Web graphics [Guest Editors' Introduction

Abstract

Unlike traditional graphics applications, which often run on a single machine, Web graphics applications assume a distributed environment, that is, over the Internet. Most of these applications are based on a client-server architecture, where a server provides services and often the geometry data, and a client accesses them. The two main issues in Web graphics are the content itself and the tools that support content development and playback. Research issues on Web graphics tools include geometry data streaming, progressive geometry compression, real-time rendering and interactions, data synchronization, motion prediction, and message filtering. The computer graphics community has investigated some of these issues, while the distributed systems community has addressed many of the remaining issues. Recently, researchers have combined the research results from these two communities, adapting them to the new domain. In this special issue, five articles that describe some of the important research issues related to Web graphics,are briefly summarized before they are presented.