Toni, Excellent post! In my opinion, I think RealXtend is definitely headed in the right direction.
*> professional C++ programmers with years of experience with Ogre3D; > tossing that out for C# and Irrlicht is not a trivial matter * I understand certain developers prefer C#, and like DirectX (the Microsoft Devs), but I really do like the way RealXtend stays with OPEN Standards (non-Microsoft exclusive). I really do prefer Ogre3D over Irrlicht. Ogre3d is well supported. I really do prefer OpenGL standards over Microsoft DirectX (on the client/viewer side). I believe we should ultimately give people choices. Having different viewers (that will each work with each of the various servers) would be excellent. I also believe this is the right way to approach things (especially from a cross-platform Viewer standpoint). Since Naali is C++ based, it will make it easier to port the viewer to various platforms (such as PlayStation 3, Wii, PSP, Linux/Ubuntu/OS X) *> It certainly would be nice if there was at least one complete* *> enough open modular viewer that would be actually usable * *> for stuff. It was interesting to hear on irc one day that some * *>(teacher?) found Idealist already complete enough so that he* *> could use that with his students* I agree that it would be nice to have a nice working viewer, but ultimately it would be great to have SEVERAL working viewers. I'd love to see "Rei" working with RealXtend/ModRex, OpenSim core, and 3Di. I'd also like to see "Naali" working with ModRex and OpenSim native core (and possibly even seem some of 3Di's technologies working their way into ModRex?) I agree that it is good to have a lot of different kinds of innovation in place, and develop a robust platform where users (and content developers) can choose from a wide variety of standards out there. Toni, what are your thoughts on using the "OpenSim MegaRegions"? It seems to be a very useful new feature for vehicles, and may help solve some of the "border crossing" issues: http://www.adamfrisby.com/blog/2009/09/opensim-megaregions/ *"Regions within the same simulator process can be ‘combined’ via the new RegionCombinerModule" For vehicles I can see this being a very impressive and useful new feature – eliminating border crossings makes for bigger racetracks and faster speeds. Sailors can build oceans that aren’t equivilent to a lake-in-the-backyard, and if my estimate of 5MB per empty region holds true at scales larger than 64 regions in size; then it’d be possible to build a 4km x 4km ocean on a server with less than 2GB of RAM (equivilent to about 256 sims normally).* This is a quick video of the Border Crossings and MegaRegions for OpenSim: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zftuoMO_R1U Could we just implement this "MegaRegion" support into RealXtend so at least we have multi-region support (for right now) and then later as other ideas (or different protocols) are developed (specifically for better multi-region support) in the future then maybe OpenSim will head that direction and RealXtend can work closely with enabling better multi-region support as well, but something is still better than nothing at this point. The megaRegions support that Adam is working on sounds very interesting. It seems the MegaRegions, and Border Crossings that Adam Frisby is working on would seem like a good idea for RealXtend, no? At least we would have multi-region support in RealXtend, and the only two things that are really holding RealXtend back right now are multi-region support, and the Viewer. I understand that ModRex/RealXtend will continue to evolve, but at least we would have a nice multi-region development platform that we can begin importing models into and using. ;-) What are your thoughts on this? Are you familiar with the Mega-Region support that Adam is working on? Mark On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 2:35 PM, Toni Alatalo <ant...@kyperjokki.fi> wrote: > > Ryan McDougall kirjoitti: > > just chiming in to elaborate on of the reasons why Naali and Idealist > are not the same: > > > The reason why realXtend couldn't proceed with Idealist, although the > > idea was seriously considered is the following: > > 2. language and rendering engine: more than half of realXtend are > > professional C++ programmers with years of experience with Ogre3D; > > tossing that out for C# and Irrlicht is not a trivial matter > > > > Also the idea with Naali was to quickly get something that is compatible > with the existing server on a protocol level. At the same time the > server implementation refactoring from a fork to an opensim module was > completed, but the protocol and asset formats etc. stayed the same, so > both the old rexviewer and Naali work with both the old rexserver and > current opensim+modrex. And we got there relatively quickly: after > programming started in March, in May we could see Rex scenes at least > partially how they ought to be. > > So with that idea it certainly seems that it made sense to continue > using Ogre, and not switch the gfx engine at the same time. > > Like someone already said in this crazily exploded discussion on the > various lists, it is also good to have options. The Idealist techs: > .net, c#, Irrlicht, .net gui libs etc have certain characteristics that > fit certain usage environments, developers and libraries. Naali techs: > c++ native code, Ogre, qt for ui and increasingly for other things, and > cpython for non-native extensions (and javascript as qtscript) are a > different family. > > I do agree that there is and has been too much fragmentation, given how > little resources most of these projects have (like lookingglass seems > quite nice but is one guy, Idealist 2-3 occasionally?). It certainly > would be nice if there was at least one complete enough open modular > viewer that would be actually usable for stuff. It was interesting to > hear on irc one day that some (teacher?) found Idealist already complete > enough so that he could use that with his students - wanted something > simpler and more restricted than full slviewer. But in some places the > differing also makes sense, due to different platforms like described > above. > > At least we can learn from each other, like thanks to pyov and Idealist > (which I think inherited it from pyov) we know one way to do multiregion > support, which we don't have in Naali at all yet (and I don't know how > it should / will be done, given that the whole SL way with regions is > perhaps not a good idea). > > In any case there will be several viewers, with different graphics > engines etc. -- even if some of the open, modular, bsd-like things would > merge, at least also the slviewer and others based on that will be > there. So like said the questions about format standards and such > interoperability are topical. For standardization it is good that there > is a lot of different kinds of innovation first in many places, so that > people get to know what actually needs to be standardized (mr. > Tannenbaums networking book has a nice diagram about this) - some of > that is already known now (mesh and scene data I think, animations to a > lesser extent), but not everything I believe. > > But I sure also hope that we keep sharing design ideas, perhaps code > too, and who knows perhaps have some parts where have merged subprojects > from different efforts. > > ~Toni > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ http://groups.google.com/group/realxtend http://www.realxtend.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
