Educationally enhanced Virtual Worlds

Colin Allison; Alan Miller; Thomas Sturgeon; Indika Perera; James Ross Nicoll

doi:10.1109/FIE.2010.5673645

Educationally enhanced Virtual Worlds

Colin Allison, Alan Miller, Thomas Sturgeon, Indika Perera, James Ross Nicoll

School of Computer Science

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution

Abstract

Virtual worlds continue to attract considerable interest as an innovative means of engaging students through the use of immersive, 3D, collaborative environments. They allow for the dynamic creation of content and for that content to be programmed. Second Life is the dominant virtual world technology in use, and whilst attractive in that it is a ready-made - albeit commercial - service, it was not designed for educational use and has significant social and technical drawbacks when used for that purpose. As such, we have been researching the serious use of OpenSim as an alternative virtual world for Computer Science education. OpenSim is a free, open source software development project which supports self-hosting and maintenance of virtual worlds. This paper explains our rationale for using OpenSim and reports on our experiences to date. It includes a feature comparison between OpenSim and Second Life as an aid for those wishing to exploit virtual worlds in the Computer Science curriculum.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	Proceedings of the 40th IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE '10
Publisher	IEEE
ISBN (Print)	ISBN: 978-1-4244-6259-9
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1109/FIE.2010.5673645
Publication status	Published - Oct 2010
Event	40th IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE '10 - Washington, DC, United States Duration: 25 Oct 2010 → …

Conference

Conference	40th IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE '10
Country/Territory	United States
City	Washington, DC
Period	25/10/10 → …

Keywords

Virtual Worlds
HCI
Virtual Laboratories

Access to Document

10.1109/FIE.2010.5673645

Cite this

@inproceedings{e532294a9feb4d1ba3b70b9c79178ec4,

title = "Educationally enhanced Virtual Worlds",

abstract = "Virtual worlds continue to attract considerable interest as an innovative means of engaging students through the use of immersive, 3D, collaborative environments. They allow for the dynamic creation of content and for that content to be programmed. Second Life is the dominant virtual world technology in use, and whilst attractive in that it is a ready-made - albeit commercial - service, it was not designed for educational use and has significant social and technical drawbacks when used for that purpose. As such, we have been researching the serious use of OpenSim as an alternative virtual world for Computer Science education. OpenSim is a free, open source software development project which supports self-hosting and maintenance of virtual worlds. This paper explains our rationale for using OpenSim and reports on our experiences to date. It includes a feature comparison between OpenSim and Second Life as an aid for those wishing to exploit virtual worlds in the Computer Science curriculum.",

keywords = "Virtual Worlds, HCI, Virtual Laboratories",

author = "Colin Allison and Alan Miller and Thomas Sturgeon and Indika Perera and Nicoll, {James Ross}",

note = "This work has been supported by FILTA, the University of St Andrews Fund for Initiatives in Learning, Teaching and Assessment, and also by the UK Higher Education Academy subject centre for Information and Computer Sciences. ; 40th IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE '10 ; Conference date: 25-10-2010",

year = "2010",

month = oct,

doi = "10.1109/FIE.2010.5673645",

language = "English",

isbn = "ISBN: 978-1-4244-6259-9 ",

booktitle = "Proceedings of the 40th IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE '10",

publisher = "IEEE",

}

TY - GEN

T1 - Educationally enhanced Virtual Worlds

AU - Allison, Colin

AU - Miller, Alan

AU - Sturgeon, Thomas

AU - Perera, Indika

AU - Nicoll, James Ross

N1 - This work has been supported by FILTA, the University of St Andrews Fund for Initiatives in Learning, Teaching and Assessment, and also by the UK Higher Education Academy subject centre for Information and Computer Sciences.

PY - 2010/10

Y1 - 2010/10

N2 - Virtual worlds continue to attract considerable interest as an innovative means of engaging students through the use of immersive, 3D, collaborative environments. They allow for the dynamic creation of content and for that content to be programmed. Second Life is the dominant virtual world technology in use, and whilst attractive in that it is a ready-made - albeit commercial - service, it was not designed for educational use and has significant social and technical drawbacks when used for that purpose. As such, we have been researching the serious use of OpenSim as an alternative virtual world for Computer Science education. OpenSim is a free, open source software development project which supports self-hosting and maintenance of virtual worlds. This paper explains our rationale for using OpenSim and reports on our experiences to date. It includes a feature comparison between OpenSim and Second Life as an aid for those wishing to exploit virtual worlds in the Computer Science curriculum.

AB - Virtual worlds continue to attract considerable interest as an innovative means of engaging students through the use of immersive, 3D, collaborative environments. They allow for the dynamic creation of content and for that content to be programmed. Second Life is the dominant virtual world technology in use, and whilst attractive in that it is a ready-made - albeit commercial - service, it was not designed for educational use and has significant social and technical drawbacks when used for that purpose. As such, we have been researching the serious use of OpenSim as an alternative virtual world for Computer Science education. OpenSim is a free, open source software development project which supports self-hosting and maintenance of virtual worlds. This paper explains our rationale for using OpenSim and reports on our experiences to date. It includes a feature comparison between OpenSim and Second Life as an aid for those wishing to exploit virtual worlds in the Computer Science curriculum.

KW - Virtual Worlds

KW - HCI

KW - Virtual Laboratories

U2 - 10.1109/FIE.2010.5673645

DO - 10.1109/FIE.2010.5673645

M3 - Conference contribution

SN - ISBN: 978-1-4244-6259-9

BT - Proceedings of the 40th IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE '10

PB - IEEE

T2 - 40th IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE '10

Y2 - 25 October 2010

ER -

Educationally enhanced Virtual Worlds

Abstract

Conference

Keywords

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Cite this