From: Bernie Roehl (broehl_at_ece.uwaterloo.ca)
Date: 15 February 1999
Len writes:
> It is said, the VRML as it is is too hard. It is said
> that the Web content community has not embraced it.
> Ok. This list has most of the talent that has embraced it.
>
> o What can't it do that it should to make applications
> easier to create?
It should be much easier to implement. That inevitably means simplifying the language itself, to remove those features that create a needlessly high barrier to implementation.
If a company wants to implement a plugin that's maybe 200k in size that does streaming real-time 3D, they cannot use VRML -- period. The smallest VRML browsers are way too bulky.
They could try to leverage existing VRML browsers, but there's no really efficient way to do streaming into them. I know that, because I've done it (for VRML Dream). It's hard to get working, it requires using *both* the EAI and JSAI, and even then it's slow compared to a custom solution.
Another issue is that many companies need to protect their intellectual property, since that's their bread-and-butter. VRML doesn't have any way of doing this. Anyone could theoretically steal the content.
Yet another issue has nothing to do with technology, but with perception. Companies who have been tracking VRML's progress have seen that there was a big discontinuity in going from VRML 1.0 to VRML 2.0, and they're about to see another big change in going to X3D. They've also seen a lot of VRML-only companies fail. Technical issues aside, those facts alone are enough to convince many companies that a proprietary solution is going to be more stable. Fixing the technology isn't enough -- we have to somehow build mindshare.
> o Given some range of applications (you choose), what
> components do you need to build them if the geometry
> component is common?
Streaming. Both streaming of animation data and streaming of audio, which can be spatialized using the equivalent of Sound and AudioClip nodes.
--
Bernie Roehl
University of Waterloo Dept of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Mail: broehl_at_ece.uwaterloo.ca Voice: (519) 888-4567 x 2607 [work]
URL: http://ece.uwaterloo.ca/~broehl
This archive was generated by hypermail pre-2.1.8 : 28 November 2004 CST