New WebGL standard aims for 3D Web without browser plugins

Aug.08, 2009 in Ars Technica

The Khronos Group revealed this week that it will move forward with its plans to build a new 3D standard for the Web. Khronos, a technology industry consortium that developed OpenGL and a number of other prominent graphical standards, will devise new JavaScript APIs for natively rendering 3D graphics in webpages without requiring browser plugins. The effort is being undertaken in collaboration with Mozilla, Opera, and Google, indicating that it will receive broad support from prominent browser vendors.

Khronos first demonstrated an interest in bringing 3D to the Web back in March when it issued a joint announcement with Mozilla. At roughly the same time, Google was working on its own 3D Web technology called O3D. Google’s O3D is a high-level engine that can load and display models. Mozilla’s 3D Web prototype takes a very different approach and aims to expose the conventional OpenGL APIs through JavaScript. It was previously unclear how these competing visions would converge into a single standard.