, but they do mean that all 0.4 applications will have to be ported over to the 0.5 APIs. Another major change in 0.5 is replacing Java3D with the more modern jMonkeyEngine (JME) scene graph. The change is needed for a number of reasons. There are features in JME that will substantially help to upgrade the look of Wonderland including render-to-texture, programmable shaders, and multi-pass. Additionally, there is an existing and growing tool chain around JME, including a Collada loader, which will be a huge benefit to Wonderland content developers. The third major architectural change is replacing the existing inflexible avatar system with a modern state-of-the-art avatar system that includes new bone models, and advanced skinning features. Here is a complete list of new features slated for 0.5 followed by a rough plan for when these features will be implemented. | | |
- Move from CVS to SVN source code control
| |
<
< |
-
- Review period
- Revise draft
| | | | |
<
< |
-
- Port all existing features to new APIs
| >
> |
-
- Port significant 0.4 features to new APIs
| | |
-
- Improve developer documentation
| |
<
< |
-
- Evaluate JME and prioritize necessary enhancements
| | |
-
- Make changes to core JME code
| |
<
< |
-
- Remove Java3D and replace with JME
- Port necessary features
| >
> |
-
-
- Add listeners to transform changes
- Optimize rendering
- Create MTGame - Adds threading and processing model to JME
| | |
- Design and build new avatar system
- Create new avatar API
- Avatar designs
- Bone models
- Skinning
| |
<
< |
-
- Customizable avatar animations
- Posing (inverse kinematics)
- Avatar customization UI for end users
| >
> |
-
- Customizable avatar animations (requires Maya)
- Limited Posing
- Avatar customization UI
| | | | |
<
< | | >
> | | | |
-
- Plugable modules containing artwork and code
- Deliver art assets via embedded HTTP server
| |
<
< |
-
- Support for master and mirror artwork repositories
| | |
-
- Package extensions (e.g. new cell types)
| |
>
> |
-
- Module Central web UI for distributing modules
| | | | |
<
< | | >
> |
- Embedded Swing
- Basis for new HUD (heads-up display)
- For general user interface construction
| | | | |
>
> |
- World Assembly
- Import 3D models in Collada format, including direct import of .kmz models created with Google SketchUp
- Dynamically add cells (eg, microphone, audio recorder, PDF Viewer, Firefox browser) to world using a palette
- Move, resize, and scale cells using in-world tools
| | | | |
<
< | Release 1.0 - June 2009 - Wonderland for Small and Medium-Sized Groups | >
> |
- Web Administration UI
- Start and stop server components
- Edit properties of server components
- Manage modules
- Manage world snapshots - enables world persistence across server restarts
| | | | |
<
< | This release will be the next major step beyond the Small Work Group release by providing more complete, stable implementations of the Wonderland core functionality. There are three target uses cases for the 1.0 release: | >
> | Dev1 & Dev2 - January 2009 - Completed | | | | |
<
< |
- Small work group meetings or classes
In this type of gathering, a small group of 10 to 20 people work in a highly-interactive style. In the meeting or class, they share a number of applications, such as text editors, whiteboards and web browsers. Most participants gather in the virtual world, although a small number may participate by phone.
| >
> | These two developer releases included: | | | | |
<
< |
- Medium size all-hands style meetings or lecture classes
A group of around 100 people meet and listen to a small number of presenters. The application sharing focuses on a small number of presentation tools such as slide shows or shared browsers. Presenters and some of the audience gather in the virtual world. Other attendees may choose to watch a web-cast of the meeting through their browser or dial in to the audio portion of the presentation.
| >
> |
- Many of the core API changes
- First version of MTGame and JME integration
- Basics of the new module system
- First version of the web administration UI
- Initial world assembly tools
| | | | |
<
< |
- Interactive training
A small class of 10 to 20 people are lead through a training program by an instructor. The instructor will use a combination of presentation tools and live applications to present the lesson. Students will use their own applications, as well as other techniques like role-playing, to interact with the lesson. All students will be in the virtual world, although they may review recordings of the class afterwards.
| >
> | Dev3 - February 2009 | | | | |
<
< | To support these use cases, the features planned for this release include: | | | | |
<
< |
- Usability
- Improved camera control
- Uniform mechanism for interacting with objects in the environment (e.g. HUD, selecting)
- More natural mechanisms for working with applications in the world
- Improved presence and messaging integrated into the client HUD
| >
> | Dev4 - March 2009 | | | | |
<
< |
- Scalability
- ~200 simultaneous users in a world with several rooms
- Work with multi-node Darkstar
| >
> | Dev5 - April 2009 | | | | |
<
< |
- Security and Access Control
- Implement basic security on cells
- Allow users to define security parameters for documents, applications and spaces in the world
- Documents and applications can automatically inherit the security parameters of the space they are in
- Improved Application Sharing
- Default share-aware apps (whiteboard, presentation viewer)
- Server-based sharing of X11 and Windows applications
- Firewall and NAT traversal for client-side shared apps
- Video, Audio and Telephony
- Play recorded video in-world
- Record and play back in-world interactions
- Stream in-world live or recorded content to web
- Private voice chat
- End user content creation
- End user design and customization of basic building using 2D user interface
- Placing 3D models in the world
- Open animation file import
| >
> | Dev6 - May 2009 | | | | |
>
> | Dev3 - February 2009 | | | Release 1.1 and Beyond
The vision for Wonderland going forward is to make it the best possible environment for collaboration, be it for business, education, commerce, or entertainment. Our focus is on features that will enhance how people communicate, work together, learn together, and play together. Features that we will consider for future releases include: | |
<
< | Turning Wonderland into a primary work environment
We are aiming for an environment that runs applications well enough that users can comfortably do most of their real work within the virtual environment. The sort of features that would enable this include:
- Further application sharing improvements for desktop-level performance
- Scheme for allowing any application to run in-world with little or no effort
Flexible space
As a virtual environment, there is no need to stick closely to the physical metaphor. We want to take more advantage of the malleability of the environment to allow:
- Everyone to have a front-row seat
- Rearranging your in-world office to be near a different person or team room at any time
- Dynamically adding walls to a room as more space is needed
- Generating new spaces based on dynamic queries (eg, search for a music group and a room dedicated to that band is automatically created and populated with related songs, artwork, and other artifacts found on the web)
Share-aware applications
Sharing existing applications designed for single users is never going to be the ideal way to collaborate. The best possible user experience can only be accomplished when applications are built with multiple users in mind from the outset.
- create several more example share-aware 2D applications
- create several example share-aware 3D applications
- add API and toolkit features to make it easy for developers to build new share-aware applications
Avatar expressiveness based on live data capture
While some avatar expressiveness can be programmed, natural body language is an important step in dramatically increasing the emotional bandwidth provided by the virtual environment. We believe realistic avatar motions including head gestures, facial expressions, and hand gestures will work most effectively if these gestures are captured in real time from actual human motion.
- synchronize audio with avatar mouth movements
- video capture of head gestures (nodding and shaking) mapped to avatar movement
- video capture of facial expressions mapped to avatar facial animation
- video or sensor capture of hand and arm motions mapped to avatar movement
Federation
The Wonderland model is for individuals or organizations to be able to create worlds on their own servers, either inside or outside their organization's firewall. Like web servers today, we envision that Wonderland servers can be federated such that users can move easily from one organizations virtual world to another's in a way similar to moving from one web site to another. | >
> | Previous Roadmap | | | | |
<
< |
- help develop and implement interoperability standards
| | | \ No newline at end of file | |
>
> | PreviousRoadmap2008 |
| |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="ProjectWonderland" |
|---|
Home | Changes | Index | Search | Go <-- This creates the navigation links to : Home | Help | Index | etc. --> | |
<
< | Project Wonderland Roadmap and Release Plans | >
> | Project Wonderland Roadmap and Release Estimates | | | | |
<
< | | >
> | This document contains the Wonderland Roadmap. The dates included here are estimates of when we hope to have functionality complete. Please keep in mind while reviewing this roadmap that the core team of developers on this project are situated in a research lab without documentation, testing, Q/A and other resources typically associated with a product organization. This is a living document that will be updated periodically as our thinking evolves and as we develop a better understanding of how long it will take to implement different aspects of the system. | | | | |
>
> | | | | | |
<
< | Detailed Release Plans? | | | Release 0.4 - June 2008 - Feature Release based on 0.3 | | | Release 0.5 - Fall 2008 - Major Architectural Improvements | |
<
< | In parallel with the feature work going on in the 0.3 branch, three major architectural changes are in the works. The first is a re-design of all the major APIs. This should dramatically improve development going forward, although will require some porting of existing features in the short term. The second change is replacing Java3D with the more modern jMonkeyEngine (JME) scene graph. This change will also involve making some core changes to JME to better support Wonderland features. The change is needed for a number of reasons. There are features in JME that will substantially help to upgrade the look of Wonderland including render-to-texture and multi-pass. Additionally, there is an existing and growing tool chain around JME, including a Collada loader, which will be a huge benefit to Wonderland content developers. The third major architectural change is replacing the existing inflexible avatar system with a modern state-of-the-art avatar system that includes new bone models, advanced skinning features, and some inverse kinematics for avatar posing. The new system will substantially improve the expressiveness of the avatars and will support a wide range of animated avatar behaviors. | >
> | In parallel with the feature work going on in the 0.3 branch, three major architectural changes are in the works. The first is a re-design of all the major APIs. This should dramatically improve development going forward, although will require some porting of existing features in the short term. The second change is replacing Java3D with the more modern jMonkeyEngine (JME) scene graph. This change will also involve making some core changes to JME to better support Wonderland features. The change is needed for a number of reasons. There are features in JME that will substantially help to upgrade the look of Wonderland including render-to-texture and multi-pass. Additionally, there is an existing and growing tool chain around JME, including a Collada loader, which will be a huge benefit to Wonderland content developers. The third major architectural change is replacing the existing inflexible avatar system with a modern state-of-the-art avatar system that includes new bone models, advanced skinning features, and some inverse kinematics for avatar posing. The new system will substantially improve the expressiveness of the avatars and will support a wide range of animated avatar behaviors. This release involves major code changes to the system, so there is substantial risk that the date of this release will slip. | | |
- Move from CVS to SVN source code control
|
| |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="ProjectWonderland" |
|---|
Home | Changes | Index | Search | Go <-- This creates the navigation links to : Home | Help | Index | etc. --> | | | Detailed Release Plans? | |
<
< | Release 0.4 - April 2008 - Feature Release based on 0.3 | >
> | Release 0.4 - June 2008 - Feature Release based on 0.3 | | | | |
<
< | Starting at the beginning of 2008, two Wonderland efforts will be going on in parallel. We will be fleshing out platform features as well as developing new Wonderland applications. This work is being done based on the 0.3 code base. The items listed below should be completed by around April. This work, which is already in progress, is happening in parallel with the three major architectural changes described in the 0.5 release section below. As soon as the 0.5 work is far enough along, we will port all 0.3 and 0.4 features to the new architecture. | >
> | Starting at the beginning of 2008, two Wonderland efforts will be going on in parallel. We will be fleshing out platform features as well as developing new Wonderland applications. This work is being done based on the 0.3 code base. The items listed below should be completed by around June. This work, which is already in progress, is happening in parallel with the three major architectural changes described in the 0.5 release section below. As soon as the 0.5 work is far enough along, we will port all 0.3 and 0.4 features to the new architecture. | | |
- General
- Basic meeting recording
- Preliminary 2D world builder
- In-world object placement
| |
>
> | | | |
-
- Enhanced web UI for managing Wonderland in hosted environments
- Audio Features
- Enhanced telephony support (ability to carry out-worlders around world; dial-in)
- New audio cell types - microphone, cone of silence
| |
>
> |
-
- Personal volume control for all audio sources
| | | | |
<
< | | >
> |
-
- Video from web cams (standard view, video panorama)
| | | | |
<
< |
-
- Investigate other solutions for Windows application sharing
- Music in Wonderland ?
| >
> | | | | | | | | |
<
< | Release 1.0 - January 2009 - Wonderland for Small and Medium-Sized Groups | >
> | Release 1.0 - June 2009 - Wonderland for Small and Medium-Sized Groups | | | This release will be the next major step beyond the Small Work Group release by providing more complete, stable implementations of the Wonderland core functionality. There are three target uses cases for the 1.0 release: | | |
-
- Play recorded video in-world
- Record and play back in-world interactions
- Stream in-world live or recorded content to web
| |
<
< | | | | | |
<
< |
-
- Presentation audio (amplified audio that fills room)
| | |
- End user content creation
- End user design and customization of basic building using 2D user interface
- Placing 3D models in the world
- Open animation file import
| |
<
< | | | |
Release 1.1 and Beyond |
|
>
> |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="ProjectWonderland" |
|---|
Home | Changes | Index | Search | Go <-- This creates the navigation links to : Home | Help | Index | etc. -->
WonderlandRoadmap <-- this automatically adds a header showing the name of this page -->
Release 0.4 - April 2008 - Feature Release based on 0.3
Starting at the beginning of 2008, two Wonderland efforts will be going on in parallel. We will be fleshing out platform features as well as developing new Wonderland applications. This work is being done based on the 0.3 code base. The items listed below should be completed by around April. This work, which is already in progress, is happening in parallel with the three major architectural changes described in the 0.5 release section below. As soon as the 0.5 work is far enough along, we will port all 0.3 and 0.4 features to the new architecture.
- General
- Basic meeting recording
- Preliminary 2D world builder
- In-world object placement
- Enhanced web UI for managing Wonderland in hosted environments
- Audio Features
- Enhanced telephony support (ability to carry out-worlders around world; dial-in)
- New audio cell types - microphone, cone of silence
- Applications
- Video player
- Video from web cams
- PDF Viewer
- VNC
- Investigate other solutions for Windows application sharing
- Music in Wonderland ?
Release 0.5 - July 2008 - Major Architectural Improvements
In parallel with the feature work going on in the 0.3 branch, three major architectural changes are in the works. The first is a re-design of all the major APIs. This should dramatically improve development going forward, although will require some porting of existing features in the short term. The second change is replacing Java3D with the more modern jMonkeyEngine (JME) scene graph. This change will also involve making some core changes to JME to better support Wonderland features. The change is needed for a number of reasons. There are features in JME that will substantially help to upgrade the look of Wonderland including render-to-texture and multi-pass. Additionally, there is an existing and growing tool chain around JME, including a Collada loader, which will be a huge benefit to Wonderland content developers. The third major architectural change is replacing the existing inflexible avatar system with a modern state-of-the-art avatar system that includes new bone models, advanced skinning features, and some inverse kinematics for avatar posing. The new system will substantially improve the expressiveness of the avatars and will support a wide range of animated avatar behaviors.
- Move from CVS to SVN source code control
- Redesign APIs
- Draft specifications for new API design
- Review period
- Revise draft
- Implement APIs
- Port all existing features to new APIs
- Improve developer documentation
- Migrate to JME
- Evaluate JME and prioritize necessary enhancements
- Make changes to core JME code
- Remove Java3D and replace with JME
- Port necessary features
- Design and build new avatar system
- Create new avatar API
- Avatar designs
- Bone models
- Skinning
- Customizable avatar animations
- Posing (inverse kinematics)
- Avatar customization UI for end users
Release 1.0 - January 2009 - Wonderland for Small and Medium-Sized Groups
This release will be the next major step beyond the Small Work Group release by providing more complete, stable implementations of the Wonderland core functionality. There are three target uses cases for the 1.0 release:
- Small work group meetings or classes
In this type of gathering, a small group of 10 to 20 people work in a highly-interactive style. In the meeting or class, they share a number of applications, such as text editors, whiteboards and web browsers. Most participants gather in the virtual world, although a small number may participate by phone.
- Medium size all-hands style meetings or lecture classes
A group of around 100 people meet and listen to a small number of presenters. The application sharing focuses on a small number of presentation tools such as slide shows or shared browsers. Presenters and some of the audience gather in the virtual world. Other attendees may choose to watch a web-cast of the meeting through their browser or dial in to the audio portion of the presentation.
- Interactive training
A small class of 10 to 20 people are lead through a training program by an instructor. The instructor will use a combination of presentation tools and live applications to present the lesson. Students will use their own applications, as well as other techniques like role-playing, to interact with the lesson. All students will be in the virtual world, although they may review recordings of the class afterwards.
To support these use cases, the features planned for this release include:
- Usability
- Improved camera control
- Uniform mechanism for interacting with objects in the environment (e.g. HUD, selecting)
- More natural mechanisms for working with applications in the world
- Improved presence and messaging integrated into the client HUD
- Scalability
- ~200 simultaneous users in a world with several rooms
- Work with multi-node Darkstar
- Security and Access Control
- Implement basic security on cells
- Allow users to define security parameters for documents, applications and spaces in the world
- Documents and applications can automatically inherit the security parameters of the space they are in
- Improved Application Sharing
- Default share-aware apps (whiteboard, presentation viewer)
- Server-based sharing of X11 and Windows applications
- Firewall and NAT traversal for client-side shared apps
- Video, Audio and Telephony
- Play recorded video in-world
- Record and play back in-world interactions
- Stream in-world live or recorded content to web
- Telephone dial-in
- Private voice chat
- Presentation audio (amplified audio that fills room)
- End user content creation
- End user design and customization of basic building using 2D user interface
- Placing 3D models in the world
- Open animation file import
- User-defined placemarks
Release 1.1 and Beyond
The vision for Wonderland going forward is to make it the best possible environment for collaboration, be it for business, education, commerce, or entertainment. Our focus is on features that will enhance how people communicate, work together, learn together, and play together. Features that we will consider for future releases include:
Turning Wonderland into a primary work environment
We are aiming for an environment that runs applications well enough that users can comfortably do most of their real work within the virtual environment. The sort of features that would enable this include:
- Further application sharing improvements for desktop-level performance
- Scheme for allowing any application to run in-world with little or no effort
Flexible space
As a virtual environment, there is no need to stick closely to the physical metaphor. We want to take more advantage of the malleability of the environment to allow:
- Everyone to have a front-row seat
- Rearranging your in-world office to be near a different person or team room at any time
- Dynamically adding walls to a room as more space is needed
- Generating new spaces based on dynamic queries (eg, search for a music group and a room dedicated to that band is automatically created and populated with related songs, artwork, and other artifacts found on the web)
Share-aware applications
Sharing existing applications designed for single users is never going to be the ideal way to collaborate. The best possible user experience can only be accomplished when applications are built with multiple users in mind from the outset.
- create several more example share-aware 2D applications
- create several example share-aware 3D applications
- add API and toolkit features to make it easy for developers to build new share-aware applications
Avatar expressiveness based on live data capture
While some avatar expressiveness can be programmed, natural body language is an important step in dramatically increasing the emotional bandwidth provided by the virtual environment. We believe realistic avatar motions including head gestures, facial expressions, and hand gestures will work most effectively if these gestures are captured in real time from actual human motion.
- synchronize audio with avatar mouth movements
- video capture of head gestures (nodding and shaking) mapped to avatar movement
- video capture of facial expressions mapped to avatar facial animation
- video or sensor capture of hand and arm motions mapped to avatar movement
Federation
The Wonderland model is for individuals or organizations to be able to create worlds on their own servers, either inside or outside their organization's firewall. Like web servers today, we envision that Wonderland servers can be federated such that users can move easily from one organizations virtual world to another's in a way similar to moving from one web site to another.
- help develop and implement interoperability standards
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