configuring your estate in VRML and AJAX
for more than half a year i worked on a big project now. the aims:
- choose a flat, that was preconfigured by architects.
- set your own walls, doors, colours and textures.
- walk through the result in 3D.
- save your settings to reload them later.
my solution is based on the following techniques and 3rd party scripts:
- VRML and X3D. there are a lot of plugins out there for VRML and X3D. most of them use DirectX or OpenGL. some of them have anti-aliasing, lights, shadows and more visual effects for a better experience.
- AJAX. i used Prototype.js, Scriptaculous, an MD5-algorithm for JavaScript, PHP-serializer and Date.format together with JSMin and a gzip-compressor. on server side i used PHP and MySQL together with Services_JSON.
- WYSIWYG. for the user forms i used tinyMCE, which is highly AJAX-ready.
- I18N, L10N and skins. the system is already prepared for different languages and skins.
a lot of people would ask now: "why not do it in FLASH?". my answers:
- FLASH is proprietary. handgestrickt tries to use open standards.
- the 3D-capabilities are limited. the engine is not fast and able to give you a quick and realistic experience.
- the development would be cost intensive, because the Actionscript engine would be much more complicated.
here is the link to the stable first release: Raumwerk Dortmund | Wohnungskonfigurator 3
related:
VRML
X3D
DirectX
OpenGL
AJAX
Prototype.js
Scriptaculous
MD5
JavaScript
PHP
Date.format
JSMin
MySQL
Services_JSON
WYSIWYG
tinyMCE
I18N
L10N
skins
FLASH
Actionscript
