Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference:	GR/L01527/01
Title:	LARGE SCALE REAL-TIME MULTI-USER VIRTUAL REALITY
Principal Investigator:	Sharkey, Professor P
Other Investigators:	Benford, Professor S Warwick, Professor K
Researcher Co-Investigators:
Project Partners:	BT Pre Nexus Migration
Department:	Cybernetics
Organisation:	University of Reading
Scheme:	Standard Research (Pre-FEC)
Starts:	01 April 1996	Ends:	31 August 1999	Value (£):	147,403
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:	Networks & Distributed Systems
EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:	Communications Information Technologies
Related Grants:
Panel History:
Summary on Grant Application Form
Many applicants including interactive home entertainment and battle field simulation are set to drive the development of very large scale distributed virtual reality systems. For these applications to be successful they must be responsive, allowing participants to interact with their surroundings and peers in a natural manner. Conventional multi-user virtual reality systems do not full encompass the concept of time, resulting in inconsistencies across the disturbed database induced by network delays. Consistency is maintained in some systems through object locking, but this severely reduces responsiveness and makes the system only scaleable to a small number of users.This proposal focuses on the development of unified kernel, based on an underlying time parameterised environmental model. The model incorporates time based reasoning, which reduces the effects of network induced latency by anticipation and advance communication of events, including ownership of objects. This kernel will be designed with the emphasis on providing manageable and scaleable services for a large number of users, interacting in real time. The kernel will be validated by comparing its performance and usability against that of an industry standard approach. A test consisting of sites in both the UK and USA will be set up for long distance multi-user testing.
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Potential use in non-academic contexts
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Organisation Website:	http://www.rdg.ac.uk