A Translator for Converting CAD Models to Second Life

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ratnadeep Paul ◽  
Sam Anand
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Worlds ◽  
Second Life ◽  
Product Life Cycle ◽  
Manufacturing Industry ◽  
Product Information ◽  
Life Cycle Management ◽  
3D Models ◽  
Transfer Product ◽  
Cad Models ◽  
Business Entities

Product Life-cycle Management (PLM) has been one of the single most important techniques to have been developed in the manufacturing industry. The increasing capabilities of internet and the ever increasing dependence of business entities on internet have led to the development of metaverses — internet-based 3D virtual worlds — which act as business platforms where companies display and showcase their latest products and services. This is in turn has led to a demand for development of methods for the easy transfer of data from stand alone PLM systems to the internet based virtual worlds. This paper presents the development of a translator which will transfer product data of 3D models created in CAD systems to an internet based virtual world. This translator uses a faceted-surface approach to transfer the product information. In this work CAD models were converted to a CAD-neutral data format, JT file format, and finally recreated in the metaverse Second Life (SL). Examples of models translated from JT to SL have been presented. A technique known as prim optimization, which increases the efficiency of the translation was also incorporated in the algorithm for the translator. Examples of prim optimization have been provided in the paper.

scholarly journals Virtual Reality Application of the Fortress Al Zubarah in Qatar Including Performance Analysis of Real-Time Visualisation

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Kersten ◽  
Daniel Drenkhan ◽  
Simon Deggim
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Reality ◽  
Real Time ◽  
Virtual Worlds ◽  
3D Models ◽  
Frame Rate ◽  
Computer Hardware ◽  
Head Mounted Display ◽  
Digital World ◽  
Cad Models ◽  
Game Engines

AbstractTechnological advancements in the area of Virtual Reality (VR) in the past years have the potential to fundamentally impact our everyday lives. VR makes it possible to explore a digital world with a Head-Mounted Display (HMD) in an immersive, embodied way. In combination with current tools for 3D documentation, modelling and software for creating interactive virtual worlds, VR has the means to play an important role in the conservation and visualisation of cultural heritage (CH) for museums, educational institutions and other cultural areas. Corresponding game engines offer tools for interactive 3D visualisation of CH objects, which makes a new form of knowledge transfer possible with the direct participation of users in the virtual world. However, to ensure smooth and optimal real-time visualisation of the data in the HMD, VR applications should run at 90 frames per second. This frame rate is dependent on several criteria including the amount of data or number of dynamic objects. In this contribution, the performance of a VR application has been investigated using different digital 3D models of the fortress Al Zubarah in Qatar with various resolutions. We demonstrate the influence on real-time performance by the amount of data and the hardware equipment and that developers of VR applications should find a compromise between the amount of data and the available computer hardware, to guarantee a smooth real-time visualisation with approx. 90 fps (frames per second). Therefore, CAD models offer a better performance for real-time VR visualisation than meshed models due to the significant reduced data volume.

scholarly journals Methodology for User-Centered Innovation in Industrial Living Lab

2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angelo Corallo ◽  
Maria Elena Latino ◽  
Grazia Neglia
Keyword(s):  
Product Life Cycle ◽  
Manufacturing Industry ◽  
New Products ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Life Cycle Management ◽  
Industrial Sector ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Research Activities ◽  
Living Lab ◽  
User Centered

In the last years the Living Labs (LLs) approach is becoming really important to test new products/services in real-life settings. Following the perspective of user-centered innovation emerged by the critical review of the existing international LLs’ methodologies, this paper describes how, in the Living Lab related to KHIRA research project, research activities and innovation are integrated, according to a public-private-person partnership (PPPP), to develop innovation processes, participated and user-centered, in the industrial sector. The LL related to KHIRA research project involves several users categories: industrial partners, universities and research centers, SMEs belonging to Apulian manufacturing industry, public administrations, and other users. A heterogeneous users’ community can produce new ideas of products and services oriented to solve real industrial problems as those related to the product life-cycle management (PLM) in complex manufacturing environments. Purpose of this study is to present a methodology that can be used in the industrial LLs aimed at developing new products/services in complex environments, bridging the existing gap between the LLs’ activities management and those aimed to develop user-centered innovation.

Product Data Integration and Management Research Based on XML

2010 ◽  
Vol 118-120 ◽  
pp. 957-961
Author(s):  
Chen Guang Guo ◽  
Yong Xian Liu ◽  
Shou Ming Hou ◽  
Hua Long Xie
Keyword(s):  
Information Technology ◽  
Product Life Cycle ◽  
Product Information ◽  
Integrated Management ◽  
Life Cycle Management ◽  
Heterogeneous Data ◽  
Enterprise Information ◽  
Product Data ◽  
Product Life Cycle Management ◽  
Schema Translation

Product information technology has been widely applied in manufacturing field, improved the rapid response ability of enterprises to the market demands, and to some extent enhanced the competitiveness of enterprise products. However, product data information generated by different information system has the characteristics of diversification and differentiation. The integration and management of these product heterogeneous data has become the bottleneck which restricts the development of enterprise information technology. Based on XML, this paper researches the integration and management of heterogeneous data, expounds integration structure of heterogeneous data, introduces integration process and schema mapping of heterogeneous data, and realizes schema translation of heterogeneous data. Finally, through the PLM XML schema which is provided by the product life-cycle management software, this paper verifies the integrated management of relational heterogeneous data on Teamcenter.

scholarly journals Virtual Archaeology in Second Life and OpenSimulator

2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Luís Miguel Sequeira ◽  
Leonel Caseiro Morgado
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Worlds ◽  
Second Life ◽  
Virtual World ◽  
3D Models ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
The Public ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
Virtual Archaeology ◽  
Novel Approach ◽  
Traditional Approaches

Traditional approaches to virtual archaeology include dealing with research methods to capture information from heritage sites, creating models out of that information and how to present them to the public; these are intense technical procedures which might be too costly for some types of history or heritage-based projects. Virtual worlds allowed new types of models of/for heritage sites to be produced and disseminated at a fraction of the cost.Second Life®, and its open source counterpart, OpenSimulator, are virtual world platforms with user-generated content. 3D models are created in real time and instantly rendered for all visitors. This allows amateurs and researchers create their own virtual archaeology projects easily and with few costs, and to have the resulting models immediately available to a vast community of users. This article presents an overview of four different approaches to virtual archaeology projects that are present in these platforms and that have been publicly discussed and analyzed; in particular, the last type shows a novel approach to virtual archaeology which is not found in other platforms, and explains how researchers have managed to extend the concept to new areas and develop methodologies to incorporate the validation of historical accuracy to encompass these areas.

An Agent Based Framework to Automatically Generate 3D CAD Models of Customer Specified Products

2003 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zahed Siddique ◽  
Karunakar Reddy Boddu
Keyword(s):  
Mass Customization ◽  
3D Model ◽  
Product Information ◽  
3D Models ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Agent Based ◽  
User Input ◽  
3D Cad ◽  
Design And Manufacturing ◽  
Cad Models

To survive in today’s volatile market, companies are striving to deliver greater quality, more customization, faster response, more innovative designs and lower prices. The new shift in the current market has introduced the concept of mass customization. One of the aspects of mass customization is to provide customers with products that are manufactured to their needs and requirements. To provide such a support requires better integration of customer with different stages of design and manufacturing. Expansion of the Internet provides an opportunity for such an integration, which will need to link design and manufacturing of the company with the customer. In current approaches, customer usually specifies the options and gets the price or simple pictures of the object. In this paper a system is presented, where customer options and size parameters are gathered using the Internet and is used to automatically generate 3D CAD model of the product and then display the 3D model to the customer for feedback. Development of a framework to generate 3D models from user input will require maintaining explicit correspondence among various types of product information from a module perspective. The Internet based system presented in this paper uses templates to automatically generate 3D CAD models of components, assemble them into products and then export VRML files that are displayed to the customer.

Towards Identifying the Elements of a Minimum Information Model for Use in a Model-Based Definition

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander McDermott Miller ◽  
Nathan W. Hartman ◽  
Thomas Hedberg ◽  
Allison Barnard Feeney ◽  
Jesse Zahner
Keyword(s):  
Research Study ◽  
Product Information ◽  
3D Models ◽  
Information Model ◽  
Manufacturing Companies ◽  
Minimum Information ◽  
3D Cad ◽  
Model Based ◽  
Cad Models ◽  
Industry Sectors

The Model-Based Enterprise (MBE) paradigm is being adopted by manufacturing companies in a variety of industries. Companies benefit from enhanced visualization, documentation, and communication capabilities when 3D annotated product definitions, or Model-Based Definitions (MBD) replace two-dimensional drawings throughout an enterprise. It is critical that product information, much of which is defined implicitly in drawings, is not lost in this transition. This presents a challenge to authors and translators of 3D models used through the product lifecycle. They must understand the semantics of the product information typically presented by a drawing then explicitly include this information, in a computer-interpretable form, in the MBD. The research study described in this paper seeks to discover what is the minimum set of required information to carry out all the tasks in a given workflow of a model-based enterprise. A survey was conducted across various industry sectors to identify the foundational elements of this Minimum Information Model (MIM) in selected workflows. This study identified the information used within the specific workflows, the capabilities of 3D CAD models to carry this information, and the implications for doing so.

scholarly journals Application of Artificial Intelligence and Collaborative Knowledge for Manufacturing Design

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Tingting Luo ◽  
Guangyao Li ◽  
Naijiang Yu
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Big Data ◽  
Decision Support ◽  
Collaborative Design ◽  
Product Life Cycle ◽  
Manufacturing Industry ◽  
Product Information ◽  
Rapid Development ◽  
Influence Coefficient ◽  
Sensitivity Index

With the rapid development of science and technology, digital technology has brought the world economy and management into a new stage. Collaborative design can realize product design process by cross-regional and cross-industry designers and share and exchange product information through network. With the rapid development of big data and artificial intelligence, knowledge services have gradually developed into multirole collaborative design activities based on artificial intelligence decision support. Traditional manufacturing industry has gradually transformed into modern manufacturing service industry after integrating information technology means such as Internet, communication, computer, and modern management methods. This article focuses on artificial intelligence decision support systems and the complex product manufacturing industry. We present a detailed analysis of how to integrate the knowledge generated by the product life cycle in the era of big data. We calculate the influence coefficient and sensitivity index of four different industries and propose a metadata architecture to improve the value of products as a whole. The findings of the research study imply that a knowledge-based collaborative platform should be designed by the enterprises and industries and a platform-based construction approach for economical, practical, and reliable production. We also present a detailed discussion about other factors such as the network cost of symmetric services, raw data and forecast data, and the number of nodes and the processing complexity.

A New ISO 10303 (STEP) Resource for Modeling Parameterization and Constraints

2004 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 339-351 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael J. Pratt
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Product Life Cycle ◽  
3D Models ◽  
Cad Model ◽  
Product Life ◽  
Cad Systems ◽  
International Standard ◽  
Cad Models ◽  
Constraint Information ◽  
Iso 10303

ISO 10303 (STEP) is a standard for the electronic exchange of product life-cycle data. It has been continually expanded by the addition of new capabilities since its first release by ISO in 1994. Until now, the standard has not been capable of exchanging models with parameterization and constraints such as those commonly generated by modern CAD systems. This makes it difficult to modify a model for any purpose following an exchange. However, new STEP resources have been developed to rectify this situation, and the paper reports on the the first of them to reach International Standard status. It provides the capability to associate explicitly represented parameterization and constraint information with CAD models. The primary application areas are in the 2D profiles or sketches that are inherent in many CAD model constructional procedures, in the positioning and orientation of features in 3D models and in the positioning and orientation of assembly components. Other complementary new STEP resources are briefly discussed at the end of the paper.

scholarly journals Second Life as a research environment: avatar-based focus groups (AFG)

2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eman Gadalla ◽  
Ibrahim Abosag ◽  
Kathy Keeling
Keyword(s):  
Focus Groups ◽  
Data Quality ◽  
Virtual Worlds ◽  
Second Life ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Marketing Research ◽  
Two Phase ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages

Purpose – This study aims to examine the nature and the potential use of avatar-based focus groups (AFGs) (i.e. focus groups conducted in three-dimensional [3D] virtual worlds [VWs]) as compared to face-to-face and online focus groups (OFGs), motivated by the ability of VWs to stimulate the realism of physical places. Over the past decade, there has been a rapid increase in using 3D VWs as a research tool. Design/methodology/approach – Using a two-phase reflective approach, data were collected first by using traditional face-to-face focus groups, followed by AFGs. In Phase 2, an online, semi-structured survey provided comparison data and experiences in AFGs, two-dimensional OFGs and traditional face-to-face focus groups. Findings – The findings identify the advantages and disadvantages of AFGs for marketing research. There is no evident difference in data quality between the results of AFGs and face-to-face focus groups. AFG compensates for some of the serious limitations associated with OFGs. Practical implications – The paper reflects on three issues, data quality, conduct of AFGs (including the moderator reflection) and participant experience, that together inform one’s understanding of the characteristics, advantages and limitations of AFG. Originality/value – This is the first paper to compare between AFGs, traditional face-to-face focus groups and OFGs. AFG holds many advantages over OFGs and even, sometimes, over face-to-face focus groups, providing a suitable environment for researchers to collect data.

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