Collaborative Design with NetDraw

Abstract

The paper describes NetDraw, a Java-based object oriented drawing program that employs a server-client architecture to provide a shared drawing environment for collaborative design. NetDraw goes beyond conventional shared whiteboard applications in its support for concurrency control, groups and constraints, and ephemeral gesture objects. Small and simple enough that users can learn it quickly, NetDraw is designed to run on small platforms such as handheld computers. We describe NetDraw's features and an early evaluation of its use.