1. Hardware (how they work)
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Hardware (how they work)

2. Virtual Reality (VR) hardware
Input Devices
Output Devices
Virtual Reality System
input device - measures and records physical phenomena electronically, creating digital signals that the computer understands
output device - changes electronic signals into physical phenomena and provide sensible data 
virtual reality system - follows software instructions in assembling, processing and displaying all the data involved in creating a virtual world in real-time

3. VR Input Devices Flying mouse Wand similar to mouse
Forceball
ball mounted on small, stationary platform
twist, squeeze, press down, pull up, and turn side to side
uses LEDs and photoreceptors inside the base to measure force
six degrees of freedom(6DOF)
2DOF devices - measure movements along the X and Y axes
6DOF devices - measure movements along the X, Y, Z axes AND orientation of an object
Examples of 6DOF devices - flying mouse, wand, forceball and dataglove
Dataglove
captures relative movement of fingers, thumb and wrist
allows the hand to grasp, move, or interact with virtual objects
includes position sensor
Flying mouse
similar to mouse
becomes 6DOF sensor when lifted off the desktop
electromagnetic sensors built-in
Wand
similar to a flying mouse
lacks mouse ball
contains position-tracking sensor and designed to be held upright 

4. VR Display Devices 3-D Glasses uses a red and blue colored lens
to combine into stereoscopic
Head-Mounted Displays (HMDs)
with head-tracking devices
LCD shutter glasses are synchronized to two alternating separate views of the same scene

6. World Builders & Authoring Tools
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World Builders & Authoring Tools

7. What is an authoring tool?
An authoring tool is a tool to help you in building something, in this case, a VR world
There are a lot of authoring tools out there and one of the most common tool used and found is the Notepad (or any other text editor)

8. Other Authoring Tools
Any 3D modeler (that may or may not support exporting to VRML 97 format)
Example : 3D Studio Max, Lightwave Studio, Maya
World builders that are specific to VRML
Example : Cortona, Interactive VRML World Builder

9. Advantages vs. Disadvantages
Text Editor
Advantages :
Able to have full control over the model
Building sleek and slim codes
Gain better knowledge and port it to world builders
Disadvantages :
Long coding times for large worlds
Human typo errors

10. Advantages vs. Disadvantages
Generic 3D Modelers
Advantages :
Wide variety of built in tools
More comprehensive then most world builders
Disadvantages :
Not optimised for web development

11. Advantages vs. Disadvantages
VRML World Builders
Advantages :
Optimised for web
Most are able to port to the web which can be viewed directly (to HTML format)
Disadvantages :
Not very comprehensive
Sometimes might generate errors which are hard to debug

12. How does it work?
Records down all vertices and positions of all objects in the scene
Records down other info like material and lighting
File uses .wrl extension
Other formats can be converted to VRML 97 format by using 3rd party softwares

13. Future of Authoring Tools
X3D-Edit is a new tool for Extensible 3D Graphics (Virtual Reality is one of it)
X3D-Edit uses XML tagset defined by the X3D Compact Document Type Definition (DTD) in combination with Sun's Java, IBM's Xeena XML editor, and an editor profile configuration file

14. Virtual Reality Programming, scripting, etc
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Virtual Reality Programming, scripting, etc

15. Programming Tools & Libraries
OpenGL
Needs no introduction
DirectGraphics
A component of DirectX
Only works on Windows
Java3D
Java-based
Less mature than DirectX and OpenGL

16. Programming Tools & Libraries
CAVE
Full-fledged projection-based VR system
CAVE library is the SDK
GHOST SDK
Toolkit for developing touch-enabled applications.

17. Programming Tools & Libraries
VR Juggler
Library used as framework for app development
Controls rendering, VR devices, projection, etc.
Not a visual development environment.

18. Programming Tools & Libraries
Java (2) SDK v 1.3
standard tool used
automatic installation
java3D as an extension to libraries
MS Visual J++
has to be hacked into to enable java3D
might cause a problem

19. Programming Tools & Libraries
Activate - VRML2 Toolkit for C/C++ Developers
allow adding VRML97 files into MS Windows products
needs a C++ compiler
VIPER: The NIST VRML97 Parser
analyses and checks for error in VRML97 files

20. Agent & Avatars Technology
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Agent & Avatars Technology

21. AVATARS
An image representing a user in a multi-user virtual reality space.
Creature in a virtual reality world that has been endowed with life and may interact with each other.
Used for training, simulation, public speaking and cyber conference.

22. INTELLIGENT AGENTS
A virtual being capable of carrying out a task towards a goal while requesting and receiving advice in human terms.
Used mainly for data mining such as in and databases of companies.