This week I decided to take the WebVR/WebXR extension work I did for Van Wijnen to the next level: mainly to integrate metric information in some way into the scene, whether as 3D text objects or via some kind of Heads-Up Display (HUD). But before embarking on this I decided to take another look at the implementation of the HTML client.
When I first wrote the HTML page that consumes geometry data from the Refinery server, I decided to use raw JavaScript and WebVR/WebXR calls with three.js. I’d thought briefly about using A-Frame – an awesome framework started by Mozilla for creating VR experiences – but as the main basis of A-Frame is to “declare” content, I figured it didn’t really make sense. I was a little jealous of the capabilities built into A-Frame and contributed by its growing community, though, as I proceeded with the project. For instance, there’s some really nice controller support – including a component to help integrate teleportation – which I…