From: torg@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Grant R. Davis)
Subject: Desktop Engineering
Date: 18 Oct 91 21:59:55 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX



Is there a software package that allows you to design something (like a CAD)
and then perform structural analyses on it?

	If not, why not? I think it would be a great way to implement some
multi-user VR. There could be a giant model of the entire plane on a mainframe
somewhere with all the different reactions to the loads it would have. Then,
if someone wanted to work on a particular section of the structure, they could
'carve out' a section of the design and download the drawings and the loads to
their workstation. Then they could change something and use the loads to 
determine right away whether or not it would fail.

	Users could access the 'virtual prototype' to find out who was working
on some part at a particular time, and even talk to them over the network. One 
of the hardest things in engineering is finding people that you need to talk
to (computer, where is Mr. Laforge? :-).

	Someone has probably already done this and I'm just ignorant, or it's
probably totally unfeasible, but I thought I would put this idea down before
I forgot it.

Grant Davis