opinion
The Tao of OpenSim
In today’s long and rambling post I want to address two topics which have come up for me recently. The first is the assumption that OpenSim is just trying to be a cheaper Second Life. The second is the idea that OpenSim development is something that will inevitably be provided by other people and... »
Is a Universal Virtual Worlds Viewer possible?
Introduction - the Problems of a Universal Viewer In common with quite a few other people, I’ve speculated before about a very different internet architecture for virtual worlds from that of the current Second Life. Instead of virtual worlds comprised of big ‘grids’ of simulators sharing central services, there would be a much larger number... »
Reflections on Writing an OpenSim Region Module
Introduction A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I planned to post something about my experiences in writing the Parallel Selves Message Bridge module. This is that post, albeit a little bit later than planned :) It isn’t a region module writing tutorial - the OpenSim project wiki has one of those if you’d... »
Guesses for OpenSim in 2009
So, I thought I’d somewhat belatedly indulge in that favourite blogging staple, predictions for the coming year. In my case, I’m going to stick to speculation about OpenSim (or speculation about events that may affect it). And in the interests of truth in advertising, I’m going to call these guesses as they’re based largely... »
The democratization of virtuality
Anybody reading this blog may have noticed that I haven’t posted anything much for the past few weeks, apart from weekly OpenSim development summaries. The truth is that I’ve wanted to but just haven’t been able to get the time - as I’m sure everyone knows, travelling and starting a new job tends to... »
Could there be a future without big grids?
So, it’s late on a Friday in the UK and I’m in the mood to write another blog post. But I’ve just finished grinding out another day in my (soon to be ex) non-OpenSim related day job, so instead of writing something detailed, technical and real, I’m going to indulge in a bit of... »
Where are all the clean room clients?
Recently, Danton Sideways did a nice roundup of Second Life viewers. Naturally, this included the Linden Labs viewer, as well as editions by coders such as Nicholaz Beresford, Able Whitman and Dale Glass, and companies such as realXtend and the Electric Sheep Company. However, what was very noticeable to me is that almost all... »
OpenSim and realXtend, 4 months on
Back in February this year, Adam wrote a blog post about a company called realXtend who had, on the quiet, written both a virtual worlds viewer (based on Linden Lab’s codebase) and a virtual worlds server (based on OpenSim). This combination supported a whole load of new features, including mesh primitives and Python scripting... »
Why I love OSGrid
Okay, before we start, let me make it clear that I’m not expressing my undying affection for Ordnance Survey maps (much as I do love knowing where I am). Rather, I’m talking about the OpenSim Second Life protocol grid known as OSGrid (I’ve scattered some random shots of Wright Plaza on OSGrid throughout this... »
Open grids and distributed asset systems
One of the things I really love about OpenSim is that it gives us a platform for all kinds of experimentation. One of the experiments going on right now is the establishment of “open” grids using the Second Life protocol. An “open” grid, such as OSGrid, is one where anyone (subject to... »