SL Education
Second Life Maths Sculptures
August 18, 2011
This post is to highlight the various sculptures scattered around the Second Life “Warwick University Maths” island, which can be accessed at this SLURL. There is always a lot of discussion over the impact of education using Virtual Worlds (usually against a backdrop of the bad publicity that always makes the tabloids), but what cannot be denied is that there is a large and vibrant community with involvement from Universities from across the world (with many from the US and UK) carrying out a lot of innovative projects. A good snapshot of the situation in the UK can be found at the Virtual World Watch site. The Warwick island itself was set up using an “Education Innovation Fund” from Warwick University, and has generously been supported by the Mathemtics Department since.
From a mathematical education point of view, one of the great advantages of using virtual worlds is the ability to explore three dimensional objects in an immersive environment, as well as the flexibility to create and script with a very shallow learning curve. As well as the sculptures the island is also host to a number of tutorials to supplement a couple of modules I currently lecture, and I hope in the not too distance future to introduce a module that explores the possibilities of mathematics in virtual worlds in more detail. (more…)
Shortened URL: http://go.dave-wood.org/7
Ee’s SLideshow Viewer and Second Life 2.0
April 7, 2010
So, Linden Labs caught everyone by surprise and made the Beta 2.0 viewer the main release for new residents, despite there being numerous bugs that still need to be fixed. Pertinent to Ee’s SLideshow viewer are the new shared media facilities, or more precisely changes to parcel media.
Upgrades to SLideshow Viewer will soon incorporate prim media, allowing interaction with websites loaded in the viewer, but a concern is that until you can be certain that all residents are using viewers that support it you have to ask yourself whether presentations you are setting up are accessible by those who want to continue using the 1.23 viewer. I suspect that before long, and without much warning, Linden Lab will make upgrade to 2.0 mandatory, so getting rid of this worry. In the meantime however there are some annoyances that everyone needs to be aware of using parcel media which is the SLideshow Viewers current mechanism for displaying html and streaming media, I don’t intend to release any upgrades to deal with these yet since most will hopefully be fixed quite quickly (see JIRA links later): (more…)
Shortened URL: http://go.dave-wood.org/q
Christmas on Warwick University Maths Island
December 21, 2009
A freak snowstorm has hit the tropical Second Life island of the Warwick University Maths department (SLURL: http://tinyurl.com/56ykb2), conincidentally just in time for the Christmas break!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Shortened URL: http://go.dave-wood.org/o
Second Life + LaTeX = SLaTeX
May 7, 2009
It has long been a problem that one of the biggest obstacles to doing mathematics in Second Life was the inability to write equations. Of course, there is a counter argument that this forces you to be more imaginative in finding ways to get the same ideas across and there is a huge amount to say about the benefits of being able to create complex 3D objects to get mathematical concepts across. But, there comes a point when you really need to be able to discuss equations to get the full picture.
Well, this is a problem no more with a little gadget I’ve come up with: say hello to SLaTeX! Or $$S\LaTeX$$ if you prefer. It’s still in an experimental stage and has a few small bugs to iron out, but it seems to be quite robust.It currently uses either mathtex or mimetex , depending on how the serverside processing is done as I play around with options… it’s a little rough and ready, but it works!
Shortened URL: http://go.dave-wood.org/15
