Re: [JAVA3D] Various Java 3D Issues

[Shawn Kendall]

First, I'd like to say thanks for responding to all our grips.
Now, I will comment...

Kevin Rushforth wrote:

Several issues have been raised in the last day or two.  I would like
to respond to some of these.  Many of these issues will be addressed
in the 1.3 release of Java 3D.  To give you an idea of where we are
headed, I will post a list of many proposed 1.3 features in a separate
message.  We are getting ready to start the process for the 1.3 and
1.4 releases of Java 3D.

What kind of release schedule are we talking.  To say this is going to happen is nice, but dates would be better, even if they are lies!
We are in the middle of great growth in 3D.  OpenGL, DirectX, consoles, game engines are all pulling at us.  In the world of games, if your hardware can do it but your API cannot, you move on...

1. Transparency

Java 3D does not currently sort transparent objects other than to
render all of the transparent objects after all of the opaque objects.
We fully understand that some solution to this problem is required.
We plan to add depth-sorted transparency in 1.3.  This will probably
be via an enum to control the quality of the sort versus time (e.g.,
SORT_NONE, SORT_OBJECT_BOUNDS, SORT_OBJECT_GEOMETRY).

Will these changes be handled in the public review?  I can say without thinking much on this one, that we would want per Shape3D or Appearance node transparency sorting modes, as well as the whole scene.  That way we can use the higher granularity when we know we need it and only then.

2. Behaviors

A fully general solution to this is not an easy problem (despite

One possible solution is to implement a behavior priority, or some
other form of full or partial ordering on Behaviors that wakeup in
response to the same stimulus.  There may be other solutions.  For
those of you who are having problems with Java 3D behaviors: what
problem are you trying to solve for which the behavior scheduler is
getting in the way?

I will skip this one for now, because I have already choked the Java3D beta list with it!

3. Bug fixes
Java 3D a better release is bug reports, with test cases, sent to
[EMAIL PROTECTED]  We can't fix them if we can't reproduce them.

Makes since.  However, I'm sure you know that test apps can often be as big a problem as the problem.  We had a terrible time writing simple apps that recreated our problems.  In the end, we sent you guys our entire app, which was only somewhat easier, because we still had to produce some kind of explanation to what the huge dump of code we just sent is doing...

5. Loaders

Our strategy for loaders has been to put out a couple of sample
loaders and encourage the community to add to them.  Btw, the loaders
are a good example of why open source doesn't automatically solve the
world's problems.  Collectively, the loaders are (or could be) an
open source project that should allow good loaders to be generally
available.  In practice, it often doesn't work out that way.

Well, we did it. And it was a significant effort.  The problem I believe is that in the world of 3D, things are really getting competitive, and if I have to write a loader to get my 3D Studio Max content into some system, I will choose another system. Many times content is your biggest component, and where most of  your people's training lays.  No loader, no Java3D - Content is king...
 

6. Performance

Performance is one of the primary goals of Java 3D.  The 1.2.1 release

I think we have been quite pleased with performance since 1.2.
But it doesn't matter how fast it is running, if it isn't running correctly.

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Shawn Kendall               Full Sail Real World Education
Course Director             3300 University BLVD
Real Time 3D for Gaming     Winter Park FL 32792
[EMAIL PROTECTED]       http://www.fullsail.com
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