Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 April 2004
VIRTOOL is an application that is part of the European Union supported project “Virtual Manipulation to Simulate Machine-Tool Processes” (VIRTOOL, CRAFT-1999-70292). The application is being developed by a consortium of two industrial enterprises (Alecop, IMH) and three partners in research and higher education (CEIT, TUD, ACM) from four European countries.The objective of this project is to design and develop a computer-supported learning environment for machine-tool processes by using interactive 3D graphics and virtual reality techniques. An integral part of this software will be an easy to use construction tool for the development of new 3D simulation models of machine-tools with the supporting learning material, which is based on a general instructional design model.