Jabiru: harnessing Java 3D behaviors for device and display portability

The aim of this paper is to use the Java 3D ConfiguredUniverse utilities to create a set of behaviors that we can integrate into existing Java 3D programs, as long as these programs use the ConfiguredUniverse. We call this behavior package Jabiru (Java 3D Application Behavior Immersive Virtual Reality Utilities). The Jabiru set of behaviors, accessible from a master menu, facilitates moving Java 3D applications originally created for desktop environments to immersive VR environments and vice versa. Jabiru also provides a six-degrees-of-freedom (6DOF) device emulator for a conventional mouse, meant to facilitate offsite testing of immersive VR behaviors on a desktop. The main focus of our work with a CAVE is in relation to bioinformatics, which has embraced Java and Java 3D as one of the choice programming environments. By creating this package, we help bring 3D graphics to both the bioinformatics community and the casual Java 3D developer or user. We discuss the design and implementation of Jabiru.