Coexistence?\Merge?\Bridge?\ to Open Brush.
The main inquires are:
Merging the functionality of Open Blocks and Open Brush into a single unified app/project. llm rewritten or Enabling a seamless switch or transition between the two different 3D modeling workflows - the one in Open Blocks and the one in Open Brush. As noted by an original dev in the chat, Originally, the decision was made to have Open Blocks as seperate Tilt Brush, as the 3D modeling processes are quite different between the two. However, having the ability to easily move between the two workflows, such as by importing/exporting models between the apps, would be a desirable feature. Fully merging the two apps/projects into a single unified experience was discussed as a possibility, but it seems the core logic was built quite differently, making a full merger non-trivial. so merge would likely be out. So in summary, the key features being asked about are the ability to seamlessly transition between the Open Blocks and Open Brush workflows, and potentially merging the two apps/projects into a single unified experience, if feasible. llm rewritten
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At some point I'm going to try sticking them both into the same Unity project as separate scenes to see if I can make it possible to treat them as separate modes of a single app. It will not be much of an improvement from quitting and relaunching but if it works that eases the path to gradually making things more seamless.
Would it bog down performance?
You all are packing the apps with lots of goodies.
To offer my more general thoughts, while we can certainly do as Andy suggested, i personally feel it's very specific to our situation and a bit of a hack. You end up with a gargantuan app that just has random bits of functionality stuck on to it that don't really mesh well with each other, and if you want to use any other external tool (like gravity sketch, polysketch) you're just back in the same position. I'd really like to use this opportunity to do a real study on the interop between immersive apps, as i feel it's a big unknown for productivity in XR and isn't receiving much attention from platform developers like Meta. I begrudgingly think Apple are the furthest in this area with their "Volumes" metaphor that allows multiple tools in the same space
It's the same reason why I hate everyone sticking Vulpex browser in their apps. every immersive app is a browser 🙄
I agree. I am proposing a gigantic hack but it might be a good plan B. And even if it ends up being useful I would regard the combined app as an option - not as the default.
The correct solution is for the system browser on the Quest to properly integrate and not block immersive apps.
but we need Meta to do that
Yep. to be honest, most of this relies on platform holders
the groundwork just isn't there at the moment
the best we can do ourselves is put together a demo that shows why it would be useful
I'm sure Kronos have a spec for fixing this that will be ready in a couple of decades
but file management isn't flashy or shareable so it will likely go nowhere 😦
the attention span is far too short for thing that will actually make a difference
Talking of Apple - I literally have no idea how you share files between apps on an iPad properly - so they aren't that far ahead
oh no, i'm turning into an old man aren't I
I've got apps on the iPad that lock their files away and make export a "premium" feature. The OS shouldn't make that even possible.
Easiest way seems to be plugging into their Files app and API, that's how we surface Open Brush files on our zapbox build
yeah but then you get massive inconsistencies between what apps decide to reveal and what they don't. it's a hellscape for users
oh i totally agree, it's on developers to realise/implement. but at least it's there
there seems to be at least 3 common patterns but i'm not even sure of that because my mental model of how files work on iOS is non-existent.
it's just confusing - and now android is moving in the same direction. ffs
just gimme files and folders goddamit
but the cloud!
Unix: everything is a file
Android (based on a Linux kernel) and iOS (BSD): nothing is a file
I still find myself using
adb shell a non trivial amount on my phone, but on my iPad, I know there are files that I can't find and are duplicated, and I have no idea how to figure out where they are. Or where my space went.my ipad is too full to do an OS update and I literally have no idea how to fix that aside from going into every app and deleting things.
like.. what??
at least on android file manager apps can still see everything. on iOS even with various iTunes hacks there's stuff I can't seem to access
watching my kids download minecraft mods, I realized that Windows Explorer's ability to open ZIP files as directories is also very harmful
oh god yes. file that under "terrible ideas" along with
1. hiding file extensions by default
2. Pretending desktop is the root of the file system
3. that weird collections thing where "documents" is some virtual combination of several real folders
"Making things more complex by trying to make them simpler"
All abstractions are leaky but some are leakier than others.
Files are a pretty good abstraction. However - I'm having a hell of a time backing up dev/random 🤔
the backup is easy. It's the restore that keeps failing for me!
We should start a podcast. "Old Geeks Telling Jokes"
Have you tried pushing certain bits to the cloud? You can choose to store there and it’ll pull on demand. ESP documents and photos. Should help a lot
i can't seem to figure out how specific individual apps work with cloud backups. and if i get it wrong - i've lost data
They have their own folders for storage (each app)
do i manually have to pick a file and tell it to copy to icloud? or is it the global device backup?
You wont lose it. It’ll be in the cloud. Go in cloud settings and tik the boxes for which categories you want to push out
You’ll be able to see clearly what’s hogging your drive and that’ll sort things out for you
Or you can push all your docs on a usbc drive
comes back to 43 posts.
two things idk if you have seen or know if they would help.
https://forum.unity.com/threads/distributing-a-game-with-optional-vr-mode.898943/#post-7403534just some grist for the mill code example for flag at start to have have it launch without vr maybe could be set to a button, or between two programs or something.
https://github.com/amwatson/2DVrHybrid Objective: Launch a VR Activity from a 2D Activity (without changing applications) The new Steam Link app did something interesting: it started as a 2D app, but then launched into VR. Meta Quest always provided a way to run “flat” 2D Android phone/tablet applications inside the Quest Home environment – no VR-specific application code required. However, Quest doesn’t usually have hybrid apps: e.g. an app that starts as a 2D UI inside the Quest Home environment, and subsequently transitions into its own app-rendered environment at a later stage. It would almost certainly be useful: if applications could leverage the Quest 2D container for certain activities – i.e. showing interactive forms or deep-linking to web content – they could stand-up well-integrated, professional-looking 3D interfaces right away, and even re-use components across VR- and non-VR versions of their app. If you as an app developer tried to do what Steam Link did, you’d probably struggle. Some developers were asking how to make an app do this. As is sometimes the case, I don’t know if I know the right way, but I managed to figure out a way after a lot of experimentation.
GitHub
GitHub - amwatson/2DVrHybrid: Creating 2D-VR hybrid apps
Creating 2D-VR hybrid apps . Contribute to amwatson/2DVrHybrid development by creating an account on GitHub.
Unity Forum
Resolved - Distributing a game with optional VR mode.
Is it possible to distribute a game that is non-VR with the ability to turn on VR at runtime if a headset is present? Or do you need to make separate...
I think launching 2d is probably what most non-games should do
Mainly because of how the Quest (doesn't) support launching 2 immersive apps at the same time
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There's no reason we couldn't potentially offer separate and combined builds. A lot of this will ride on how much effort it is getting them into the same build. It's a gamble to spend a ton of effort on it if we don't know whether people will use it, and what it's effect on performance and maintainability will be.