Re: Universal network graphics language

"Jason B. Bluming" <jbluming@chivalry.eit.COM>
Message-id: <9401272035.AA22280@eit.COM>
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Subject: Re: Universal network graphics language 
In-reply-to: Your message of "Thu, 27 Jan 1994 11:25:56 +0100."
             <9401271025.AA04268@ptpc00.cern.ch> 
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 1994 12:25:46 -0800
From: "Jason B. Bluming" <jbluming@chivalry.eit.COM>
Content-Length: 2002


I'd like to add another angle to this discussion (taking it yet farther
afield), that being the representation of time.  Since TimBL took the 
step from composition to VR/gaming, and thus opened the door, I'd like
to address how to make these non-static elements interact properly
(that being "as we would like").

To create, for example, the virtual conference room spoken of, we need
not only the mechanism for incorporating individual's pictures to our
room, but one to synchronize their motions with sound, to handle the
(possibly) varied sampling rates of distinct forms of audio/video and
perhaps other chronological sequences (Vinay Kumar's "gesture recording"
comes to mind).

For generality, please consider both the linear and cyclic aspects of 
time, those that distinguish "from now til then" from "every 6th Monday
at noon."  Making this distinction, I'd propose a simple schema for
allowing systems to set up synchronizer systems using a "cookie cutter"
view of time -- if any of you recall the child's toy Spirograph in which
a circle with a pencil hole through the rim was rolled through a larger
circle to create interesting looping patterns -- in which these periodic
events can be described and then actively "rolled" to create an active
schedule.  Thereby, if in our conference room, we could create not only
mechanisms for "show this and then this", but we could have clients which
knew the intended rates for each input and would trim/pad the input to 
keep all media synchronous.  

I believe that the generic encoding of time is one of the primary 
issues in moving from a document-centered view of the Web to an
information-centered view.

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			Jason Bluming
	     Enterprise Integration Technologies
                      jbluming@eit.com

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