Visualising software in virtual reality

Software visualisations of one form or another appear in numerous software maintenance tools. Visualisation is arguably one of the most profitable means of communicating information to a user. As software systems become larger and more complex we find ourselves in greater need for techniques to visualise such large information structures. This paper concentrates on visualising software systems using 3D graphics and VR technology. The main concepts of 3D software visualisation are introduced as well as a set of desirable properties which act as both guidelines for designing a visualisation and also as a framework for evaluating existing visualisations. A prototype visualisation, FileVis, is described and evaluated against these desirable properties