From vanderhyde at sxu.edu  Wed Sep  4 14:39:58 2019
From: vanderhyde at sxu.edu (Vanderhyde, James)
Date: Wed, 4 Sep 2019 18:39:58 +0000
Subject: alice-teacher Alice + VR
Message-ID: <D1E298E4-9590-4626-83F3-659DA8168EE7@sxu.edu>

I would like to know how the demos at the ISTE and CSTA conferences went this summer. Can those of us who couldn?t make the conferences find out about how Unity VR was used with Alice? There was just one tantalizing photo shared on Facebook.

James
?
James Vanderhyde
Associate Professor and Department Chair
Computer Science
Saint Xavier University
3700 W. 103rd St.
Chicago, IL 60655
773-298-3454

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From c.r.thomas at k12.wv.us  Thu Sep  5 09:03:21 2019
From: c.r.thomas at k12.wv.us (Carolyn Thomas)
Date: Thu, 5 Sep 2019 13:03:21 +0000
Subject: alice-teacher Alice + VR
In-Reply-To: <D1E298E4-9590-4626-83F3-659DA8168EE7@sxu.edu>
References: <D1E298E4-9590-4626-83F3-659DA8168EE7@sxu.edu>
Message-ID: <DM6PR17MB25857F7B602CA96C27E55AC888BB0@DM6PR17MB2585.namprd17.prod.outlook.com>

Me too! My high school students would love to combine Alice and UnityVR - and I would really like to be paired with someone who has done this and can work with me.
 - Carolyn

Carolyn Thomas, NBCT


[cid:70dc5a76-eea0-436a-a2a8-581b655a147c]
James Rumsey Technical Institute
3274 Hedgesville Road
Martinsburg, WV 25403
304-754-7925



________________________________
From: alice-teachers <alice-teachers-bounces+c.r.thomas=k12.wv.us at lists.andrew.cmu.edu> on behalf of Vanderhyde, James <vanderhyde at sxu.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, September 4, 2019 2:39 PM
To: Alice educators <alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: alice-teacher Alice + VR

I would like to know how the demos at the ISTE and CSTA conferences went this summer. Can those of us who couldn?t make the conferences find out about how Unity VR was used with Alice? There was just one tantalizing photo shared on Facebook.

James
?
James Vanderhyde
Associate Professor and Department Chair
Computer Science
Saint Xavier University
3700 W. 103rd St.
Chicago, IL 60655
773-298-3454

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From jbekkevold at ransomeverglades.org  Thu Sep  5 10:16:56 2019
From: jbekkevold at ransomeverglades.org (Jan Bekkevold)
Date: Thu, 5 Sep 2019 10:16:56 -0400
Subject: alice-teacher Alice + VR
In-Reply-To: <DM6PR17MB25857F7B602CA96C27E55AC888BB0@DM6PR17MB2585.namprd17.prod.outlook.com>
References: <D1E298E4-9590-4626-83F3-659DA8168EE7@sxu.edu>
 <DM6PR17MB25857F7B602CA96C27E55AC888BB0@DM6PR17MB2585.namprd17.prod.outlook.com>
Message-ID: <CAPN1+ELipx-GBB3L_xV+CkZ+jGgW_=E5efMi+HF0oa5vojgg_A@mail.gmail.com>

I, too would love to see this and also try this.

On Thu, Sep 5, 2019 at 10:10 AM Carolyn Thomas <c.r.thomas at k12.wv.us> wrote:

> Me too! My high school students would love to combine Alice and UnityVR -
> and I would really like to be paired with someone who has done this and can
> work with me.
>  - Carolyn
>
>
>
> *Carolyn Thomas, NBCT *
> James Rumsey Technical Institute
> 3274 Hedgesville Road
> Martinsburg, WV 25403
> 304-754-7925
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* alice-teachers <alice-teachers-bounces+c.r.thomas=
> k12.wv.us at lists.andrew.cmu.edu> on behalf of Vanderhyde, James <
> vanderhyde at sxu.edu>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, September 4, 2019 2:39 PM
> *To:* Alice educators <alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu>
> *Subject:* alice-teacher Alice + VR
>
> I would like to know how the demos at the ISTE and CSTA conferences went
> this summer. Can those of us who couldn?t make the conferences find out
> about how Unity VR was used with Alice? There was just one tantalizing
> photo shared on Facebook.
>
> James
> ?
> James Vanderhyde
> Associate Professor and Department Chair
> Computer Science
> Saint Xavier University
> 3700 W. 103rd St.
> Chicago, IL 60655
> 773-298-3454
>
> _______________________________________________
> alice-teachers mailing list
> alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu
> To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
> https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers



-- 


Jan Bekkevold

Computer Science and Mathematics Faculty

Ransom Everglades School

2045 South Bayshore Drive

Coconut Grove, FL 33133-3299

T: 305 250 6853

E: Jbekkevold at ransomeverglades.org <xxxxxxxxx at ransomeverglades.org>

W: www.ransomeverglades.org


<http://www.ransomeverglades.org/>
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From gloria.barron at montgomerycollege.edu  Thu Sep  5 11:22:05 2019
From: gloria.barron at montgomerycollege.edu (Barron, Gloria E)
Date: Thu, 5 Sep 2019 15:22:05 +0000
Subject: alice-teacher Alice + VR
In-Reply-To: <CAPN1+ELipx-GBB3L_xV+CkZ+jGgW_=E5efMi+HF0oa5vojgg_A@mail.gmail.com>
References: <D1E298E4-9590-4626-83F3-659DA8168EE7@sxu.edu>
 <DM6PR17MB25857F7B602CA96C27E55AC888BB0@DM6PR17MB2585.namprd17.prod.outlook.com>,
 <CAPN1+ELipx-GBB3L_xV+CkZ+jGgW_=E5efMi+HF0oa5vojgg_A@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <SN6PR10MB24933C181EE99C114CAD12FEEABB0@SN6PR10MB2493.namprd10.prod.outlook.com>

If anyone has this information, please share. Sounds intriguing.

Best,
Gloria
________________________________
From: alice-teachers <alice-teachers-bounces+gloria.barron=montgomerycollege.edu at lists.andrew.cmu.edu> on behalf of Jan Bekkevold <jbekkevold at ransomeverglades.org>
Sent: Thursday, September 5, 2019 10:16:56 AM
To: Alice educators <alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: alice-teacher Alice + VR

I, too would love to see this and also try this.

On Thu, Sep 5, 2019 at 10:10 AM Carolyn Thomas <c.r.thomas at k12.wv.us<mailto:c.r.thomas at k12.wv.us>> wrote:
Me too! My high school students would love to combine Alice and UnityVR - and I would really like to be paired with someone who has done this and can work with me.
 - Carolyn

Carolyn Thomas, NBCT


[cid:16d01c84c21dc993f371]
James Rumsey Technical Institute
3274 Hedgesville Road
Martinsburg, WV 25403
304-754-7925



________________________________
From: alice-teachers <alice-teachers-bounces+c.r.thomas=k12.wv.us at lists.andrew.cmu.edu<mailto:k12.wv.us at lists.andrew.cmu.edu>> on behalf of Vanderhyde, James <vanderhyde at sxu.edu<mailto:vanderhyde at sxu.edu>>
Sent: Wednesday, September 4, 2019 2:39 PM
To: Alice educators <alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu<mailto:alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu>>
Subject: alice-teacher Alice + VR

I would like to know how the demos at the ISTE and CSTA conferences went this summer. Can those of us who couldn?t make the conferences find out about how Unity VR was used with Alice? There was just one tantalizing photo shared on Facebook.

James
?
James Vanderhyde
Associate Professor and Department Chair
Computer Science
Saint Xavier University
3700 W. 103rd St.
Chicago, IL 60655
773-298-3454

_______________________________________________
alice-teachers mailing list
alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu<mailto:alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu>
To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers


--


[https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/xhbk21BRszx-gkugUNorRB8R1SuhTL9ZbjjR8WIcl7cj993ddYI7tkDuJz1AjINgkENuBoUKabbE8dCFwMPT5beYOoqlumUtN6oDe08s0W-VtdnmzryBPbyp0XauQA9GftJtYYOT]

Jan Bekkevold

Computer Science and Mathematics Faculty


Ransom Everglades School

2045 South Bayshore Drive

Coconut Grove, FL 33133-3299

T: 305 250 6853

E: Jbekkevold at ransomeverglades.org<mailto:xxxxxxxxx at ransomeverglades.org>

W: www.ransomeverglades.org<http://www.ransomeverglades.org/>

<http://www.ransomeverglades.org/>
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From ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu  Wed Sep 18 13:30:00 2019
From: ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu (Eric Brown)
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 10:30:00 -0700
Subject: alice-teacher Alice VR and More
Message-ID: <9C25B666-6A89-44DB-A735-8636CE7B9703@andrew.cmu.edu>

Dear All,

In response to the last couple posts here is a quick outline of the Alice VR initiative as well as some other updates:

The Alice VR initiative will work through a standalone (compiled) unity player application.  This will be used to run the students projects without them having to do anything in Unity itself.  Students will continue to author their worlds in the same Alice IDE you are using today with the addition of an export button in the file drop down (this is what we used for the demos we showed at the conferences).  They will then launch the player and select load world, browse to their save file, and run.  This same player will work to run Alice worlds in the unity player on desktop without VR.  If the player detects VR it will launch there.  Our first iteration will support Oculus (rift and rift s) desktop VR.  Here is our current release schedule and some more details on the goals:

1.  Alice stand alone player: We are excited about the initial launch of just the Unity player because we think some of the performance improvements in rendering will help support some of the larger and more complicated worlds students have been creating.  We also think it will make for a better presentation method as it will go full screen without the tool bar and will allow people to play worlds without having to first launch Alice and load from the editor.  We should be launching this in October. The more exciting features that we will continue to work on after that include:

a.  A process that students can wrap their world individually in the unity player so that they can share and distribute their projects as stand alone applications.  This may require that they take our unity project (we will be open sourcing the code), loading up our code in Unity, and make a build with their saved world input in the right location.  Release TBD

b.  A web hosted player.  We have tested a webgl version that seems to indicate that we will be able to create a process where students could host their worlds on a web server and serve their creation through a web browser.  To be determined will be if we host the platform and the ability to upload to our servers or if we make the full project with directions on how to host available or both.  Release TBD

C.  Alice to Unity:  To be clear this player makes use of Unity but will not be used like netbeans to allow students to begin work on their projects in Alice and then transfer them into unity and modify them easily in Unity.  While we will explore ways that they could potentially tweak the output in Unity this work was not intended for this transition at this time.  We are working on lessons to help students translate what they have learned in Alice into early Unity projects separate from this initiative.

2.  Alice VR integration:  This work extends the unity player to make it work with VR cameras and input devices. We currently have the very basic integration working that translates the camera object to the VR headset.  Worlds run in VR will display all of the Alice animation functionality but we have not tied in different input devices yet.  We plan to begin this work in earnest once the base unity player described above is completed in October (crossing fingers).  The tentative schedule for full integration including the ability to author vr inputs through events,  interface updates to incorporate VR event language, and the ability to preview active area for VR camera areas is January.  After the initial release we will continue to work on supporting further platforms including stand alone vr headsets.

3.  VR Beta:  We did demo this already at the conferences and do want to get it out as soon as we can with limited functionality because we think it is super cool.  We are currently working to clean up the current version that would allow Alice to run all of the base animation functionality in VR (and you can drive user inputs with the keyboard).  We will put in a small temporary hack to enable toggling to use a moveable camera with the joystick similar to the future functionality of programming an object move for camera event.  To use the beta you will need to download a beta version of Alice that will include the export function (it will save out a .a3w file format).  You should be able to open existing worlds in this version and then save them out.  You will also need to download the beta of the player.   Our initial development has made use of Steam VR so you may need to also install Steam and Steam VR.  We just made a push for this version and used it at Oracle Code 4 Kids in San Francisco last weekend.  We are doing a little more clean up and plan to make this available next week.

4.  Alice 3 Bug Fix Updates - We are also working on incorporating a couple bug fixes and new features into our next release.  We may put this out before the player release as these items may be helpful for those that would like to have earlier access to them:

- Print code - we know that this functionality would be useful for student submissions for the Create task of CS Principles and also for you teachers who may want an easier way to quickly scan program code.  We have been working to implement this feature in Alice 3 and are cleaning up the output format now.

- Billboard textures - We have had a bunch of reports on different bugs ranging from crash bugs to texture and scaling issues and we have been working through billboard functionality to clean a bunch of this up.

- Built in joint arrays - for those of you using the railroad pieces we accidentally introduced a bug on our last release that broke this functionality.  We have fixed this issue.  

We hope to have more firm dates and ongoing updates as we start to roll out these exciting new features.  So stay tuned.

Sincerely,

Eric

From gflint at mcsmt.org  Wed Sep 18 13:42:36 2019
From: gflint at mcsmt.org (Garth Flint)
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 11:42:36 -0600
Subject: alice-teacher Alice VR and More
In-Reply-To: <9C25B666-6A89-44DB-A735-8636CE7B9703@andrew.cmu.edu>
References: <9C25B666-6A89-44DB-A735-8636CE7B9703@andrew.cmu.edu>
Message-ID: <CABuRqZwdhuPEUXDuTuZe-80LJjJ-h7n0V76qqMqD_1LCY=DzXg@mail.gmail.com>

This sounds incredible!  My only question is will it port to an Android
phone so we can use Google Cardboard?  Google Cardboard fits the school
budget.  Oculus is well beyond the budget.

Garth Flint
Technology Coordinator
Missoula Catholic Schools
(406)-531-7497


On Wed, Sep 18, 2019 at 11:35 AM Eric Brown <ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu> wrote:

> Dear All,
>
> In response to the last couple posts here is a quick outline of the Alice
> VR initiative as well as some other updates:
>
> The Alice VR initiative will work through a standalone (compiled) unity
> player application.  This will be used to run the students projects without
> them having to do anything in Unity itself.  Students will continue to
> author their worlds in the same Alice IDE you are using today with the
> addition of an export button in the file drop down (this is what we used
> for the demos we showed at the conferences).  They will then launch the
> player and select load world, browse to their save file, and run.  This
> same player will work to run Alice worlds in the unity player on desktop
> without VR.  If the player detects VR it will launch there.  Our first
> iteration will support Oculus (rift and rift s) desktop VR.  Here is our
> current release schedule and some more details on the goals:
>
> 1.  Alice stand alone player: We are excited about the initial launch of
> just the Unity player because we think some of the performance improvements
> in rendering will help support some of the larger and more complicated
> worlds students have been creating.  We also think it will make for a
> better presentation method as it will go full screen without the tool bar
> and will allow people to play worlds without having to first launch Alice
> and load from the editor.  We should be launching this in October. The more
> exciting features that we will continue to work on after that include:
>
> a.  A process that students can wrap their world individually in the unity
> player so that they can share and distribute their projects as stand alone
> applications.  This may require that they take our unity project (we will
> be open sourcing the code), loading up our code in Unity, and make a build
> with their saved world input in the right location.  Release TBD
>
> b.  A web hosted player.  We have tested a webgl version that seems to
> indicate that we will be able to create a process where students could host
> their worlds on a web server and serve their creation through a web
> browser.  To be determined will be if we host the platform and the ability
> to upload to our servers or if we make the full project with directions on
> how to host available or both.  Release TBD
>
> C.  Alice to Unity:  To be clear this player makes use of Unity but will
> not be used like netbeans to allow students to begin work on their projects
> in Alice and then transfer them into unity and modify them easily in
> Unity.  While we will explore ways that they could potentially tweak the
> output in Unity this work was not intended for this transition at this
> time.  We are working on lessons to help students translate what they have
> learned in Alice into early Unity projects separate from this initiative.
>
> 2.  Alice VR integration:  This work extends the unity player to make it
> work with VR cameras and input devices. We currently have the very basic
> integration working that translates the camera object to the VR headset.
> Worlds run in VR will display all of the Alice animation functionality but
> we have not tied in different input devices yet.  We plan to begin this
> work in earnest once the base unity player described above is completed in
> October (crossing fingers).  The tentative schedule for full integration
> including the ability to author vr inputs through events,  interface
> updates to incorporate VR event language, and the ability to preview active
> area for VR camera areas is January.  After the initial release we will
> continue to work on supporting further platforms including stand alone vr
> headsets.
>
> 3.  VR Beta:  We did demo this already at the conferences and do want to
> get it out as soon as we can with limited functionality because we think it
> is super cool.  We are currently working to clean up the current version
> that would allow Alice to run all of the base animation functionality in VR
> (and you can drive user inputs with the keyboard).  We will put in a small
> temporary hack to enable toggling to use a moveable camera with the
> joystick similar to the future functionality of programming an object move
> for camera event.  To use the beta you will need to download a beta version
> of Alice that will include the export function (it will save out a .a3w
> file format).  You should be able to open existing worlds in this version
> and then save them out.  You will also need to download the beta of the
> player.   Our initial development has made use of Steam VR so you may need
> to also install Steam and Steam VR.  We just made a push for this version
> and used it at Oracle Code 4 K!
>  ids in San Francisco last weekend.  We are doing a little more clean up
> and plan to make this available next week.
>
> 4.  Alice 3 Bug Fix Updates - We are also working on incorporating a
> couple bug fixes and new features into our next release.  We may put this
> out before the player release as these items may be helpful for those that
> would like to have earlier access to them:
>
> - Print code - we know that this functionality would be useful for student
> submissions for the Create task of CS Principles and also for you teachers
> who may want an easier way to quickly scan program code.  We have been
> working to implement this feature in Alice 3 and are cleaning up the output
> format now.
>
> - Billboard textures - We have had a bunch of reports on different bugs
> ranging from crash bugs to texture and scaling issues and we have been
> working through billboard functionality to clean a bunch of this up.
>
> - Built in joint arrays - for those of you using the railroad pieces we
> accidentally introduced a bug on our last release that broke this
> functionality.  We have fixed this issue.
>
> We hope to have more firm dates and ongoing updates as we start to roll
> out these exciting new features.  So stay tuned.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Eric
> _______________________________________________
> alice-teachers mailing list
> alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu
> To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
> https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers
>
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From vanderhyde at sxu.edu  Wed Sep 18 14:25:45 2019
From: vanderhyde at sxu.edu (Vanderhyde, James)
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 18:25:45 +0000
Subject: alice-teacher Alice VR and More
In-Reply-To: <9C25B666-6A89-44DB-A735-8636CE7B9703@andrew.cmu.edu>
References: <9C25B666-6A89-44DB-A735-8636CE7B9703@andrew.cmu.edu>
Message-ID: <48C6774A-05B1-4D43-84E1-E13E6958F745@sxu.edu>

Eric, thank you for the update. Maybe I will switch to Alice 3 now, instead of Alice 2.

James
?
James Vanderhyde
Associate Professor and Department Chair
Computer Science
Saint Xavier University
3700 W. 103rd St.
Chicago, IL 60655
773-298-3454


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From ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu  Wed Sep 18 18:51:35 2019
From: ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu (Eric Brown)
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 15:51:35 -0700
Subject: alice-teacher Alice VR and More
In-Reply-To: <CABuRqZwdhuPEUXDuTuZe-80LJjJ-h7n0V76qqMqD_1LCY=DzXg@mail.gmail.com>
References: <9C25B666-6A89-44DB-A735-8636CE7B9703@andrew.cmu.edu>
 <CABuRqZwdhuPEUXDuTuZe-80LJjJ-h7n0V76qqMqD_1LCY=DzXg@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <46F55C04-D2C8-43A6-B14F-9D3F0C416225@andrew.cmu.edu>

That is a great question and we do understand the price challenge of VR.  We do hope to port to further platforms including mobile and stand alone VR.  We are initially targeting desktop in our timeline because it is the natural first step and for mobile we will need to build out an infrastructure to publish the app including a web platform to support a way for students to upload and access their worlds on the device (it will also require some performance and application size optimizations).  

We do hope that classes could get access to devices that have input devices (so even google daydream) so that the worlds can include programming events and interactivity.  We will definitely try to promote/share available grants to get hardware when we hear of them and please share them (if initially there are ways we can partner to do so we will also let everyone know).  We hope that since students can work normally and then use the same world in VR that even having access to just one device that could be used by all of the students would enable this exciting functionality or even taking their saved world to a library or some other community resource that might have hardware could be an option in the beginning.


> On Sep 18, 2019, at 10:42 AM, Garth Flint <gflint at mcsmt.org> wrote:
> 
> This sounds incredible!  My only question is will it port to an Android phone so we can use Google Cardboard?  Google Cardboard fits the school budget.  Oculus is well beyond the budget.
> 
> Garth Flint
> Technology Coordinator
> Missoula Catholic Schools
> (406)-531-7497
> 
> 
> On Wed, Sep 18, 2019 at 11:35 AM Eric Brown <ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu> wrote:
> Dear All,
> 
> In response to the last couple posts here is a quick outline of the Alice VR initiative as well as some other updates:
> 
> The Alice VR initiative will work through a standalone (compiled) unity player application.  This will be used to run the students projects without them having to do anything in Unity itself.  Students will continue to author their worlds in the same Alice IDE you are using today with the addition of an export button in the file drop down (this is what we used for the demos we showed at the conferences).  They will then launch the player and select load world, browse to their save file, and run.  This same player will work to run Alice worlds in the unity player on desktop without VR.  If the player detects VR it will launch there.  Our first iteration will support Oculus (rift and rift s) desktop VR.  Here is our current release schedule and some more details on the goals:
> 
> 1.  Alice stand alone player: We are excited about the initial launch of just the Unity player because we think some of the performance improvements in rendering will help support some of the larger and more complicated worlds students have been creating.  We also think it will make for a better presentation method as it will go full screen without the tool bar and will allow people to play worlds without having to first launch Alice and load from the editor.  We should be launching this in October. The more exciting features that we will continue to work on after that include:
> 
> a.  A process that students can wrap their world individually in the unity player so that they can share and distribute their projects as stand alone applications.  This may require that they take our unity project (we will be open sourcing the code), loading up our code in Unity, and make a build with their saved world input in the right location.  Release TBD
> 
> b.  A web hosted player.  We have tested a webgl version that seems to indicate that we will be able to create a process where students could host their worlds on a web server and serve their creation through a web browser.  To be determined will be if we host the platform and the ability to upload to our servers or if we make the full project with directions on how to host available or both.  Release TBD
> 
> C.  Alice to Unity:  To be clear this player makes use of Unity but will not be used like netbeans to allow students to begin work on their projects in Alice and then transfer them into unity and modify them easily in Unity.  While we will explore ways that they could potentially tweak the output in Unity this work was not intended for this transition at this time.  We are working on lessons to help students translate what they have learned in Alice into early Unity projects separate from this initiative.
> 
> 2.  Alice VR integration:  This work extends the unity player to make it work with VR cameras and input devices. We currently have the very basic integration working that translates the camera object to the VR headset.  Worlds run in VR will display all of the Alice animation functionality but we have not tied in different input devices yet.  We plan to begin this work in earnest once the base unity player described above is completed in October (crossing fingers).  The tentative schedule for full integration including the ability to author vr inputs through events,  interface updates to incorporate VR event language, and the ability to preview active area for VR camera areas is January.  After the initial release we will continue to work on supporting further platforms including stand alone vr headsets.
> 
> 3.  VR Beta:  We did demo this already at the conferences and do want to get it out as soon as we can with limited functionality because we think it is super cool.  We are currently working to clean up the current version that would allow Alice to run all of the base animation functionality in VR (and you can drive user inputs with the keyboard).  We will put in a small temporary hack to enable toggling to use a moveable camera with the joystick similar to the future functionality of programming an object move for camera event.  To use the beta you will need to download a beta version of Alice that will include the export function (it will save out a .a3w file format).  You should be able to open existing worlds in this version and then save them out.  You will also need to download the beta of the player.   Our initial development has made use of Steam VR so you may need to also install Steam and Steam VR.  We just made a push for this version and used it at Oracle Code 4 K!
>  ids in San Francisco last weekend.  We are doing a little more clean up and plan to make this available next week.
> 
> 4.  Alice 3 Bug Fix Updates - We are also working on incorporating a couple bug fixes and new features into our next release.  We may put this out before the player release as these items may be helpful for those that would like to have earlier access to them:
> 
> - Print code - we know that this functionality would be useful for student submissions for the Create task of CS Principles and also for you teachers who may want an easier way to quickly scan program code.  We have been working to implement this feature in Alice 3 and are cleaning up the output format now.
> 
> - Billboard textures - We have had a bunch of reports on different bugs ranging from crash bugs to texture and scaling issues and we have been working through billboard functionality to clean a bunch of this up.
> 
> - Built in joint arrays - for those of you using the railroad pieces we accidentally introduced a bug on our last release that broke this functionality.  We have fixed this issue.  
> 
> We hope to have more firm dates and ongoing updates as we start to roll out these exciting new features.  So stay tuned.
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> Eric
> _______________________________________________
> alice-teachers mailing list
> alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu
> To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
> https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers
> _______________________________________________
> alice-teachers mailing list
> alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu
> To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
> https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers


From marussig at siol.net  Thu Sep 19 07:13:57 2019
From: marussig at siol.net (Matjaz Marussig)
Date: Thu, 19 Sep 2019 13:13:57 +0200
Subject: alice-teacher Alice VR and More
In-Reply-To: <46F55C04-D2C8-43A6-B14F-9D3F0C416225@andrew.cmu.edu>
References: <9C25B666-6A89-44DB-A735-8636CE7B9703@andrew.cmu.edu>
 <CABuRqZwdhuPEUXDuTuZe-80LJjJ-h7n0V76qqMqD_1LCY=DzXg@mail.gmail.com>
 <46F55C04-D2C8-43A6-B14F-9D3F0C416225@andrew.cmu.edu>
Message-ID: <CAF6NRpD0p_sJYbpp1oe54wtNNvC9uQMf0JFDkccKwR0LK6t1qw@mail.gmail.com>

Hi,
I think that mobile as an IoT is a too small device to teach and learn. I
give them a quiz on mobile for checking their knowledge and nothing more
than that. That's just my opinion.

Matjaz

---
Matjaz Marussig ME
ISV
Oracle Silver Partner

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matjazmarussig
Medium: https://medium.com/@matjazmarussig
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MatjazMarussig
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/matjazmarussig
Office Email: marussig at siol.net
Private Email: matjaz.marussig at gmail.com
www: http://marussig.si/
Skypename: matjazmarussig
Phone: 0038641508427


On Thu, 19 Sep 2019 at 12:55, Eric Brown <ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu> wrote:

> That is a great question and we do understand the price challenge of VR.
> We do hope to port to further platforms including mobile and stand alone
> VR.  We are initially targeting desktop in our timeline because it is the
> natural first step and for mobile we will need to build out an
> infrastructure to publish the app including a web platform to support a way
> for students to upload and access their worlds on the device (it will also
> require some performance and application size optimizations).
>
> We do hope that classes could get access to devices that have input
> devices (so even google daydream) so that the worlds can include
> programming events and interactivity.  We will definitely try to
> promote/share available grants to get hardware when we hear of them and
> please share them (if initially there are ways we can partner to do so we
> will also let everyone know).  We hope that since students can work
> normally and then use the same world in VR that even having access to just
> one device that could be used by all of the students would enable this
> exciting functionality or even taking their saved world to a library or
> some other community resource that might have hardware could be an option
> in the beginning.
>
>
> > On Sep 18, 2019, at 10:42 AM, Garth Flint <gflint at mcsmt.org> wrote:
> >
> > This sounds incredible!  My only question is will it port to an Android
> phone so we can use Google Cardboard?  Google Cardboard fits the school
> budget.  Oculus is well beyond the budget.
> >
> > Garth Flint
> > Technology Coordinator
> > Missoula Catholic Schools
> > (406)-531-7497
> >
> >
> > On Wed, Sep 18, 2019 at 11:35 AM Eric Brown <ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu>
> wrote:
> > Dear All,
> >
> > In response to the last couple posts here is a quick outline of the
> Alice VR initiative as well as some other updates:
> >
> > The Alice VR initiative will work through a standalone (compiled) unity
> player application.  This will be used to run the students projects without
> them having to do anything in Unity itself.  Students will continue to
> author their worlds in the same Alice IDE you are using today with the
> addition of an export button in the file drop down (this is what we used
> for the demos we showed at the conferences).  They will then launch the
> player and select load world, browse to their save file, and run.  This
> same player will work to run Alice worlds in the unity player on desktop
> without VR.  If the player detects VR it will launch there.  Our first
> iteration will support Oculus (rift and rift s) desktop VR.  Here is our
> current release schedule and some more details on the goals:
> >
> > 1.  Alice stand alone player: We are excited about the initial launch of
> just the Unity player because we think some of the performance improvements
> in rendering will help support some of the larger and more complicated
> worlds students have been creating.  We also think it will make for a
> better presentation method as it will go full screen without the tool bar
> and will allow people to play worlds without having to first launch Alice
> and load from the editor.  We should be launching this in October. The more
> exciting features that we will continue to work on after that include:
> >
> > a.  A process that students can wrap their world individually in the
> unity player so that they can share and distribute their projects as stand
> alone applications.  This may require that they take our unity project (we
> will be open sourcing the code), loading up our code in Unity, and make a
> build with their saved world input in the right location.  Release TBD
> >
> > b.  A web hosted player.  We have tested a webgl version that seems to
> indicate that we will be able to create a process where students could host
> their worlds on a web server and serve their creation through a web
> browser.  To be determined will be if we host the platform and the ability
> to upload to our servers or if we make the full project with directions on
> how to host available or both.  Release TBD
> >
> > C.  Alice to Unity:  To be clear this player makes use of Unity but will
> not be used like netbeans to allow students to begin work on their projects
> in Alice and then transfer them into unity and modify them easily in
> Unity.  While we will explore ways that they could potentially tweak the
> output in Unity this work was not intended for this transition at this
> time.  We are working on lessons to help students translate what they have
> learned in Alice into early Unity projects separate from this initiative.
> >
> > 2.  Alice VR integration:  This work extends the unity player to make it
> work with VR cameras and input devices. We currently have the very basic
> integration working that translates the camera object to the VR headset.
> Worlds run in VR will display all of the Alice animation functionality but
> we have not tied in different input devices yet.  We plan to begin this
> work in earnest once the base unity player described above is completed in
> October (crossing fingers).  The tentative schedule for full integration
> including the ability to author vr inputs through events,  interface
> updates to incorporate VR event language, and the ability to preview active
> area for VR camera areas is January.  After the initial release we will
> continue to work on supporting further platforms including stand alone vr
> headsets.
> >
> > 3.  VR Beta:  We did demo this already at the conferences and do want to
> get it out as soon as we can with limited functionality because we think it
> is super cool.  We are currently working to clean up the current version
> that would allow Alice to run all of the base animation functionality in VR
> (and you can drive user inputs with the keyboard).  We will put in a small
> temporary hack to enable toggling to use a moveable camera with the
> joystick similar to the future functionality of programming an object move
> for camera event.  To use the beta you will need to download a beta version
> of Alice that will include the export function (it will save out a .a3w
> file format).  You should be able to open existing worlds in this version
> and then save them out.  You will also need to download the beta of the
> player.   Our initial development has made use of Steam VR so you may need
> to also install Steam and Steam VR.  We just made a push for this version
> and used it at Oracle Code 4!
>   K!
> >  ids in San Francisco last weekend.  We are doing a little more clean up
> and plan to make this available next week.
> >
> > 4.  Alice 3 Bug Fix Updates - We are also working on incorporating a
> couple bug fixes and new features into our next release.  We may put this
> out before the player release as these items may be helpful for those that
> would like to have earlier access to them:
> >
> > - Print code - we know that this functionality would be useful for
> student submissions for the Create task of CS Principles and also for you
> teachers who may want an easier way to quickly scan program code.  We have
> been working to implement this feature in Alice 3 and are cleaning up the
> output format now.
> >
> > - Billboard textures - We have had a bunch of reports on different bugs
> ranging from crash bugs to texture and scaling issues and we have been
> working through billboard functionality to clean a bunch of this up.
> >
> > - Built in joint arrays - for those of you using the railroad pieces we
> accidentally introduced a bug on our last release that broke this
> functionality.  We have fixed this issue.
> >
> > We hope to have more firm dates and ongoing updates as we start to roll
> out these exciting new features.  So stay tuned.
> >
> > Sincerely,
> >
> > Eric
> > _______________________________________________
> > alice-teachers mailing list
> > alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu
> > To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
> > https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers
> > _______________________________________________
> > alice-teachers mailing list
> > alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu
> > To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
> > https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers
>
> _______________________________________________
> alice-teachers mailing list
> alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu
> To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
> https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers
>
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From ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu  Mon Sep 30 17:45:04 2019
From: ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu (Eric Brown)
Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2019 14:45:04 -0700
Subject: alice-teacher Alice Unity VR Update and Call for Community Mapping
	Help
Message-ID: <3133E290-93A2-4B95-9ACE-9F35858F2769@andrew.cmu.edu>

Dear All,

I apologize we didn?t get the Unity and VR beta out last week as promised.  We ran into a snag on the Sims people.  We have to handle these models very differently due to their unique construction.  We are trying to avoid putting out the initial beta without these models being supported as it would complicate your ability to take existing worlds and bring them in for a test ride.  We are working hard to get something together and promise that worst case scenario we will put something out this week (hopefully with people but if need without) for those itching to give this a try.

 We also have an import request for help.  We are kicking of a community mapping initiative.   As you all know Alice is a free platform and we choose not to collect usage data or require any registration information to use our software.  The only way we can learn about what you are doing and the impact that Alice is having is through initiatives like this one. The information you provide will help us raise funds to maintain and expand the platform while ensuring it will always free, give us important direction on how to improve Alice, and inform us on how to better connect, support, and grow our community. We also ask that you please help us share this survey with other administrators and educators that you know are using Alice.  Only through your efforts can we find and connect with the broad global Alice community.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/BRR2597

Sincerely,

Eric