From drewk@graphics.cis.upenn.edu Fri Aug 28 12:09:13 1998 Received: from burdell.cc.gatech.edu (root@burdell.cc.gatech.edu [130.207.3.207]) by lennon.cc.gatech.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA11872 for ; Fri, 28 Aug 1998 12:09:11 -0400 (EDT) Received: from wheaten.hitl.washington.edu (IDENT:KEyL9+yRlJvFUFNdTFcPvFirfijII4MH@[128.95.73.60]) by burdell.cc.gatech.edu (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA26686 for ; Fri, 28 Aug 1998 12:09:09 -0400 (EDT) Received: from linc.cis.upenn.edu (LINC.CIS.UPENN.EDU [158.130.12.3]) by wheaten.hitl.washington.edu (8.8.8/8.6.12) with ESMTP id JAA29556 for <3d-ui@hitl.washington.edu>; Fri, 28 Aug 1998 09:08:36 PDT Received: from graphics.cis.upenn.edu (GRAPHICS.CIS.UPENN.EDU [158.130.2.10]) by linc.cis.upenn.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id MAA15033 for <3d-ui@hitl.washington.edu>; Fri, 28 Aug 1998 12:08:34 -0400 (EDT) Received: from roger.cis.upenn.edu (ROGER.CIS.UPENN.EDU [158.130.12.70]) by graphics.cis.upenn.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id MAA05509 for <3d-ui@hitl.washington.edu>; Fri, 28 Aug 1998 12:08:33 -0400 (EDT) Received: by roger.cis.upenn.edu id QAA15148; Fri, 28 Aug 1998 16:08:32 GMT Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 16:08:32 GMT Posted-Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 16:08:32 GMT Message-Id: <199808281608.QAA15148@roger.cis.upenn.edu> From: Drew Kessler MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To: 3d-ui@hitl.washington.edu Subject: Re: COSMO In-Reply-To: <35E26234.5C22@archit.uni-weimar.de> References: <35E26234.5C22@archit.uni-weimar.de> X-Mailer: VM 6.22 under 19.15 XEmacs Lucid Status: RO Ernst Kruijff writes: > I also know, in command to > Ivan's mail, that Java 3D is increasing in popularity, but do we REALLY > need it? I mean, at this moment there is a reasonably high support of > VRML in true VR applications. I think that it is a common misconception that Java3D and VRML are the same sort of beast. In fact, VRML is a format for files containing geometry and object relationships and behaviors, and Java3D is library of functions that create, manipulate, and render a 3D model. The distinction is subtle, but significant. It is generally easier, for example, to program a global state and behavior using a programming language that manipulates the 3D model, than to express it as distributed behaviors of objects in a 3D model description. I should state that I am not a big fan of VRML, although I think it does its job fairly well (describing dynamic, 3D geometric scenes). I just can't imagine encapsulating any serious VR application in a set of VRML files, except perhaps environment walkthoughs with canned "touched" responses. Show me a VRML CAD application, though, and I will likely change my mind :) -Drew -- ___________________________________________________________________________ G. Drew Kessler drewk@central.cis.upenn.edu Dept. of Computer and Information Science Office: 174 Moore Bldg University of Pennsylvania Phone: (215)573-2815 200 South 33rd Street Fax: (215)898-0587 Philadelphia, PA, USA 19104-6389 http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~drewk/home.html