Network Visualisation and Virtual Reality

Abstract

Networks are an integral part of computing systems and have, in recent years, been incorporated in all fields especially within the business and scientific areas. However, despite the increased interest and application of networks to business and other institutes network management still remains a complex task.

The ultimate goal of this project is to investigate how applicable virtual reality is to the subject of network management. Virtual Reality enables us to create a visual metaphor to represent our network. In addition, it also enables us the use of novel and ingenious input devices to provide a natural and intuitive form of navigation and interaction with the data. The visual metaphor allows network administrators to apply intuitive reasoning and perception to manage the network by observing and manipulating the visual representation. We will show that Virtual Reality can adequately represent a local area network and all its data.

Participants

Technical Reports

[1] Melekam Tsegaye. Network visualisation with 3d metaphors. Technical Report Honours Project Report, Virtual Reality Special Interest Group, Computer Science Department, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa, November 2001. [PDF] [BibTeX]

[2] Wilfred Schmidt. Network visualization in virtual reality. Technical Report Honours Project Report, Virtual Reality Special Interest Group, Computer Science Department, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa, November 1999. [DOC] [PDF] [BibTeX]

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