IDF: Intel's 3D User Interface Gets an Collaboration Application

A 3D user interface, called Miramar, developed by Intel Corp. researchers during the late 1990s will be used in an upcoming release of Qwaq Inc.'s Qwaq Forums collaboration tool.

Justin Rattner, Intel's chief technology officer and director of its Corporate Technology Group, plans to highlight the Qwaq deal on Thursday during a planned keynote speech at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco. The next version of Qwaq Forums is due for release next year.

Miramar is "one of those lucky inventions rescued from the trash bin of history," wrote Eleanor Wynn, an enterprise architect for social computing at Intel, in a February blog post.

Miramar was developed by Intel Architecture Labs as a way of using 3D graphics to share information inside a corporation. Now, the interface is being put to use in the next version of Qwaq Forums, a tool that provides a 3D environment, similar to a virtual world, where people can work together online and share information and access to two-dimensional applications.

Some Intel employees are already using Qwaq Forums, and Rattner plans to discuss how the chip maker will use the collaboration tool during his speech.