RE>Virtual Earth.
Isn't the whole point of VR, (or at least one important one) to
create things that don't exist, instead of those that already do.
I take United if I want to see the earth.
-- Hanging on skeptic.
--jcw
>>> Neophytos Iacovou <[email protected]> - 5/4/95 3:25
PM >>>
Clay Fouts writes:
> > a virtual Earth... and who would create it? Certainly there
needs to
> be some standard means of connecting these entities, but it doesn't
need
> to be a highway or a landscape or a bright beam of light shooting
from
> one entity to another... Also, a means of indexing these entities
(realms)
> must exist in order for one to find anything, but that index
doesn't
> need to be the underlying organizational structure for a virtual
world.
I agree with you here. I think the index is more important than
anything
else. In my two previous messages I talk about how the index of
GopherSpace is maintained (I'm sure people are already familiar
with this).
That index of registered servers has nothing at all to do with the
location of links within servers to other servers and other items
in servers.
The index is something nice that is outside the realm of how
individuals
can organize their servers. People can refer to the hierarchy of
Gopher
servers when they are looking for a server or when whant to make a
link.
On the UofMn's list of Gopher servers we choose to organize the
servers
based on a geographical hierarchy, so if I have no clue what the
URL to
NYU's Gopher server is I can take a peek at the NY state branch in
the
hierarchy and find it.
The same can be said of VRML. It would be very useful if we come up
with some sort of hierarchy of VR sites. It would be nice if we do
this
early on so that 2 years from now I can find an underwater world
when
I need one.
If VRML sites are indexed using geography you also have (as a neat
aside)
a way of quickly putting together "cities" because you can just
say,
"okay, display all VRML pages in NYC as 1 big city" and it takes no
real
work to pull something like this together, because you already have
an index - BUT, it is the index that is usefull to have, not a site
with
30trilliongabillion polygons that noone can render let alone cruise
through:-)
And of course, since this is a VR world we can have geographical
locations
such as outer space and underwater, etc etc. Also, more than just
VRML
sites should be indexed, all VR worlds that
can
be
gotten
to
via
a
URL
can
be
indexed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Neophytos Iacovou Distributed
Computing Services University of Minnesota
100 Union St. SE email: [email protected]
Minneapolis, MN 55455 USA