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Hi George, I'm definitely super interested in the space - to the extent that I've ordered recently received a competitor's product (the Varjo Aero) with the in

Hi George, I'm definitely super interested in the space - to the extent that I've ordered recently received a competitor's product (the Varjo Aero) with the intent that would be used almost exclusively for productivity. I have to be blunt, the going has been rough. The clarity of the display is more than up to the task of writing software all day. But, the Aero is a windows only product. There either isn't, or I haven't found a productive Windows PCVR windows manager comparable to either SimulaVR or Immersed. This lack of software was completely unexpected, and rather shocking to me. After the Simula One is available on the market, I may well pivot to that device. But do you know of anyone who is taking on the effort of running SimulaVR on a windows host through any means? I don't mind rolling up my sleeves and doing work, but right now I don't see any path at all. My current productivity is stuck to a projection of the desktop in a VR space, rather than a true window to window, application level VR window manager.

kanetw 5y ago
Thanks. This is exactly why we're making our own device--we even talked to Varjo, but no interest in Linux compat. The problem with getting SimulaVR (Simula One will be compatible) to run is the lack of a WM API. Your best bet in that regard would be to get Microsoft to expose it or do WMR compatibility? It's a bit out of scope for us, we're focusing on OpenXR as #1 and SteamVR as fallback.
georgewsinger 5y ago
Somewhat echoing on kanetw/David's comments: But yeah, there aren't many options that I'm aware of, even in Windows. This frankly astonishes me. Of course we're biased, and think that Linux is a better OS than Windows, but it seems like Microsoft is missing a major opportunity by not focusing harder on consumer VR computing. The HoloLens was an amazing (early/experimental) product that was years ahead of its time. Rather than developing it (and other VR/AR computers) into consumer ready products, they seemed to have spent a bunch of time netting government VR contracts, and now focusing on Metaverse/social networking/gaming (like everyone else).

kanetw 5y ago

Thanks. This is exactly why we're making our own device--we even talked to Varjo, but no interest in Linux compat. The problem with getting SimulaVR (Simula One will be compatible) to run is the lack of a WM API. Your best bet in that regard would be to get Microsoft to expose it or do WMR compatibility? It's a bit out of scope for us, we're focusing on OpenXR as #1 and SteamVR as fallback.

georgewsinger 5y ago

Somewhat echoing on kanetw/David's comments: But yeah, there aren't many options that I'm aware of, even in Windows. This frankly astonishes me. Of course we're biased, and think that Linux is a better OS than Windows, but it seems like Microsoft is missing a major opportunity by not focusing harder on consumer VR computing. The HoloLens was an amazing (early/experimental) product that was years ahead of its time. Rather than developing it (and other VR/AR computers) into consumer ready products, they seemed to have spent a bunch of time netting government VR contracts, and now focusing on Metaverse/social networking/gaming (like everyone else).