Based on the message traffic it seems that there really
are two groups of people:
1. a Doom like interactive, VR, linked, network/info browser
2. a complex scientific 3D data object visualizer
Note of course that links from #1 can point to objects
in #2 (at the Virtual Observatory, the Virtual Weather Station,
the Virtual Toxic Waste Dump, etc.)
The portability requirements for both groups are the same, it's
just that #1 contains a few complex objects while #2 contains
many simple objects. We had looked into making a combined
group that did both but preliminary examinations were not
encouraging.
Perhaps, it's time to break these into two groups? The
more that I look into my effort to make 3D distributed
objects, the more it looks like VRML may not be the answer
(it seems to be too generic for my needs -- I need something
that knows more about the data since there will be A LOT
of data compared to typicaly VRML scenes).
Any feedback on these thoughts would be appreciated.
PS we are spending real cash money to do this so we'd like
to make something that many people could find useful.
>
>A note, vrml is really a 3D specification language with URLs thrown in.
>It doesn't have much to do with VR. In fact, people who do real
>VR with Silicon Graphics machines don't usually use Open Inventor, they
>use Performer --- another SGI product designed for speed -- or roll their own So why don't
>we quit pretending that VRML really says anything about immersion,
>admit that what it really describes is 3D graphics, and name the
>thing appropriately? wrl is fine.
>
--+---------------------------------------------------------+ |Scott D. Nelson B131 Rm2074 email:nelson18@llnl.gov | |Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory | |7000 East Ave., L-153 | |Livermore CA 94550 | +---------------------------------------------------------+