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From: acsgjjp@sunybcs.UUCP (Jim Poltrone)
Newsgroups: net.graphics
Subject: GKS vs. 1979 SIGGRAPH CORE
Message-ID: <1412@sunybcs.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 3-Apr-84 15:00:36 EST
Article-I.D.: sunybcs.1412
Posted: Tue Apr  3 15:00:36 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 6-Apr-84 00:47:57 EST
Organization: SUNY/Buffalo Computer Science
Lines: 39

[the IRS always takes their cut from the top ('nuff said!)]
 
   I have my copy of the GKS proposal.  I haven't sat down and read it yet
(I'm too busy reading articles on the Net).  What I'd like to know is why
the 1979 ACM SIGGRAPH CORE proposal is not being accepted as the standard.
(See NCGA Computer Graphics News, Nov./Dec. 1983.) 
   I have no experience with any Graphical Kernel System (GKS), but I am
quite familiar with the CORE proposal.  Here at SUNY/Buffalo, we have a
package called DI-3000, a device-independent graphics system written by
Precision Visuals, Inc. of Boulder, Colorado, and modeled after the CORE
proposal.  DI-3000 allows you to write a graphics program (using FORTRAN-
callable subroutines) and run it on any output device, be it a lineprinter,
direct-view storage tube graphics terminal (e.g. the Tektronix 4010), a
standard, unmodified terminal (e.g. a stock VT100), a raster display, or
any other output device you have, provided you have the device drivers.
(Most are available from Precision Visuals.)  For those familiar with
DIGRAF (based on the 1977 CORE proposal), DI-3000 has certain advantages:
colors, a "pause" subroutine, and built-in graphic-arts-quality text fonts,
to name a few.
[The above paragraph is geared toward new graphics users; seasoned veterans
can treat it as review.]
   What I am really looking for is:
     1) A description of the GKS system (in easy-to-understand terms)
     2) An open debate regarding the pros and cons of the two proposals.
     3) A chance to communicate with other DI-3000 users (how well does
        it work under Unix or Unix-type operating systems?)
   I'm hoping that this debate does not erupt into a shouting match (such
was the case for the now-infamous creation and abortion "debates"--oh, you
'n'-ed them all?  Good!).  I'll be awaiting your responses.
   
                                   The SIGGRAPH/Buffalo focal point:

-- 
                             From the polyphonic, pitch-bending keyboard of
nfqstuwxy;                        James J. Poltrone  
                             (a/k/a "Poltr1: The Last of the Raster Blasters")

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