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SimulaVR
Simula
Haskell2017–2025
SimulaVR / Simula

Simula

Linux VR Desktop

Systems & InfrastructureMobile & Desktop
Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
31Distinct people
76Mentions
2Explicit recommenders
3.2KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

Linux VR Desktop

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

Yes, Simula allows for you to retain full control of window management with only a keyboard; mouse and hand gestures are not necessarily needed, though will be supported also.…

georgewsinger used a recommendation phrase. 3 indexed comments match. This is a phrase match, not a verdict.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

No other repository is repeatedly linked in the same discussions.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 8–Nov 15 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/15/2026, 6:36:16 PM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year76 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2017-09-23 11:10:43 UTC to 2025-04-13 13:08:34 UTC.

051015202017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 13 mentions; 2 submissions, 11 comments20172018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 9 mentions; 0 submissions, 9 comments2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 5 mentions; 0 submissions, 5 comments2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 15 mentions; 1 submissions, 14 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 9 mentions; 1 submissions, 8 comments20212022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 19 mentions; 1 submissions, 18 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 1 submissions, 1 comments2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2025

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC13211
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC909
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC505
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC15114
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC918
20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC19118
20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC211
20242024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20252025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202

What Hacker News says

19 sources
hailwren·Nov 6, 2022
So, you might be interested in https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula . There have been a few examples of VR windows managers on Linux which don’t require an entire OS rewrite. Is that the solution Meta will go w/? almost certainly not. But replacing a WM for a different “view” of your OS is a pretty common thing on Linux. (For some distros like Arch, replace isn’t the right word. You have to install whichever one you’d like from the beginning)
In Ask HN: Working in a VR Headset?
georgewsinger·Nov 5, 2022
We're still in preorder phase, aiming to ship most headsets in ~Q2 of 2023. This is our first foray into hardware, but we already developed a stable Linux VR Desktop (https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula) from 2017-2021. We try to provide frequent updates on our hardware engineering progress. For example, here's a recent post showing some videos of our review units: https://simulavr.com/blog/first-glimpse-of-review-units/ If you're interested in community discussion, you might also check out https://hn.algolia.com/?q=simulavr.com.
In Ask HN: Working in a VR Headset?
georgewsinger·Nov 5, 2022
Yep, you can try out our software at https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula on the HTC Vive and Valve Index platforms. If you don't have one of those headsets, there are some videos of people (whom we have no affiliation with) on YouTube testing it out: https://youtu.be/8gVLF8SnK84?t=424 Here's also (a pretty old) video of me hacking on Simula, in Simula: https://youtu.be/FWLuwG91HnI. It's also true that we're more focused on hardware right now. We plan on reverting more towards software development in 2023. For more details: https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula/issues/180#issuecomment-1... Some things we have planned to implement include VR window tiling and some other UI stuff.
In Ask HN: Working in a VR Headset?
georgewsinger·Aug 7, 2022
Thanks for the shout-out :] It's true the Simula One is a work in progress, but we try to be transparent about our progress in the form of weekly blog updates. Our headset boards were recently assembled, so we're expecting review units within days or weeks.[1] Our software is also demoable on GitHub for HTC Vive & Valve Index platforms.[2] [1] https://simulavr.com/blog/first-batch-of-boards/ [2] https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula
In Ask HN: Anyone tried development using an Oculus?
georgewsinger·Apr 21, 2022
Thanks for your support! RE our ambition: the bulk of our work lies in hardware stuff going forward. Our VR compositor is already pretty stable, and people have been using it on older Linux compatible headsets (HTC Vive, Valve Index) for a few years now.[1] Our Linux distro will be a NixOS fork which uses nix as our package manager, and which bolts our VR compositor on top as the window manager. This choice will allow users to roll back to working configurations pretty easily if some sort of disaster ever occurs. With that said, this is an ambitious project. We're posting weekly (mostly technical) updates to help build trust that this is a real project making progress towards its target ship date (Q4 2022 - Q1 2023; review units incoming in a month or two). If there's a topic or question in the back of your mind of what's going on behind
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the scenes, let me know and I'll add it to our queue! [1] https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula
In Simular VR: Lenses and Schematics
georgewsinger·Feb 24, 2022
Thanks for following our progress. I think this is a good question. Before getting into "reasons for NixOS", I just want to note that our headset is still an open-source Linux flavored project, which means that if you don't like our choices, you are free to install whatever Linux distro you want on it. =] You'll probably want to use Simula's window manager, but even here there will be other choices as well (xrdesktop, Stardust's display server, and so forth). NixOS is definitely an opinionated distro, at least in terms of how it allows developers to configure a system. However, as builders, we view it as our job to make informed, opinionated choices on what the defaults are. (To be clear, not saying we can never be wrong or learn from these choices). Here are some reasons we chose NixOS as the basis for our VR distro: 1. *NixOS allows u
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s to provide the best support to our users.* Simula itself (https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula) is built over nix build tools, and we have the most experience and comfort with that ecosystem. This means we are able to solve other people's issues much easier using our own familarity with the system if things go wrong. 2. *NixOS allows for system rollbacks if something goes wrong.* If either we or a user accidentally torches a headset, NixOS makes it so that all they have to do to get things running again is rollback to the most recently working configuration in the boot benu, and the problem is solved. This is particularly important for a beta/early adopter product like ours, and makes it more manageable for us to support things if things go wrong. 3. *NixOS allows us to iterate faster/release headset updates more quickly.* Using NixOS allows us to push frequent (and non-breaking) system updates much more easily than other distros, which is important for an early/iterative product like ours. 4. *Using Nix[OS] allows our software components to work on other distros.* Building all of our software components over nix allows us to support as many Linux distros as possible. This is important so that we can support, e.g., our Tethered headsets when users connect them to different Linux hosts. It also makes it easier for us to support users who change their Linux distro, but still use some Simula components (e.g., our VR window manager). 5. *A disproportionate number of existing Simula users run NixOS.* Despite NixOS being a "niche" distro, we've noticed a shocking number of people (at least in our Discord) run NixOS already, which makes us more comfortable with the choice.
In Show HN: Simula One – Portable Linux VR Computer
georgewsinger·Feb 23, 2022Recommendation phrase
Yes, Simula allows for you to retain full control of window management with only a keyboard; mouse and hand gestures are not necessarily needed, though will be supported also. In order to do this, we make use forward eye gaze, which you can use to move mouse cursors (and also to move windows around). Customizable keyboard shortcuts can be configured to resize/shrink/expand/zoom in/zoom out/push in/push away windows. Default keyboard shortcuts are explained in our GitHub repo (https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula). As a demonstration, here's an old demo of me using eye gaze to manipulate windows: https://youtu.be/rm72Qmi8Bik RE "focus follow mouse", Simula is currently set so that the "actively gazed at window" is the one that receives all inputs. We have found this to be pretty resilient almost all use cases, but as you said there are s
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cenarios where you want to lock focus on a window while typing on another. We should add a keyboard shortcut to do this (would be very easy to implement). Thanks for your interest BTW. The posture/freedom of movement part is one of my favorite things about VR computing. I love to work on things while "supine".[1] It allows you to get way more time spent on a task without the constraint of physical/postural fatigue limiting you. [1] As demonstrated in this cool blog series I found: https://mgsloan.com/posts/supine-computing/
In Show HN: Simula One – Portable Linux VR Computer
georgewsinger·Feb 23, 2022
Upvoted for the excellent feedback. 1. We'll do a better job defining the term "VR Computer" in our sales page. 2. We'll consider adding a keyboard/mouse as optional add-ons. We have thought about including a "keyboard apron" as an item add-on that is actually differentiated from other keyboards, and one that would be particularly useful for VR computing (with the added freedom of movement).[1] Would something like this interest you? Note that we'd use a more accessible keyboard than the 40% "Corne keyboard" one shown in the photo. 3. We're going to add some of our comparison charts showcasting the Simula One versus other products/prices. They were included in a recent blog post[2], but aren't featured on our shop. Looks like they would be helpful there as well. 4. We're definitely interested in developing "3D office apps" (or somethi
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ng like a Linux ecosystem for them), but decided that the first step was to get people using our 2D VR app environment first. 5. At a high level, SimulaOS is going to be NixOS + our VR window manager. The current features of this window manager are outlined here: https://github.com/SimulaVR/Simula. We plan to add to these features over time (especially including: VR app tiling/window grouping and hand interactions). This should be better showcased in our shop though for sure. Thanks for flagging this. [1] https://www.wolframcloud.com/obj/george.w.singer/business/pn... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29923197
In Show HN: Simula One – Portable Linux VR Computer

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