X3D Ecosystem Special Interest Group Charter

Overview

The X3D Ecosystem Special Interest Group (SIG) brings together industry and 3D graphics expertise to improve the deployment of X3D in real time interactive 3D worlds. Maximizing play-anywhere Web compatibility across platforms and devices, demonstrating best practices for interoperability and usability in 3D applications.

The  group will be  working to enable the seamless integration of 3D worlds across diverse platforms and end-users by extending Web3D‘s X3D and HAnim standards, X3D Pipeline, X3D authoring tools and  X3D conversion tools. Developing immediate solutions to real-world problems with the existing X3D standard. 

Several Web3D Consortium member projects have been showcasing this feasibility. Based on these efforts, the Web3D Consortium is forming the X3D Ecosystem Special Interest Working Group in order to explore a wide variety of possibilities to extend X3D capabilities to support 3D enriched applications.

Motivations

  • Collaborate with professionals from the  Web3D community from Geospatial, DPS, VR/AR/XR, and Humanoid Animation domains, to promote interoperability and best practices for real-time interactive 3D Web applications.
  • Solve immediate real world problems with available standards, workflows and tools
  • Improve tool Conformance
  • Educate the 3D community via webinars, workshops and tutorials
  • Establish tangible X3D Resources and best practices
  • Establish standard procedure and pipelines

Goals

  • Identify gaps in the X3D Ecosystem
  • Propose X3D Ecosystem projects for 3D scenes and applications
  • Produce sample applications, recommended practices,  using X3D to demonstrate how it works
  • Identify pipelines, applications, commercial solutions and more
  • Collect requirements and repository describing  typical use cases for using X3D
  • Provide tangible X3D Resources (starting content)

Objectives

The working group is collaboratively designing a general framework that supports:

  • Collaboration among professionals in Web3D, Geospatial, DPS, Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), user accessibility, and data science
  • User research and usability study with procedures, tools
  • Interoperable 3D applications on the Web, mobile and others multiplatform;  
  • Task-oriented Web3D application applied in practices while serving the community needs.  

If successfully designed, such a general framework might be gradually extended with new concepts related to a variety of different semantic areas using the X3D presentation.

Practices

The X3D Ecosystem Special Interest Group (SIG) follows Web3D Working Group Practices.

The role of the X3D community has been crucial throughout every stage of development for the VRML and X3D International Standards. The public community of interested web authors has always been a principal stakeholder for success and indeed is often a primary driver of long-term progress. Open public discussion and periodic community review of critical issues remain an essential activity for all Web3D Working Groups.

Meetings

The Working Group holds twice-monthly teleconferences and face-to-face meetings annually at the SIGGRAPH and Web3D Conferences.

Participants

The  X3D Ecosystem Special Interest Group (SIG) is a Web3D Consortium public activity. Experts are invited to participate in topics of interest. The leadership of the Special Interest Group consists of 2 co-chairs.

Dependencies and Liaisons

The X3D Ecosystem Special Interest Group supports other Web3D Working Groups and Web3D Consortium Liaisons and Partnerships.
Efforts and products are also coordinated via the Web3D Standard working group to achieve planned specification milestone activities and effective external liaisons.

Confidentiality

The group communications are published in the x3d-ecosystem@web3d.org public mailing list. At the discretion of the Group, as appropriate, information may also be released to the Web3D public lists.

Communication

Creation and Approval Dates

This charter was approval by the Web3D Consortium Board of Directors, June 2024.