Title :
Virtual-SAP: an immersive tool for visualizing the response of building structures to environmental conditions
Author :
Bowman, Doug A. ; Setareh, Mehdi ; Pinho, Marcio S. ; Ali, Ndiwalana ; Kalita, Alex ; Lee, Yunha ; Lucas, John ; Gracey, Matthew ; Kothapalli, Malini ; Zhu, Qinwei ; Datey, Ameya ; Tumati, Pradeep
Author_Institution :
Dept. of Comput. Sci., Virginia Tech., VA, USA
Abstract :
Immersive virtual environments (VEs) offer interactive, real-time visualization capabilities for engineers, architects, and scientists. This paper presents Virtual-SAP, an immersive VE application allowing users to assess building structures and their response to various environmental conditions through an interactive design-build-test-redesign cycle. Virtual-SAP has three distinct user interfaces that support its use with a high-end, multi-tracker VE system, with a low-cost portable VE system, or on the desktop. Two of these interfaces have been proven highly usable in user testing, and the third will be tested soon. Virtual-SAP is being used for both research and education.
Keywords :
civil engineering computing; data visualisation; human factors; real-time systems; user interfaces; virtual reality; Virtual-SAP; building structures; design-build-test-redesign cycle; environmental conditions; immersive virtual environments; interactive real-time visualization; user interfaces; user testing; Buildings; Computer architecture; Computer graphics; Computer science; Computer science education; Data visualization; Layout; Testing; User interfaces; Virtual environment;
Conference_Titel :
Virtual Reality, 2003. Proceedings. IEEE
Print_ISBN :
0-7695-1882-6
DOI :
10.1109/VR.2003.1191146
