Inspiration
We were inspired by data presentation software, like Jupyter notebooks, as well as virtual spaces like VR Chat and Rec Room.
What it does
We successfully demonstrated that there is a synergy between virtual spaces and presenting information. This application specifically allows users to explore the web through multiple virtual displays and offers catered learning experiences. To demonstrate how a researcher may use this framework to display their work, we created a few custom experiences. The user can choose to play some educational finance games or to go to a research room that displays several google scholar sites from Digital Futures.
How we built it
We built this application using Unity and C#. We used art assets from BrokenVector to demonstrate how simple it is to change the environment to custom or premade scenes. We also utilized the ZFBrowser package to allow us to project web pages as game textures.
Challenges we ran into
Getting the web pages to load correctly was immensely difficult. We tried many plugins and tutorials before landing on something that we could modify to work. Introducing VR support was another hurdle that we were not expecting.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We are very proud of the spawn web browser feature. We think it is hugely beneficial that the user can choose to place a screen anywhere in the environment. Doing so places control in the user's hands to create an effective and efficient environment.
What we learned
We all have limited Unity experience, so this was a great exercise in application development in Unity. We learned about plugins, prefabrication, VR support, and embedded browsers.
What's next for Virtual Office Space
Virtual Office Space, being a hackathon project, is limited in nature. With more time and a budget, we would introduce more quality-of-life improvements and perhaps a multiplayer feature. We think that allowing multiple users to work together in this space would dramatically increase its utility. Imagine working with and laying out documents in a virtual space with someone across the world!
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