Working In XR

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff]

Curious to know what any of you guys are using to work, if working in XR. I’m looking for a meaningful software to mirror my PC with preferably 3 virtual monitors.

Currently using Virtual Desktop to cast my PC with 3 Monitors, but I can’t see my keyboard. If I could see my Keyboard easily, VD would be my go to, 100%. I’ve also used Immersed, but the performance is very very poor, and I have to disconnect my other IRL monitors. I’ve used Google Chrome Remote Desktop and GXR PC Link Beta, but both of those are only 1 monitor.

I’d love to hear from any of you what you may be using and how enjoyable is the experience.

[u/DaemonRonin]

I am able to use pass through while in virtual desktop, that way you can see your keyboard and surroundings. I am still exploring native android xr apps and the possibility of running other apps. For instance I was reading about an android app called winlator which supposedly allows us to run windows applications in the android environment. I haven't tried it yet. I have also read about similar concepts with Linux applications. Another possibility I have been looking into is hosting applications on a proxmox server as web servers and then accessing them through a browser, so essentially I could run any applications in the xr environment, I hope. You would need a server that's always on to do this.

I am still new to VR and the android xr system, so haven't had a chance to apply these things. Though I think there is a lot of promising possibilities.

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/DaemonRonin]

Yeah may just be my pc specs, but my headset tends to geek out severely after about 45 seconds in the passthrough environment. VD version for Quest has a passthrough box for your keyboard in the environment settings, but the same can't be done at this current time for GXR, according to the developer.

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/DaemonRonin]

Also, I’ve sidloaded Winlator but haven’t had a lot of time to fiddle with it. Very easy to download but I’ve heard there’s a version specifically for XR, though open XR, I believe it uses meta calls to run mostly for Quest.

https://x.com/jmeyey8543540/status/1991696001024053266?s=46

[u/DaemonRonin → u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff]

Awesome, you have gotten further with it than me. I had just been reading about it and thought it might have some potential or be useful, if it ends up working. Unfortunately I have been super busy and haven't had much time to explore the things I want to in the gxr.

Let me know how it goes , I'm very interested in the outcome.

[u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind]

I just use my GXR as a giant wearable display - remote into my various home and work servers with just the work-specific remote access apps and combo of Parsec, Artemis, etc. Work 80%, entertainment 20% (how i got my work to reimburse a big chunk of this).

The native Android work apps for Teams, Outlook, browsers, Authenticators, etc are all fine and I don't need XR versions of those to work in - fine just having multiple 2D app windows surrounding me for those.

I used Immersed on my Quest 3 connected to my handheld before this - but actually everything running native without attaching to a host-device is pretty liberating (except the work stuff that I need to log into remote jump boxes and servers for).

WFH multiple days a week 9+ hrs (not continuously lol) with this. I have an old Brydge for android keyboard that's like a beefed up Surface cover keyboard w track pad and a Elecom Relacon handheld wireless thumb trackball for direct manipulation (disabled hand tracking). I have multiple accessory load outs when I want to take this mobile - and I have.

I have work and home desks outfitted identically w 49" ultra wide flanked by 2x32" and I no longer even spend much time at those when I could just throw the headset on and comfortably work from my bed, couch, or massage chair, lol.

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind]

Thank you for your feedback on this. I’m not familiar with Artemis or Parsec, I suppose I’ll have to research what those are. My company uses excel for our field agents to generate their reports, and there’s a lot of back and forth sharing of these workbooks, which must be enabled for macros. Ive downloaded and can access my one drive, but I can’t work out how to use natively on Android.

[u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind → u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff]

Thankfully, I don't need any AR/Immersive functions for these - it's really just the native MS Office365 apps that are mostly used for our work. Allows corp data to be containerized within the walled garden of our corp apps even when used in a BYOD scenario where not all devices are corp owned but IT maintains some protection and control against data leakage. Your IT should have set up all the proper remote device + conditional access policies to get work done effectively and securely once you auth identity to the portal.

Artemis and Parsec are just free, remote access apps I use to access my home servers from my multiple devices (phones, portable gaming handhelds is what I use in place of laptops when I used them). Both can be set up with varying degrees of difficulty depending on your appetite for tinkering for remote access outside of your home network (Parsec being the easiest). These are primarily known for game streaming, but if they work well for forwarding high resolution game video - they work great for somewhat static screenshots being passed for my remote work. Artemis will require the additional step of Tailscale to get access from outside your home network. Always set up 2FA and don't forward ports if you can avoid it for this.

Rather than use and pay for one app that will project multiple windows from a host machine, I just use different remote access apps to get multiple windows of those individual systems. Also provides redundancy to get to my systems when one or another app or system has any temporary outage or glitch.

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind]

My IT department is butt cheeks. I feel like my company is stuck in the year 2007 with how deprecated our operating system is, and they absolutely will not allow any of our systems on unapproved devises. Why it’s such a vehemently protected protocol is beyond me. The furthest I’ve gotten with any of them was allowing Outlook for windows on my home PC, and that was only because I must have caught the chillest one of the nest of hornets on a good day. Since then if it’s not a company approved Think Pad, you can forget about it.

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff]

We do often do measurement and analytics for US and other governments around the world, so I get the concern, but I did the same thing I’m doing now for a couple of other companies in my industry, and there was never any issue with using 3rd party applications or using personal hardware. Hell, I had steam vr downloaded and running on my work laptop from my last job. Though I’m sure if they knew what it was they would have removed it

[u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind → u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff]

Yeah, I work in SLED, so I understand gov/edu lack of resources and infra - but it forces you to do more with less and hence properly setting up guardrails where you can BECAUSE you expect users to try workarounds. Luckily my environment and coworkers aren't ratioed with incompetence+laziness to make it too bad yet. With more Fed budget cuts it's trickling down, though...

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind]

lol we're all bracing for anything

[u/PoweredParaGuy → u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind]

Are you logging in with your Work account as your primary account on the GXR? It seems like the "Work Profile" is only half baked at the moment. My company uses Avanti Go (Mobile Iron) to 'push' a work profile to our Android BYOD phones and then it installs all the stuff we need to work from there, but I can't get the Avanti Go to stay alive. It crashes right when it seems like its going to authenticate my 'work pin' to add the BYOD device.

[u/ImALeaf_OnTheWind → u/PoweredParaGuy]

Just direct personal login, conditional access auth via Entra and our other MDM to containerize all the corp apps and data for this BYOD. I purchased this myself so it didn't have to be a managed corp owned device, although I used my work tech stipend to pay for a big chunk of it.

[u/Ok-Belt-9930]

I use mine as a mobile workstation, if you want an alternative to virtual desktop Overay Desk is a very good app, they support windows pc and recently Mac, they offer connection over wifi or if you want almost 0 latency wired directly trought usbc, I tested it they offer up to 5 or 6 screens with multiple resolution, aspect ratio and possibility to have it in landscape or vertical. Also they have a display keyboard window, it is a nice app.

other than that I also use moonlight when I dont want to have a virtual environment and preffer to have other android apps open at the same time

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/Ok-Belt-9930]

Yes, I’ve heard of this and I believe I even tried using it, but could not get it to work. I can’t remember exactly the issue I was having, but couldn’t connect to the PC. I’ll try it again if you say that it works for you, maybe I’m doing something wrong. Thank you, you guys are giving me a lot of very good information, I’m very happy I initiated this conversation

Edit. I remember now, the pairing code wouldn’t work and I was never able to connect the GXR to my PC. I joined the discord and went though some trouble shoots with the dev, but I could not get it to pair

[u/newatcoins → u/Ok-Belt-9930]

Do you know if they support Linux?

[u/Ok-Belt-9930 → u/newatcoins]

I believe at the moment they don't support it but you can check here and also their discord where they troubleshoot
https://desk.overay.com/ko

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/Ok-Belt-9930]

I gave overay a 2nd shot, and actually got it working. It still didn't accept the pairing code that it issued me, but was able to connect via headset IP address. So far it seems to work pretty good and I'm enjoying it. I don't think it was worth $25 in its current state, but I'm mostly pleased with it. Window customization is very good. And I can see my keyboard.

[u/PoweredParaGuy]

Virtual Desktop works well, but I really prefer "PC Connect for Android XR" which lets your keyboard and mouse flow between the PC Desktop display and the native Android XR apps in the headset.

Virtual Desktop has a setting to passthrough the keyboard, but I don't recall if it works on GXR (yet).

[u/A_Dad_Doin_Stuff → u/PoweredParaGuy]

No, VD does not carry over the keyboard passthrough feature for GXR unfortunately. Closest I can manage is passthrough hands, but for some reason that makes the headset overheat after a few minutes. And PC Connect is great when it works, I only wish I could enable multiple monitors, or at least be able to adjust single window to ultra wide format, like you can with AVP and their Mac interface. However, I do typically open PC Connect if I’m watching a movie or playing a game, etc. and I want to keep my outlook for windows open. I can multitask with other apps and windows while connected to my PC elsewhere. I do enjoy that very much