A Virtual Office Environment Supporting Shared Applications

A virtual environment supporting communication and cooperation can increase both the effectiveness and the acceptance of multi-user applications. This paper describes the basic concepts as well as a prototypical implementation of such an environment based on a virtual office metaphor. Users, rooms, and documents are modelled in a rather abstract way, providing an intuitive but not necessarily realistic way to access multi-user sessions. The implementation is based on the GINA application framework which provides generic concepts to support the development of multiuser applications, facilitating the integration of shared applications into the virtual environment. Communication and cooperation between users are supported using different techniques such as animation, video and audio support.