SoftspaceAR App Lab Alpha

Unified UI, Dropbox import/export, multiple workspaces

Hi everybody!

I have some big news to share with you.

We’ve finished building a major new version of Softspace: v2022.06. This is the first version of the AR app that we intend for broader public testing and feedback.

As such: we’ve submitted it to Meta’s App Lab, where it’s currently under review. Getting on App Lab will make installing Softspace to your Quest a one-click process. It’s also a big step toward listing on the main Quest Store, which will get Softspace in front of millions of headset owners.

Since v2022.06 is such a mouthful, let’s call it the App Lab Alpha.

The Alpha incorporates many lessons we’ve learned from building and testing SoftspaceAR prototypes 01–05, as well as from years of building the VR versions of Softspace.

As the name suggests, it’s by no means finished—but I could not be more pleased with how well the ideas and mechanics from the Prototypes came together here.

The App Lab approval process takes some weeks. In the meantime, you can already register to get the Alpha as soon as we’re live, using the link below:

Register for SoftspaceAR App Lab Alpha

But I didn’t write this post to tell you to hurry up and wait 😉. Let’s take a sneak peak at what the Alpha has up its sleeve!

Sneak Peek: App Lab Alpha

Unified UI Model

One of the core questions in last year’s prototyping process was: How do we design a 3D interface that’s great for working with 2D content like notes and images?

Early VR versions of Softspace took a “Cartesian playground” approach to positioning items in the workspace. Each piece of text or image or PDF had a simple (x,y,z) coordinate that defined its position (either relative to the global workspace origin, or its parent container).

We always knew that this approach would be inadequate (hence the “playground” designation). Its primary drawback is the lack of a reliable way to sensibly order objects. Without ordinality, it’s impossible to convert 3D layouts to a format that’s compatible with the other productivity tools you use on your laptop and mobile devices.

The Prototypes experimented with ways to introduce the necessary structure and ordinality to a 3D layout system, without throwing away all the spatial magic that AR offers.

Prototype03 tested a layout system that is both ordinal and uses all three spatial dimensions. Prototype04 tested a force-directed layout system that uses semantic references to automatically generate 3D layouts.

It wasn’t obvious how (or if) these systems could be reconciled. Happily, the Alpha successfully incorporates each as a distinct view mode, and lets you switch back and forth between them at the workspace (global) level, or the topic (local) level.

The layout system from Prototype03 is implemented as the Stacks view mode.

The layout system from Prototype04 is implemented as the Galaxy view mode.

A single click of a button lets you switch between the two modes.

Import & Export

Prototype05 introduced features that moved SoftspaceAR much closer to being a real tool for doing real creative work. However, it wasn’t quite there yet, which is why we still considered it a prototype, as opposed to a main-branch version of the app.

One of the key requirement that Prototype05 failed to meet was upstream and downstream integration with the rest of your workflow. By this, I mean the ability to bring work from your other tools into Softspace, and to take work you do in Softspace back out.

The Alpha meets this requirement by implementing import from, and export to, Dropbox. For the first, time, SoftspaceAR can slot into your existing workflows, using common file formats like markdown, jpgs, and pngs.

This import and export functionality is only possible because of the global and local ordinality that the unified UI model brings to each workspace and topic container.

Workspaces

The Alpha introduces the ability to create, open, switch between, and delete independent collections of content called Workspaces.

We’ve put a lot of thought into what the right way to organize content in Softspace should be. We’re starting here with a clear and simple model, in which the contents of each workspace are independent. For performance reasons, only one workspace can be opened at a time.

This approach leaves open the possibility for multiple workspace in the future, as well as fancier functionality like content that is transcluded across multiple workspaces.

Registration Is Open

Although the Alpha isn’t live yet on App Lab, it’s actively being reviewed by Meta’s team, so we expect to launch it very soon.