[x3d-public] procedure for timely resolution of straightforward X3D specification issues; Web3D Consortium is open

Wed Feb 24 10:15:06 PST 2016

On 2/23/2016 12:52 AM, Yves Piguet wrote:
> I'm totally with Michalis, and regret the reply of Don. Of course, I also understand that patents could be very harmful and must be avoided. However, I'm not sure that a closed membership is the only answer.

Correction please: we are _not_ closed.  Anyone can join Web3D Consortium.  Please examine how to join other organizations, and you will often find that individuals have no standing and thus are not eligible to join them -- that is closed, and quite different from Web3D.

Commitment is important too.  Many people consider $100/year to not be an over-high bar to cross and have joined as Web3D Professional Members.  Many others see the value to their company, agency or academic institution and then join at an organizational level.

Web3D members recognize and try to balance many concerns, which sometimes appear at odds but are always commonly motivated by getting 3D on the Web.  So there is always a good foundation of shared goals and understanding to build upon.

If the thresholds or value propositions are a difficulty for someone, they are welcome to privately Contact our Web3D Consortium leadership for further discussion.

	http://www.web3d.org/contact

I hope that the fundamentally open nature of Web3D Consortium members is clearly demonstrated by many actions, sustained for many years.  Here are a few:
-  dedicated open stance of protecting X3D/VRML from potential IPR attack,
- offering numerous resources freely,
-  publishing standards freely (the first ISO standard to ever do so),
-  publishing drafts,
- encouraging open source,
- inviting comments at every stage,
- sponsoring conferences and events,
- all contributions welcome,
- etc. etc. etc.

Of course an organization must be responsive to its members - they make up the people with perhaps the greatest commitments.  They have also agreed to work together constructively under our Web3D Bylaws.  So membership has value.

	http://www.web3d.org/member-benefits

Personally I think that the Web3D Consortium members always find a remarkably great balance when we tackle hard issues together.  Such sustained progress is not repeatable by closed organizations.  The community is an essential part of this rich mix.

We respect independence of course.  But we are committed as well.

p.s. YMMV, all points of view welcome...  8)

	"I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members." Groucho Marx
	http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/g/groucho_marx.html

p.p.s. Open community discussion is certainly another - and compatible - approach.  Thanks for your following insights here, they were discussed on the weekly teleconference.

> Some kinds of public read-only drafts of 3.4 would be helpful to get a better feeling of the future of X3D. I'm still unsure how to get this information by googling this list or with the documents I've found on github. What I think would be very useful is rationales for the decisions behind X3D. The X3D xml-based format, for instance, seems to be by far the preferred official format, relegating VRML classic to some historic artifact. I assume this means that nobody is supposed to write X3D in a text editor. Standard-compliant JSON obviously isn't meant to be written or read by hand, except for debugging.

Classic VRML is alive and well.  All of the online open-source examples (3200+) are provided in .x3d (XML) .x3dv (Classic VRML) .json and other formats.  All are functionally equivalent because the Web3D Consortium makes sure that the specifications remain fully aligned over time.

	http://www.web3d.org/x3d/content/examples/X3dResources.html#Examples

	http://www.web3d.org/specifications/X3dSpecificationRelationships.png

So rest assured that we are totally serious about successfully maintaining archival backwards compatibility together with forward extensibility.  There are a lot of VRML97 scenes from 1997 that... still work.

> With the buzz around VR headsets promised for 2016 and all related VR developments on the software side, X3D should be in a good position to be an important piece of the puzzle. I'm not sure it will.  Here are three ideas I humbly share:
>
> - Make developing with X3D more fun by reducing its verbosity. For example put more emphasis on VRML classic (renaming it?), and simplify some recurring constructs (Shape, Transform, Script or interpolator nodes required even for trivial things such as converting an SFFloat angle to an SFRotation).
>
> - A large, cool application, such as a totally distributed version of Second Life. Simplicity should be one of the goals to create a community quickly. Most of the pieces are already available.
>
> - Adoption on VR headsets as soon as possible when they'll arrive.
>
> Yves

Merci encore Yves, certainly sounds great to me too. Maybe someone wants to pursue them at our upcoming event, I'll be there too and discussion/co-development is always welcome.  A bientot!

	VR Hackathon San Francisco, 11-13 March 2016
	Sponsored by Web3D Consortium
	http://vrhackathon.com/san_francisco.html

> On 23 févr. 2016, at 01:59, Michalis Kamburelis wrote:
>
>> c. We have begun putting the X3D Specification draft documents into github version control for shared editing and detailed member review.
>>
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> This is fantastic news, if this repository is going to be public. I would love to be able to submit pull requests (or at least issues to the public bugtracker) to the X3D specification. It could be an incredible boost to X3D, to be so open.
>>
>> (I believe it would be much better system than Web3d.org form "spec comments", where in my experience many submitted issues, even trivial corrections of obvious spec errors, have been lost.)
>>
>> Is there a chance of this possible in the near future?
>>
>> I cannot google the X3D specifications on GitHub now, so I assume they are private now?
>>
>> I'm sorry if this was already explained on this list --- I was a little quiet for the last couple of months, busy in coding (around my engine and X3D and Android:)
>>
>> Best regards,
>> Michalis
>> _______________________________________________
>> x3d-public mailing list
>> x3d-public at web3d.org
>> http://web3d.org/mailman/listinfo/x3d-public_web3d.org
>
>
> On 23 févr. 2016, at 04:37, Don Brutzman wrote:
>
>> The specification drafts in version control will remain accessible to members only.
>>
>> On occasion, especially prior to a review vote, we present them to the public for comment.  The recent posting of the Extrusion revisions was hopefully helpful.
>>
>> The Web3D Consortium has carefully established a "safe haven" for members to work where everyone has committed to the IPR Agreement.  This approach has ensured, since 1998, that the X3D Specification series remains unencumbered by license fees.  It also ensures that members can consider patented contributions as long as they are provided to become royalty free, if accepted.

all the best, Don
-- 
Don Brutzman  Naval Postgraduate School, Code USW/Br       brutzman at nps.edu
Watkins 270,  MOVES Institute, Monterey CA 93943-5000 USA   +1.831.656.2149
X3D graphics, virtual worlds, navy robotics http://faculty.nps.edu/brutzman