The viewers which support the Oculus Rift DK2 for use in the Second Life and OpenSim virtual worlds are making progress. At the time of writing the latest Oculus Rift SDK (version 0.4.2, 4-Sep-2014) does not yet properly support OpenGL in the “Direct to Rift” video driver mode. This will be the preferred and easiest to set up and used method in due course. “Extended Desktop” mode must be used and the method to initiate the display varies between the two viewers currently available.
Remember this post is about early test builds of the Rift viewers and not released software. Nothing here should be considered a criticism, far from it…
Linden Labs Rift Project Viewer
Linden Labs Rift Viewer is being developed and tested for eventual release as a “Project Viewer” alongside the standard main released viewer. The current latest “automated build” is version 3.7.16.293997.
See also Information on later builds 3.7.16.293997 in September 2014 described in in this blog post and 3.7.18.295296 made available in October 2014 are described in this blog post as well as this Linden Lab blog post and these Linden Lab videos.
Unfortunately a latter version in July 2016 was, for some reason, unusable… see this blog post.
The Rift Display Mode is set to “Extended Desktop to the HMD” and the Windows desktop is configured so that the Rift is the second screen and shows as landscape orientation (methods to achieve that differ depending on whether the Windows desktop configuration or your graphics card control panels are used, but if its rotated 90 degrees or flipped, just change the orientation and try again). The viewer is started and then the “HMD Mode” button (or Ctrl+Alt+D) can be used to toggle the Rift Display on or off.
The Space Navigator 3D controller can be used in this viewer (don’t install recent Space Navigator software, just use default Windows drivers and built in viewer support). Menu bars, UI buttons and HUDs are all working in this version with a few display glitches that are gradually being ironed out. The UI is mapped to a curved surface which you can stretch out vertically and horizontally and at a greater of lesser distance from your viewpoint. If you push it too far away the controls can appear behind your avatar or objects and be inaccessible. The UI can be hidden by entering “mouselook” mode (“M” key) or toggling the interface on/off with the Ctrl+Shift+U keys.
More on Second Life Viewer Key Codes, including those for the RIFT Viewer are shown at http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/All_keyboard_shortcut_keys
CtrlAltStudio Viewer
David Rowe’s CrlAltStudio Viewer has an alpha test version 1.2.2.41206 Alpha 3. It is based on Firestorm 4.6.5.
The viewer must be configured to be in windowed mode (opposite to that required for the 3D stereoscopic mode), i.e., make sure Preferences -> Graphics -> General -> Fullscreen mode is not ticked. And the Advanced Lighting Model must be turned on via Preferences -> Graphics -> General -> Advanced Lighting Model.
The viewer is started and then the Windows key + right-arrow (twice) is used to move the viewer window onto the Rift’s display, then Ctrl+Alt+3 makes the window full screen and switches into Rift view. Ctrl-Alt+3 again to turn off 3D and full screen mode and then the Windows key + left arrow moves the display back onto the normal screen.
As well as the Space Navigator, CtrlAltStudio also supports the Xbox 360 controller for keyboard-free avatar navigation and camera movement. Some UI elements can be displayed via their keyboard commands (such as Ctrl+I to show the Inventory) and then interacted with via the mouse.
Ai Austin Blog 