e-tipi sounds like a weird name for a web-based service, and when you find out it stands for “Espresso Thinking Platform,” things don’t become much clearer. But once you find out what the app’s developers think “Espresso Thinking” is, then you start to get the idea:
“We believe that sharing an espresso in a nice café creates a particular atmosphere that frees minds and promotes promising ideas to expressly appear. This is what we call Espresso Thinking.”
It’s a nice thought, but is that really something that can be captured in a web-based environment? I recently talked about the same kind of collaboration (lack of coffee products notwithstanding) in an article about my beloved sketchbook, so I was eager to find out if I could recreate the experience digitally using e-tipi. Read the rest of this entry »
Over on the OStatic blog, Lisa Hoover covered Luminotes, which has been around for a while, but just became completely free and open source, for anyone to use. It’s a note-taking and wiki-building tool that you can either use online or offline, collaborating with others, or just collecting notes and information on your own. I’ve been working with it, and I think a lot of people will like it for its ease of use and flexibility.
Read the rest of this entry »
Document collaboration with distributed teams can be a bit of a headache, as I’ve noted in previous posts. No doubt, if you’ve ever tried it yourself, you don’t need me to remind you. More tools are available than ever before for getting this kind of work done, but with a plethora of choices comes a conundrum. What kind of tool works best for collaborating on a single document? A specialized web app, a wiki, something like iWork.com that integrates with your word processing program, or a Google Docs/Zoho Writer shared document? I’ve yet to find a definite answer, but not for lack of trying.
Revizr is a new app that combines wiki elements with change tracking features that preserves the integrity of your original document, so you can see exactly what your collaborators have added (or taken away) from your copy. And it does so in an app that’s so easy to use, you’re actually using it the moment you visit its homepage for the first time. In order to manipulate your own documents, and work together with others, you will have to sign up, but if you’re just looking for a taste of what Revizr can do before you enroll, the trial is the site itself. Read the rest of this entry »
As much as I try not to, I still like paper for some things. Boring, plain old paper, with all its failings and negative environmental impact. It seems a chore to pull out my iPhone or log in to Google Docs every time I want to make a note or write down someone’s number. Still, I want to keep trying to kick my paper habit, if only to establish a more clutter-free lifestyle.
A new web app called NotePub seems to be devised around the principle that, for computerized note-taking to be as useful as the paper kind, it should also be as simple and hassle-free. Accordingly, NotePub is built around the concept of an easy-to-edit wiki.
Read the rest of this entry »
Last week I wrote an article about Liferay, an open source portal app. Today, I’ll be looking at another option, Cyn.in, from Cynapse, an enterprise software solution provider.
Cyn.in is an open source collaboration app, and as such only offers a portion of the functionality of Liferay, but those looking for a more pure collaboration platform, and not a full-fledged intranet, may find it more tailored to their specific needs.
Cyn.in is centralized software that collects all of your basic collaboration software, like blogs, wikis, discussion boards, etc. It also supports file sharing and repositories. I tried the live demo to get a sense of what Cyn.in has to offer, with a special focus on how it might compare to Liferay regarding my specific goal of using it to help organize and grow my collaborative writing blog.
Read the rest of this entry »
Having spent some time teaching at a university, and being on the brink of becoming a student again myself, I recently stopped to reflect about how my school work and that of my students might be improved with some Web 2.0 tools. The discussion is timely, too, since a lot of working professionals are heading back to the classroom in an attempt to stay relevant during tough times.
During my first go-around, I wasn’t savvy enough to take advantage of what was available, but with the benefit of hindsight, I’ve identified the following three categories of web apps that could make studying easier and more effective.
Read the rest of this entry »
I recently spoke with Ross Mayfield, founder of Socialtext, about his product – an enterprise-level group collaboration platform – and he shared some theories of collaboration that led to the development of the software.
He spoke about the construction of a social network and how our networks have dense cores (strong ties) surrounded by dynamic peripheries (looser ties).
The core of an organization – such as the leadership team – tends to work closely together. They process information well and can usually make decisions quickly and effectively. The rest of the team, however, is the dynamic periphery and there is strength in these weak ties.
Traditional groupware serves the dense core, says Mayfield, never connecting to the weak ties. However, tapping into the periphery – the distributed team – can accelerate a project and a process cycle. Socialtext is meant to save the time individuals spend seeking information or the right people with the information or skills they need to get a job done.
Read the rest of this entry »
Web Work 101: How To Escape The Cubicle
