Workplace collaboration in a 3D Virtual Office

We describe Virtual Office, an innovative application of virtual world technology for enabling informal office interactions and collaboration even when some of the participants are physically out of office. Each instance of the system is tied to an actual physical office, so the communication and visual channels created among its users are designed to offer the level of privacy in the corresponding real-world office. VirtualOffice supports auras and automated navigation based on logical seats in the office, rather than geometric distances. The system is implemented using a distributed MVC architecture employing a practical combination of (a) push and pull communication, and (b) cloud-based servers. The system is designed to support remote `management by walking around as well as virtually visiting both collaborators' and ones' own offices, thereby enabling informal conversations that seamlessly bridge the physical and virtual worlds. VirtualOffice also represents a new point in both Benford's and Schroeder's taxonomies of collaboration systems that classifies instant messaging, virtual worlds, and video conferencing. A detailed scenario is used to motivate our new design point and compare it with commonly used as well as emerging collaboration applications as well as established virtual worlds such as Second Life, for the specific purpose of informal office collaboration.