MDraw - A tool for cooperative work in the MultiG telepresence environment

This paper will discuss MDraw, a tool that supports cooperative work in the Tele-presence environment. The Tele-Presence project lies within a Swedish research program called MultiG, wich does research on distributed multimedia applications and high-speed networks. In the Tele-Presence system, several users can simultaneously reside in a virtual world where they can see graphical representations of each other. MDraw is a simple drawing tool, shaped like a whiteboard, that can be placed in any virtual world where it can be seen and accessed by all users present. The whiteboard supports the creation and manipulation of simple objects, like lines and ellipses, and also offers a video function that gives users the ability to display a live video picture on the board. Drawing is accomplished by using a wand, which is a six-dimensional interaction device...