Real time multi-user interaction with 3D graphics via communication networks

There is a lot of development currently being carried out on cooperative visualization via communication networks. User interaction is kept to minimum in this kind of development, such as only making marks on the transmitted images, etc. There is relatively less work being done on complicated cooperative interactions, especially real-time cooperative interaction via networks. The work presented in this paper is a challenge to this type of cooperative work. The objective of the system is to allow multiple users to design a 3D scene cooperatively via communication networks in real time. The paper describes the design and communication model of the system, the design and implementation of the protocol to transmit changes in the 3D scene, the database consistency techniques and the implementation of the 3D editor interface. The current implementation status of the system shows that a real-time, full user interaction in 3D cooperative design via communication networks is achievable by our design strategy.