AgentCAD is a network infrastructure of distributed CAD applications. It facilitates the concurrent and cooperative interaction of several designers working together on a design project, possibly across several physical locations. It provides a set of services and protocols that support the communication of distributed design information captured by CAD drawings, multiple design views, and design changes. It coordinates access to a common and multiple design models as well as the activities of designers based on captured knowledge of designers' tasks, capabilities, and interests, which characterize their behaviors. The idea of AgentCAD represents a departure from the usual way in which CAD applications are used as single-user tools, applied to one view of specific design problems. In describing the AgentCAD environment, I discuss the organization of AgentCAD, its communication model, and the cooperative interaction protocols for designers in the context of a design scenario.

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