ACADIA DESIGN COMPETITION FAQ

A C A D I A

A S S O C I A T I O N F O R C O M P U T E R A I D E D D E S I G N I N A R C H I T E C T U R E

LIBRARY FOR THE
INFORMATION AGE

The 1998 ACADIA
International Design
Competition

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

If you have questions about the competition, please check the questions and answers listed below. If you do not find the answer to your question here, please email Branko Kolarevic using branko@hku.hk

Earlier Questions

Competition News

The Competition is Finished.

The results are in!

Check out the Winners!

There was a tremendous amount of great work done for this competition. We hope that you will continue to watch this space for another ACADIA Internet Competition starting next year!

When will I receive confirmation of my registration status?

(11/15/98) Email confirmations should be sent out very shortly. If you did not give us an email address, or if your email is returned as "undeliverable", we will attempt to confirm your status by postal mail. If you do not receive some form of mail from us by December 1, 1998, please contact us via email at acadia@psu.edu.

I need to change the web-address where the competition entry will be presented. How do I do that?

(11/15/98) Contact us via email at acadia@psu.edu BEFORE December 31, 1998. Be sure to include the name of the team member under which you originally registered, so we are sure to update the correct record.

What is the final list of plug-ins?

(11/15/98) You should expect the judges to be able to handle the following data formats (or plugin's) as a minimum:

Plugin	version	download link
Multimedia		Shockwave/Flash
VRML	2.0	Cosmoplayer, Worldview
Animation		Quicktime
Streaming Audio & Video	5.0	RealPlayer

This list may be expanded slightly in the next few days. Be sure to check back.

We have gotten a URL (web address) on a server which limits us to 10 MB. Knowing that it is not very much to be able to present our project, we would like to know if it is possible to send you a CD-ROM?

(12/2/98) No, we don't accept CD-ROMs. Web pages only..

We find that we will not be able to prepare a competition entry after-all. Is it possible to get a refund of our professional-status entry fee?

(12/2/98) Sorry, no refunds.

Has the organizing committee defined a technical standard for the displays, i.e. screen resolution and bit depth.

(12/2/98) Please see The submissions page for a description of the submission requirements. There is a line there that states that the "pages will be viewed at the resolution of 1024 by 768 pixels".

Will the judges be using Macs or PCs to view the entry web sites? (I ask because slight variations in file formats make ensuring total cross-platform compatibility for all but the most basic media extremely tedious and difficult.)

(12/2/98) We expect jurors to use both platforms (and possibly others, such as unix).

Which VRML browser will the judges have available for viewing VRML content? (May I cast my vote for Silicon Graphics' Cosmo 2.0?)

(12/2/98) You should make sure that you save your VRML files in version 2.0. The Cosmo browser may be used, but other VRML plug-ins may be used too.

Will the judges be using computers with at least basic audio hardware? (I guess this only applies in the case of PCs...)

(12/2/98) Yes, we expect them to have access to Macs/PCs with audio.

I am a student and I sent the copy of my shool ID as a proof. But i have another team member. and i did not send the copy of his ID. Should I also send the copy of his ID?

(12/2/98) Yes, please send a copy to Loukas Kalisperis and attach an explanation..

The aim of the competition is to design a "library for the information age". So the "information age" not only refers to "information and current technology related to it" but also includes visions of future information technologies, I want to ask you, to what extend the solution should be a real building project. Do we have to make a design, that could be realized today, or may there be proposals for future information handling with visions of future abilities, that are not posible nowadays.Or may/should this be part of the design decision.

(12/2/98) It's all part of the design decision.

How do I add new members into my team?

(12/2/98) You can't add new members into your team. The registration is now closed.

We are working as a team and were wondering if we could include a page on our site about us? It might include some bio info and pics. Is this appropriate for the competition?

(12/2/98) No, it is not. The jurors are interested in your design and not in who you are.

If you win one of the prizes, then you may want to add some biographical information to the web site, since we intend to publish the web addresses of the winning proposals.

I work with the metric unit scale of design. Can I work and participate have in mind this design unit?

(12/2/98) Yes, you can use metric units.

Will student entries and professional entries be judged separately?

(12/2/98) No; all entries are judged in a single category.

I'm planning to publish my web page on January 30, 1999 which is in accordance with the competition time schedule on the dates page. Would you please confirm me if my understanding of the deadline is right?

(1/14/99) The deadline for the submission of entries is January 31, 1999. Earlier submission is perfectly acceptable. Later submission is not.

We have received the general e mail re conditions for web pages and note with dismay that Macromedia's Flash player is not mentioned. The link from the FAQ page re multimedia takes you directly to the Shockwave and Flash page , hence we were under the impression flash movies would be used as well...

(1/14/99) The Macromedia's web site has a player plug-in that can play both the Shockwave *AND* Flash files. That is the player that the jurors will have on their machines. The jurors should be able to view your files with that player. I suggest you download that player and test it with your files (please let us know what the outcome is).