Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
27.2 PREVIOUS WORK RELATED TO
COLLABORATIVE TECHNOLOGIES
A brief review of the literature with respect to digital collaborative work-
spaces, tiled display environments, multitouch systems, and multiuser interac-
tion techniques is presented next to better outline the capabilities, techniques,
and tools that may be harnessed for the creation of new collaborative tech-
nologies and environments for biomedical research.
27.2.1
Collaborative Digital Workspaces
Digital colocated collaborative workspaces have shown great potential for
enabling a multiuser approach for scientifi c analysis [14]. Heer and Agrawala
outline the strengths and challenges for multiuser environments in their paper,
“ Design Considerations for Collaborative Visual Analytics ” [11] . “ The offi ce
of the future” project demonstrated a collaborative virtual working environ-
ment for the workplace. Churchill et al. examined the history of these types
of spaces, the technical issues and challenges these systems present, and the
types of applications enabled through this technology [14]. Taesombut et al.
explored real-time collaborative efforts to analyze earth science data on tiled-
display systems [10]. Scott et al. examined how to develop colocated collabora-
tive workspaces for tabletop environments [15]. Shen et al. continued in the
same direction and developed a software architecture for multiuser table
interactions [16]. Peltonen et al. studied how multiple users interacted on a
multitouch-enabled display wall [17], analyzing how users negotiated their
interaction space and how confl icts between users were resolved.
27.2.2
Large - Scale Multitile Display Environments
Large - scale, ultra - high - resolution display environments have emerged as
viable solution for coping with some aspect of the data avalanche, allowing
sizable data collections to be colocated to literally help with presenting the
“big picture” in conjunction with being able to explore varying levels of details
intuitively and interactively by traversing through the data with power-of-10
capabilities. Rendering content on tiled-display systems is not a straightfor-
ward task though. Various paradigms have been derived in order to present a
uniform visual environment across the entire display space. Each of these
paradigms presents unique advantages and challenges for domain experts
(users) and developers alike. The advantages and disadvantages of the various
approaches is briefl y outlined below since they defi ne possible use scenarios
in the context of collaborative biomedical research.
27.2.2.1 Geometry Forwarding
One way of controlling tiled-display walls
is to create a virtual unifi ed display as shown by Chromium [18] and OpenSG
[19]. This method forwards each call made to the graphics card on the head
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