Working in Virtual Reality

[jyl]

Trying something new, interested if anyone has done similar.

I work with six 27" monitors for my desktop PC and am much slower if using just a couple of monitors. As mentioned before, I have a "travel" kit which is four 21" monitors, stand, and dock for my laptop, but that all weighs over 50 lb so not really suitable if I am flying somewhere. Last time I went to Europe I brought laptop, two 17" portable monitors, and a home-made stand, which didn't work well, monitors were too few and too small.

I'll be working from Europe for a month in September, so I need a better solution. I decided to try working in virtual reality. Bought an Oculus Quest 2 and loaded the Immersed app, which supposedly allows you to create five "virtual monitors".

Can't say how well it works - I basically just got everything sort of figured out and set up when the Oculus battery gave out. Obviously a long power cable or battery pack will be needed.

Anyone work - as opposed to play - in VR? How do you do it?

[Tervuren]

Do you look with your eyes or with your head?

I have a tendency to look with my eyes rather than my head, and this makes working in VR a lot more difficult.

[LEAKYSEALS951]

I've only used oculus for play, but I don't really use it much due to eye strain? headaches? Something about it messes with me if I use it for more than several minutes at a time. Perhaps there was an adjustment or something. I would not be able to use it for lengthy work.

Good luck. The virtual monitors sound neet though.

[gacook]

Interesting concept.

I use 1 monitor. I have 4 monitors on my desk, but they're all for different systems that can't cross-connect. I've always been one who makes little windows to work from on one monitor, though. Most my people don't get how I do it (they all have at least a dual monitor setup); I just think it's from my network monitoring days where I watched 30+ circuits on one screen in little tiles.

[stomachmonkey]

You will hate it.

You can't wear one of those things for the amount of time you will be working.

Air touch is not optimal and will frustrate you.

[stomachmonkey]

If you will be in a stationary place in the EU, as in not bouncing from Hotel to Hotel just buy regular gear when you get there then return it before you leave and eat the restock fee.

Ashamed to admit it but I've done that a number of times when no other practical solution was available.

[jyl]

For about 2 weeks I will be in my daughter's apartment in Marseille (she won't be there), so I can buy or bring over physical monitors, and leave a couple for her. After that I will be moving between AirBnBs n France and Italy, so hauling lots of full size monitors around won't work. Maybe I can bring the two 17" portable monitors and the Oculus, and switch back and forth. Dunno - need to see if I can work in VR at all - will report back.

[cstreit]

I tried this a while back, here was the issue I had...

ANy time I needed something in the physical world - locate the mouse, type on the keyboard, jot a note, etc.. I had to take the glasses off.

This happened frequently enough that I found it frustrating.

[jyl]

Immersed has a "passthrough" feature. With "full passthrough", everything in the physical world is visible through the (unfortunately low-rez, black & white) external cameras on the Oculus, unless your virtual monitors are in the way. You can also set up defined passthroughs for just where your keyboard or mouse are, where your coffee cup is, where the doorway is, etc. That part seems to work okay - the resolution is so low that reading the letters on your keys is very hard, but just seeing the keyboard is good enough for me to find the Ctrl key etc.

[jyl]

Here’s a screenshot of what I have so far.

Everything that is black is the passthrough, i.e. a low rez b+w image of the physical room. The passthrough is not captured in the screenshot.

I am having trouble using the Oculus with glasses. If everything is just so, it works fine, nice and crisp. Until the goggle slips or it starts getting sweaty in there and my glasses start to fog even a little. Not sure how to solve that, maybe wear contacts or learn to adjust the strap better or get the fan accessory.

The virtual screens are readable. Not as good as the physical screen, but bring able to expand the virtual screen to the equivalent of a 50” TV helps. I can read the small font ticker data, my Excel sheet is legible, etc. I think there is a way to increase the render resolution of the Oculus too. You sure wouldn’t do any photo editing this way, but for spreadsheets and reading, I think it will be fine.

I am having trouble typing because i don’t know my laptop keyboard well, unlike my 101 key AT standard keyboard. I’ll plug in an extra Model M and mouse.

There is some lag. It isn’t bad, not irritating, but detectable. There is supposed to be a way to use WiFi Direct to connect the Oculus directly to the laptop and bypass the router and wireless AP.

I haven’t actually done any work yet. That will be the actual test. So far I’m just avoiding doing work.

[LEAKYSEALS951]

Do work. Test it.

[stealthn]

Tried this with a HoloLens, worked well but I am not a no see typer so that was a little hard. Not sure I could do it full on for more than 4 hours.