3D collaborative virtual environment for real-time GUI sketching

This paper describes the findings from 3 user studies conducted to identify the real functional and awareness information requirements of a group of graphical user interface (GUI) designers while they carry out a GUI sketching task. Special attention was paid to the natural and software restrictions, participants’ interaction and the way they use the information about the workspace, the team, the artifacts and the tasks. These findings are used in the design of a collaborative virtual environment in which designers can perform the task in a very natural, friendly and efficient way. The system built is explained in detail, remarking its architecture and functional improvements compared to similar existing programs. As future work, some already scheduled tasks are described and additional functionalities and possible improvements are proposed, so that the tool can be complemented.