Slashdot Mirror
3D Desktops for Linux?
Ryn asks: "I've
been looking around for a nice and easy to use 3D desktop/window
manager for Linux, and the choice seems to be extremely limited.
3dwm seems to be more of an
application framework than anything else. On the Windows side, there
are applications like rooms3d
and my favorite, 3dtop. Are
there any Linux apps like these?"
A 3D windowing environment will not be much use if you have a hard time reaching into the third dimension. The mouse is a nifty input device, but to do 3D with it, it is difficult.
For everyone that has played Homeworld, they have come the closest that I have seen to true 3d movement with a mouse, but the interface is still VERY annoying to me, I want my ships to attack them from above!
We do not cater to idiots.
The benefits come from shifting your information management away from the flat desk paradigm towards one we are used to using every day - a 3D world.
Most people know how to navigate a simulated 3D environment because of games such as quake etc. And because a 3D environment maps directly onto our day to day experience I think that it will be much easier to organise data. Just think of it was a virtual office, you have a room which contains printers, your desk with e-mail and word processing, the coffee bar where you go to chat with your friends etc. etc.
This would provide a use for the emerging 3D technologies such as 3D glasses, headsets etc. Eventually I am sure that someone will come up with a 3D "holographic" style display, at which point a simulated 3D on 2D environment could easily be converted and people would already be used to the interface.
I for one would find this wonderful. I love the idea of the ability to arrange my work in the same way I organise things in the real world. Roll on 3D, along with decent 3D display's :)
If you ever drop your keys into a river of molten lava, let'em go, because, man, they're gone.
But it would be slow.
"Moving" to the printer room, then clicking on the printer to get its status is way slower then just typing in the command.
And if you have to make physical motions like in real life, then it become comically slower. What good is vr if I have to move my hands to oen a file cabnet, then wiggle my fingers to shuffle through the papers, etc....
Not that it wouldn't be cool, in that eyecandy see what I can do kind of way, just not very useful for daily activities.
The reason why I believe this is because when the Source to quake was released I hacked it to load a different creature depending on varies deamons running, then send kill commands whenevr I shot a particular creature. My co-worker where very impressed, but hunting down a onster take a lot longer then typing the kill command.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on