Review Of 3D Web Browsers

shelflife points to this very intersting article on the 3D Web browsers in Scientific American. He writes that of the 3D systems mentioned, "A Swiss company, Geonova (www.geonova.ch), seems to demonstrate best that the idea of a geography-based Web is feasible with today's PCs. Engineers there created two impressively detailed models of Switzerland--one of the entire nation with 25-meter resolution and another of two central cantons at 50-centimeter resolution. .. Text and iconic labels hovered quite legibly above towns, lakes, companies and tourist attractions; clicking on the labels opened associated Web pages. What other 3D browsers are there -- VRML plugins have been around a while -- yet they do not seem to be successful. Why is that?"

why they don't work

yuck, the reason why they don't work are because they're slow and don't benifit any. Even most 'regular' people don't want to surf the net by clicking through an interface that looks like a town. Even if it does look nice, the fun wears off after running around in your own little virtual town when you notice that it takes twice as long to find information.

Why not VRML? VRML sucks.

The question in the article was: VRML plugins have been around a while -- yet they do not seem to be successful. Why is that?

This isn't a flame, but the answer is simply that nobody likes VRML. People think that things are successful because of some other force than people like something. This can be true in rare cases (huge marketing campaigns like Nike's can change what people want), but ultimately, if something isn't successful, then it is because people don't want it.

The real question is: why don't people like VRML? Well, load it up yourself and view 3D worlds. Now play Quake. The VRML experience is unsatisfying, but Quake is fun.

Here are some basic reasons why VRML fails to stimulate people:

• Navigation sucks. The controls were built for people who wanted to model 3D objects from the outside, they weren't built for people who wanted to navigate the intireors of dungeons. Few people wanted to look at the 3D objects, most people want to fly through objects.
• VRML worlds sucked. Because of (or causing) the navigation problems, most VRML were objects you attempted to manipulate rather than 3D worls you could fly through.
• VRML didn't grok "cyberspace". Go to old VRML design documents and read the description of how they define "cyberspace", then read William Gibson's defition (or any cyberpunk definition). The VRML group was trying to model the real 3D world and objects, trying to make the PC model reality. People don't want this -- they want the computer to do stuff that you can't do in the real world. Doing real world stuff is easier in the real world -- VRML brought nothing new that the real world didn't have to offer. (This is why Quake is fun: it isn't the real world -- I love the low-grave levels :-)
• Poor leadership. Read Mark Piesce's old writings and contrast with Linus/ESR's writings. Piesce is a petulant child compared to the maturity of Linus/ESR/Cox/etc. Emotional ranting is popular in forums like Slashdot, but leaders who behave that way hurt their projects.

The real answer is that 3D has taken over the world and become the driving force behind computers (e.g. 3D cards in computers have more gates than CPUs). The 3D market has expanded hugely fast. There are those that figured out how to catch the wave (John Carmack @ Id) and those that failed to grok what was going on (Mark Piesce w/ VRML). One of these days we'll see some interesting 3D technology added to browsers; it won't look like VRML, it might look like Quake/Doom or Flight Simulator, or it might be something completely different.

Re:Why not VRML? VRML sucks.

As someone a little bit closer to this issue (check webpage) this is why I think VRML failed.

1. VRML-97 is not a superset of VRML-1. There are features in VRML-1 that don't convert easily to VRML-97 so people who started with VRML-1 had to re-do a lot of stuff by hand. That discouraged a lot of the early movers.

2. The VRML-97 specification specified too many things that didn't need to be specified (like text layout, which looks crappy in VRML anyway) and initially failed to specify some things very well. There was some question about what scripting should be used at first, later Java and ECMAScript worked their way in but that leads me to...

3. It duplicated things that could be done with other things. In particular, you can do a lot of 3d with Java, and if you are going to use Java to script your VRML world anyway you might as well just do everything in Java which leads me to...

4. Crappy installed base. Really weak VRML browser shipped with IE and Netscape died before its decision could have made any impact.

5. Somewhat different computing paradigm. The VRML file contains "sensors" which trigger events that are processed by scripts. In other words, the data drives the code instead of the code driving the data. Is it a file format? A programming language? What is it? I'll tell you, introducing a different way of computing is fine, but they didn't pitch it that way, which tells me that it was more of an accident. It's always a bad sign when different ways of doing things get introduced by accident.

6. Bloated syntax. I know I'll catch it from some people for this, but I stand by it. Why was the proposal for VRML-97 called VRML-2? I'll tell you: because it has twice as many brackets and braces as VRML-1, and it doesn't really make things any easier to read.

7. Performance, performance, performance. A few months ago someone on comp.lang.vrml posted something that looked like a simple Quake level. It ran at 1 FPS on my box in a tiny little window. The same box runs Quake full screen at least 24 FPS, probably more but I can't tell and I don't care because Quake looks fine. The VRML performance problem is intractable too, because it doesn't have any standard way to do BSP or any of the other tricks that games do.

There are probably other reasons too; that's just the top of my list. Oh well, I had a lot of fun with it in the early days, and I learned a lot coding for it but it is DEAD, DEAD, DEAD. I use my VRML program mostly to create animated GIFs and for photo-shop like effects (layering translucent PNGs and taking screen shots is cool) and I keep the web page up because I hate to kill stuff. I harbor no delusions. VRML will never see mass appeal. It seems to have carved out a niche in some government and academic circles, but there is no excitement there, no profit, and not much life.

Kinda cool

The demo is really neet - it's worth firing up a Windows box. As you fly around, the system feeds you better and better textures for the ground. Unfortunatly, it seems that it dumps the good textrues as soon as you fly away too far. The user interface works ok - user '-' and '+' on the numeric keypad to change elevations.

3D requires interaction

Computer screens are generally 2D, without even depth information. When we talk about "3D graphics", what it means is that we get a 2D image that transforms like the image of a 3D object when we interact with it (mouse, trackball, etc.). That is, 3D graphics is simply a particular way of showing and hiding information in response to user input. So, we need to evaluate it relative to other ways of interacting with data on the screen.

I think in practice it has turned out that mechanisms like a folding tree and a tabbed window are more effective and easier to use for interacting with the kinds of data we deal with. Our current 2D interfaces require less user interaction and intervention and display more useful and related information than a system that is constrained by trying to conform to the rules of 3D objects. The closest to 3D we have come in user interfaces is zoomable UIs, but even there the jury is still out whether that is actually useful in practice.

I can prove that VRML will never catch on...

There is no VRML porn.

'nuff said.

-b

Why VRML didn't work

I think VRML failed because it was not as easily understood by the mass market. Anyone and their dog can set up a HTML page, and they usually do, but to do a VRML page they have to use a computing metaphor that most consumers and even geeks can't understand.

Interior Decorating.

What is it? You can't ask a geek to make you a stylish personal home on the web. Its just not feasable because they spent their lives reclusively, with clutter all over the room and with clean elegance on the paper products they make. Sure there is an elite few who can make WAD files already, but they cannot easily pass this knowledge on to the masses.

Speaking of WADs, there is the difficulty in scripting events in VRML. You need a plug-in for a static language that doesn't even offer realistic doors or interaction with monsters. Where's the fun in a 10 meg download that doesn't even offer you a gun or sword or knife? VRML came out about the same time as games which for the first time offered Deathmatch mode, so it was sadly feature-poor for its size.

If they could re-make VRML as a familiar XML-style language with some support for java and javascript, then all you would need is a good Frontpage equivalent and free interior decorating or painting courses on the web.

X3D vs. VRML

The XML solution on the horizon is X3D [web3d.org]. This has a much better chance of being a useful 3D markup language because in most cases it would be only one representation of the base data among a set of alterantives including vector graphics (SVG) and XHTML.

Ack...

3D Browser? For the love of god, keep that thing away from goatse.cx [goatse.cx]!!! It's bad enough as it is...

*Shudder*

The Sims Online

I am not sure if it is true 3D or just isometric, but eventually everyone will have their own personalized eHouse, as opposed to a webpage.

The Sims Online [ea.com] is basically just that, an massively multiplayer online world, where people can build their own houses, and live virtual alternate lives as criminals, playboys, doctors, etc...

You can bet The Sims Online will become the next killer app for the internet. Just as the other killer apps (chat rooms, email, instant messaging) appeal to a large audience, The Sims appealed/appeals to a large audience. Making the game massively multiplayer is obviously the next level to take the game to, and Will Wright is the man for the job.

Everquest was too geeky for the mainstream, and chat rooms are too boring... The Sims Online? Now thats going to make allot of money!

Why there is no 3-D /.

Just because you can, doesn't mean you should. So we now have super faster computers and graphic cards that can render 1024x768 at 60fps with 32bit colours, so what? It maybe good for gaming and some very specialised research and visualisation applications, but it is no good for general web browsing.

Why? What does browsing mean? Reading (and maybe typing) text, and maybe some images here and there. So what does a 3D environment bring you in this case? Nothing. Reading an article in 3D is pointless; most people will rather stick with the good old "flat text".

The reason Virtual Reality did not catch on for web browsing is that it is not bring anything new. At least not anything people think are useful outside of some very specialised cases. For example 3D maps cool! 3D /.? No thanks.

We are still waiting for a killer (non-game) app in 3D. In the mean time, the idea of 3D browser is probably only of interest to academics researchers.