A Survey of the Virtual Environments-based Assembly Training Applications

The advent of virtual environments is presenting new ways of trainingtomorrow’s workforce. Virtual environments offer numerous benefits in
training applications. First, virtual environments allow extensive user
interactions in a very convenient and natural manner. This interaction is
greatly beneficial for increasing the user’s retention of spatial information
compared to text-based or video-based instructions that are non-interactive in
nature. Second, virtual environments provide users with a 3D immersive
experience. This feature helps users gain a better understanding of spatial
relationships compared to 2D displays. Third, virtual environments support
multi-media instructions. One can watch standard videos, view 3D animations,
view text instructions, listen to audio instructions, and interact with 3D objects
in the scene. This paper describes representative research and associated
systems that use of virtual environments in assembly training applications.