UNIFORM SMARTPHONE CONTROLLER FOR WEB-BASED VIRTUAL REALITY PURPOSES

Abstract

This work introduces a uniform smartphone controller interface integrated into LIRKIS G-CVE web-based global collaborative virtual environments. In general, VR controllers provide various kinds of interaction techniques to manipulate virtual objects. Mostly, those aim focus on controlling the virtual context and the interaction with 3D GUI integrated in the virtual environment. With respect to web-based virtual reality, the progress in development of uniform interfaces is raising thanks to emerging web technologies and frameworks with cross-platform support. Although there are many manufacturers of VR controllers, their usage is often limited only for specified display device. Our intention is to cover multiple devices through only one simple controller interface, that is capable to provide a variety of interactions for web-based VR. In this study we proposed Enhanced Smart Client Interface designed for providing fully immersive interaction through smartphones. We performed several experiments focused on user experience and usability under two cloud platforms. Results obtained from experiments performed in our study confirm that utilization of our interface is mostly affected by the server response time. Based on the results this solution is suitable for further development and improvements.

Keywords

• virtual reality
• web-based
• smartphone controller
• virtual environment