Shared 3D environments within a virtual prototyping environment

The goal of the Virtual Prototyping Environment (VPE) is to decrease product development time and costs and to increase quality and flexibility by providing continuous computer support for the development cycle. Virtual prototypes are directly derived from integrated CAD systems, enriched with simulation data. In addition, the VPE supports cooperative teams by providing different computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) techniques of shared viewing environments in combination with tools for long distance collaboration. One aspect of CSCW in VPEs are multi-user and multi-application Shared 3D Environments. In the shared environment model, three dimensional objects from different applications can be joined into one scene that can be viewed by different users with independent or shared camera positions, enabling the distribution of visualization tasks between smaller, flexible and more specialized applications