Tecnologie per la cooperazione Sistemi di supporto alla collaborazione, condivisione dell informazione Alcuni dei lucidi in inglese sono liberamente adattati da lucidi di Saul Greenberg, Department of Computer Science, University of Calgary
Applicazioni Groupware: 3C Supporto alla comunicazione sincrona: Tele/video/desktop conferencing, chat e buddy systems o Instant Messaging (IM) clients asincrona: e-mail (message systems), newsgroup Supporto alla collaborazione, condivisione dell informazione sincrona: facilitazioni ai meeting, electronic meeting room, roomware, GDSS asincrona: gestione dell informazione condivisa Supporto al coordinamento agende condivise, coordinamento ad hoc, workflow 2
Applicazioni Groupware: s/t Stesso Tempo Tempo Differente Stesso Luogo Facilitazioni ai meeting, Electronic Meeting room, Group Decision Support System (GDSS), GSS Interazione Asincrona Co-Locata team rooms large public displays Luogo Differente Tele-Videoconferenze, Desktop conferencing, Shared Workspaces, realtime group editor e-mail, newsgroup, group editor, Workflow Management, Shared Information 3
Electronic Meeting Room Support decision making process dedicated computer-based conference facility real time large group support (5-50) facilitate a structured meeting process typically facilitated (facilitator) domain of MIS Typical services explore unstructured problems brainstorm ideas organize/prioritize results voting good for brainstorming The CoLab meeting room, Xerox PARC (1987-1992) http://www2.parc.com/istl/members/stefik/colab.htm 6
Shared Table / Wall Displays Social affordances of tables/wall InteracTable and Dynawall, From www.ipsi.fraunhofer.de i-land project 8
Roomware Computer-augmented room elements Integrated desk/wall displays for collaboration Inter-operation between devices From www.ipsi.fraunhofer.de i-land project 9
Applicazioni Groupware: s/t Stesso Tempo Tempo Differente Stesso Luogo Facilitazioni ai meeting, Electronic Meeting room, Group Decision Support System (GDSS), GSS Interazione Asincrona Co-Locata team rooms large public displays Luogo Differente Tele-Videoconferenze, Desktop conferencing, Shared Workspaces, realtime group editor e-mail, newsgroup, group editor, Workflow Management, Shared Information 10
Community Bulletin Boards Post information from various sources to public places; some problems: Who posts? How to personalize the information visualized? Relevance of the posts? From Multimedia Fliers, Churchill, Nelson, Denoue, Proceedings of the Conference on Communities and Technologies 2003 12
Applicazioni Groupware: s/t Stesso Luogo Stesso Tempo Facilitazioni ai meeting, Electronic Meeting room, Group Decision Support System (GDSS), GSS Milk- large interactive screen Tempo Differente Interazione Asincrona Co- Locata team rooms Milk-large interactive screen Notification Collage Luogo Differente Tele-Videoconferenze, Desktop conferencing, Shared Workspaces, real-time group editor Milk-large interactive screen Notification Collage e-mail, newsgroup, group editor, Workflow Management, Shared Information 14
Milk large interactive screen Large interactive screens posed in semi-public spaces for multiple uses (various channels), e.g.: awareness (news, people) group browsing video-conference 15
Milk- thematic channel & video-conferencing 16
Milk thematic ch. after login 17
Notification Collage Connect distributed groups Public display www.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/grouplab 20
Notification Collage (NC) Posting ephemeral information onto a distributed group surface Distributed and co-located colleagues, comprising a small community, post media elements onto a real-time collaborative surface that all members can see NC generally resides on a large public display, or even a secondary personal display that can be turned transparent Not requiring direct attention, it allows work to be performed beneath it while still being able to observe changes to the collage NC randomly places incoming assorted media on its surface: live video from desktop cameras; editable sticky notes; slide shows displaying a series of digital photos NC can become a rich forum for discussions in the community it represents. Video on the NC lets everyone 'see each other' via the internet, while the availability of post-it notes frequently results in both formal and informal discussions about various topics 21
Applicazioni Groupware: 3C Supporto alla comunicazione sincrona: Tele/video/desktop conferencing, chat e buddy systems o Instant Messaging (IM) clients asincrona: e-mail (message systems), newsgroup Supporto alla collaborazione, condivisione dell informazione sincrona: facilitazioni ai meeting, electronic meeting room, GDSS asincrona: gestione dell informazione condivisa Supporto al coordinamento agende condivise, coordinamento ad hoc, workflow 24
Document Management Systems Caratteristiche principali comuni: Focus sulla condivisione dell informazione (versus comunicazione) Gestione persone e/o gruppi Gestione organizzazione dei dati (es. cartelle) Gestione dell accesso ai dati (permessi, lock, replica) Gestione versioni documenti Tracking (stato, eventi), history awareness 25
Document Management Systems Servizi di ricerca e filtraggio dati (viste, raccomandazioni) Gestione calendario condiviso Integrazione con servizi per la comunicazione (es.: forum, e-mail, blog) Inoltre: Adattabili (programmabili e/o personalizzabili) Definizione macro e semplici workflow 26
About BSCW www.bscw.de The Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology, FIT, began to develop the BSCW shared workspace system in 1994. The software has since evolved into an awardwinning, world renowned groupware system (winner of the European Software Innovation Prize, ESIP) BSCW is installed in thousands of locations worldwide and is utilized by millions of groupware users around the globe. BSCW customers include major telecommunications firms, SME s across numerous industries, international research institutes, universities and public agencies OrbiTeam Software GmbH & Co. KG, the distributor of BSCW licences, launched BSCW as a commercial product in 1998. License fees are based on the number of users supported by the BSCW server. The license includes software and technical support. As an alternative to licensing and operating a BSCW server, customers can rent server space from Orbi-Team 28
Group collaboration with BSCW Users can create shared workspaces to exchange information with internal and external partners without installing additional software Workspaces can be accessed from any location through a Web browser, by using desktop applications or from a PDA Support for synchronization of documents, contacts and appointments enables offline usage of shared data 29
BSCW - GUI 30
Centralized document storage and management Users can post documents within shared workspaces to provide access to other authorized personnel Users can lock documents, create new versions or directly modify documents using their preferred editor Document upload via integrated upload clients: users can choose from a variety of document transfer mechanisms, such as simple drag and drop, to post documents in the system Documents can be annotated and rated by multiple users 31
Self-organized workgroups BSCW is based on self-administered workgroups and flexible, rolebased access management New workspace members are added by invitation, with no administrative effort Access rights can be customized for any user and any data category; other users can be given anonymous WWW access Security of content can be guaranteed by using built-in document encryption Shared contact folders: BSCW provides an up-to-date list of contact information to all group members. Contact information can be imported and exported using the standard vcard format. Synchronization of contacts and appointments with Microsoft Outlook 32
Event notification & Calendar BSCW provides a continuous overview of all activities in shared workspaces through event histories, direct e-mail notification and/or daily reports Users can specify the notification method and precisely which events to be notified of Group calendars allow event planning in a shared environment. Import/export to other applications or direct synchronization with users local PC is possible too The calendar component provides an appointment reminder service (also recurring appointments are possible) 33
Event Map Users may filter workspace content by events and graphically visualize them For example, it allows users to view who has read their documents 34
Various features BSCW supports content-based searches of documents in different formats using an index-based search facility Workspace objects can be located based on properties (e.g., author, date of the last modification) Web-based search results can be imported directly into a workspace Opinions of team members on specific topics can be solicited by using surveys. Survey results can be published in visual form using graphs Threaded forums offer users a platform to initiate and conduct discussions 35
Tagging Users may tag documents, folders or blog entries Tags allow users to mark objects with certain keywords in order to find related objects By clicking on a tag, all objects in the current workspace being tagged by the same keyword will be listed 36
Online Presence and Communication The (optional) toolbar indicates the online status of each workspace member, using default timing: green: the user has been active during the last five minutes; yellow: the user has been active during the last hour; white: the user has been active during the last two hours; red: the last user activity has taken place more than two hours ago. Users may select the displayed user names in the toolbar to contact the person using different communication tools An improved and updated configuration feature for different communication channels such as Skype or different Messengers allow each user to indicate what communication tools he/she prefers 37
Blogs Users can create personal blogs, group blogs or public blogs It is possible to specify a custom layout of a blog BSCW blogs support tags (shown as a tag cloud) as well as RSS news feeds 38
Communities Communities offer self-organized platforms for users with similar interests Each Community has an associated Community workspace and may have its own admission policy, being open, closed or hidden 39
Web Folder - Customization Web Folders provide a convenient way to customize the presentation of a shared workspace A Web Folder defines its own template and index page, thereby replacing the standard folder view of BSCW An integrated Web editor provides a selection of predefined BSCW features that may be integrated into the view (e.g., a folder content list or links to other objects in the workspace) By using Web Folders and adding content in a shared workspace based on Web documents (i.e., HTML files) users may collaboratively access and edit content in a shared workspace in a Wiki-like manner 40
Workflow Management BSCW provides: 1. Time planning in projects 2. Flow folders 3. Tasks and user-defined workflow Time planning in projects The project is divided into processes; each process has a certain project member as responsible. Start and end dates of the processes are visualized in a bar chart, that also represents dependencies between processes. Project folders include the following features: Project dates may be changed (by the project manager) Causal dependencies between processes may be newly defined or cancelled Date shifts which are due to dependencies between processes are specifically indicated Processes are also part of the personal task list of the project members 41
Workflow Management Flow folders Documents flow from one user to another for subsequent processing. A task list is associated to each flow folder A flow folder is processed by forwarding the folder to the users on the task list, one after the other The flow may branch at a certain step, thereby allowing the user responsible for the task at hand to choose where to forward the folder to Even after forwarding, a flow folder is visible and accessible to its members 42
Workflow Management Tasks and user-defined workflow A task represents something that a requestor wants to have done by one or more other users (contractors) A task has input and output data fields. The input data fields are specified by the requestor, the output data fields are to be filled in by the contractors A task may also contain any kind of attachments A set of tasks within a task may be combined to form a workflow A workflow may be changed at runtime by adding more tasks, removing others or re-contracting existing tasks to other users Workflows may be copied for re-use continua 43
Task Status Tasks have a status that changes during processing. A newly created task has status initial Task status and user task role (requestor or contractor) determine which actions are possible for a given task Requestor actions are in blue (dark) and contractor actions are in green (light) 44
Towards Knowledge Management La condivisione dell informazione da sola non è sufficiente BSCW e sistemi simili attualmente, come abbiamo visto, forniscono ulteriori servizi integrati Rimangono comunque alcuni problemi aperti, ad es.: The One-size-fits-all solution usually fits nothing Come stimolare la condivisione dell informazione, l uso del sistema, la pubblicazione (esternalizzazione) di conoscenza? Come far conoscere ciò che è pubblicato soprattutto per evitare la duplicazione di sforzi? Come rendere facilmente accessibile ciò che serve in ogni momento ed in ogni situazione? Vedremo MILK un sistema prototipale di Knowledge Management sviluppato appoggiandosi su BSCW nell ambito di un progetto di ricerca europeo 45