Re: WWWInline; include non-VRML data?

Don Brutzman (brutzman@cs.nps.navy.mil)
Mon, 17 Oct 1994 19:35:19 -0700 (PDT)


Gavin Bell writes:
> So "Embed" is "add more .vrml nodes to the current scene"
> And "WorldEmbed" is "replace all nodes".
>
> What happens if a WWWButton that Embed's a URL is picked twice?
> Adding the same set of children again doesn't seem very useful; maybe
> it should become "dead" and ignore picks after the first one?

Multiple picks should query and retrieve the target each time. This
is how you retrieve changes or updates to a linked node.
If coupled with an engine, this is even a simple networked animation feature
(e.g. the amazing fish cam http://mosaic.mcom.com/fishcam/fishcam.html).
For the sake of graphics & network efficiency, browsers might insist
on a little latency between repeated identical mouse picks.

> Should there be some way to un-embed embedded objects?
> The semantics of embedding seem pretty fuzzy-- you're performing an
> "transient change" to a scene.

In effect un-embed edits the scene graph. Options might be U)ndo or
B)ack. An overachieving viewer might even make a vrml editor
available. It is probably better not to be too restrictive on the first
go round.

r/Don

-- 
Don Brutzman                                           work (408) 656-2149
Code OR/Br   Naval Postgraduate School  [Glasgow 204]  fax  (408) 656-2595
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