OKO 2023.05

Date: 18th May 2023

Client versions: Unity 1.0.5, Web RC 2.5.1, Unreal OKO Plugin Build number 93255

Here's What's New In This Release For Unreal OKO Plugin

• We’ve upgraded to UE5.1.

• We’ve improved avatars. 

• Tech debt and interoperability improvements have been made. 

Upgrade to UE5.1 

We have officially upgraded OKO to UE5.1.After rigorous testing to confirm that all the main features of OKO (such as login, entering/exiting spaces, component behavior) work on the new SKUs for UE5.1, the Unreal desktop and mobile project have been updated.

Avatars

Say hello to a new and improved avatar representation in the plugin! Previously, avatars within the OKO plugin would display as the default Unreal Engine avatar, which looked out of place in comparison to other avatars on the platform. The default avatar has now been updated to a ‘Ready Player Me’ style avatar. 

Left: Previous default avatar. Right: New and improved Ready Player Me style default avatar

Following CSP’s introduction of a new avatar component to describe how a client locomotes within a space, Unreal has updated the OKOAvatarSpaceComponent to set the locomotion model on the bound Foundation avatar component when created based on play mode.

When loading static meshes the Unreal Editor often stalled and in some cases crashed when entering/exiting site models that contained a large amount of meshes. Following the GLTF importer updating to support asynchronous static mesh loading, we investigated whether updating the Unreal code to follow that upgrade would improve the responsiveness of the Editor and potentially decrease the loading time. See video here. 

Tech Debt & Interop Improvements

Various pieces of technical debt and improvements to interop features have been made as part of this release such as:

• Removing support for creating and removing anchors from UE clients – this also included removing related unit tests.

• Refactoring the spacesystem to use GetSpaces as an endpoint when retrieving all public and private spaces. 

Major Bugs We’ve Fixed…

• The Editor Extension no longer crashes when exiting a space with a comment selected. 

• Blank UE projects no longer crash when being made using the OKO plugin.

• The comment icon size now matches on Web.

• Buttons and external link components are now visible in the UE extensions for UE5.0

• Assets and comments can be deleted in UEEE. 

• Comment icons no longer occlude other icons and now match on Web. 

Here's What's New In This Release For Unity iOS

• Room plan anchoring is a go! 

• In-space loading indicator.

• 2D map view of geo-located spaces. 

• In-space asset appearance improvements: lighting, shadows, and reflection.

• AR asset visibility improvements.

Room Plan Anchoring

After the scan is complete, an anchor flow will prompt the user to scan an automatically selected location in the room to create a GCA anchor tied to the space created by the scan.

In-Space Loading Indicator

When a user initially enters a space, there will be a short period where all assets are still loading. Each asset has had an individual, contextual loading indicator for it, but this Summary Loading Indicator will make it clear to the user how close the space is to being fully loaded. See video here.

2D Map View of Geo-Located Spaces

As part of the Siteview feature, the map view will now display geo-located spaces accessible to the user as they scroll around the map. See video here. 

In-Space Asset Appearance Improvements: Lighting, Shadows, and Reflection

Assets in-space in the Unity app will look better for you, the user. Shadow Debug settings and Quality settings will enable more configurability to meet user needs. [Video Link]

AR Asset Visibility Improvements

Many assets in-space are present but hidden when the user enters AR. We cleaned up some of our implementations to better handle the visibility of assets for an improved AR experience.

What’s new in this release for OKO Web 

• We’ve made Web UI/UX improvements. 

• There are new keyboard/mouse shortcuts for Creator Mode.

• Clients now contextually select the appropriate LOD level for any given space.

• Users can now navigate geolocated spaces.

Web UI/UX Improvements

New functionality updates have been performed across the entire Web UX. This is the first pass with a UI upgrade coming shortly. This includes a full refactor of the ECS to make it more modular and manageable by our engineers for future features. Users can all see their local graphics settings based off of their device hardware, the following graphics settings are exposed.

• Bloom

• Shadow quality

• Exposure

New Keyboard / Mouse Shortcuts for Creator Mode

LODs

Clients now contextually select the appropriate LOD level for any given space. Utilizing the Musubi pipeline now lets users enter spaces faster and experience increased performance on first entering. Editors can select which step of LOD generation an asset is at on upload.  Mobile devices will now also natively select the lowest LOD level, increasing accessibility for devices. [Video Link]

Site View

Site view utilizes maps to allow users to navigate geolocated spaces on the global map. Users are then able to filter and search the relevant spaces either within their local area or globally. [Video Link]

Chessboard View

Chessboard View is a new feature that allows users to view their space topographically. Different zoom levels provide asset clustering and location markers allow users to easily navigate their space. [Video Link]

Major Bugs We’ve Fixed…

• We’ve corrected the visibility toggle, it wasn’t affecting static models on Web, whether set in UI or by script.

• LOD3 Object Captures no longer appear graphically corrupted in Mobile Web.

• The grid floor is no longer visible in viewer mode on Web.