Inspiration

In the realm of extended reality (XR), we’re witnessing a remarkable shift in how we interact with digital content. Traditional methods of navigation, designed for flat screens, are being reimagined to meet the needs of immersive XR environments. To support this transformation, the VR WebOS includes three core apps—Books, Bubbles, and Rooms—each offering a unique approach to content management, social engagement, and digital exploration. This WebOS merges the digital and physical worlds, allowing users to interact with their media collections, applications, and virtual environments in a deeply intuitive way.

1. Books - Content Organizer

The Books app represents a modern fusion of a digital library and a physical archive, revolutionizing the way users organize and access their media. Books transforms media browsing into a book-like experience, combining the nostalgic charm of physical libraries with the efficiency of a digital interface.

Features of Books:

• Virtual Bookshelf with Tab Dividers: Users organize their media using a bookshelf interface, with each "page" representing a different file, document, or media type. Tab dividers guide users through categories and collections, making large libraries easily accessible.
• Multi-Media Support: Books is designed to handle various media types, from images and audio to 3D models and websites. With the ability to manage collections of over 20,000 items, the app enables seamless access to vast archives.
• Interactive Markers and Personalization: Interactive markers allow users to quickly navigate to specific categories or files, and customizable dividers make media browsing feel both natural and enjoyable.

User Experience: Books brings the appeal of traditional library organization to the digital realm, transforming media interaction into a tactile experience. It’s ideal for users who appreciate a tangible approach to content management and offers a level of immersion and organization that transcends standard digital file systems.

2. Bubbles - PWA App Organizer

Bubbles is an app organizer that goes beyond the standard grid layout, offering a nested, bubble-based approach to app storage and navigation. With Bubbles, users categorize apps within dynamic, interconnected bubbles, creating a flexible, visually engaging way to access and organize their Progressive Web Apps (PWAs).

Features of Bubbles:

• Nested Bubbles for App Organization: Apps can be grouped within primary bubbles, which can further contain sub-bubbles for specific categories, such as "Productivity" or "Entertainment." Each main bubble and its sub-bubbles can represent themes, making organization feel natural and intuitive.
• Drag-and-Drop Simplicity: Users can seamlessly move apps between bubbles, customizing their collections as their needs change.
• Customizable Labels and Colors: Each bubble can be personalized with labels and colors, creating a unique look that visually organizes different app groups.
• Expandable Bubbles: Selecting a bubble expands it to reveal all nested apps within, creating a smooth, user-friendly experience.
• Intuitive Navigation: With simple gestures or taps, users navigate between nested bubbles, gaining quick access to the apps they need in an organized, spatially conceptual way.

User Experience: Bubbles transforms app management into an engaging, customizable experience. This spatial approach appeals to users who prefer a more organic, folder-like method of organizing their apps, rather than the limitations of a rigid grid. Bubbles adapts to individual preferences, whether users organize apps by project, frequency, or category, providing a uniquely engaging way to navigate digital content.

3. Rooms - XR Browser and the Vision for a Spatial Social Network

Rooms is more than an XR browser; it’s a fully customizable virtual environment where users can personalize and share their digital space. By combining social collaboration with a spatial browser, Rooms takes users on a journey through a 3D cosmos, where each room, city, and planet represents a different category, topic, or website, reflecting a web reimagined as a spatial experience.

Features of Rooms:

• Customizable Virtual Environments: Users can scan and replicate their own physical rooms or design imaginative, fantastical spaces, decorating them with interactive objects, artworks, and 3D elements.
• Social Collaboration: Rooms isn’t a solo experience; users can invite friends to explore, collaborate, and engage within their virtual spaces, making Rooms a social hub in the XR world.
• Interactive Objects and Art: Within each room, users can place objects that display content, such as musical instruments, virtual plants, and interactive books that transform into curated websites.
• Extendable with Subscriptions: Users can add virtual sculptures, paintings, and other artistic pieces to personalize their space, enabling unique expressions of creativity.

A Vision for the Spatial Web: Inspired by the original Yahoo directory, Rooms introduces a structured, spatial web where each level (planets, cities, streets, and rooms) acts as a gateway to knowledge and content. Users navigate this cosmos like a city, exploring categories, topics, and specific sites as if traveling between buildings and rooms.

Since 2016, my work in the XR community has been dedicated to advancing this concept, developing webXR solutions and working with A-Frame to create immersive environments. The 3D Hub, an initial prototype for a spatial web, centers around a room featuring Earth and ten planets, each symbolizing a different taxonomy. Users can explore topics by choosing a planet and following pathways through cities and rooms to specific sites or datasets.

To bring this idea to life, I developed Space-amp in 2023, a device that encapsulates A-Frame content in standalone, shareable files, much like eBooks. These files enable offline sharing, allowing users to experience the spatial web without internet access. The next step is to create an open-source browser that renders this universe, using JSON feeds to fetch encapsulated A-Frame sites. With Rooms as the starting point, the spatial web has the potential to reshape how we interact with the digital world, providing an immersive experience where navigation mirrors real-world exploration.

Collaborative Potential: Rooms and the broader spatial web vision invite collaboration within the XR community to advance this innovative approach. This framework offers exciting possibilities for education, research, and social interaction by transforming the web from a series of pages and links into a 3D cosmos that fosters human-centered exploration.

Conclusion

Together, Books, Bubbles, and Rooms form the core of this VR WebOS, each enhancing digital interaction in unique and immersive ways. From organizing media collections to structuring social spaces, these apps set the foundation for a digital experience that’s not only intuitive but deeply personal. This project encourages us to think beyond traditional navigation and unlocks new forms of interaction within the XR space, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in the digital world.