Det virtuella kontoret
En litteraturstudie i möjligheter och utmaningar med att använda 3D kollaborativa virtuella miljöer inom distribuerad systemutveckling
Global software developmentDistributed system developmentVirtual realityCollaborative virtual environments3D CVEDistribuerad systemutvecklingVirtuell verklighetKollaborativa virtuella miljöer
Distributed system development is a common occurrence in today?s technological and global world. Because the consequences of its geographically distributed nature it creates barriers between people that affects their communication and collaboration efforts in the distributed context. Despite a lot of technological breakthroughs over the last decades and the occurrence of video-conference applications and other tools for communication and collaboration, cultural and geographical issues have so far not yet been completely resolved. In this study I have made a literature study over distributed system development to form a set of central factors that affects the distributed development process. With these factors in hand, I have made another literature study to compare how these factors are affected within the use of 3D collaborative virtual environments, which is a mixture of virtual reality (VR) and computer supported cooperative work (CSCW). I wanted to study what the opportunities and/or challenges were within using 3D CVEs in a distributed system development context. My findings are that although the technology might be ready to handle such an occurrence, there are still obstacles to really involve it in the already complex context of distributed work. However, there are still some uses within team-building and creation of social ties that could benefit from the 3D CVE technology, and there is a possibility to use this technology within some design phases during a system development project process.