IEEE Internet Computing: VWRAP for Virtual Worlds interop

Tentative skeletal pre-draft of a possible article. --- Remember the wiki motto, "Be Bold." :-)

Introduction

• <<<Set the scene with an epic literary start>>

Mankind is an imaginative, storytelling species. From our first glimmers of intelligence in the wielding of a bone as a weapon, through to today's visions of our future among the stars, we have always imagined new worlds that are different to those of yesterday. We have continually redefined our physical world through progress, created innumerable fantasy worlds through sheer imagination, and told stories about past worlds and future worlds to keep our culture and visions alive. Some new worlds we have even reached physically by departing from our little planet of origin into the darkness of space. We're really not happy with just a single world.

Computing is a microcosm of everything else that Mankind does, so it's no surprise that our worlds of the imagination have become part of this new space as well, indeed an essential part. We call our computer-driven worlds virtual worlds, although the adjective is oddly superfluous. As has been the case throughout history, these CPU-assisted worlds gain their immersive reality as worlds entirely within our minds.

This article is about a small corner of the huge space of virtual worlds, a corner in which one large established virtual world and a constellation of small newer ones share sufficient commonality that a desire for interoperability between them has taken root under the auspices of the IETF.

A brief history of virtual worlds

• <<<The only thing I can bring to this section is a small acquaintance since 1996 with what became ActiveWorlds, a decade of excessive online gaming in 3 major MMOs, and 5 years of Second Life + a little Opensim. I don't consider this a usable background for writing even a brief history of VWs. Morg>>>

The Second Life virtual world model

• <<<Intro to Linden Lab and the rise of SL>>>

• <<<Paragraph on the SL grid/simulator/client model>>>

• <<<Short paragraph on the SL data model>>>

Opensim and open source virtual worlds

• <<<libsecondlife and reverse engineering of SL protocols>>>

• <<<Founding of Opensim project and goals>>>

• <<<OSgrid and other Opensim-based grids>>>

• <<<Interop mechanisms available in Opensim>>>

• <<<User expectations for the SL/Opensym ecosystem>>>

Defining the VW interop problem space

• <<<LL+IBM, founding of the AWG, and scary numbers>>>

• <<<The OGP agent domain + region domain model>>>

• <<<One-sentence description of capabilities>>>

• <<<The OGP interop trial of Summer 2008>>>

• <<<Taking OGP to the IETF --- MMOX and problem space overload>>>

• <<<Narrowing the VW interop problem space: OGPX>>>

VWRAP: a services model of VW interop

• <<<Extending OGP to multiple VWs through policy-defining RDs == OGPX>>> (acceptable simplification?)

• <<<A successful OGPX BoF, and the foundation of VWRAP workgroup>>>

• <<<Brief description of expected VWRAP services>>>

• <<<High level overview of protocol entities>>>

VWRAP: the work ahead

• <<<Goals, rough timeline, and open invitation>>>