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Extensible 3D (X3D)<br />
Part 1: Architecture and base components</p>
<p class="HeadingClause"><span class="proposed" title="editorial Mantis 837">Introduction</span></p>
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General</h1>
<p><i>Extensible 3D </i>(X3D) is a software standard for defining interactive
web- and broadcast-based 3D content integrated with multimedia. X3D is intended
for use on a variety of hardware devices and in a broad range of application
areas such as engineering and scientific visualization, multimedia presentations,
entertainment and educational titles, web pages, and shared virtual worlds.
X3D is also intended to be a universal interchange format for integrated 3D
graphics and multimedia. X3D is the successor to the Virtual Reality Modeling
Language (VRML), the original ISO standard for web-based 3D graphics (<a href="references.html#[I14772_1]">ISO/IEC
14772</a>). X3D improves upon VRML with new features, advanced application
programmer interfaces, additional data encoding formats, stricter conformance,
and a componentized architecture that allows for a modular approach to supporting
the standard.</p>
<p>This section <span class="proposedDeletion" title="editorial Mantis 837">provides a background to</span> <span class="proposed" title="editorial Mantis 837">describes </span> the design objectives behind the development
of X3D<span class="proposedDeletion">,</span> <span class="proposed" title="editorial Mantis 837">and provides</span> an overview of the features of X3D<span class="proposedDeletion"> and a description of the X3D specification
process</span>.</p>
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Design objectives</h1>
<p>X3D has been developed to meet a specific set of market and technical requirements.
To meet these requirements, X3D has adopted the following design objectives:
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<ul>
<li>Separate the runtime architecture from the data encoding</li>
<li>Support a variety of encoding formats, including the Extensible Markup Language (XML)</li>
<li>Add new graphical, <span class="proposedDeletion" title="editorial">behavioral</span> <span class="proposed" title="editorial">behavioural</span> and interactive objects</li>
<li>Provide alternative application programmer interfaces (APIs) into the 3D scene</li>
<li>Define subsets of the specification ("Profiles") that meet different market needs</li>
<li>Allow for the specification to be implemented at varying levels of service</li>
<li>Eliminate, where possible, unspecified or underspecified <span class="proposedDeletion" title="editorial">behaviors</span> <span class="proposed" title="editorial">behaviours</span></li>
</ul>
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X3D features</h1>
<p>X3D has a rich set of features to support applications such as engineering
and scientific visualization, multimedia presentations, entertainment and
educational titles, web pages, and shared virtual worlds. The X3D feature
set includes:</p>
<ul>
<li><b>3D graphics</b> - Polygonal geometry, parametric geometry,
hierarchical transformations, <span class="proposedDeletion" title="editorial">lighting, materials and Physically Based Rendering (PBR)</span> <span class="proposed" title="editorial">advanced materials and lighting for Physically Based Rendering (PBR),</span> multi-pass/multi-stage
texture mapping</li>
<li><b>2D graphics</b> - Text, 2D vector and planar shapes displayed within the 3D
transformation hierarchy</li>
<li><b>Animation</b> - Timers and interpolator to drive continuous
animations; humanoid animation and morphing</li>
<li><span class="proposed" title="editorial"><b>Humanoid Animation</b> - full-fidelity representations of human skeleton with motion animation</span></li>
<li><span class="proposed" title="editorial"><b>Metadata</b> - comprehensive inclusion of typed metadata sets</span></li>
<li><b>Spatialized audio and video</b> - <span class="proposed" title="editorial">Audio generation and rendering,</span> audiovisual sources
mapped onto geometry in the scene</li>
<li><b>User interaction</b> - Mouse-based picking and dragging;
keyboard input</li>
<li><b>Navigation</b> - Cameras; user movement within the
3D scene; collision, proximity and visibility detection</li>
<li><b>User-defined objects</b> - Ability to extend built-in
browser functionality by creating user-defined data types</li>
<li><b>Scripting</b> - Ability to dynamically change the scene
via programming and scripting languages</li>
<li><b>Networking </b>- Ability to compose a single X3D scene out of assets
located on a network; hyperlinking of objects to other scenes or assets located
on the World Wide Web; <span class="proposed" title="editorial">improved control of loading, refresh rates and security</span></li>
<li><b>Physical simulation</b> - Humanoid animation; geospatial
datasets; integration with Distributed Interactive Simulation (DIS) protocols</li>
<li><b>Geospatial positioning</b> - Ability to accurately position X3D scene
objects geospatially.</li>
<li><b>CAD geometry</b> – ability to represent CAD models mapped from CAD
systems.</li>
<li><b>Layering</b> – Ability to organize X3D scenes into rendering groups
so that objects in each layer can overlay objects in underlying layers.</li>
<li><b>Support for programmable shaders</b> – Ability to replace the X3D
lighting model with custom shader programs.</li>
<li><b>Particle systems</b> – Ability to generate systems of particles that
can represent fire, smoke, and other such effects.</li>
<li class="proposed" title="Mantis 838"><b>Volume rendering</b> – Ability to specify and render volumetric data
sets, as used within medical imaging, for example.</span></li>
</ul>
<p>For a complete list of X3D features, consult the component descriptions in
clauses 7 through <span class="proposedDeletion" title="editorial">40</span> <span class="proposed" title="editorial">42</span> of this part of ISO/IEC 19775.</p>
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