"Fullscreen" mode would be a feature where the browser can be set so that the 3D viewport takes up most or all of the monitor, and the rest of the interface (menus, dialogs, etc.) are either minimized or removed entirely. Many users feel that this effect, which is how most 3D games operate, would improve the "immersive" feel of Active Worlds.

There are two different ways that this feature could be approached. One way is to do it the way 3D games do it: when you enable 3D mode, the entire Windows desktop vanishes, the video mode of the monitor is changed, and only the 3D window displays, taking up the entire screen. The other is to simply minimize as much as possible all other aspects of the interface so that the 3D window takes up the vast majority of the screen. An example of what this would be like can be seen in Internet Explorer, by selecting "Full Screen" from the View Menu. The differences between these two approaches may seem subtle but they are actually quite significant.

The "game" approach

The 3D "game" approach is perhaps more immersive, and is closer to what 3D gamers are used to, but it provides several significant challenges. The most significant is that this mode would require us to either simply remove access to the current GUI (including things like that history, chat field, telegram list, etc.) or to re-implement them completely from scratch in this new mode. Needless to say, re-implementing the GUI would be a challenging and time consuming task. Much thought would have to be given towards which functions should be implemented, how they should be implemented, and how they would be accessed while in this mode.

The other challenge with this approach is that Windows is notoriously unstable when it comes to switching between video modes on the fly. If you are a 3D gamer, you've probably experienced crashes or lock ups when trying, for example, to Alt-Tab out of a game while it is still running. A fear is that adding a "fullscreen" mode that users could switch into and out of on the fly would lead us in to a nightmare of difficult crash bugs. Realistically, this approach to fullscreen mode would probably be something that could only be turned on when you first start the browser, and not left until you exit the browser.

The "Internet Explorer" approach

Currently, this approach would be the favored way of implementing fullscreen mode. It gives the best balance between ease of implementation, immersiveness, stability, and access to GUI features. It does not require actually changing the video mode of the display, only enlarging the current 3D window so that it covers most of the desktop, and removing the rest of the interface except perhaps for a small bar of buttons at the top or bottom.