General Computer Stuff

Oculus Rift Update 2013-25

by

Jo Yardley has written up her firs hands on experience with the Oculus Rift (Rift). This is an excellent article that puts the state of the art in perspective. The current Rift’s are low resolution, but still impressive. See: Oculus Rift and Second Life.

[youtube lcAaFAIZwH0]

The day she saw the Rift the company was releasing a high resolution version, still beta. There is an even higher resolution version coming for retail sales.

Jo portrays the possibilities for this technology very well. The article is worth the read.

Hamlet recently published: Oculus VR Gets $15M in VC Funding – Virtual Reality Much More Likely to Go Mass Market.

Every indication is this tech will create sweeping changes to computer games and virtual worlds. Jo is portraying ways VR headsets could change RL activities. It will certainly change how we experience and build in Second Life.

Euclideon Geoverse

by

Every so often I see an update on voxel technology. Jo Yardley caught a new update from Euclideon. I first saw a demo of Euclieon tech a year or two ago. At the time it was very impressive. Today the recent announcement of Geoverse is even more impressive.

[youtube Irf-HJ4fBls]

About a month ago I mentioned this tech in relation to Philip Rosedale’s High-Fidelity project. It is supposed to be using the voxel tech Euclideon is developing. (See: High Fidelity News) The comments in this new video about lag may be the reason that Philip’s people think they can build a no lag virtual world.

Geoverse would seem to suggest it is possible.

 

 

Oculus Rift 2013-21

by

There is an interesting video about how Oculus VR™ (OVR) is changing the game design paradigms. I came across it in my Facebook browsing. 22 minutes. Nate Mitchell is speaking at GDC 2013 (Game Developers Conference) which ran from March 25 to 29.

[youtube oMmi-jS4OYA]

I’ve written about what I think the user interface problems will be. This video really gets into some of the problems and how people are handling them.

Read more

Adobe in the Cloud

by

In Second Life we tend to use open source products. But, some people use the professional products from Adobe, Photoshop being the best known. I think it has no equal. There are other image editors. But, Photoshop (PS) is the industry standard. If you plan to work for a gaming or other company that works with images, you have to know PS. But, Adobe is making big changes that will radically affect casual users.

Adobe Creative Cloud
Adobe Creative Cloud

Adobe is changing how they deliver their software. Until now they have sold their software in a package with a perpetual license. I can still use an old copy of CS3, CS4, CS5.5, and CS6. (CS = Creative Suite) It isn’t cheap. A new version of PS costs US$800. Updates can be $300 to $400 per version come every 12 to 24 months. People can find PS on Amazon and in stores for $650. But, quite often that is the ‘basic’ version not the ‘Extended’ version.

Read more

Pages: 1 2 3

Second Life Chrome Extensions

by

Daniel Voyager has an article up: Second Life Extensions on Google Chrome.Wow! How neat is that?

Check it out.

If you are wondering what a ‘browser extension’ is, it is a program that runs in your browser. It adds functionality to the Browser. For instance; to check on which of your friends are online you currently have visit the SL web pages, login, and look for friends. An extension does all the work for you. You see a friends list without all the hassle.

Daniel list 3 more extensions you can get.

There is a small downside to extensions. They burn up some CPU cycles and slow your browser down. They are more of a hit at start up when opening the browser then while it is running. When your browser is closed they don’t run. So, it is not a big deal.

If your browser is loaded with search tools bars like My Web Search and other annoying near malware, you need to learn about extensions and remove the annoying crap. Check these removal tutorials for help with; Chrome, Internet Explorer, and Firefox.