VRML List Members -
The VRML Architecture Group (VAG) met on the 5th and 6th of February, 1996, at the offices of Intervista Software in San Francisco. This document is a summary of the key points decided during the meeting.
Six VRML 2.0 proposals were received by the VAG; each was examined and measured for fulfillment of the Request for Proposal criteria. Proposers are being notified of the receipt of their proposals and are begin given initial feedback.
The VAG went on to define and specify a community-driven process to reach consensus on a VRML 2.0 working draft. This process begins now, with a "reading period", during which proposals are to be studied by the entire VRML community, and during which the community can address questions to the proposers reguarding completeness or ambiguous areas within the proposals. The reading period goes through the 18th of February, at which point the active "debate period" begins. During this phase, community members are encouraged to openly critique and compare the various proposals. In addition, the VAG will be establishing a "polling booth" so that the community can rate its level of interest for each of the proposals. Following the closure of the debate period, on the 8th of March, the VAG will invite the consensus candidate proposers to draw up a document which will become the working draft for VRML 2.0. We expect to have this draft in a releasable form by the 22nd of March, to be followed - after extensive peer review - with a final draft, sometime in the summer.
Extensive information on this process - including the notes of the VAG meeeting - will be published at the VAG site, http://www.vrml.org/ on Friday, 9 February.
Over the next few months VAG will be meeting with representatives of several standards bodies and organizations to identify the best approach for a VRML standards process. The VAG also outlined a series of long-term goals for a VRML consortium, including:
The VAG foresees the formation of a consortium and will be actively involved in that process. The VAG will need to meet again in the middle of March to certify the working VRML 2.0 draft specification, and continue the standards and consortium formation processes.
based on mail from Mark Pesce to www-vrml on or about 7-FEB-96