The 3dmov Icon
Location in the BeOS: /demos/3dmov

3dmov helps you show off the power of the BeOS.

3dmov lives in your /demos/ directory, waiting patiently for its chance to show off. Reading the documentation in that folder reveals:

"3dmov is a 3D Kit application which allows you to manipulate 3D objects in real-time, and to drag images and movies onto those interactive 3D objects."

What it doesn't explain is:

"3dmov is a great way to show off the BeOS to your friends and co-workers who look at your computer running the BeOS as if someone just asked them to handle a dead fish and ask 'But what's so good about the BeOS anyway?' in that whiny sort of voice that reminds you of the guy who used to sit behind you in programming class and demanded to know why he shouldn't name his variables after his thirty-seven cats."

Sure, you could (and should) espouse the benefits of a modern multi-threaded, symmetric multiprocessing OS, but as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. And 3dmov is worth a googolplex of words. So as you weave your tale of an OS designed from the ground up for digital media, slide your cursor on over to the demos folder and launch 3dmov.

Witness, the amazing gray spinning cube! Wait, don't go away -- there's more! Now take some images, (there are a bunch conveniently located in /optional/images/) and drop them onto the faces of the cube. The images will render in real-time on the faces of the cube. Ok, that is better than a spinning gray cube, but probably won't shock anyone into having a heart attack. So now drop some movies (/optional/movies/) onto the cube and watch as the movies play at normal speed while being rendered onto the cube in real-time. Oohhh! Aahhh!

3dmov is more than a cube, however. From the Options menu, select Book. The book is a favorite of the Be Demo Gods for good reason. You can "grab" the book, turn it and angle it. Plus you can turn the pages and they will curve and fall just like one of those old-fashioned paper books. Play around with the book and turning the pages at various speeds. Then, drop some movies on the pages. Now when you turn the pages the movies render (in real-time, of course) to the curve of the page. Lift up a page halfway and not only does the movie continue playing, but you can see the movie playing on the page below it.

Of course, the rest of the BeOS remains responsive while you do this. Menus respond and switching to other applications is trivial. In fact, I have four movies in my 3dmov book as I write this. There are more choices under 3dmov's Options menu. Explore them and you'll be ready to show off the power of the BeOS at any time.