A hardware-independent virtual reality development system

Author

Pape, Dave

Author_Institution

Electron. Visualization Lab., Illinois Univ., Chicago, IL, USA

Volume

16

Issue

4

fYear

1996

fDate

7/1/1996 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

44

Lastpage

47

Abstract

Simulating virtual reality (VR) hardware allows programs to be written in a desktop environment without constant use of limited VR resources. Rather than shifting constantly between VR and workstation environments, developers at the Electronic Visualization Laboratory (EVL) wanted to be able to test VR applications on the normal workstation console. We therefore created a software simulator for VR development. It simulates various VR system features with an interface that runs on an ordinary workstation. The simulator is implemented as part of the CAVE library, the programming library originally written to support the CAVE hardware. It can, however, be used to develop applications for several VR systems, including ImmersaDesks and head-coupled displays. The library itself has been designed so that use of the simulator or any supported hardware is entirely transparent to application code

Keywords

development systems; graphical user interfaces; software libraries; software tools; virtual machines; virtual reality; workstations; CAVE library; Electronic Visualization Laboratory; ImmersaDesks; desktop environment; hardware-independent virtual reality development system; head-coupled displays; programming library; user interface; virtual reality hardware simulation; workstation console; Application software; Computational modeling; Debugging; Graphics; Hardware; Mice; Testing; Virtual environment; Virtual reality; Workstations;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Computer Graphics and Applications, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0272-1716

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/38.511852

Filename

511852