Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
virtual world implementation is needed to achieve desired business outcomes; and (3) create
a practical framework that represents the varying levels of both functionality and capability
for establishing and maintaining virtual workspaces. In this chapter the authors propose the
ROTATOR model to establish a series of incremental stages that form the foundation for a
virtual workspace framework.
As a foundation for this analysis, the concepts, history and use of the terms virtual
collaboration and virtual workspaces are also discussed in this article to clarify their import
and use in industry. These discussions include a description of the recent evolution of
virtual collaborative environments with a focus on the most important online global
workforce drivers. The impact of other key technologies with respect to the ROTATOR
Model within the virtual workspace arena including cloud computing, semantic web, and
web 3-D are also discussed.
2. Defining the collaborative virtual workspace landscape
Over the past few decades, computing sciences has grappled with different approaches to
presenting digitally generated content. In recent years the field of virtual reality (VR) has
become one of the most intriguing technologies in the area of content presentation.
Although most people tend to relate virtual reality to its use in more common entertainment
arenas like gaming, the real impacts are in the broader areas of the, “arts, business,
communication, design, education, engineering, medicine and many other fields” (Briggs,
1996). Over the last 15 years, John Brigg's prediction has proven to be correct--the biggest
impacts of virtual reality technology use are now being felt especially in the business,
communication and medical fields (Briggs, 1996). While the virtual world technology is still
evolving and developing, it has finally matured to a level where we are routinely
implementing it in whole or part in educational and business settings. The issue for businesses
seems to be less one of will they implement VR technology in workspaces, but rather more one
of how it will be done and in what sequence investment in the requisite technology will be
made. This includes considering not just current VR technology but also requires
understanding the likely evolution and trajectory of the technology development in the future.
Additionally, savvy users should ask themselves now what other technologies are being or
might be co-implemented to supplement the virtual environments along the way.
Appropriate planning and scaling of implementation of VR technologies based on knowing
your industry goals, your company's historical and future growth patterns, your immediate
real needs and your tolerance for risk are all crucial to planning implementation of VR
platforms and workspaces. Poor planning for implementation of VR workspaces or any new
technology may result in unnecessary risk exposure, cost overruns and simple ineffective
use of costly infrastructure that is both unnecessary and/or inefficient. While there are
many studies of the implementation of virtual, mixed and augmented reality spaces most or
many of those have been focused on education and medical uses (Caudell & Mizell,
1992)(Steuer, 1992) (Barfield & Caudell, 2001) (van Krevelen & Poelman, 2010). Before
considering the available studies and their place in the ROTATOR model though it's
important to understand exactly what virtual reality is and how it is affected by other
technologies like augmented reality. Additionally as cloud computing becomes more widely
used in industry we will consider how that storage process along with some other most
common storage processes may affect the implementation plan for VR workspaces in a
