Show HN: Simula One – Portable Linux VR Computer

If this is the future of work and productivity - I'm ready to opt out.

This looks like a decent deal looking deeper into it.

Things that weren't obvious on first pass:

(1) The VR specs are much higher than consumer level. I suspect this is what makes it reasonable to read text on it. The comparison headset is this: https://varjo.com/products/aero/ (They named it, but didn't google it)

(2) They said "VR Computer" but don't define the term. They mean that it's a full PC with a headset instead of a regular display. Oddly they don't include a mouse or keyboard.

My feedback for Simula one:

(0) The value proposition here is (a) the included equipment and (b) the software. They together have to justify the price at some level.

(1) You have to really push the point that this is a full computer, not another headset. I suggest you include a keyboard/mouse, and include it in the pictures with the headset (the pictures with just the headset, not the ones with the people). Perhaps a keyboard with a trackpad.

(2) Show that the headset is substantially higher-spec than the consumer ones. Show a comparison chart.

(3) Dump the AR coffee shop video. Show AR in a home office. Don't assume/require that your customers are that VR gun-ho.

(4) Show more than a bunch of shells in the VR screenshots. I can alt-tab as fast as I can move my head, with less work. If this is your underlying value proposition, it sucks. I'm sorry. If you have something more interesting, like a combined VR/app environment, then it can work.

(4.1) Is there some useful interactions between 3D visualization and high-quality small-text rendering? If you have good VR/3D developer stories, then this can work.

(5) Simula One - is it Ubuntu with a 3d window manager and custom rendering stack? Does it do anything else? Does it just make a (claustrophobic) shell of windows around the user in VR?

(5.1) Are there any integrations with anything? Like https://blog.jupyter.org/ipygany-jupyter-into-the-third-dime... ipygany?

(5.2) What do you expect people to do with it? Is

Interesting, I don't know how I feel about replacing desktops/laptops with VR but it's been around 5 years since I've been in VR. Recently, I finished reading "Dawn of a New Everything" by Jaron Lanier, one of the pioneers of VR that brought the first commercial headset to market in the early 80s at VPL. In that era, the hardware wasn't nearly powerful to maintain any kind of fidelity (I think this was before even graphics cards were a thing) and the VR sets themselves cost ~$70000, but some of the things he mentions doing are still absent today.

Phenotropic software, as I first encountered in [0], could be conceived of as maximum encapsulation in VR, where instead of writing code one interfaces with virtual objects, or builds objects to do so, etc. In the book he claims they were developing their software this way in the 80s, but there aren't any surviving examples. In any case I think it's a fascinating research direction. At the very least VR should lead us away from the teletype based interfaces we work in today.

Alongside headsets, VPL was known for the Data Glove, a peripheral which I feel is lacking in the modern VR ecosystem. Using a QWERTY keyboard in VR is almost some cruel joke, and the modern "do it all in ML" ethos can't account for haptics. I don't know who, but someone is going to come up with the next great human interface device for VR. Perhaps it will even be tongue oriented, which Lanier points out is one of the most controllable muscles.

Anyways, I'm excited for the Simula One, though it's well beyond my price point. We definitely need more open hardware that can be built on, especially if it's an all-in-one product like the Quest. Good luck!

[0] https://www.edge.org/conversation/jaron_lanier-why-gordian-s...

Yeah it's towards the bottom of the page (60% down the page), right side, he's wearing it on this apron-looking thing.

> Compute with freedom of movement

100k? 2k should be doable without compromising on the specs.