Brainwaive Spearheads AREA Research Project on Web-based Delivery of Enterprise AR Content
Brainwaive, LLC, collaborating with Alfred University, Georgia Tech’s Augmented Environments Lab and the Mozilla Mixed Reality team, is honored to be awarded the AREA’s sixth member-funded research project focused on the challenges and opportunities ahead for those who use Web-based technologies to create, manage and deliver AR experiences in the workplace. The research will include an in-depth study of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Immersive Web (IW) working group activities, and a comparison of benefits and limitations of using Web-based delivery of enterprise AR content versus the existing native application approach.
In an effort to enable interoperable, browser-based AR experiences, World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Immersive Web (IW) working group is developing the WebXR Device API specification. The resulting IW-based solutions promise to deliver inexpensive content development, delivery and maintenance options while supporting OS interoperability, device portability, easy content sharing, improved security and scalability, and seamless integration with existing enterprise Web architectures and databases. As AR technologies mature, developers working for AREA member organizations will generate growing catalogs of AR experiences for use in the workplaces where employees encounter new and/or complex situations involving physical world spaces, machines and materials.
Industry specialists are now seeking scalable ways to author, manage and maintain those AR experiences and to support a wide range of display devices, sources of data and users operating in diverse workplaces. Currently, their options are limited to adopting closed, proprietary system architectures and methods for AR experience authoring, delivery and presentation. This “walled garden” approach is designed to support “native” mobile applications, which are neither interoperable across devices nor easy to maintain.
An alternative is currently under development in the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Immersive Web (IW) working group. All major Web browser vendors are currently collaborating in the W3C IW working group to develop the WebXR Device API specification. When ratified and adopted, WebXR Device API and its extensions will enable delivery of AR experiences to any device running a standards-compliant browser. Immersive Web-based solutions will offer inexpensive content development, delivery and maintenance options. IW will enable OS-interoperability, portability between devices, intuitive sharing of content using common hyperlinks, improved security and scalability, and seamless integration with existing enterprise Web architectures and database investments.
This research project will educate and empower AREA members as they begin to explore Web-based AR as a resource in their AR portfolio, and permit members to converse with enterprise stakeholders and Web-based AR solution providers. With this knowledge, AREA members will be able to choose if, when and how to take full advantage of the emerging Immersive Web.
The Augmented Reality for Enterprise Alliance (AREA) is the only global non-profit, member-based organization dedicated to widespread adoption of interoperable AR-enabled enterprise systems. We encourage you to learn more and join.
Brainwaive is a member of the AREA and chairs its Security Committee.