Text-based assignments

I. Match the sentence beginnings (1-6) with the correct endings (a-f):

1. Use of computer modeling and simulation enables a person 2. A computer-generated environment simulates reality by means of 3. The illusion of being in the created environment (telepresence) is accomplished by motion sensors that 4. The basis of the technology emerged in the 1960s in simulators that taught 5. It came in the 1980s and is now used in 6. It has potential for use in many fields

a) pick up the user's movements and adjust his or her view accordingly, usually in real time. b) interactive devices that send and receive information and are worn as goggles, headsets, gloves, or body suits. c) including entertainment, medicine and biotechnology, engineering, design, and marketing. d) how to fly planes, drive tanks, shoot artillery, and generally perform in combat. e) games, exhibits, and aerospace simulators. f) to interact with an artificial three-dimensional visual or other sensory environment.

II. Fill in the gaps using the list of words in the box. Translate.

■ liquid-crystal ■ sensors ■ screen ■ illusion ■ devise ■ link ■ simulate ■ cockpit ■ simulation ■ image ■ stereoscopic ■ electronic glove ■ control ■create ■ helmet ■ launched ■ video games

A virtual reality system consists of a … with a color display in front of each eye, and wide-angle lenses (широкоугольные линзы) to cover the entire field of view and give a … effect. The helmet contains …, rather like electronic compasses, to record where it is pointing. A computer calculates what the wearer should see in that direction and displays it on the …. In more advanced systems, the operator wears an … that detects exactly what the fingers are doing and transmits the information to the computer. If the user tries to pick up something, the computer will make the object follow the hand to give the … of carrying it.

Pads in the latest type of gloves press into the insides of the fingers and palm when an object is encountered, to … the illusion of feeling it. Complete ‘exoskeletons’ covering the user and allowing the computer … almost anything possible in real life are still in the laboratory.

The biggest initial market is likely to be for a new generation of … . W Industries have recently … a virtual reality system for video arcades. The system, called Virtuality, consists of a … in which a player sits, wearing the helmet, at a set of controls that can mimic a bobsleigh, a spaceship, or whatever the imagination of the games programmer can … . The helmet has a pair of … displays with wide-angle lenses giving a stereoscopic … , and a set of magnetic sensors to tell the computer what the helmet is looking at as it moves. The first game is a fighter … . Another is based on a sequence (эпизод) in the film, Return of the Jedi, in which flying motor-cycles race through a forest. The computer can … and … several helmets at once for a group game.