Iain Oliver

University of St Andrews · School of Computer Science

This paper discusses how a digital reconstruction of the Scottish capital of Edinburgh around the year 1544 was created and communicated to the public. It explores the development and reception of the Virtual Time Binoculars platform – a system for delivering virtual reality heritage apps suitable for use on most smartphones. The Virtual Time Binoc...

Developments in digital infrastructures and expanding digital literacies lower barriers for museums and visitor centres to provide new interactive experiences with their collections and heritage. With virtual reality more accessible, heritage institutions are eager to find out how this technology can create new methods in interpretation, learning a...

Cultural heritage artefacts act as a gateway helping people learn about their social traditions and history. However, preserving these artefacts faces many difficulties, including potential destruction or damage from global warming, wars and conflicts, and degradation from dayto- day use. In addition, artefacts can only be present in one place at a...

This work discusses the methodology for the design, development and deployment of a virtual 19\(^\mathrm{th}\)-century Fish Curing Yard as an immersive museum installation. The museum building now occupies the same space where the curing yard was over 100 years prior, hence the deployment of a virtual reconstruction of the curing yard in a game eng...

Multi-User Virtual Worlds (MUVW) such as Open Wonderland and OpenSim have proved to be fruitful platforms for innovative educational practice. However, when compared with the way educational activities have flourished through the use of the constantly evolving WWW, MUVW learning environments remain a relatively obscure niche. Since the advent and p...

The continuing advances in computer graphics and Internet bandwidths are supporting a gradual convergence between multi-user virtual worlds (MUVW), such as Second Life and OpenSim (SL/OS), and the nascent 3D Web. However, significant networking barriers remain to exploiting these capabilities for developing the 3D Web. These barriers include latenc...

This paper discusses a Virtual Histories project, which developed a digital reconstruction of the St Kilda archipelago. St Kilda is the most western part of the United Kingdom. It is a world heritage site for both built and natural environment. The Virtual St Kilda acted as a focus for the collection and presentation of tangible and intangible cult...

In the recent past 3D and immersive technologies were not supported by standard business and educational computers. Yet new generations of Intel and AMD processors and improved networking provide a basis for the spread of immersive technologies, into all aspects of education, business and leisure. Consequently, it is critical that computer science...

As the Internet continues to establish itself as a utility, like power, transport or water, it becomes increasingly important to provide an engaging educational experience about its operation for students in related STEM disciplines such as Computer Science and Electrical Engineering. Routing is a core functionality of the global Internet. It can b...

St Andrews Cathedral is located on the East Coast of Scotland. Construction started in 1160 and spanned Romanesque and Gothic architectural styles. It was consecrated in 1318, four years after the battle of Bannockburn in the presence of King Robert I. For several hundred years, the Cathedral was one of the most important religious buildings in Eur...

Coastal erosion is causing the destruction of archaeological sites around the world. The problem is particularly grave in Scotland, where storms can cause many meters of land to be lost in a single event. Archaeological researchers from the University of St Andrews and the SCAPE Trust have worked with community groups to excavate sites before they...

Continuing advances and reduced costs in computational power, graphics processors and network bandwidth have led to 3D immersive multi-user virtual worlds becoming increasingly accessible while offering an improved and engaging Quality of Experience. At the same time the functionality of the World Wide Web continues to expand alongside the computin...

User manuals and other guide documents are popular instruments for training new users of a software system. Quite often these documents have many screenshots of the application user interface which are used to steer a new user through sequential orders of actions. However, for complex scenarios of user interactions, such as those found in virtual w...

The Web has spurred our imagination as to how education could be radically transformed and enhanced through the adoption of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs). While there have been many significant innovations and successes over the last decade there have also been many unrealised aims. Beliefs in technology-driven change for educat...

Metaverses provide a framework for developing distributed 3D Internet applications where users gain presence through the proxy of an avatar. They offer much of the engagement of online 3D games but support heterogeneous applications. From the network perspective metaverses are similar to games in that timeliness is important but differ in that thei...

The growth in the range of disciplines that Virtual Worlds support for educational purposes is evidenced by recent applications in the fields of cultural heritage, humanitarian aid, space exploration, virtual laboratories in the physical sciences, archaeology, computer science and coastal geography. This growth is due in part to the flexibility of...

This paper evaluates metaverses as a platform for game based learning. Metaverses such as Second Life are a relatively new type of Internet application. Their functionality is similar to that offered by 3D multi-player online games, but differs in that users are able to construct the environment that avatars inhabit and are not constrained by prede...

Metaverses such as Second Life (SL) are a relatively new type of Internet application. Their functionality is similar to online 3D games but differs in that users are able to construct the environment their avatars inhabit and are not constrained by predefined goals. From the network perspective metaverses are similar to games in that timeliness is...

“Tell me and I forget, Show me and I remember, Involve me and I understand”. This paper discusses the motivation for, and design of, a learning resource which allows students to explore the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP). TCP is responsible for transporting over 80% of the traffic on the Internet – all web and e-mail for example – and in addit...

Computer Networking is the subject that enables us to build and understand the Internet which in turn lies at the heart of many social and economic transformations that are central to modern society. At the subject's core are the protocols for sending and receiving packets and reporting errors. Although it is a dynamic and naturally engaging subjec...

Providing support for experiential learning about computer networking poses difficulties for both students and lecturers: the low level nature of network programming and monitoring requires systems-level skills that are often absent in undergraduates; the time available in any given module is limited; the view from the class's laboratory is constra...

There are significant barriers which make it difficult for a student to engage realistically with network protocols. For example, they are situated in one location which will always define their view of the network. Furthermore, interaction with the network is mediated through libraries provided by the operating system which in turn require systems...

Abstract—DCCP is a protocol that provides congestion control for applications that don’t require the reliability provided by TCP. DCCP is a connection oriented protocol and is designed to allow for a number of dierent,congestion control mechanisms. To aid in the development and evalua- tion of congestion control mechanisms we have designed, im- ple...