Development of platform-independent multi-user choreographies for virtual worlds based on ontology combination and mapping

Abstract

This paper presents two contributions: (i) a system architecture capable of staging platform-independent choreographies within different virtual worlds, and (ii) an ontologybased solution for capturing and representing multiuser choreographies with reduced time/effort. We argue that choreographies for virtual worlds should be clearly separated from the technical characteristics of their execution in virtual world technological platforms. Due to the heterogeneity of the various virtual worlds and their domain requirements, we propose exploiting the modularity, generality, and granularity dimensions of ontologies to simplify and empower the choreography modeling capabilities. Instead of a unique ontology, several ontologies with different levels of generality and granularity can be progressively combined to support the modeling requirements of a given choreography. Because these ontologies are aligned with the ontology of each specific virtual world platform, the mapping and transformation between the core ontology is simplified and automated, thus reducing the development and time-to-market.

Model-Driven Generation of Multi-user and Multi-domain Choreographies for Staging in Multiple Virtual World Platforms

“… is the generic high-level ontology representing the core concepts of a choreography independent of any implementation platform, also designated as the foundational choreography [23]. Fig.…”

Staging Choreographies for Team Training in Multiple Virtual Worlds Based on Ontologies and Alignments

“…• (platform-independent and domain-independent) is the generic high-level ontology representing the core concepts of a choreography independent of any implementation environment, also designated as the foundational ontology. Figure 3 presents its current status, whose motivations and design decisions have been described in a previous paper [14].…”

3D simulators in professional training learning complex tasks overcoming material, economic, and human constraints

“…As a consequence, we cannot have the simulator automatically change a trainee's perspective without an authorization prompt being presented to the trainee. Our architecture splitting the simulator between an interface and a back-end server with the actual control code is part of a larger effort that aims to provide software architecture support for using the rapid prototype advantages of virtual worlds for streamlined development and at a later stage simplify the process of moving the simulator to a different visual interface environment (more details on this effort are provided in [10].…”

“…In fact, the virtual environment might even be seen as available on mobile devices and be used as a mediator between mechanics operating on a physical engine and experts on remote sites, which could demonstrate a procedure on the virtual counterpart -an idea of merging virtual training and physical actions imagined earlier for other subjects, but which could see new application contexts here [10].…”