OpenCobalt /Croquet client for Opensim

Thinking out loud regarding the feasible of a OpenCobalt /Croquet
client/peer for Opensim ?

* Connect to Opensim Server -  much like Cobalt connects to Jabber now
* Portal window opens to server - much like opening a stored file or
connecting to another peer

Convergence of the technologies would seem to bring the best of both
"worlds" (peer/server/content) into one ecosystem.

A few dangling pointers:
http://opensimulator.org/wiki/OpenSim_Archives
http://opensimulator.org/wiki/User_Documentation


Ideas? Is a convergence possible? ... This though may be WAY off but
wanted to bring it up and see what others thought.

Cheers,
Rich
===

I'd approach this by trying to leverage Jabber as much as possible.

OpenSim does have a Jabber module (see: http://opensimulator.org/wiki/JabberBridge 
  )
so it would be possible to IM the people in OpenSim.

If you first establish an IM session between OpenSim and Cobalt  
worlds, you could
then use the Jabber/XMPP session to transport connection info (IP  
addresses, ports, etc) needed to establish a session to the other  
world. The advantage of this is it can all be done at runtime and  
allows for dynamically creating connections/sessions without having a  
static central rendezvous point or directory.

Another advantage is that your identity would be decoupled from any  
specific world - [hidden email] would be me whether I  
started on the OpenSim side or the Cobalt side - or a generic jabber  
client.

Some sort of third party identity service is a very good thing,  
particularly when I don't entirely trust the people running the other  
server (and so do not really want to give them an account/password  
pair).

- mpm

On Nov 17, 2009, at 10:40 AM, Rich White wrote:

I second this approach.  XMPP is a pretty good open standard for rendezvous, and there is lots of support for it.


On 11/17/2009 10:55 AM, Mark P. McCahill wrote:

I'd approach this by trying to leverage Jabber as much as possible.

OpenSim does have a Jabber module (see: http://opensimulator.org/wiki/JabberBridge )
so it would be possible to IM the people in OpenSim.

If you first establish an IM session between OpenSim and Cobalt worlds, you could
then use the Jabber/XMPP session to transport connection info (IP addresses, ports, etc) needed to establish a session to the other world. The advantage of this is it can all be done at runtime and allows for dynamically creating connections/sessions without having a static central rendezvous point or directory.

Another advantage is that your identity would be decoupled from any specific world - [hidden email] would be me whether I started on the OpenSim side or the Cobalt side - or a generic jabber client.

Some sort of third party identity service is a very good thing, particularly when I don't entirely trust the people running the other server (and so do not really want to give them an account/password pair).

- mpm

On Nov 17, 2009, at 10:40 AM, Rich White wrote:

Thinking out loud regarding the feasible of a OpenCobalt /Croquet
client/peer for Opensim ?

* Connect to Opensim Server -  much like Cobalt connects to Jabber now
* Portal window opens to server - much like opening a stored file or
connecting to another peer

Convergence of the technologies would seem to bring the best of both
"worlds" (peer/server/content) into one ecosystem.

A few dangling pointers:
http://opensimulator.org/wiki/OpenSim_Archives
http://opensimulator.org/wiki/User_Documentation


Ideas? Is a convergence possible? ... This though may be WAY off but
wanted to bring it up and see what others thought.

Cheers,
Rich
===

Rich White wrote:
Actually, I've been looking at merging SL and Croquet off and on for
several years, and there's far more interesting ways of merging the two
that can serve as a pattern for using Croquet in many situations besides
formal virtual worlds.

The simplest is to simply use the SL media plugin or the equivalents
that work with 3rd party viewers, and create a "telepresence" between
worlds. I.E. a simple view-only portal or 2D equivalent using VNC, with
or without interaction:

 http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/User:Saijanai_Kuhn/Plugins_discussion#Media_Rendering_Plugin

This particular use can be extended to provide a service that could be
added to SL instant messaging, so that you could create a temporary
world and invite a buncha people to join you in a private 3D chat
island, for collaboration or simply to "hangout" without having the
overhead of maintaining a genuine OpenSim or SL sim.

Obviously, you can extend the concept to be an option for ANY kind of 2D
collaboration system, from Jabber to IRC to Google Wave to whatever.
Imagine having a "create Croquet island/invite people" option as
standard in any IRC client.

Getting back to typical virtual worlds usage, the idea of a viewer
plugin that leverages all of Squeak/Croquet's functionality to enhance
some other viewer shouldn't be sneered at. Right now, the SL viewer (for
example) barely provides access to raw mouse coordinates for UV tracking
on a texture (the current media plugin scenario), but there's no reason
why any arbitrary event or internet packet couldn't be intercepted and
shunted off to squeak for pre/post processing.

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/User:Saijanai_Kuhn/Plugins_discussion#Proposed_Extension_to_Media_Plugin


I'm currently working on a proof of concept of this last by intercepting
arbitrary packets to/from the SL server/viewer using the Gridproxy
utility and/or injecting or pre/post processing such packets. When you
combine that with the ability to intercept mouse UV coordinates on a
texture in SL and render into said texture from Squeak/Croquet directly,
you get all sorts of possibilities. Add localhost/seaside into mix and
you've got a very powerful experimental system that can project control
surfaces via html on a prim, or in the SL built-in browser, or via
VNC-like interactions directly to a prim on the local SL viewer.  
Combine that with broadcasting to streaming server, and you have a
virtual worlds whiteboard that can project into SL ala the metanomics
virtual lecture hall.

http://www.metanomics.net/


Start interacting with internal viewer events, and you can leverage
physics/graphics creation/etc from the Squeak/Croquet side, and merge it
directly into a local SL instance for custom puppeteering with the
possiblilty of doing a P2P collaboration mechanima where individual
avatars can be controlled by a single machine using a script and/or
timeline control interface. The resulting avatar activity can be
"filmed" for mechanima, or could be uploaded to a central server for
rebroadcast to a virtual world audience (or both).

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/User:Saijanai_Kuhn/Plugins_discussion#Puppeteering_Plugin


Instead of using 2D projections, you could also leverage the 3D portal
system of Croquet to inject 3D cenes from Croquet into a given virtual
world viewer, and either maintain a backk-end P2P connection between
participants, or shoot the composite scene to a central server in some
fashion using the existing virtual world protocols.

The possibilities are endless for synergy between Croquet and other
virtual worlds, IMHO.


Lawson (Saijani Kuhn in Second Life)