For those who are interested, I've been able to extract from my Amiga
the original e-mail I sent to CompuServe that started off the POV-Ray
project.  In this e-mail, I proposed the name STAR Light.  The team
(including myself) later changed it to POV-Ray.  I thought I'd post it
here so you could see it and to give permission for the POV-Ray team
members to include it in the documentation if they wish.  I've corrected
a few small typos, but the message is otherwise unchanged.

Enjoy
David (Kirk) Buck
===========================

11906 S16/Raytraced Images
   07-Mar-91 18:56:37
Sb: DKB Development
Fm: David Buck 70521,1371
To: All

Greetings all.  This is my first posting to this group, so you'll have
to excuse me if I make any mistakes in this post.

Finally, after several weeks of waiting, I've received my CompuServe
account.  It's nice to see that people are enjoying my raytracer (DKB,
of course). I have noticed, however, that you are less than satisfied at
the support I've been able to provide <grin>.  True, I'm the first to
admit that the support is poor.  I have little time these days to work
on graphics - it takes long enough to answer all the questions I get
asked on a daily basis from all across the world.

My motivation for releasing the raytracer as Freely Distributable
software in the first place was to allow people to have some fun with a
program I'd developed for just that purpose.  I don't consider it to be
a professional package - I know it's nowhere near that good.  I didn't
make it shareware, however, because I knew I wouldn't have much time for
support.  I didn't want the hassles of maintaining user lists, sending
updates and notices, etc.

There has recently been a proposal in this forum that you write your own
raytracer to use instead of DKB.  Perhaps I can make that prospect a
little bit easier.  Suppose we take DKB and use it as a base for a
completely new system (the name "Renderdog" has been tossed around, but
I'm not fond of that one <g>).  I would like to propose the name
"Software Taskforce on Animation and Rendering" or STAR.  I would
imagine that there would be several packages developed such as:

 STAR Light  - the raytracer
 STAR Guider - an animation system
 STAR Maker - a user interface for StarLight

If you decide to do this, I would like to place a few rules on the
packages (or at least those developed from DKB):

  - they will remain freely distributable
  - support and maintenance of this new product will be undertaken by
the STAR team (including but not limited to myself)
  - the programs will remain as portable as possible

What do you think of this proposal?

David Buck

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"extract" an e-mail from your Amiga?  You make it sound painful.  Thanks
from me.

I can understand why the name wasn't used or kept anyway, sounds very much
like a astronomy program name and many people that work with POV-Ray also
seem to have interests in many of the sciences.
Until I saw a POV magazine (people of vision), and realized POV also means
point of view, I thought the name fit very well since it isn't really a word
in itself.  Kind of a utterance.  Unswayed, I still don't associate those
other meanings when it comes to the program but it kind of fits those
definitions too.  Besides, Persistence of Vision is certainly a fine name.

Pretty incredible really that only a mere handful of people, like you, were
able to meet, collaborate, and grow a ray tracer into maturity as it has
done.

Bob H.

Post a reply to this message

On Tue, 28 Aug 2001 02:06:34 -0500, Bob H. wrote:
>"extract" an e-mail from your Amiga?  You make it sound painful.  Thanks
>from me.

It probably was painful.  It's not as though most Amigas have ethernet 
interfaces, and the standard disk format is unreadable on a DOS machine,
so it would require a little effort.

--
#macro R(L P)sphere{L __}cylinder{L P __}#end#macro P(_1)union{R(z+_ z)R(-z _-z)
R(_-z*3_+z)torus{1__ clipped_by{plane{_ 0}}}translate z+_1}#end#macro S(_)9-(_1-
_)*(_1-_)#end#macro Z(_1 _ __)union{P(_)P(-_)R(y-z-1_)translate.1*_1-y*8pigment{
rgb<S(7)S(5)S(3)>}}#if(_1)Z(_1-__,_,__)#end#end Z(10x*-2,.2)camera{rotate x*90}

Post a reply to this message

Ron Parker wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 28 Aug 2001 02:06:34 -0500, Bob H. wrote:
> >"extract" an e-mail from your Amiga?  You make it sound painful.  Thanks
> >from me.
> 
> It probably was painful.  It's not as though most Amigas have ethernet
> interfaces, and the standard disk format is unreadable on a DOS machine,
> so it would require a little effort.

IIRC, Amiga could read and write DOS floppies (720 KB).
Perhaps not shipped by default, though.

I think the painful part was to reach the Amiga under the
pile of debris in the back of the garage, then search which
of the 5462 floppies contained that damn file.

I think most former Amiga and Atari users have hundreds of
floppies in their garage.

-- 
Adrien Beau - adr### [at] freefr - http://adrien.beau.free.fr
 Mes propos n'engagent que moi et en aucun cas mes employeurs

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Thank God they chose "POV-Ray"! :)

Post a reply to this message

"Tony[B]" wrote:
> Thank God they chose "POV-Ray"! :)

I must admit that however much I love POV-Ray I've never been fond of its
name.

A good name would mean that you could say it to someone else and then they'd
know how to spell it. But with POV-Ray there isn't even agreement on how
it's pronounced. Pee-oh-vee-ray sounds dumb and has to be pronounced a bit
slowly to be clear. Pov-ray sounds like a bit like power-ray and will lead
to confusion too.

Another problem is the "-". Even though it officially is a part of the
written name, it's not always used, which makes searches for POV-Ray (or
Povray ?) more difficult.

Thirdly you have to know the program in order to have a clue about what the
name actually means.

I don't think STAR would be a better name, but I think there ought to be
better alternatives.

But anyway, none of this really matters, because it's about ten years too
late to change...

Rune
--
3D images and anims, include files, tutorials and more:
Rune's World:    http://rsj.mobilixnet.dk (updated June 26)
POV-Ray Users:   http://rsj.mobilixnet.dk/povrayusers/
POV-Ray Webring: http://webring.povray.co.uk

Post a reply to this message

> I must admit that however much I love POV-Ray I've never
> been fond of its name.
>
 > Rune

For me, POV has always meant "point-of-view"  . . . from the
photographic world where it defines the camera location.
I imagine that is how I will alwyas think of it ... but ... it fits.
--
Y

Post a reply to this message

Rune wrote:
> 
> A good name would mean that you could say it to someone else and then they'd
> know how to spell it. But with POV-Ray there isn't even agreement on how
> it's pronounced. Pee-oh-vee-ray sounds dumb and has to be pronounced a bit
> slowly to be clear. Pov-ray sounds like a bit like power-ray and will lead
> to confusion too.

I've always heard it pronounced as two words: "pov" and "ray".

In French, "pov" can sound like "pauvre" (stands for "poor").
However, it sufficiently differs from "pauvre" that nobody
really makes a connection when they first hear the name.
But nevertheless, it allows for some puns in the French speaking
POV newsgroup.  :-)

> Another problem is the "-". Even though it officially is a part of the
> written name, it's not always used, which makes searches for POV-Ray (or
> Povray ?) more difficult.

The official case "POV-Ray" is a bit longer to type.
But "povray" is used as an executable name, not "pov-ray".

It's easy to point mistakes made 10 years ago... :-)

> Thirdly you have to know the program in order to have a clue about what the
> name actually means.

But then, you want to call it "freeware-raytracer v3.1g"?

Java, Blender, Winamp, Emacs, Oracle, QuickTime, Acrobat...
Do all these names mean something meaningful to the clueless
newbie? The real clueless newbie, I mean.

Or would you prefer Microsoft Ray, yet another program in
the Microsoft Office offer.  :-)

-- 
Adrien Beau - adr### [at] freefr - http://adrien.beau.free.fr
 Mes propos n'engagent que moi et en aucun cas mes employeurs

Post a reply to this message

On Tue, 28 Aug 2001 17:31:25 +0200, Adrien Beau wrote:
>
>Or would you prefer Microsoft Ray, yet another program in
>the Microsoft Office offer.  :-)

Is he Microsoft Bob's brother?

-- 
#local R=<7084844682857967,0787982,826975826580>;#macro L(P)concat(#while(P)chr(
mod(P,100)),#local P=P/100;#end"")#end background{rgb 1}text{ttf L(R.x)L(R.y)0,0
translate<-.8,0,-1>}text{ttf L(R.x)L(R.z)0,0translate<-1.6,-.75,-1>}sphere{z/9e3
4/26/2001finish{reflection 1}}//ron.parker@povray.org My opinions, nobody else's

Post a reply to this message

>
> In French, "pov" can sound like "pauvre" (stands for "poor").
> However, it sufficiently differs from "pauvre" that nobody
> really makes a connection when they first hear the name.
> But nevertheless, it allows for some puns in the French speaking
> POV newsgroup.  :-)

We call ourselves "POV-gars", which could sound like "poor guys" :-)

I always pronounced 'POV', and dislike 'Pee Ow Vee'.

> The official case "POV-Ray" is a bit longer to type.
> But "povray" is used as an executable name, not "pov-ray".

Typographically, "POV-Ray" looks very good, IMO.

> Or would you prefer Microsoft Ray, yet another program in
> the Microsoft Office offer.  :-)

Brrrrr..

Fabien.

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