VRML from CIS/2 displayed without a plugin

[Robert Lipman]

There is a new web technology called X3DOM http://www.x3dom.org/ that
lets you display X3D files (which can be converted from VRML files) in
a web page and be able to navigate the model, without any plugin.

I have created an example of a CIS/2 file that was converted to VRML
with SteelVis and then to X3DOM.

http://cic.nist.gov/vrml/cis/ramcis2_x3dom.html

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Robert Lipman
http://cic.nist.gov/vrml/cis2.html

[Robert Lipman]

SteelVis can now export an X3DOM file so that you can view the 3D
model without a plugin. However, you need the right web browser and
only a limited set of VRML can be displayed.

1 - Download or upgrade to the latest version (8.08) of SteelVis.

2 - To be able to generate X3DOM files, you need to download and
install InstantReality. You can get the lastest version here
ftp://ftp.igd.fraunhofer.de/irbuild/Windows-i686/ Download the most
recent version and install it in the default location.

3 - If InstantReality is installed properly, then an option to
Generate X3DOM will appear in the More VRML tab of SteelVis.

4 - X3DOM can only be displayed in certain web browsers. I've used it
successfully (sort of) with Firefox 4 beta and Google Chrome. You can
check if you have the right web browser installed here
http://cic.nist.gov/vrml/cis/ramcis2_x3dom.html If you're using
Firefox 4 beta, then follow instructions on http://www.x3dom.org/?page_id=9
to enable WebGL.

5 - In SteelVis, select the web browser you want to use in the Browser
menu. Hopefully, they will show up. In the More VRML tab, select
Generate X3DOM (not the X3D option) and translate a CIS/2 file. The
resulting X3DOM file is an HTML file that will automatically be
displayed by SteelVis. You should be able to rotate, translate, and
zoom the model with various mouse buttons.

X3DOM is still being developed so that are a lot of things that
SteelVis that do not work in X3DOM. Here's what does not work: bolts,
holes, welds, curved parts, text popups, analysis model wireframe and
nodes, etc. If you have any of those in a model, then nothing will be
displayed, even the parts that should work.

The beauty of using X3DOM is that you do not need a VRML plugin to
view the model only the right web browser. It will be a lot easier to
share the 3D model. I'm pretty sure that this will eventually work in
IE9 also.

If you try it out, let me know if it works. I've tried it with a CIS/
2 file that has over 83,000 parts. The X3DOM file displayed properly
but was too big to rotate the model around. Smaller models worked
just fine.

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Robert Lipman
http://cic.nist.gov/vrml/cis2.html