Introduction — Beyond Walkthroughs

Abstract

Innovative products and shorter time-to-market are essential for the competitiveness of every company. It is therefore very important for the industry to apply new methods and tools of information technology to support the product development, production planning and other processes concerning a product. Virtual reality is one of these enabling technologies. Looking at the history of CAD/CAE techniques, we can identify the trend from pure computation to the support of creative work. In the late 1950’s, systems for finite element analysis, electronic circuit design and NC-programming were introduced to the industry. Ten years later, appeared the first systems for computer aided design with 2D and 3D wireframe graphics. Now, every CAD/CAE system has a window/menu-based interface with shaded 3D models. The enhancements on presentation quality and interactivity of these systems has led to much more efficient support of design and engineering.