12 ms·

Android XR

354 points by dagmx 2y ago

nashashmi 2y ago
Anyone know of low priced glasses that can extend monitor into virtual displays in VR? So far I see the lenovo VR set able to do this.
- jamespo 2y ago
  https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2024/12/11/immersive-productivity-with-windows-and-meta-quest/ https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2024/12/11/immer... announced very recently
  - nashashmi 2y ago
    Yes my research showed that Meta can do this via partnership. And that makes me wonder do others need partnerships as well?
    - jayd16 2y ago
      There are a few remote desktop type apps for the Quest. The partnership is primarily a branding exercise, I would assume.
- verdverm 2y ago
  https://visor.com https://visor.com and https://immersed.com https://immersed.com Immersed works with lots of VR headsets, Visor is their bespoke HW shipping in '25
  - Philpax 2y ago
    In theory. In practice, they have failed to demonstrate a single fully functional headset to any external media, and their marketing strategy is borderline predatory ("lock in a better price for your subscription before it's too late!") I'll believe it when I see it.
    - verdverm 2y ago
      The day after the botched demo they had a few of the community members over to their AirBnB for a more hands on demo. Those people have spoken in the discord on their experience They have been keeping with updates as best they can, production lines are starting up, but they also have large orgs like Qualcomm dictating how much they can share. They are not keen to upset their suppliers
- angryasian 2y ago
  I think Xreal will likely be your best option right now, but there software support is not so good. Youll likely go down the rabbit hole and learn about viture and rokid and make more informed decision.
  - raffraffraff 2y ago
    I've got the Viture glasses. There's no support for Linux aside from working as a basic HDMI display over USB-C (so no head tracking, the screen stays welded to the same spot). The Spacewalker app on Android is basically a web / media browser, zero productivity. You can't use it like a launcher and launch other apps. There's Taskbar and Second Screen but these don't work on my Sony Xperia (you don't get window controls like resize, move or close). There is a paid app for Linux that uses the Viture SDK. It's supposed to be decent but I couldn't get it working during the free trial (I'm using OpenSuse Tumbleweed). TBH I got totally fed up with the glasses and lost interest in trying anything further. So this announcement is actually interesting to me.
tucosan 2y ago
Cool. In the meantime Google Assistant still fails to reliably call my contacts via voice command. And trying to use Google's AI offering as a paying customer of Google apps for work is a giant shitshow. So much so that I'm finally contemplating of dropping the Google ecosystem all together.
dagmx 2y ago
And the verge blog post about it. https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-xr-samsung-project-moohan-smart-glasses https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-... Seems like a very similar direction to visionOS. I’m glad Apple normalized the ability to run mobile apps spatially. I do wonder how this affects Meta’s plans for horizonOS. Are access to Meta’s game library more important than access to androids ecosystem.
- world2vec 2y ago
  That Verge article has at least a rendering of some VR/AR/XR headset, original post doesn't show or talk about any hardware.
- jsheard 2y ago
  > Seems like a very similar direction to visionOS. A crucial difference is that Android XR apparently has first-class support for 6DoF controllers (like Horizon OS) in addition to eye and hand tracking (like Vision OS) so it's aiming to compete on both fronts. Google thankfully didn't cargo-cult Apples decision to rely on eye and hand tracking, which is far from ideal for VR games.
  - dagmx 2y ago
    I think Apple picked the right direction to launch with as their primary interaction method. Controllers would be nice but as a secondary input. Google are apparently not mandating eye tracking or hand tracking. Which is nice for flexibility but you’re going to have a mishmash of interaction models for native apps.
    - MBCook 2y ago
      There is a recent rumor that they have been working with Sony to bring the PSVR 2 controllers to work on visionOS. Given Apple has not focused on gaming I think the decision they made was a good one too. You shouldn’t NEED special controllers to use the device like early VR headsets. However there are definitely things that would work better with controllers. Not just gaming but things where you need very fine input or having multiple buttons to switch modes or something would be good. So I hope the rumor turns out to be true.
marban 2y ago
I hope we don't see bloggers using it in the shower this time.
perdomon 2y ago
I love the navigation video example. It's so much better than staring down at a cell phone. At the end of the day, however, it all comes down to style (looking at you, Apple Vision Pro).
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  I'd wish for arrows and directive lines overlayed straight at eye level at the actual turning points. Basically video game style. In the video it's still limited to messages and map pictures in their dedicated box and makes me think the platform still won't be good enough to handle more complex overlaying.
- astrange 2y ago
  For navigation to work in VR, location services have to accurately know where you are and which way you're facing, which they don't. Compasses don't work in most urban situations because there's too much magnetic metal around you. Visual localization does work but the map has to be up to date.
- reaperducer 2y ago
  It's so much better than staring down at a cell phone. When the iPhone's App Store came out, there were a bunch of apps that were all about overlaying information on real-time real-world imaging. One of them was navigation where you'd hold your phone up (horizontally) and it would overlay the real world with lines and arrows. I wonder why that never really caught on. There was another great one that was an SMS app that overlayed your conversations on the camera feed, so you could walk and text at the same time without falling into a mine shaft, or stepping in dog poo, or whatever. With today's technology, that could be just a toggle. Again, for some reason people didn't like it.
theonlyjesus 2y ago
I'm so excited about this, but the fact that Google's behind it has me worried. Android XR will be ditched 1-2 years after release
- cubefox 2y ago
  Seems unlikely, only Meta and Apple have a comparable OS. Other manufacturers would have to either build their own thing or use Android XR.
  - n144q 2y ago
    Who are the "other manufacturers"? I don't see many companies interested in this area. Sony has almost given up, Pico has had some major setbacks, and you know what happened to Apple's Vision Pro. There will continue to be investment, but likely by the same big players. There just isn't a lot of money out there, and not many companies can afford this. Honestly, if Zuckerberg is no longer Meta's boss, they may have already shut down Quest entirely.
    - cubefox 2y ago
      I was assuming that VR headsets or AR glasses would become mainstream at some point, like smartphones or tablets, with various Chinese manufacturers competing for the best price. But maybe you are right and that's too optimistic.
      - 8n4vidtmkvmk 2y ago
        They've been around for awhile now and it's still not mainstream. What's holding people back now? Quest is pretty affordable. The quality is pretty good. You think a sleeker form factor will finally tip the scales?
        cubefox 2y ago
        Maybe not VR then. But perhaps AR glasses like Meta's Orion prototype. Though that seems somewhat doubtful as well.
makeitdouble 2y ago
Google and Samsung going against Meta sounds as much as a cursed alliance than it was with GearVR. I trust Samsung to execute excellently on the hardware and be ready to iterate, but will Google keep pushing the platform even if Meta also goes after regular android apps and crushes them commercially ? Now that regulators are on Google's back, Meta getting accesss to the whole Play Store or at least being protected from Google's shenanigans is realistic, and the Meta store could potentially be decently competitive for regular android apps as well if they want to.
- warkdarrior 2y ago
  Let's wait and see if apps will be 30% cheaper on Meta's store.
  - makeitdouble 2y ago
    For anyone curious, current Quest Store fees are probably still 30% https://www.techradar.com/news/metas-quest-2-game-store-fees-are-turning-it-into-the-metaverses-first-villain https://www.techradar.com/news/metas-quest-2-game-store-fees...
- Cumpiler69 2y ago
  Knowing how Google shuts down or forgets about products that don't make them a million billion dollars, I wouldn't invest into Google's XR ecosystem. Do you remember Google also has an ecosystem for Android Tablets and Wearables? Do THEY remember? Meta could sink in all that money because Zuck is really into that stuff.
  - meibo 2y ago
    What do you mean? They just released new tablet and watch hardware and accompanying OS updates.
    - makeitdouble 2y ago
      Yes, the Pixel Tablet is now 1 year old. Next move: https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/21/24302508/google-pixel-tablet-2-canceled-rumor https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/21/24302508/google-pixel-ta...
not_your_vase 2y ago
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- ddalex 2y ago
  All tablets are dying. The pixel watch 3 has excellent reviews, what's botched about it ?
  - BudaDude 2y ago
    > All tablets are dying. Highly disagree. The iPad line is very strong, especially in the artist community.
  - deleted 2y ago
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- Andrex 2y ago
  They already botched XR twice by killing Cardboard and Daydream. You're right, third time's gotta be the charm.
  - pzo 2y ago
    and from related they also killed: Google Glasses, Project Tango (3d cameras). ARCore also seems pretty much barely alive.
- deleted 2y ago
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fidotron 2y ago
Some of the mockups here look eerily like those from Google Glass. Somehow I doubt walking around with head mounted cameras beaming everything to the cloud is suddenly going to become OK, though there is definitely a generational shift on that.
- wkat4242 2y ago
  Yeah and that wasn't even the real reason glass failed. The tech just wasn't mature.
whatever1 2y ago
The similarities with Vision OS are insane.
- verdverm 2y ago
  Considering how little the difference is in phone UIs, one would expect XR UIs to be highly similar as well
taco_emoji 2y ago
Stop trying to make VR happen, it's not gonna happen
- ThrowawayTestr 2y ago
  Have you tried it?
  - taco_emoji 2y ago
    No, I have no interest
    - verdverm 2y ago
      You're missing out on some pretty awesome experiences
      - ncr100 2y ago
        The horizon VR game on psvr2, yeah. And of course Puzzling places. VR is fuuuuun.
        verdverm 2y ago
        VTOL VR Down the Rabbit Hole Trover Saves the Universe (mostly because I'm a Rick & Morty fan)
    - liontwist 2y ago
      Recently I realized that what I want out of a personal computer is a Unix terminal. And that’s actually pretty weird and far from how most people use a computer. PowerPoint, adobe video editing products. And all those things look unnecessary and complex to me. But I have to acknowledge a few facts: 1. I’m not as young and open to new experiences. I mostly want to refine workflows I already know. 2. I understand computers better than most people. 3. I’m less interested in screen entertainment because I work on computers. There will be people who grow up with stuff and they will have experiences in VR that are meaningful and they won’t use a computer like you or I.
bnchrch 2y ago
Honestly there's no point in Android XR. We can't trust Google to maintain even profitable endeavours past a couple years. And an investment in AR/VR hardware and software is likely over a decade long initiative. IMO They're already showing there weak amount of determination by making this a partnership out of the gate. Thats a bag of misaligned incentives, diluted returns and 2x as many execs who could kill the project.
- deleted 2y ago
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- herval 2y ago
  this is getting downvoted, but it's not a bad take. Google has proven, over and over, that it's unable to execute on any long running initiative like this - including 3 past botched XR initiatives
xnx 2y ago
Endeavors like this have failed before, but at some point (soon would be my guess) the utility of having an AI assistant with vision capability will just be too useful to resist putting an always available camera in glasses.
- criddell 2y ago
  I'm not sure I trust Google enough to walk around my home wearing their cameras. The last thing I want to see are ads based on the contents of my home or specific details of my family. The police might like it though. They could find out from Google the layout of a home or see if they know of any guns in a home before they SWAT it.
  - LordDragonfang 2y ago
    But (odds are) you trust them enough to walk around your home wearing their microphone. Letting them listen in on all your conversations and show you ads based on those, if the conspiracy theories are true. (Unless if you're an iPhone user, then you trust Apple - and make no mistake, they're building the exact same product, they just pathologically avoid talking about prototypes) It's boiling the frog. Unthinkable, until everybody is doing it and it's normal.
    - deleted 2y ago
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    - acdha 2y ago
      The number of people buying Apple devices for privacy suggests that quite a few people do not trust them, and while the rumors have flown around for years they’ve never been confirmed. That’s a contrast with, say, smart TV content recognition so it seems unlikely that Android phones are secretly monitoring what you say without anyone noticing the data being transmitted or the battery drain.
      - elcritch 2y ago
        > so it seems unlikely that Android phones are secretly monitoring what you say without anyone noticing the data being transmitted or the battery drain. Ah! So that’s why Androids always have bigger batteries than iPhones. ;)
contrarian1234 2y ago
Is it going to be open like Android or closed like Google Play? They seem to be evasive about licensing I also don't quite get why AI needs to be on the OS level (AI seems to make more sense on an app level) and what connection it has to XR. They're also very vague about what tangible OS integration they're planning. Sounds like a buzzword soup. They just forgot decentralized crytocurrencies
- freedomben 2y ago
  I suspect we agree, but to try to steelman here there is a signficant and increasing need for hardware to support on-device AI, and anytime you're talking hardware there has to be a baseline level of support in the OS. My guess though is that they are doing it because it's easier to just move AI stuff to the OS than have to do the hard work of modularizing and isolating, defining APIs and such. Also worth remembering that many of the Android decision makers don't seem to actually like Android and want to make it more like their iPhones. Android seems determined to erase (or bury to the point of impracticality) all the things that I originally loved about it. It's getting more and more closed and "the user is a security threat" with every release. I would guess that somebody is loving the amount of power and control that they can gain by doing it this way, and as long as the people continue to reward behavior like that we're going to get more of it. The iPhone being a textbook example.
  - refulgentis 2y ago
    I'd bet a lot of money it's not running anything significant on device AI-wise, maybe a speech model, but not anything in the key assistant pipeline that wasn't there in 2020.
- tredre3 2y ago
  It has essentially nothing to do with AI, they seem to have thrown that in for bonus PR points. Sure, ML is plenty involved behind the scenes for both actual use cases (AR and VR) but it's not relevant and not what people think of when they read AI. Reading the dev blog or the actual documentation was more informative to me: https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2024/12/introducing-android-xr-sdk-developer-preview.html https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2024/12/introducin... https://developer.android.com/develop/xr https://developer.android.com/develop/xr
Eisenstein 2y ago
I wonder how society is going to adapt to everyone literally having a camera pointed at them all the time by the people they interact with. You can say 'there are cameras everywhere' or 'cameras are on phones', but it is different when the camera is on someone's face that you are talking to. Imagine every social interaction being on video, or at least not knowing if it is. We will have to adapt to that, probably by being overly cautious about what we say and do.
- deleted 2y ago
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- reaperducer 2y ago
  I wonder how society is going to adapt to everyone literally having a camera pointed at them all the time by the people they interact with. I wonder if VR cameras can be blinded by IR emitters like we used to do to digital video cameras in movie theaters. My IR LED-studded headband won't look any stranger than someone walking around in public with a VisionPro strapped to their head.
  - Eisenstein 2y ago
    Many VR systems rely on IR light for controller tracking, but if the camera is doing hand tracking, it might filter it out.
ARandomerDude 2y ago
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- deleted 2y ago
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tummler 2y ago
My initial thoughts: - Some cool ideas at the OS/UXD level. Genuinely impressed the thinking behind them seems more thoughtful and innovative than what Apple did with VisionOS. (Not surprising given that Apple doesn’t understand or believe in XR from the top down.) - Not looking forward to continued knee-capping of their products/services on other XR platforms but c’est la vie. - I have zero faith they’ll actually invest resources in this long-term, given how they treated their previous XR efforts. As an XR dev, I doubt I will bother to build anything for their platform until I see a serious long-term investment in the space, and decent momentum / market share.
rkagerer 2y ago
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- deleted 2y ago
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- acdha 2y ago
  … and did a massive pivot to copy the iPhone when that launched in 2007. It made sense from the perspective of protecting search but let’s be honest about the real motivation.
- jsheard 2y ago
  To be fair the Android they bought was trying to be a Blackberry clone, Google did the legwork on turning it into an iOS clone.
  - rkagerer 2y ago
    I wish they'd been more inspired by PalmOS.
_bent 2y ago
I'd hope for Meta to support these new Jetpack APIs for the Quest / horizonOS, as their SDK is currently basically limited to Unity / Unreal / Native, with no primitives for building regular apps. Two competing XR platforms build on Android may not be too bad if apps just run on both. There are some warts on horizonOS for true XR experiences like the guardian system effectively locking you into a predefined/scanned room or the camera feeds not being accessible (would be useful for scanning QR codes or copying IRL text), hopefully some competitive pressure can move Meta here. Right now there are quite a few Quest 2 & 3 devices on the market and not a single new Samsung XR glass. Any developer building a new XR app would want their app to run on Quest
- jsheard 2y ago
  > I'd hope for Meta to support these new Jetpack APIs They did deprecate their original proprietary VR APIs in favor of the cross-vendor OpenXR standard, so maybe there's hope for them playing ball.
- MikeTheRocker 2y ago
  Meta actually has a native SDK for apps that appears very similar to what Google announced today with Android XR. https://github.com/meta-quest/Meta-Spatial-SDK-Samples https://github.com/meta-quest/Meta-Spatial-SDK-Samples
  - PaulHoule 2y ago
    I'd bet on Meta because XR is Zuckerberg's Moby Dick whereas it is 20% of a 20% priority at GOOG. Meta is watching competitors (Vision Pro) but also keeping an eye on cost conscious consumers. It's so refreshing to see "Big Tech" taking such a pragmatic approach.
    - throwaway314155 2y ago
      I don't think I would call Zuckerberg's approach pragmatic so much as costly and anti-competitive.
- 2y ago
ethernot 2y ago
Last thing I want is Google, Qualcomm and Samsung looking over my shoulder all day.
- cubefox 2y ago
  Last thing? So you prefer Horizon OS (Meta) or visionOS (Apple) instead?
  - ethernot 2y ago
    I'm not sure why you could infer that from my answer. Last thing is a figure of speech not an ordered set with my point being the tail item :)
    - mike_ivanov 2y ago
      I think they are implying that eventually you'll be forced to choose from those three options, and it will be kind of mandatory.
      - ethernot 2y ago
        I can't see that happening at all. The idea gives little utility over the top of the last big leap (smart phones) with a lot of additional costs and problems.
      - n144q 2y ago
        The vast majority of people in the world don't own any VR device as of today, and likely never will. I don't see there is a "be forced to" thing happening.
    - yamazakiwi 2y ago
      They inferred it because those companies were left out of your category of the "last thing you'd want". Anything left out would be categorized as "not the last thing you'd want" when there are parallels in the omitted yet well known offerings.
01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y ago
I'm holding out for Android One
lordswork 2y ago
Why is there no pictures of the actual headset anywhere?
- cubefox 2y ago
  That's probably announced in a separate Samsung press release.
- jayd16 2y ago
  There is no actual headset. Its an OS they're offering to hardware partners.
- umeshunni 2y ago
  The verge review has a picture of the headset: https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-xr-samsung-project-moohan-smart-glasses https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-...
andrewmcwatters 2y ago
This is cool, but I'm mostly sad the future of computing is so closed. I can already see that you're not going to be allowed to do a lot of things on these devices to the point that they're useless, like iPhones.
- cubefox 2y ago
  Android (XR) is a lot more open than iOS (visionOS).
  - jayd16 2y ago
    Is there any information on this or you simply mean they're working with out of house hardware?
- gumby271 2y ago
  Google's announcements around these things always scare me. So many references to Google Play and their own services, its hard to tell if this will be open like Android itself or some locked down appliance like the Vision Pro. Its no surprise Apple chose to follow the iPhone model since it's so profitable for them, I'm not sure Google has the same incentives so maybe they wont copy that part.
  - andrewmcwatters 2y ago
    It seems like even Android being "open" these days is an incomplete story, as it's almost more like a barebones Linux kernel build with some bare UI and libraries now, rather than a mobile OS distribution with standard apps that vendors can build on. You seemingly have to do everything yourself, which begs the question why not just go full blown Linux distribution, and throw on some sort of Android app emulation?
    - gumby271 2y ago
      I largely agree, especially when focused on consumer devices. Professionally I'm building a product built on top of AOSP, and it's been really nice to have a standard target and all the tooling that Android brings. It could be better but the base AOSP does have a lot of value as a general purpose OS. I'm in the midst of debating moving us to just Linux or sticking with Android, and the list of things to replace isn't insignificant.
xwall 2y ago
3rd day of announcements from Google, looks like Google is also celebrating 12 days ship-mas anonymously.
- deleted 2y ago
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ghjfrdghibt 2y ago
I am guilty of not seeing the point of the internet when it first came about, so I fully expect I'm wrong again. But I don't get these wearables beyond games, and potentially in the context of museums. I certainly don't think I'll be using these things.
- stronglikedan 2y ago
  I use my Quest almost daily for exercise. It's a game changer in that regard. Especially, in MR, which is more aligned with the XR in this post.
  - ghjfrdghibt 2y ago
    Never even considered that. How does it work? I don't exercise with earphones or a phone because I don't like things on my head/ears while exercising. I don't like wearing jewelry, even watches. I'm aware this is fairly unique.
    - hnuser123456 2y ago
      There's a game called beat saber where you have to swing light swords at blocks that fly towards/past you in sync with music. It will get you sweating pretty fast while having fun and not noticing how hard you're exerting yourself.
  - bogwog 2y ago
    > I use my Quest almost daily for exercise. It's a game changer in that regard. I exercise almost daily without a VR/AR headset. How would that technology improve my workouts? My impression is that it's a gimmick that is not worth the costs (discomfort, increased risk of injury, sweat, privacy issues).
    - crazygringo 2y ago
      Gamification, fun, and variety. Exercise can get really monotonous for some people. But if you practice in a boxing app that also makes it a game of skill, which you enjoy more, why wouldn't you? Also, I'd guess you're much more likely to injure yourself with heavy weights in the gym, then during the more aerobic/cardio type of exercise you do in VR.
HaZeust 2y ago
With the iPhone XR being an existing namesake and "Android" being first understood to many as a type of phone, I don't think this was a good naming convention idea for a completely different category of product.
- rodiger 2y ago
  I don't think most consumers are familiar with the iPhone XR. They know iPhone, and maybe iPhone X, but I don't think the naming will be an issue here.
  - HaZeust 2y ago
    I guess we shall see. https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png
- dagmx 2y ago
  XR is common as a name for the space. OpenXR, WebXR. Even visionOS is actually xrOS if you look at the SDK.
  - iAMkenough 2y ago
    From a developer perspective, that's true. I don't think the average consumer shares the same perspective.
    - dagmx 2y ago
      True but does the average customer care that it’s running Android either?
  - HaZeust 2y ago
    https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png I guess we'll see.
- ryandvm 2y ago
  Don't worry, it will be abandoned and recreated multiple times in the next 10 years anyway.
deleted 2y ago
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cube2222 2y ago
Nice, I'm excited for more development and adoption in this area, as I enjoy gaming on VR! I've recently got a Quest 3 (previously had a Valve Index) and I'm frankly blown away by the progress over the last 5 years, and also how well streaming games over wifi works - and generally, cable-less PCVR - I wasn't aware it's gotten so good by now! Though I think there's still a long way to go, ergonomics-wise, until I'm happy to wear goggles all day long to work in them.
OnionBlender 2y ago
Was Android XR announced before this? I remember seeing a job ad for Android XR on Google's job board.
zitterbewegung 2y ago
I see that they have added many of the visionos window / volumetric design language which is good if you want to target both devices especially if you have a Unity project. I actually expected visionos 2 to have at least some of the AI features that AndroidXR has or even what was launched with Apple Intelligence. But, looking at both releases of XR applications it is a huge buy in with developers. I've been trying to learn visionos and it is difficult. If I want to develop with Android XR you always have to worry about the possibility that they will stop supporting the project if the current devices don't do as well and also Google tried to do XR already. I really do like that there is competition in the space. What is even better is that AndroidXR does have familiar window management so users don't have to learn things twice. I want to have this be successful.
poisonborz 2y ago
I see no other reason for this than to show to investors "yeah can also do the Apple thing" - most probably to not have to sink something that was probably developed head to head with Vision Pro before. Expect to not really hear from this again.
OnionBlender 2y ago
Hopefully Google won't follow Meta by forcing developers to create an account just to develop apps for the device. On Quest 2 you can just enable developer mode and use adb, but on Quest 3 you have to create an account and have a companion phone just to enable developer mode.
- tokioyoyo 2y ago
  Like a Google account? I’ve always been curious if that actually had ever been a showstopper for anyone other than very niche tech circles.
- a2128 2y ago
  On Quest 2 it's the exact same process, you have to create a developer account (sometimes verify a credit card or phone number) and have a companion phone to enable developer mode. In fact you need to have a companion phone to use either headset at all. I had problems pairing my Quest 2 headset with my phone initially and the headset was just a useless brick until it's set up with an account through a phone app and a brittle pairing process.
  - wkat4242 2y ago
    For the Quest 1 too. It's always been this way.
    - OnionBlender 2y ago
      Weird. Maybe I've always been given a Quest that was already setup or rooted. I've never bought one myself. I only ran into this issue recently with a Quest 3. Every Quest 1 and 2 I've used I could enable developer mode and do what I wanted. adb just worked after enabling developer mode.
      - wkat4242 2y ago
        Yeah the developer mode toggle only shows up if you have the developer flag on your account. Maybe you had it switched on at some point? You also need this to run sidequest for example. I've always had it too because I already had a developer account with them since the first Rift devkit.
skgough 2y ago
It would super cool if they eventually make this a part of the phone OS and all you would need to do is buy a headset and plug it in over USB-C. Same idea as Dex, different display form factor, but same computer. Then with Android Auto, Dex, and XR, you would just need a single computer you can carry with you. Seems like the end state for personal computing. Instead of buying separate computers, you buy human interface devices and plug them in over USB-C.
- Thorrez 2y ago
  What about wireless? Wireless earbuds popular. People might find it a UX downgrade to need a cable running from their glasses to their phone in their pocket as they walk down the street (the demo shows AR navigation as someone walks down the street).
  - elcritch 2y ago
    WiFi 6 does ok for VR. The current limitations IMHO are the hardware on glasses / headsets in terms of compute and power. Not too dissimilar to how wireless earbuds just weren’t practical til what 5 years ago?
- 999900000999 2y ago
  I had a very weird day and I thought about this. Cloud sessions for everything, one unified OS for your phone, VR, PC, TV, etc. Built from the ground up, it both runs on a 30$ phone and a 6k computer. Do it on Risc V or another open source architecture. Then I came back to earth and realized this would cost hundreds of billions to build and market. Android is close. But ultimately you can't run any PC apps on it( although Dex + Remote Desktop to a Microsoft Cloud PC can fake it). In my dream we don't even need USB C, your just limited to whatever device your currently using. For example you're TV could probably play the Sims, or use cloud gaming. Your PC could also play the Sims, but AAA games as well. We'd have to build a new OS( probably a Linux distro) which is heavily dependent on cloud services. I'd be hyper aggressive with the marketing. A 50$ mini Risc V PC gets you started.
  - 2y ago
greatgib 2y ago
The Google vaporware of 2025 to be discontinued in 2026...
yathern 2y ago
Google's VR/XR strategy has been very stop-and-go, between Cardboard, Daydream, and a host of their VR applications they invested into 8 years ago (Poly, Earth, TiltBrush). It's obvious they don't want to be a leader in the space - just want to hedge their bets in case it becomes a viable market. If they maintained a steady presence in the space, I think Daydream could be competitive as a lower-entry-point alternative to the Quest headsets - which - since they run Android, would be potentially mutually beneficial.
- askafriend 2y ago
  > If they maintained a steady presence in the space Problem is no one gets promoted for that. That would require a vision and strong leadership. Something both Apple and Meta have but Google does not.
  - kelnos 2y ago
    I think it's perhaps not quite that. If this post[0] is correct, then this is Google's intended way of doing things. They intentionally do not have strong leadership, because they don't believe that's the best way for them to operate. Whether or not that's "right" or "wrong" (or neither) is of course up for debate. I personally think they could probably use at least some top-down initiatives here and there, but overall I think having most of their decisions be bottom-up is a nice way to work. I think their culture around that may not be quite right, though, as it seems to incentivize project-hopping and not seeing things through past the explosive "wow factor" phase. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42404117 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42404117
    - askafriend 2y ago
      I don't think that post is entirely true. It's overly simplistic and I don't think any of my friends or family that work at Google would agree wholeheartedly with that characterization. You may still have a broader point that's worth considering but I don't think it negates my characterization of their issues entirely.
- 2y ago
PaulHoule 2y ago
Pro tip: did you know that there are certain words and phrases that make people's glaze over? Many authors of press releases don't. "XR" is one and "Gemini" is another. Use more than one in the same headline and your audience concludes the message is "move along folks nothing more to see here" (at least they avoided 5g and blockchain... for now)
shatsky 2y ago
Looks like a chance to finally have modern standalone HMD with unlocked bootloader. Meta and ByteDance ones are locked down and full of spyware
- 0x457 2y ago
  Are you suggesting that a company where ads are a major revenue source going to release a product that doesn't spy on you?
  - lostmsu 2y ago
    No, but their product might have an option to opt-out via some hard hoops.
- floren 2y ago
  I really wish Glass-style HMDs had taken off... I've built my own, but it's useless if the sun is out at all. I just want something unobtrusive and inexpensive that I can drive with a real computer.
  - wkat4242 2y ago
    I have a glass enterprise edition and it's ok with the sun out. But unobtrusive it is not. I'd rather have something like the Vuzix Blade. The device is completely abandoned by google by the way, but at least it can run normal Android apps so it can still be useful.
    - floren 2y ago
      Vuzix Blade would be fine too, just something that has a display you can look at when you want to and ignore when you don't. The Blade is way too damn expensive, though.
      - wkat4242 2y ago
        Yes it is :( I got the glass second-hand super cheap but that was way too expensive new as well.
therealmarv 2y ago
They should create their own glasses with this new Android and name it: Google Glass
cush 2y ago
Google is struggling to catch up so hard that they're only now just working on their metaverse play
- mattlondon 2y ago
  Happy that quantum computing breakthrough and AI 2.0 launches came out "first". Happy for "metaverse" to be a distant distant distant 3rd.
ClassyJacket 2y ago
Can't wait for Google to abandon this in 6 months and shut it down in two years! Let's all get invested... not.
eqvinox 2y ago
Okay, but... Who's gonna buy this, and when? *R seems to have been cooling for quite some time, AI is cooling among reports of negative workplace productivity gains and poor private customer acceptance... And, timing wise, this being just announced... is it gonna ship straight into a market collapse?
- thih9 2y ago
  > reports of negative workplace productivity gains Is this anecdotal or is there a source? I’d be interested to learn more.
  - eqvinox 2y ago
    Off the cuff, I remember https://www.forbes.com/sites/torconstantino/2024/09/12/77-of-surveyed-employees-say-ai-tools-make-them-less-productive/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/torconstantino/2024/09/12/77-of... I thought there was also a report from one of the big consultancy firms but I need to search for that.
runjake 2y ago
Watching their videos makes me sea sick after a few seconds and I wonder if they should have posted those as 60 fps videos.
ozten 2y ago
Google as a first class partner is a massive liability. Example: Stadia was amazing and they snuffed it in the cradle. Samsung should license Google App store, but retain full control for executing a product launch.
- onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
  > Example: Stadia was amazing and they snuffed it in the cradle. You can be amazing and not make money. Google is in the business of building good products AND making money. Stadia was a good product. It didn't look like it would ever make money.
yalogin 2y ago
Is there a real market and revenue to be made with these mixed reality headsets like Quest and AVP? If so what does mass market adoption even mean for these? I suspect the peak is not far from where we are now. Thoughts?
- fixprix 2y ago
  AR is still very much a gimmick as we are surrounded by screens right now and we don’t need anything on our face to see them. They’re also easier on the eyes as headsets like AVP have a fixed focal plane. VR on the other hand like the Quest, lots of people use everyday for games, exercise, media and socialization. Unfortunately big tech thinks VR is for children, and keeps plowing money into AR because that’s what adults want. Meta’s best demos for AR was annotating prices on pieces of fruit. Apple, Meta and now Google are like lemmings jumping one after the other off the AR cliff. At least Meta made a decent headset. They could probably make some money off of if if the software was better and the store better curated, but they are way over extended on hardware people in AR lala land as their VR software just crawls along.
- k__ 2y ago
  A week ago I went into the XR glasses rabbit hole and it seems there is much happening. XReal released a 6DoF model with 2x1080@120Hz that weights under 100g. That's something you can wear in the wild without looking crazy. With Samsung DeX and a Bluetooth keyboard, it's probably enough to do everyday work. Get the size and power consumption down a bit more and I could see these glasses replacing laptops for most people.
modeless 2y ago
The "Gemini era"? Really? This press release is obnoxious. Nearly zero relevant technical or business details. The only thing I got here is that Samsung is releasing a headset of unspecified type next year running Android and Google is helping with the software. There is nothing else new or interesting in this announcement. Maybe someday someone else will be able to make some kind of other compatible device too but it sounds like a far-off possibility rather than anything imminent. Given the abject failure of Daydream as a platform it's hard to see how Google being involved is going to improve anything. In fact, this is worse than status quo because it means Google apps like YouTube and Photos and Earth VR will likely be limited in functionality or simply not present on competing platforms like Vision Pro or Quest for the foreseeable future.
angryasian 2y ago
im most interested in producytivity
bjclark 2y ago
Someone at Google actually got Apple to kill the Juno app on vOS because they decided to make this. Imagine that being your job.
jaimex2 2y ago
Sorry Google. You lost this one to Facebook, like you did messaging. You're going to kill it in a few months anyway.
saagarjha 2y ago
We're talking about an effort from the company whose AR lead quit and then excoriated them publicly for being unfocused, right: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-head-of-ar-software-quits-citing-unstable-commitment-and-vision/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-head-of-ar-s...? Like, just a year ago?
- T-A 2y ago
  From that article: A report from Insider claimed that Google had shifted its focus to "creating software platforms for AR that it hopes to license to other manufacturers building headsets." For example, it has been working on an Android-based XR platform for use in a product that Samsung plans to produce. Google said during its I/O conference in May that it will announce more details about this partnership with Samsung sometime before 2024. The part about "before 2024" may have been overly optimistic, but other than that, they seem to be sticking to the plan.
mycall 2y ago
I'm thinking how this will improve wayfinding for the blind. Amazing opportunities here.
starlite-5008 2y ago
[dead]
a1371 2y ago
A couple of years ago I came to the possession of a Google daydream VR. It sat for a little while because my phone was old. Then I got to upgrade to a Pixel 5 and one of the first things that excited me was the ability to explore the headset. To my disappointment the two products, both coming out of Google, were incompatible even though they were only 2 years apart. I don't believe that flip floppy culture has had a reason to change.
stiltzkin 2y ago
[dead]
raffraffraff 2y ago
Great, so maybe the Viture Pro that gather dust on my shelf will become useful.
apatheticonion 2y ago
I would love to see _anyone_ release a minimal MR headset with the form factor/weight around that of the big screen beyond, a resolution equivalent to looking at a 1440p monitor and no onboard mobile hardware/battery. WIRED data & video via USB-C. No compression. Latency equivalent to a desktop monitor with DisplayPort/HDMI, good colours and a high refresh rate. If I want standalone VR; I would like to be able to plug my headset into my phone via USB-C and Android XR pops up. After all, what's the point of putting a phone in my headset when I already have a flagship phone with the same specs? If I want to do productivity work; I would like to be able to plug my headset into my laptop/desktop and the OS displays a minimal/familiar virtual space to do stuff in (unlike WMR home) that lets me arrange several virtual monitors around me - or better yet, no monitors, just floating windows themselves. Having tried to use the Q3 for productivity, I can see that we actually have the technology for this but headset vendors cram hardware we don't need into these devices making them impractical for anything other than 45 minutes of VR gaming. Give me a headset I can wear for 8+ hours a day that replaces my multi-monitor workstation and I can pack in my laptop bag.
websap 2y ago
Is it just me, or is this a really bad website? If I jumped into any of the experiences by clicking the blue dot, it seems to stutter for 2 - 3 seconds before the video starts, there is no audio even though it seems like there should be? I'm on an M1 Macbook Pro, tried Chrome and Firefox both. I know Google has been hard chasing profits given the current financial climate, but I'm a little surprised by the drop in quality here.

354 points by dagmx 2y ago

Anyone know of low priced glasses that can extend monitor into virtual displays in VR? So far I see the lenovo VR set able to do this.

jamespo 2y ago
https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2024/12/11/immersive-productivity-with-windows-and-meta-quest/ https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2024/12/11/immer... announced very recently
- nashashmi 2y ago
  Yes my research showed that Meta can do this via partnership. And that makes me wonder do others need partnerships as well?
  - jayd16 2y ago
    There are a few remote desktop type apps for the Quest. The partnership is primarily a branding exercise, I would assume.
verdverm 2y ago
https://visor.com https://visor.com and https://immersed.com https://immersed.com Immersed works with lots of VR headsets, Visor is their bespoke HW shipping in '25
- Philpax 2y ago
  In theory. In practice, they have failed to demonstrate a single fully functional headset to any external media, and their marketing strategy is borderline predatory ("lock in a better price for your subscription before it's too late!") I'll believe it when I see it.
  - verdverm 2y ago
    The day after the botched demo they had a few of the community members over to their AirBnB for a more hands on demo. Those people have spoken in the discord on their experience They have been keeping with updates as best they can, production lines are starting up, but they also have large orgs like Qualcomm dictating how much they can share. They are not keen to upset their suppliers
angryasian 2y ago
I think Xreal will likely be your best option right now, but there software support is not so good. Youll likely go down the rabbit hole and learn about viture and rokid and make more informed decision.
- raffraffraff 2y ago
  I've got the Viture glasses. There's no support for Linux aside from working as a basic HDMI display over USB-C (so no head tracking, the screen stays welded to the same spot). The Spacewalker app on Android is basically a web / media browser, zero productivity. You can't use it like a launcher and launch other apps. There's Taskbar and Second Screen but these don't work on my Sony Xperia (you don't get window controls like resize, move or close). There is a paid app for Linux that uses the Viture SDK. It's supposed to be decent but I couldn't get it working during the free trial (I'm using OpenSuse Tumbleweed). TBH I got totally fed up with the glasses and lost interest in trying anything further. So this announcement is actually interesting to me.

tucosan 2y ago

Cool. In the meantime Google Assistant still fails to reliably call my contacts via voice command. And trying to use Google's AI offering as a paying customer of Google apps for work is a giant shitshow. So much so that I'm finally contemplating of dropping the Google ecosystem all together.

dagmx 2y ago

And the verge blog post about it. https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-xr-samsung-project-moohan-smart-glasses https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-... Seems like a very similar direction to visionOS. I’m glad Apple normalized the ability to run mobile apps spatially. I do wonder how this affects Meta’s plans for horizonOS. Are access to Meta’s game library more important than access to androids ecosystem.

world2vec 2y ago
That Verge article has at least a rendering of some VR/AR/XR headset, original post doesn't show or talk about any hardware.
jsheard 2y ago
> Seems like a very similar direction to visionOS. A crucial difference is that Android XR apparently has first-class support for 6DoF controllers (like Horizon OS) in addition to eye and hand tracking (like Vision OS) so it's aiming to compete on both fronts. Google thankfully didn't cargo-cult Apples decision to rely on eye and hand tracking, which is far from ideal for VR games.
- dagmx 2y ago
  I think Apple picked the right direction to launch with as their primary interaction method. Controllers would be nice but as a secondary input. Google are apparently not mandating eye tracking or hand tracking. Which is nice for flexibility but you’re going to have a mishmash of interaction models for native apps.
  - MBCook 2y ago
    There is a recent rumor that they have been working with Sony to bring the PSVR 2 controllers to work on visionOS. Given Apple has not focused on gaming I think the decision they made was a good one too. You shouldn’t NEED special controllers to use the device like early VR headsets. However there are definitely things that would work better with controllers. Not just gaming but things where you need very fine input or having multiple buttons to switch modes or something would be good. So I hope the rumor turns out to be true.

marban 2y ago

I hope we don't see bloggers using it in the shower this time.

perdomon 2y ago

I love the navigation video example. It's so much better than staring down at a cell phone. At the end of the day, however, it all comes down to style (looking at you, Apple Vision Pro).

makeitdouble 2y ago
I'd wish for arrows and directive lines overlayed straight at eye level at the actual turning points. Basically video game style. In the video it's still limited to messages and map pictures in their dedicated box and makes me think the platform still won't be good enough to handle more complex overlaying.
astrange 2y ago
For navigation to work in VR, location services have to accurately know where you are and which way you're facing, which they don't. Compasses don't work in most urban situations because there's too much magnetic metal around you. Visual localization does work but the map has to be up to date.
reaperducer 2y ago
It's so much better than staring down at a cell phone. When the iPhone's App Store came out, there were a bunch of apps that were all about overlaying information on real-time real-world imaging. One of them was navigation where you'd hold your phone up (horizontally) and it would overlay the real world with lines and arrows. I wonder why that never really caught on. There was another great one that was an SMS app that overlayed your conversations on the camera feed, so you could walk and text at the same time without falling into a mine shaft, or stepping in dog poo, or whatever. With today's technology, that could be just a toggle. Again, for some reason people didn't like it.

theonlyjesus 2y ago

I'm so excited about this, but the fact that Google's behind it has me worried. Android XR will be ditched 1-2 years after release

cubefox 2y ago
Seems unlikely, only Meta and Apple have a comparable OS. Other manufacturers would have to either build their own thing or use Android XR.
- n144q 2y ago
  Who are the "other manufacturers"? I don't see many companies interested in this area. Sony has almost given up, Pico has had some major setbacks, and you know what happened to Apple's Vision Pro. There will continue to be investment, but likely by the same big players. There just isn't a lot of money out there, and not many companies can afford this. Honestly, if Zuckerberg is no longer Meta's boss, they may have already shut down Quest entirely.
  - cubefox 2y ago
    I was assuming that VR headsets or AR glasses would become mainstream at some point, like smartphones or tablets, with various Chinese manufacturers competing for the best price. But maybe you are right and that's too optimistic.
    - 8n4vidtmkvmk 2y ago
      They've been around for awhile now and it's still not mainstream. What's holding people back now? Quest is pretty affordable. The quality is pretty good. You think a sleeker form factor will finally tip the scales?
      - cubefox 2y ago
        Maybe not VR then. But perhaps AR glasses like Meta's Orion prototype. Though that seems somewhat doubtful as well.

makeitdouble 2y ago

Google and Samsung going against Meta sounds as much as a cursed alliance than it was with GearVR. I trust Samsung to execute excellently on the hardware and be ready to iterate, but will Google keep pushing the platform even if Meta also goes after regular android apps and crushes them commercially ? Now that regulators are on Google's back, Meta getting accesss to the whole Play Store or at least being protected from Google's shenanigans is realistic, and the Meta store could potentially be decently competitive for regular android apps as well if they want to.

warkdarrior 2y ago
Let's wait and see if apps will be 30% cheaper on Meta's store.
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  For anyone curious, current Quest Store fees are probably still 30% https://www.techradar.com/news/metas-quest-2-game-store-fees-are-turning-it-into-the-metaverses-first-villain https://www.techradar.com/news/metas-quest-2-game-store-fees...
Cumpiler69 2y ago
Knowing how Google shuts down or forgets about products that don't make them a million billion dollars, I wouldn't invest into Google's XR ecosystem. Do you remember Google also has an ecosystem for Android Tablets and Wearables? Do THEY remember? Meta could sink in all that money because Zuck is really into that stuff.
- meibo 2y ago
  What do you mean? They just released new tablet and watch hardware and accompanying OS updates.
  - makeitdouble 2y ago
    Yes, the Pixel Tablet is now 1 year old. Next move: https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/21/24302508/google-pixel-tablet-2-canceled-rumor https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/21/24302508/google-pixel-ta...

not_your_vase 2y ago

[flagged]

ddalex 2y ago
All tablets are dying. The pixel watch 3 has excellent reviews, what's botched about it ?
- BudaDude 2y ago
  > All tablets are dying. Highly disagree. The iPad line is very strong, especially in the artist community.
- deleted 2y ago
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Andrex 2y ago
They already botched XR twice by killing Cardboard and Daydream. You're right, third time's gotta be the charm.
- pzo 2y ago
  and from related they also killed: Google Glasses, Project Tango (3d cameras). ARCore also seems pretty much barely alive.
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fidotron 2y ago

Some of the mockups here look eerily like those from Google Glass. Somehow I doubt walking around with head mounted cameras beaming everything to the cloud is suddenly going to become OK, though there is definitely a generational shift on that.

wkat4242 2y ago
Yeah and that wasn't even the real reason glass failed. The tech just wasn't mature.

whatever1 2y ago

The similarities with Vision OS are insane.

verdverm 2y ago
Considering how little the difference is in phone UIs, one would expect XR UIs to be highly similar as well

taco_emoji 2y ago

Stop trying to make VR happen, it's not gonna happen

ThrowawayTestr 2y ago
Have you tried it?
- taco_emoji 2y ago
  No, I have no interest
  - verdverm 2y ago
    You're missing out on some pretty awesome experiences
    - ncr100 2y ago
      The horizon VR game on psvr2, yeah. And of course Puzzling places. VR is fuuuuun.
      - verdverm 2y ago
        VTOL VR Down the Rabbit Hole Trover Saves the Universe (mostly because I'm a Rick & Morty fan)
  - liontwist 2y ago
    Recently I realized that what I want out of a personal computer is a Unix terminal. And that’s actually pretty weird and far from how most people use a computer. PowerPoint, adobe video editing products. And all those things look unnecessary and complex to me. But I have to acknowledge a few facts: 1. I’m not as young and open to new experiences. I mostly want to refine workflows I already know. 2. I understand computers better than most people. 3. I’m less interested in screen entertainment because I work on computers. There will be people who grow up with stuff and they will have experiences in VR that are meaningful and they won’t use a computer like you or I.

bnchrch 2y ago

Honestly there's no point in Android XR. We can't trust Google to maintain even profitable endeavours past a couple years. And an investment in AR/VR hardware and software is likely over a decade long initiative. IMO They're already showing there weak amount of determination by making this a partnership out of the gate. Thats a bag of misaligned incentives, diluted returns and 2x as many execs who could kill the project.

deleted 2y ago
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herval 2y ago
this is getting downvoted, but it's not a bad take. Google has proven, over and over, that it's unable to execute on any long running initiative like this - including 3 past botched XR initiatives

xnx 2y ago

Endeavors like this have failed before, but at some point (soon would be my guess) the utility of having an AI assistant with vision capability will just be too useful to resist putting an always available camera in glasses.

criddell 2y ago
I'm not sure I trust Google enough to walk around my home wearing their cameras. The last thing I want to see are ads based on the contents of my home or specific details of my family. The police might like it though. They could find out from Google the layout of a home or see if they know of any guns in a home before they SWAT it.
- LordDragonfang 2y ago
  But (odds are) you trust them enough to walk around your home wearing their microphone. Letting them listen in on all your conversations and show you ads based on those, if the conspiracy theories are true. (Unless if you're an iPhone user, then you trust Apple - and make no mistake, they're building the exact same product, they just pathologically avoid talking about prototypes) It's boiling the frog. Unthinkable, until everybody is doing it and it's normal.
  - deleted 2y ago
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  - acdha 2y ago
    The number of people buying Apple devices for privacy suggests that quite a few people do not trust them, and while the rumors have flown around for years they’ve never been confirmed. That’s a contrast with, say, smart TV content recognition so it seems unlikely that Android phones are secretly monitoring what you say without anyone noticing the data being transmitted or the battery drain.
    - elcritch 2y ago
      > so it seems unlikely that Android phones are secretly monitoring what you say without anyone noticing the data being transmitted or the battery drain. Ah! So that’s why Androids always have bigger batteries than iPhones. ;)

contrarian1234 2y ago

Is it going to be open like Android or closed like Google Play? They seem to be evasive about licensing I also don't quite get why AI needs to be on the OS level (AI seems to make more sense on an app level) and what connection it has to XR. They're also very vague about what tangible OS integration they're planning. Sounds like a buzzword soup. They just forgot decentralized crytocurrencies

freedomben 2y ago
I suspect we agree, but to try to steelman here there is a signficant and increasing need for hardware to support on-device AI, and anytime you're talking hardware there has to be a baseline level of support in the OS. My guess though is that they are doing it because it's easier to just move AI stuff to the OS than have to do the hard work of modularizing and isolating, defining APIs and such. Also worth remembering that many of the Android decision makers don't seem to actually like Android and want to make it more like their iPhones. Android seems determined to erase (or bury to the point of impracticality) all the things that I originally loved about it. It's getting more and more closed and "the user is a security threat" with every release. I would guess that somebody is loving the amount of power and control that they can gain by doing it this way, and as long as the people continue to reward behavior like that we're going to get more of it. The iPhone being a textbook example.
- refulgentis 2y ago
  I'd bet a lot of money it's not running anything significant on device AI-wise, maybe a speech model, but not anything in the key assistant pipeline that wasn't there in 2020.
tredre3 2y ago
It has essentially nothing to do with AI, they seem to have thrown that in for bonus PR points. Sure, ML is plenty involved behind the scenes for both actual use cases (AR and VR) but it's not relevant and not what people think of when they read AI. Reading the dev blog or the actual documentation was more informative to me: https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2024/12/introducing-android-xr-sdk-developer-preview.html https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2024/12/introducin... https://developer.android.com/develop/xr https://developer.android.com/develop/xr

Eisenstein 2y ago

I wonder how society is going to adapt to everyone literally having a camera pointed at them all the time by the people they interact with. You can say 'there are cameras everywhere' or 'cameras are on phones', but it is different when the camera is on someone's face that you are talking to. Imagine every social interaction being on video, or at least not knowing if it is. We will have to adapt to that, probably by being overly cautious about what we say and do.

deleted 2y ago
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reaperducer 2y ago
I wonder how society is going to adapt to everyone literally having a camera pointed at them all the time by the people they interact with. I wonder if VR cameras can be blinded by IR emitters like we used to do to digital video cameras in movie theaters. My IR LED-studded headband won't look any stranger than someone walking around in public with a VisionPro strapped to their head.
- Eisenstein 2y ago
  Many VR systems rely on IR light for controller tracking, but if the camera is doing hand tracking, it might filter it out.

ARandomerDude 2y ago

[flagged]

deleted 2y ago
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tummler 2y ago

My initial thoughts: - Some cool ideas at the OS/UXD level. Genuinely impressed the thinking behind them seems more thoughtful and innovative than what Apple did with VisionOS. (Not surprising given that Apple doesn’t understand or believe in XR from the top down.) - Not looking forward to continued knee-capping of their products/services on other XR platforms but c’est la vie. - I have zero faith they’ll actually invest resources in this long-term, given how they treated their previous XR efforts. As an XR dev, I doubt I will bother to build anything for their platform until I see a serious long-term investment in the space, and decent momentum / market share.

rkagerer 2y ago

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acdha 2y ago
… and did a massive pivot to copy the iPhone when that launched in 2007. It made sense from the perspective of protecting search but let’s be honest about the real motivation.
jsheard 2y ago
To be fair the Android they bought was trying to be a Blackberry clone, Google did the legwork on turning it into an iOS clone.
- rkagerer 2y ago
  I wish they'd been more inspired by PalmOS.

_bent 2y ago

I'd hope for Meta to support these new Jetpack APIs for the Quest / horizonOS, as their SDK is currently basically limited to Unity / Unreal / Native, with no primitives for building regular apps. Two competing XR platforms build on Android may not be too bad if apps just run on both. There are some warts on horizonOS for true XR experiences like the guardian system effectively locking you into a predefined/scanned room or the camera feeds not being accessible (would be useful for scanning QR codes or copying IRL text), hopefully some competitive pressure can move Meta here. Right now there are quite a few Quest 2 & 3 devices on the market and not a single new Samsung XR glass. Any developer building a new XR app would want their app to run on Quest

jsheard 2y ago
> I'd hope for Meta to support these new Jetpack APIs They did deprecate their original proprietary VR APIs in favor of the cross-vendor OpenXR standard, so maybe there's hope for them playing ball.
MikeTheRocker 2y ago
Meta actually has a native SDK for apps that appears very similar to what Google announced today with Android XR. https://github.com/meta-quest/Meta-Spatial-SDK-Samples https://github.com/meta-quest/Meta-Spatial-SDK-Samples
- PaulHoule 2y ago
  I'd bet on Meta because XR is Zuckerberg's Moby Dick whereas it is 20% of a 20% priority at GOOG. Meta is watching competitors (Vision Pro) but also keeping an eye on cost conscious consumers. It's so refreshing to see "Big Tech" taking such a pragmatic approach.
  - throwaway314155 2y ago
    I don't think I would call Zuckerberg's approach pragmatic so much as costly and anti-competitive.
2y ago

ethernot 2y ago

Last thing I want is Google, Qualcomm and Samsung looking over my shoulder all day.

cubefox 2y ago
Last thing? So you prefer Horizon OS (Meta) or visionOS (Apple) instead?
- ethernot 2y ago
  I'm not sure why you could infer that from my answer. Last thing is a figure of speech not an ordered set with my point being the tail item :)
  - mike_ivanov 2y ago
    I think they are implying that eventually you'll be forced to choose from those three options, and it will be kind of mandatory.
    - ethernot 2y ago
      I can't see that happening at all. The idea gives little utility over the top of the last big leap (smart phones) with a lot of additional costs and problems.
    - n144q 2y ago
      The vast majority of people in the world don't own any VR device as of today, and likely never will. I don't see there is a "be forced to" thing happening.
  - yamazakiwi 2y ago
    They inferred it because those companies were left out of your category of the "last thing you'd want". Anything left out would be categorized as "not the last thing you'd want" when there are parallels in the omitted yet well known offerings.

01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y ago

I'm holding out for Android One

lordswork 2y ago

Why is there no pictures of the actual headset anywhere?

cubefox 2y ago
That's probably announced in a separate Samsung press release.
jayd16 2y ago
There is no actual headset. Its an OS they're offering to hardware partners.
umeshunni 2y ago
The verge review has a picture of the headset: https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-xr-samsung-project-moohan-smart-glasses https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/12/24319528/google-android-...

andrewmcwatters 2y ago

This is cool, but I'm mostly sad the future of computing is so closed. I can already see that you're not going to be allowed to do a lot of things on these devices to the point that they're useless, like iPhones.

cubefox 2y ago
Android (XR) is a lot more open than iOS (visionOS).
- jayd16 2y ago
  Is there any information on this or you simply mean they're working with out of house hardware?
gumby271 2y ago
Google's announcements around these things always scare me. So many references to Google Play and their own services, its hard to tell if this will be open like Android itself or some locked down appliance like the Vision Pro. Its no surprise Apple chose to follow the iPhone model since it's so profitable for them, I'm not sure Google has the same incentives so maybe they wont copy that part.
- andrewmcwatters 2y ago
  It seems like even Android being "open" these days is an incomplete story, as it's almost more like a barebones Linux kernel build with some bare UI and libraries now, rather than a mobile OS distribution with standard apps that vendors can build on. You seemingly have to do everything yourself, which begs the question why not just go full blown Linux distribution, and throw on some sort of Android app emulation?
  - gumby271 2y ago
    I largely agree, especially when focused on consumer devices. Professionally I'm building a product built on top of AOSP, and it's been really nice to have a standard target and all the tooling that Android brings. It could be better but the base AOSP does have a lot of value as a general purpose OS. I'm in the midst of debating moving us to just Linux or sticking with Android, and the list of things to replace isn't insignificant.

xwall 2y ago

3rd day of announcements from Google, looks like Google is also celebrating 12 days ship-mas anonymously.

deleted 2y ago
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ghjfrdghibt 2y ago

I am guilty of not seeing the point of the internet when it first came about, so I fully expect I'm wrong again. But I don't get these wearables beyond games, and potentially in the context of museums. I certainly don't think I'll be using these things.

stronglikedan 2y ago
I use my Quest almost daily for exercise. It's a game changer in that regard. Especially, in MR, which is more aligned with the XR in this post.
- ghjfrdghibt 2y ago
  Never even considered that. How does it work? I don't exercise with earphones or a phone because I don't like things on my head/ears while exercising. I don't like wearing jewelry, even watches. I'm aware this is fairly unique.
  - hnuser123456 2y ago
    There's a game called beat saber where you have to swing light swords at blocks that fly towards/past you in sync with music. It will get you sweating pretty fast while having fun and not noticing how hard you're exerting yourself.
- bogwog 2y ago
  > I use my Quest almost daily for exercise. It's a game changer in that regard. I exercise almost daily without a VR/AR headset. How would that technology improve my workouts? My impression is that it's a gimmick that is not worth the costs (discomfort, increased risk of injury, sweat, privacy issues).
  - crazygringo 2y ago
    Gamification, fun, and variety. Exercise can get really monotonous for some people. But if you practice in a boxing app that also makes it a game of skill, which you enjoy more, why wouldn't you? Also, I'd guess you're much more likely to injure yourself with heavy weights in the gym, then during the more aerobic/cardio type of exercise you do in VR.

HaZeust 2y ago

With the iPhone XR being an existing namesake and "Android" being first understood to many as a type of phone, I don't think this was a good naming convention idea for a completely different category of product.

rodiger 2y ago
I don't think most consumers are familiar with the iPhone XR. They know iPhone, and maybe iPhone X, but I don't think the naming will be an issue here.
- HaZeust 2y ago
  I guess we shall see. https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png
dagmx 2y ago
XR is common as a name for the space. OpenXR, WebXR. Even visionOS is actually xrOS if you look at the SDK.
- iAMkenough 2y ago
  From a developer perspective, that's true. I don't think the average consumer shares the same perspective.
  - dagmx 2y ago
    True but does the average customer care that it’s running Android either?
- HaZeust 2y ago
  https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png https://i.imgur.com/3HqLMma.png I guess we'll see.
ryandvm 2y ago
Don't worry, it will be abandoned and recreated multiple times in the next 10 years anyway.

deleted 2y ago

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cube2222 2y ago

Nice, I'm excited for more development and adoption in this area, as I enjoy gaming on VR! I've recently got a Quest 3 (previously had a Valve Index) and I'm frankly blown away by the progress over the last 5 years, and also how well streaming games over wifi works - and generally, cable-less PCVR - I wasn't aware it's gotten so good by now! Though I think there's still a long way to go, ergonomics-wise, until I'm happy to wear goggles all day long to work in them.

OnionBlender 2y ago

Was Android XR announced before this? I remember seeing a job ad for Android XR on Google's job board.

zitterbewegung 2y ago

I see that they have added many of the visionos window / volumetric design language which is good if you want to target both devices especially if you have a Unity project. I actually expected visionos 2 to have at least some of the AI features that AndroidXR has or even what was launched with Apple Intelligence. But, looking at both releases of XR applications it is a huge buy in with developers. I've been trying to learn visionos and it is difficult. If I want to develop with Android XR you always have to worry about the possibility that they will stop supporting the project if the current devices don't do as well and also Google tried to do XR already. I really do like that there is competition in the space. What is even better is that AndroidXR does have familiar window management so users don't have to learn things twice. I want to have this be successful.

poisonborz 2y ago

I see no other reason for this than to show to investors "yeah can also do the Apple thing" - most probably to not have to sink something that was probably developed head to head with Vision Pro before. Expect to not really hear from this again.

OnionBlender 2y ago

Hopefully Google won't follow Meta by forcing developers to create an account just to develop apps for the device. On Quest 2 you can just enable developer mode and use adb, but on Quest 3 you have to create an account and have a companion phone just to enable developer mode.

tokioyoyo 2y ago
Like a Google account? I’ve always been curious if that actually had ever been a showstopper for anyone other than very niche tech circles.
a2128 2y ago
On Quest 2 it's the exact same process, you have to create a developer account (sometimes verify a credit card or phone number) and have a companion phone to enable developer mode. In fact you need to have a companion phone to use either headset at all. I had problems pairing my Quest 2 headset with my phone initially and the headset was just a useless brick until it's set up with an account through a phone app and a brittle pairing process.
- wkat4242 2y ago
  For the Quest 1 too. It's always been this way.
  - OnionBlender 2y ago
    Weird. Maybe I've always been given a Quest that was already setup or rooted. I've never bought one myself. I only ran into this issue recently with a Quest 3. Every Quest 1 and 2 I've used I could enable developer mode and do what I wanted. adb just worked after enabling developer mode.
    - wkat4242 2y ago
      Yeah the developer mode toggle only shows up if you have the developer flag on your account. Maybe you had it switched on at some point? You also need this to run sidequest for example. I've always had it too because I already had a developer account with them since the first Rift devkit.

skgough 2y ago

It would super cool if they eventually make this a part of the phone OS and all you would need to do is buy a headset and plug it in over USB-C. Same idea as Dex, different display form factor, but same computer. Then with Android Auto, Dex, and XR, you would just need a single computer you can carry with you. Seems like the end state for personal computing. Instead of buying separate computers, you buy human interface devices and plug them in over USB-C.

Thorrez 2y ago
What about wireless? Wireless earbuds popular. People might find it a UX downgrade to need a cable running from their glasses to their phone in their pocket as they walk down the street (the demo shows AR navigation as someone walks down the street).
- elcritch 2y ago
  WiFi 6 does ok for VR. The current limitations IMHO are the hardware on glasses / headsets in terms of compute and power. Not too dissimilar to how wireless earbuds just weren’t practical til what 5 years ago?
999900000999 2y ago
I had a very weird day and I thought about this. Cloud sessions for everything, one unified OS for your phone, VR, PC, TV, etc. Built from the ground up, it both runs on a 30$ phone and a 6k computer. Do it on Risc V or another open source architecture. Then I came back to earth and realized this would cost hundreds of billions to build and market. Android is close. But ultimately you can't run any PC apps on it( although Dex + Remote Desktop to a Microsoft Cloud PC can fake it). In my dream we don't even need USB C, your just limited to whatever device your currently using. For example you're TV could probably play the Sims, or use cloud gaming. Your PC could also play the Sims, but AAA games as well. We'd have to build a new OS( probably a Linux distro) which is heavily dependent on cloud services. I'd be hyper aggressive with the marketing. A 50$ mini Risc V PC gets you started.
- 2y ago

greatgib 2y ago

The Google vaporware of 2025 to be discontinued in 2026...

yathern 2y ago

Google's VR/XR strategy has been very stop-and-go, between Cardboard, Daydream, and a host of their VR applications they invested into 8 years ago (Poly, Earth, TiltBrush). It's obvious they don't want to be a leader in the space - just want to hedge their bets in case it becomes a viable market. If they maintained a steady presence in the space, I think Daydream could be competitive as a lower-entry-point alternative to the Quest headsets - which - since they run Android, would be potentially mutually beneficial.

askafriend 2y ago
> If they maintained a steady presence in the space Problem is no one gets promoted for that. That would require a vision and strong leadership. Something both Apple and Meta have but Google does not.
- kelnos 2y ago
  I think it's perhaps not quite that. If this post[0] is correct, then this is Google's intended way of doing things. They intentionally do not have strong leadership, because they don't believe that's the best way for them to operate. Whether or not that's "right" or "wrong" (or neither) is of course up for debate. I personally think they could probably use at least some top-down initiatives here and there, but overall I think having most of their decisions be bottom-up is a nice way to work. I think their culture around that may not be quite right, though, as it seems to incentivize project-hopping and not seeing things through past the explosive "wow factor" phase. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42404117 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42404117
  - askafriend 2y ago
    I don't think that post is entirely true. It's overly simplistic and I don't think any of my friends or family that work at Google would agree wholeheartedly with that characterization. You may still have a broader point that's worth considering but I don't think it negates my characterization of their issues entirely.
2y ago

PaulHoule 2y ago

Pro tip: did you know that there are certain words and phrases that make people's glaze over? Many authors of press releases don't. "XR" is one and "Gemini" is another. Use more than one in the same headline and your audience concludes the message is "move along folks nothing more to see here" (at least they avoided 5g and blockchain... for now)

shatsky 2y ago

Looks like a chance to finally have modern standalone HMD with unlocked bootloader. Meta and ByteDance ones are locked down and full of spyware

0x457 2y ago
Are you suggesting that a company where ads are a major revenue source going to release a product that doesn't spy on you?
- lostmsu 2y ago
  No, but their product might have an option to opt-out via some hard hoops.
floren 2y ago
I really wish Glass-style HMDs had taken off... I've built my own, but it's useless if the sun is out at all. I just want something unobtrusive and inexpensive that I can drive with a real computer.
- wkat4242 2y ago
  I have a glass enterprise edition and it's ok with the sun out. But unobtrusive it is not. I'd rather have something like the Vuzix Blade. The device is completely abandoned by google by the way, but at least it can run normal Android apps so it can still be useful.
  - floren 2y ago
    Vuzix Blade would be fine too, just something that has a display you can look at when you want to and ignore when you don't. The Blade is way too damn expensive, though.
    - wkat4242 2y ago
      Yes it is :( I got the glass second-hand super cheap but that was way too expensive new as well.

therealmarv 2y ago

They should create their own glasses with this new Android and name it: Google Glass

cush 2y ago

Google is struggling to catch up so hard that they're only now just working on their metaverse play

mattlondon 2y ago
Happy that quantum computing breakthrough and AI 2.0 launches came out "first". Happy for "metaverse" to be a distant distant distant 3rd.

ClassyJacket 2y ago

Can't wait for Google to abandon this in 6 months and shut it down in two years! Let's all get invested... not.

eqvinox 2y ago

Okay, but... Who's gonna buy this, and when? *R seems to have been cooling for quite some time, AI is cooling among reports of negative workplace productivity gains and poor private customer acceptance... And, timing wise, this being just announced... is it gonna ship straight into a market collapse?

thih9 2y ago
> reports of negative workplace productivity gains Is this anecdotal or is there a source? I’d be interested to learn more.
- eqvinox 2y ago
  Off the cuff, I remember https://www.forbes.com/sites/torconstantino/2024/09/12/77-of-surveyed-employees-say-ai-tools-make-them-less-productive/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/torconstantino/2024/09/12/77-of... I thought there was also a report from one of the big consultancy firms but I need to search for that.

runjake 2y ago

Watching their videos makes me sea sick after a few seconds and I wonder if they should have posted those as 60 fps videos.

ozten 2y ago

Google as a first class partner is a massive liability. Example: Stadia was amazing and they snuffed it in the cradle. Samsung should license Google App store, but retain full control for executing a product launch.

onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
> Example: Stadia was amazing and they snuffed it in the cradle. You can be amazing and not make money. Google is in the business of building good products AND making money. Stadia was a good product. It didn't look like it would ever make money.

yalogin 2y ago

Is there a real market and revenue to be made with these mixed reality headsets like Quest and AVP? If so what does mass market adoption even mean for these? I suspect the peak is not far from where we are now. Thoughts?

fixprix 2y ago
AR is still very much a gimmick as we are surrounded by screens right now and we don’t need anything on our face to see them. They’re also easier on the eyes as headsets like AVP have a fixed focal plane. VR on the other hand like the Quest, lots of people use everyday for games, exercise, media and socialization. Unfortunately big tech thinks VR is for children, and keeps plowing money into AR because that’s what adults want. Meta’s best demos for AR was annotating prices on pieces of fruit. Apple, Meta and now Google are like lemmings jumping one after the other off the AR cliff. At least Meta made a decent headset. They could probably make some money off of if if the software was better and the store better curated, but they are way over extended on hardware people in AR lala land as their VR software just crawls along.
k__ 2y ago
A week ago I went into the XR glasses rabbit hole and it seems there is much happening. XReal released a 6DoF model with 2x1080@120Hz that weights under 100g. That's something you can wear in the wild without looking crazy. With Samsung DeX and a Bluetooth keyboard, it's probably enough to do everyday work. Get the size and power consumption down a bit more and I could see these glasses replacing laptops for most people.

modeless 2y ago

The "Gemini era"? Really? This press release is obnoxious. Nearly zero relevant technical or business details. The only thing I got here is that Samsung is releasing a headset of unspecified type next year running Android and Google is helping with the software. There is nothing else new or interesting in this announcement. Maybe someday someone else will be able to make some kind of other compatible device too but it sounds like a far-off possibility rather than anything imminent. Given the abject failure of Daydream as a platform it's hard to see how Google being involved is going to improve anything. In fact, this is worse than status quo because it means Google apps like YouTube and Photos and Earth VR will likely be limited in functionality or simply not present on competing platforms like Vision Pro or Quest for the foreseeable future.

angryasian 2y ago

im most interested in producytivity

bjclark 2y ago

Someone at Google actually got Apple to kill the Juno app on vOS because they decided to make this. Imagine that being your job.

jaimex2 2y ago

Sorry Google. You lost this one to Facebook, like you did messaging. You're going to kill it in a few months anyway.

saagarjha 2y ago

We're talking about an effort from the company whose AR lead quit and then excoriated them publicly for being unfocused, right: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-head-of-ar-software-quits-citing-unstable-commitment-and-vision/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-head-of-ar-s...? Like, just a year ago?

T-A 2y ago
From that article: A report from Insider claimed that Google had shifted its focus to "creating software platforms for AR that it hopes to license to other manufacturers building headsets." For example, it has been working on an Android-based XR platform for use in a product that Samsung plans to produce. Google said during its I/O conference in May that it will announce more details about this partnership with Samsung sometime before 2024. The part about "before 2024" may have been overly optimistic, but other than that, they seem to be sticking to the plan.

mycall 2y ago

I'm thinking how this will improve wayfinding for the blind. Amazing opportunities here.

starlite-5008 2y ago

[dead]

a1371 2y ago

A couple of years ago I came to the possession of a Google daydream VR. It sat for a little while because my phone was old. Then I got to upgrade to a Pixel 5 and one of the first things that excited me was the ability to explore the headset. To my disappointment the two products, both coming out of Google, were incompatible even though they were only 2 years apart. I don't believe that flip floppy culture has had a reason to change.

stiltzkin 2y ago

[dead]

raffraffraff 2y ago

Great, so maybe the Viture Pro that gather dust on my shelf will become useful.

apatheticonion 2y ago

I would love to see _anyone_ release a minimal MR headset with the form factor/weight around that of the big screen beyond, a resolution equivalent to looking at a 1440p monitor and no onboard mobile hardware/battery. WIRED data & video via USB-C. No compression. Latency equivalent to a desktop monitor with DisplayPort/HDMI, good colours and a high refresh rate. If I want standalone VR; I would like to be able to plug my headset into my phone via USB-C and Android XR pops up. After all, what's the point of putting a phone in my headset when I already have a flagship phone with the same specs? If I want to do productivity work; I would like to be able to plug my headset into my laptop/desktop and the OS displays a minimal/familiar virtual space to do stuff in (unlike WMR home) that lets me arrange several virtual monitors around me - or better yet, no monitors, just floating windows themselves. Having tried to use the Q3 for productivity, I can see that we actually have the technology for this but headset vendors cram hardware we don't need into these devices making them impractical for anything other than 45 minutes of VR gaming. Give me a headset I can wear for 8+ hours a day that replaces my multi-monitor workstation and I can pack in my laptop bag.

websap 2y ago

Is it just me, or is this a really bad website? If I jumped into any of the experiences by clicking the blue dot, it seems to stutter for 2 - 3 seconds before the video starts, there is no audio even though it seems like there should be? I'm on an M1 Macbook Pro, tried Chrome and Firefox both. I know Google has been hard chasing profits given the current financial climate, but I'm a little surprised by the drop in quality here.