Re: VRML, the client and the third component

Mark Waks (justin@dsd.camb.inmet.com)
Tue, 6 Dec 94 14:27:48 EST


Jan writes:
>There must be a third piece. The MUD/MOO/Simultateous Simulation Engine.
>This piece maintains a database of who is in the space, what behavior
>objects
>are exhibiting and what stage they are in and where things are. This is
>where
>edits need to happen if others will see them.
>
>I believe this third piece is NOT part of VRML or the viewer. But, I was
>wrong about
>whether prefetch should be allowed, so I could be wrong about this, too.

Take a dig through the archives; we've discussed this specific topic
before. (Indeed, not long ago -- it should be relatively near the
end.) Your opinion here is essentially the same as mine: the "VRMUD"
engine is a separate beast from the "rooms" or the "viewer"
itself. (Indeed, I've been arguing that you can easily have multiple
"VRMUDs" that run off the same "rooms" as their base datasets.) A
sophisticated viewer would synthesize the rooms being uploaded with
the data from the VRMUD into a more interactive scenario.

However, note that this isn't the only way this could be handled, and
I don't think we've hit consensus yet. As I recall, we sort of tacitly
decided not to decide this issue quite yet -- first, we're going to
worry about getting the basic viewer technology up and running, then
worry about the harder problems like this...

-- Justin

Random Quote du Jour:

"The day after tomorrow is the third day of the rest of your life."
-- Dfan