3Di’s Web-based viewer used for on-line commerce
3Di of Japan has released the source code for its browser-based viewer, accelerating the possibility that the ability to access openSim virtual worlds through the browser will become increasingly stable and effective.
According to the company press release:
3Di, Inc., which develops and offers 3D Internet solutions (Head office: Shibuya-ku, Tokyo; CEO: Satoshi Koike; hereinafter referred to as 3Di) has today launched an open source project, named 3Di Viewer “Rei”, for viewing and interacting with OpenSim-based(*1) 3D virtual worlds in web browsers. With this public release of open source technology, 3Di hopes to assist industry adoption and standardization of 3D Internet technology. Using the same core technology as 3Di’s commercial product 3Di OpenViewer(*2), the open source project 3Di Viewer “Rei” offers software developers an open platform for delivering multi-user 3D Internet content inside the web browser.
Multi-user 3D virtual worlds have achieved success in focused application areas, but they have not yet achieved broad penetration and universal adoption, like traditional 2D web media. 3Di Viewer “Rei” addresses this problem by integrating 3D content inside of traditional 2D web pages, allowing existing 2D content to merge with or migrate to 3D content.
According to Norman Lin, Technology Group Manager at 3Di: “We have been receiving quite some interest about the possibilities of a viewer running inside the web browser. Also, the OpenSim community has been looking for a new BSD-licensed(*3) viewer solution. By offering our viewer as open source under the BSD license, we’re hoping to help accelerate the standardization and industry-wide adoption of 3D Internet technologies.”
In addition to being browser-based, the project provides another option to the openSim development community, as the release notes.
Combined with the various “light viewers” that Linden Lab is exploring, expect to see a new generation of options for accessing openSim and Second Life.
I will probably butt in here and say that it’s going to be locked to OpenSim for the time being. 3DiOV uses a couple of key changes from the SL protocol to speed it up and make it more usable.
Some of these include a better texture delivery protocol (not based around UDP), only supporting mesh avatars (which require custom protocol bits), and supporting mesh objects (ditto, custom protocols).
While I do expect we’ll see SL support probably get contributed eventually; it’s going to require cutting back on features and lowering the user experience a little.
I wrote a little bit more about the technical side of it here: http://www.adamfrisby.com/blog/2009/09/opensim-in-a-web-page-for-everyone/
Thanks Adam – didn’t mean to imply it was compatible with SL – I understand it isn’t. But moves towards light viewers and Web-based ones seem to be an emerging trend and it’s great to see different approaches.
Help me understand – how is this different from other browser-based VWs and VW standards such as x3d, Metaplace, etc?
I think this is the type of solution business need to open up 3D fuctionality into their existing web sites to support product demostrations, product training, sales, support, all the mission critical aspects of a business. Companies want to keep people on their web site not send them off to another place which I think will always create a paradox for business and SL.
The guys who do the weekly BBC radio show “The Naked Scientists” can’t login to SL using the regular viewer because of some firewall issues or the like. (They stream the show live into SL on Sundays.) I’m sure they’d love to have a good reliable web-based SL viewer. The one they were using stopped working I think.
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