Towards Integrating Virtual Reality with NIST's Digital Library of Mathematical Functions

Justin Slud

NIST SURF

Information Technology Lab

Applied and Computational Mathematics Division

High Performance Computing and Visualization Group

Mentor: Sandy Ressler

August 5, 2019

Outline

WebVR
Project Description
Tools Used
Added Features
Results
Future Steps

WebVR

View scenes in web browser or virtual reality (VR) headset
No need to download special software
Shared with a URL

experiments.withgoogle.com/konterball

anssiko.github.io/ac2017-webvr/#8

The DLMF

Digital Library of Mathematical Functions
NIST public resource
Web 3D visualization
Want to add immersive visualization/manipulation

amazon.com

Background

Previous DLMF visualization
GLTF models created
Missing information about surface, DLMF options

math.nist.gov/~SRessler/knc7/experiments/grid/smindex.html

VR Toolkit:

A-FRAME

Javascript library
Built on Three.JS
Easy to create simple experiences
Uses HTML tags

<head>
  <script src="https://aframe.io/releases/0.9.2/aframe.min.js"></script>
</head>
  <body>
<a-scene background="color: #FAFAFA">
  <a-box position="-1 0.5 -3" rotation="0 45 0" color="#4CC3D9" shadow></a-box>
  <a-sphere position="0 1.25 -5" radius="1.25" color="#EF2D5E" shadow></a-sphere>
  <a-cylinder position="1 0.75 -3" radius="0.5" height="1.5" color="#FFC65D" shadow></a-cylinder>
  <a-plane position="0 0 -4" rotation="-90 0 0" width="4" height="4" color="#7BC8A4" shadow></a-plane>
</a-scene>
  </body>

aframe.io

Oculus Rift

Allows for 6 degrees of freedom (orientation, position)
Relatively inexpensive

oculus.com

New DLMF Manipulation

Multiple rotations
Scaling
Axes
Resetting
Shading
Pause / Play

DLMF Menus

Functions by chapter
Change surface quickly on hover

New Gallery

2D interface of all 3D functions
View in WebVR
View in DLMF
Download 3D files of many types

3D Models

Meshlab and 3D Builder, Node JS for editing and converting
Used for modelling, 3D printing, etc.
gltf, stl, glb, obj, dae, ply

var ifolder = //import folder 
fs.readdir(folder, (err, files)=>{		
 files.forEach(function(folder) {    
  var exportName = 
  // change file extension
  var efolder = // export folder
  var command = 
  // terminal command to convert
  shell.exec(command); 
});