GP3 - A Distributed Grid-Based Spatial Index Infrastructure for Massive Multiuser Virtual Environments

Massive Multiuser Virtual Environments (MMVEs) and especially the idea of a ´´3D Web´´ as a combination of a MMVE and today´s WWW currently attracts a lot of attention. The realization of such a vision on a global scale though poses severe technical challenges to the underlying network infrastructure. It is generally accepted that such a global scale scenario can only be realized in a distributed fashion. The HyperVerse project aims at the provision of a federated global scalable infrastructure for such a ´´3D Web´´ scenario. We propose a two-tier Peer-To-Peer infrastructure that combines a loosely structured overlay network of user clients with a highly-structured overlay network of reliable so-called public servers constituting the backbone of our architecture. This paper presents the Grid-based plane Partitioning Protocol (GP3), a structured peer-to-peer overlay network for the interconnection of the public servers that realizes a spatial index in order to allow fast location based queries.