“Study how to create intelligent agents and the computer simulation environments they reside in”
This is an 'ancient' quest going back many years before I studied Computer Science; and at some point I will be writing a 'memoir' Blog post on my personal website about its beginnings. Skipping the rationale to focus on the intent: I continue to work on an initiative which I call 'VREI', i.e. Virtual Reality Environments and Interfaces.
Its mission: Develop iterative improvements for the implementation of and human immersion within simulation (a.k.a. virtual reality) environments.
Its goal: Provide users with a level of immersion converging on what is called 'Simulated Reality': a simulation whose output to the user's sensory perceptions are such that the user cannot distinguish between the simulation and reality.
This project involves multiple areas and disciplines encompassing human interfaces (i.e. Virtual Reality headsets such as Oculus Rift), hardware (i.e. Graphics Cards and CPUs), and software (i.e. simulation programs).
Software is what I focus on, and includes three 'emphases':
While the ideal is to concurrently work on these three areas, the practical demands I switch between periods of focus on each. This has, thankfully, largely worked during my career so far.
For example: I spent my tenure at the AZ-LIVE Lab working largely on the 'Portal' and 'World' emphases, though for the latter: much of the work in setting up the support software for my visualizations was handled by the game engine we used.
However these days, and as 3/4 of my graduate research: I am focusing on targeted research and development areas within the 'Source' and 'World' emphases. In particular: the two areas I am planning to focus in on when several peripheral projects are completed within a few months involve: