Re: question about vrml syntax of Texture2 node

James C Deikun (jcdst10+@pitt.edu)
Mon, 14 Nov 1994 16:29:20 -0500 (EST)


On Mon, 14 Nov 1994, Gavin Bell wrote:

> Yes, the filename field of the VRML Texture2 node is a URL. The spec
> should say that; it's just an oversight on my part that it doesn't.
>
> Defining which file formats a VRML implementation "must" support (where
> "must" == we tell authors they can count on these formats...) is still
> an open issue. It seems like JPEG and GIF are the popular HTML image
> formats; do we need others? (by the way, does JPEG support alpha
> channels in images?)

Well, no implementation I've ever seen supported alpha, and from reading
on comp.compression I've gathered that there really aren't standard
semantics for it though the file format itself might or might not be able
to incorporate the additional channel. These, of course, are only a
small subset of the limitations of JPEG as a hypermedia graphics format.
The ability to define things like losslessly compressed 'link' channels
mapped with a table of URLs or other addresses would be a good start, as
would an alpha channel. If you'd like to hear more about this, though,
I'd suggest it'd go better on www-talk.

--
James Deikun
#include <std_disclaimer.h>