Today, engineers have to interact with manufacturers, part suppliers, customers and many others flung far across the planet. While globalized commerce continues to dramatically expand, the ability of engineers to simply and securely communicate high-fidelity 3D data on that global stage is only just emerging.
One of the key technologies driving this communications change is a ubiquitous piece of Internet technology: the browser. Combining those web portals with 3D developer tools is making it possible to transform browsers into customizable viewers in which any manner of data can be streamed from machine to machine, regardless of geography.
For the past few years, HOOPS Communicator has enabled developers with tools to bring CAD to the browser. With HOOPS Communicator, developers can create bespoke environments where CAD data can be streamed to clients. With these streams, vendors can view designs, understand the design intent and make better product decisions.
In the latest edition of HOOPS Communicator, much of the software has been revamped in an effort to accommodate even larger CAD models. Now HOOPS Communicator comes packaged with an entirely new kernel dedicated to engineering graphics needs.
“HOOPS Communicator now combines sophisticated graphics performance, advanced streaming capabilities and model editing functionality so that even demanding and large-scale data sets can be accessed and viewed on the web with speed and ease,” said Guido Hoffman, HOOPS Communicator product manager.
In addition to its upgraded graphics handling, HOOPS Communicator also now provides two options for streaming data. Data can be steamed using an automatic “intelligent” mode in which no user interaction is needed from the owner of the CAD file. However, if, say, a model being streamed contains a number of feature-rich parts, or it’s just an enormous assembly, HOOPS Communicator provides a second option that allows users to selectively stream components to cut down on bandwidth requirements.
Though streaming a CAD file can give a distant user information that can’t be conveyed in 2D drawings, it’s little more than a parlor trick if the model can’t be interrogated. To that end, HOOPS Communicator includes all of a model’s geometric data within the stream, making it possible for third-party users to get a precise view of the product and components they’re viewing.
Finally, the HOOPS Communicator 2016 release also includes upgrades to its server components, making it easier to scale streaming services, especially if those components are hosted in the cloud.