Virtual home design software is a type of computer-aided design software intended to help

architects An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

, designers, and homeowners preview their design implementations on-the-fly. These products differ from traditional homeowner design software and other online design tools in that they use

HTML5 HTML5 is a markup language used for structuring and presenting content on the World Wide Web. It is the fifth and final major HTML version that is a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommendation. The current specification is known as the HTML ...

to ensure that changes to the design occur rapidly. This category of

software as a service Software as a service (SaaS ) is a software licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted. SaaS is also known as "on-demand software" and Web-based/Web-hosted software. SaaS is con ...

puts an emphasis on usability, speed, and customization.

Background

Homeowners,

contractors A general contractor, main contractor or prime contractor is responsible for the day-to-day oversight of a construction site, management of vendors and trades, and the communication of information to all involved parties throughout the course of ...

, and architects use virtual home exterior design software to help visualize changes to designs. Since virtual home design suites that use HTML5 are able to rapidly propagate changes to the home design, users can A/B test designs much more efficiently than with previous iterations of online design software. Virtual home design software has found widespread usage among homeowners who have suffered property damage, as server-side, HTML5-based design software is ideal for homeowners who wish to see what certain products will look like on damaged areas of their houses.

Examples

Several manufacturers use virtual home design software to display their products online. These companies that utilize virtual home design software include GAF Materials Corporation, James Hardie, Exterior Portfolio, and CertainTeed. Some companies, such as Design My Exterior, have built virtual home design software that is not limited to products or brands in order to allow for greater flexibility by the end-user. Design My Exterior also uses ImageMapster in order to generate a greater range of options with less processing time. Live Home 3D is a virtual home design software for Microsoft Windows and

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...

Future applications

Several companies are experimenting with virtual reality for architecture. They design virtual homes and allow customers to walk around with the help of a VR headset (such as the Occulus Rift). This way, customers get a realistic, true-to-scale idea of the end result.

References

{{Reflist Computer-aided design software Architectural design Interior design