Tim Bray wrote:
> ...
>
>> The VRML guys did the smart thing. They formed
>> a consortium to work on the technology and
>> liased with ISO to get the documentation process
>> right. It works stunningly well
>
>
> I'm glad to hear that VRML is working stunningly well, that word
> hadn't reached my neck of the woods.
> ...
You might not realize it, but VRML lives on, with Java-enablement and
extensions, in MPEG4 in the higher level profiles.
I wondered where it 'went' for a while and then read all of the MPEG4
standards, and implemented the file format and scene description, while
working for an MPEG4 video encoding company a couple years ago. VRML is
the basis for the generalized scene description language which is
encoded as a hand-packed bit encoded (a la Huffman) specific-schema. As
long as you never extend it, that's somewhat ok, although you end up
with a lot of specific parser code corresponding to everything.
That's not to say that anyone has really tried yet to create a complete
MPEG4 player. MPEG4 is truly the kitchen sink of "standards", er
specfications. I like it and am horrified by it at the same time.
That it includes VRML, Java, and a file format based on Quicktime is
very interesting I thought.
sdw
--
http://www.hpti.com Per: http://sdw.st
Stephen D. Williams 703-724-0118W 703-995-0407Fax 20147-4622 AIM: sdw
