System and Methods for Managing Distributed Physics Simulation of Objects in a Virtual Environment

Abstract

A computerized server managing a Virtual Environment (VE) has a network port for communicating with remote computerized appliances, a plurality of virtually-defined rigid objects in the VE, including one or more avatars representing persons in the VE, a physics simulation engine executing from a machine-readable medium, for calculating object states and properties, including motion of virtually-defined rigid objects, and a mechanism for assigning and tracking identification of remote computerized appliances connected via the network port, each remote appliance capable of physics simulation. The server responds to signals from the remote computerized appliances to assign individual ones of the virtually-defined rigid objects to individual ones of the remote computerized appliances for physics simulation, and the server simulates all virtually-defined objects in the VE that are not assigned to at least one of the remote computerized appliances.

1 - 11 . (canceled) 
     
     
         12 . A system comprising:
 a computerized server having a processor executing software (SW) from a non-transitory machine-readable medium, the SW enabling the server to manage a virtual environment (VE) comprising a plurality of virtually defined objects;   a network interface at the computerized server communicating with a remote client-side computerized appliance allowing access to and interaction with the VE by a person directly operating the computerized appliance;   a first simulation engine executing as a part of the SW at the computerized server managing the VE;   a second simulation engine executing on the client-side computerized appliance, enabled to calculate object states and properties for objects in the VE; and   an application executing on the client-side computerized appliance monitoring operating characteristics of the client-side computerized appliance and managing a variable client-simulation region (CSR), the application varying one or both of volume and shape of the CSR according to varying operating characteristics of one or both of the client-side computerized appliance;   wherein the second simulation engine executing on the client-side computerized appliance calculates object states and properties for objects of the VE within the region of the CSR, and the first physics simulation engine, at the server calculates object states and properties for all objects of the VE that are not in the CSR.   
     
     
         13 . The system of  claim 12  wherein one of the objects is an avatar, and the second simulation engine manages all changes in behavior of the avatar while the avatar is in the CSR. 
     
     
         14 . The system of  claim 13  comprising more than one avatar, wherein the second simulation engine manages all changes in behavior of any avatar while in the region of the CSR. 
     
     
         15 . The system of  claim 12  wherein any change in the VE triggered by user input at the client-side computerized appliance is managed by the second simulation engine. 
     
     
         16 . The system of  claim 14  wherein sharing of workload between the first and the second simulation engines is varied according to varying operating characteristics of one or both of the server and the client-side computerized appliance. 
     
     
         17 . The system of  claim 12  wherein the CSR is anchored to a specific object in the VE, and moves with that object. 
     
     
         18 . The system of  claim 17  wherein the object to which the CSR is anchored is an avatar. 
     
     
         19 . A method comprising:
 determining object states and properties for a first set of objects in a virtual environment (VE) by a first simulation engine executing from a non-transitory medium on a processor of a computerized server; and   determining object states and properties for a second set of objects in the VE by a second simulation engine executing from a non-transitory medium on a client-side computerized appliance operated by a user interacting with the virtual environment;   wherein objects in the first set and the second set are determined by monitoring varying computing capability of one or both of the server and the client-side computerized appliance.   
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 19  wherein the objects in the first set and the objects in the second set are all of the objects defined in the VE. 
     
     
         21 . The method of  claim 19  wherein the objects in the second set are determined as objects within a client-simulation region that varies in one or both of size and shape according to computing capability of the client-side computerized appliance. 
     
     
         22 . The method of  claim 21  wherein one of the objects in the second set is an avatar, and the second simulation engine manages all changes in behavior of the avatar while the avatar is in the CSR. 
     
     
         23 . The method of  claim 22  comprising more than one avatar, wherein the second simulation engine manages all changes in behavior of any avatar while in the region of the CSR. 
     
     
         24 . The method of  claim 19  wherein any change for objects in the VE triggered by user input at the client-side computerized appliance is managed by the second simulation engine. 
     
     
         25 . The method of  claim 12  wherein the CSR is anchored to a specific object in the VE, and moves with that object. 
     
     
         26 . The method of  claim 25  wherein the object to which the CSR is anchored is an avatar.