Extra Dimensions: 3D and Time in PDF Documentation
Experimental science is replete with multi-dimensional information which is often poorly represented by the two dimensions of presentation slides and print media. Past efforts to disseminate such information to a wider audience have failed for a number of reasons, including a lack of standards which are easy to implement and have broad support. Adobe's Portable Document Format (PDF) has in recent years become the de facto standard for secure, dependable electronic information exchange. It has done so by creating an open format, providing support for multiple platforms and being reliable and extensible. By providing support for the ECMA standard Universal 3D (U3D) file format in its free Adobe Reader software, Adobe has made it easy to distribute and interact with 3D content. By providing support for scripting and animation, temporal data can also be easily distributed to a wide, non-technical audience. We discuss how the field of radiation imaging could benefit from incorporating full 3D information about not only the detectors, but also the results of the experimental analyses, in its electronic publications. In this article, we present examples drawn from high-energy physics, mathematics and molecular biology which take advantage of this functionality. We demonstrate how 3D detector elements can be documented, using either CAD drawings or other sources such as GEANT visualizations as input.
- Research Organization:
- SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC02-76SF00515
- OSTI ID:
- 1038418
- Report Number(s):
- SLAC-REPRINT-2012-012
- Journal Information:
- JINST 6:C01053,2011, Journal Name: JINST 6:C01053,2011
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Extra Dimensions: 3D and Time in PDF Documentation
Extra Dimensions: 3D in PDF Documentation