Multi-user Environment, Virtual Collaborative Learning Platform Design And Implementation

For nearly three decades, with the rapid development of information technology, virtual reality technology has made considerable progress in various fields, and more and more people show great concern about it. Virtual reality is a kind of computer system in which people can create and experience the virtual world. It uses computer technology to generate a realistic virtual environment with visual, hearing, touch and other perceptions. Through the use of various interactive devices, users interact with the entities in a virtual environment to produce visual simulation and interactive exchange of information with an immersed sense. The most essential feature of virtual reality technology is Immersion, Interaction and Imagination integrated with other advanced technologies. In such a world where the Internet is developing rapidly, virtual reality technology has a wide application prospect.The popular mainstreams of WEB virtual reality technology at home and abroad are as follows: VRML technology, Flash technology, Viewpoint technology, Cult3D technology and JAVA 3D technology. Among them, in a virtual scene, particularly in the application of great scenes, technology based on VRML standard has unique advantages.Contemporary constructivism advocated, the world is an objective reality, but it is a personal decision to understand the world and give meaning to it. Based on our own experiences, we construct a reality, or interpret it. Everyone's experience world is created in our own minds. As a result of different experiences and beliefs in them, we understand the outside world in a different way. Therefore, learning is not a process in which teachers simply transfer knowledge to students, but one by which the students construct their own knowledge. Students take the initiative to construct the meaning of knowledge rather than receive information simply passively; meanwhile, such a construction is not to be replaced by others. Modern learning theories emphasizes that learning is an interaction of human beings and the environment, while learning must be based on the presentation of real learning circumstances. Virtual Reality Technology is another brand-new technology after multimedia technology and network technology, playing an irreplaceable role in creating the virtual learning circumstances.Collaborative Learning is a kind of activity organized to promote effective learning and to cultivate collaboration among them. In a Collaborative Learning process, learners share information and recourses and take on learning tasks together with a collaborative attitude. So far, most of the VRML-based Systems are in WEB form, that is, adding function modules like BBS, on-line communication and so on, but these ways of communication are not plentiful enough in Collaborative Learning, which is not beneficial for presentation of real learning scene with difficulties in clear description.This paper first elaborates the cooperation study and the present development of network education, analyzes its basic concept and typical teaching methods under the guidance of constructivism learning theory and the study community theory, and takes them as theoretical foundation of the studies in this paper. Then it draws out the virtual reality technology, designs the VR learning platform under the multi-user environment by using Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML). This last part of the paper analyzes certain key technologies of Distributed Virtual Reality (DVR)—server environment, client environment, interactive sensation and operation sensation on a basis of virtual reality technology and implements collaborative learning on the multi-user virtual environment based on the VR learning platform.