Path: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!faqserv From: groupware@arch.ping.dk (Groupware FAQ) Newsgroups: comp.groupware,comp.answers,news.answers Subject: comp.groupware FAQ: Products5: Frequently Asked Questions Supersedes: Followup-To: poster Date: 22 Apr 1997 09:22:28 GMT Organization: University of Copenhagen Lines: 684 Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.EDU Expires: 9 Jul 1997 09:21:29 GMT Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: penguin-lust.mit.edu Summary: Groupware Products, part five Keywords: CSCW, orgware, group, interactive, shared, environments X-Last-Updated: 1995/09/08 Originator: faqserv@penguin-lust.MIT.EDU Xref: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu comp.groupware:9889 comp.answers:25525 news.answers:100410 Archive-name: comp-groupware-faq/products5 Posting-Frequency: monthly Last-modified: 1995.9.8 Version: 3.3 Copyright: 1990 - 1995 (C) David S. Stodolsky, PhD Groupware Products - Part 5 =========================== Internet conference to Notes database ------------------------------------- Newsgroups: comp.groupware From: joe@netcom.com (Joseph Jesson) Subject: Re: Converting internet conference to Notes database Date: Thu, 3 Mar 1994 23:07:49 GMT Our product(s) does exactly that without the intermediate import requirement. A UNIX spooled file injected into a Notes Database is available for $320.00 (use your UNIX shell account and rn to collect the newsgroups of interest. A full-blown NNTP-to-Notes production gateway goes for $8,700 per Notes server and completes a real-time translation of an NNTP newsfeed into Notes. Joe Jesson, 708-356-6817 joe@netcom.com Lite, fast, Conferencing system ------------------------------- From: benpolk@netcom.com (Ben Polk) Subject: Re: Looking for lite, fast, Conferencing system... Date: Fri, 6 Jan 1995 23:10:14 GMT Jerry Cashman (Jerry.Cashman@asx.decus.com.au) wrote: : Hi all, : I'm looking for a small, fast, LAN based (NETbios) Windows, conferencing tool. : A pretty basic feature set is required, almost NEWS like. (Groups, Articles, : Threads & binary file attachments or OLE support.) : I don't want to go to the (IMHO) expense or hassle of Notes... "small, fast, LAN based... Windows conferencing tool". Sounds like a description of the Share product from Collabra (where I work). Share is easy to use and manage, as well as reasonably priced. It's also won a litany of software awards which I will refrain from repeating here. Our Australian distributor is: ITS (Information Technology Solutions) Phone: 011-613-826-6522 Fax: 011-613-824-1488 Collabra's USA number is 1-800-474-7427 If you are calling Collabra from outside the US, the number is 415-940-6400. For people using Novell Groupwise, call Novell at 800-861-2507 for information about the version of Collabra Share included in Groupwise. For people using Banyan e-mail systems, call Banyan at 800-222-6926 for information about Share included with the Banyan messaging products. If you are using Vines, but not one of the Banyan mail systems, contact Collabra directly. From: sksonney@escape.com (The Alchemist) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: Looking for lite, fast, Conferencing system... Date: Wed, 25 Jan 1995 07:54:41 In article <3g3jhd$v96@usenetw1.news.prodigy.com> CFNT13A@prodigy.com (John Culbert) writes: >I've looked into Collabra Share and it looks to be a very strong >conferencing program. One of the magazines called it Lotus Notes, Jr. >Call 800-474-7427 and they'll send you a demo. It's more of a document management program, like Notes. The latest Network World did call it "Notes Jr," but it mentions that you don't get all the functionality of Notes. If you want realtime confrencing, there are a few more products on the market - Including one by Toshiba - that are focused on confrencing. Notes and Collabra Share are more directed towards document management and workflow. - Kevin Sonney From: traxsoft@netcom.com (Trax Softworks) Subject: Re: Collabra Share Date: Fri, 24 Feb 1995 00:04:55 GMT We have placed an evaluation copy of TeamTalk, our group conferencing package, into an anonymous FTP directory. This evaluation version is the same as the full product, except that it will stop working after 500 appends. It is available from ftp.netcom.com, in the directory /pub/tr/traxsoft. The file that is out there is a 1.8meg file, tt11eval.zip. I kept it one file so a person can do a single ftp get. After they have it on their PC they can unzip it and it becomes 4 files which can be put on 2 diskettes if they wish to move it to another machine. There is also a small readme.wri file with info about TeamTalk if you'd like to check that out before committing to a 1.8 Meg transfer. Here is some basic info about TeamTalk: TeamTalk is a graphical conference system designed to enhance communication among groups. It works on a network and can be accessed by anyone who can access the files or has an e-mail connection. TeamTalk offers a unique way to share ideas and data throughout the organization: TeamTalk members communicate through named conversations, known as Topics. Each conversation appears as one continuous document instead of a list of messages; this provides a continuity not possible in bulletin board and e-mail systems. Comments can be typed directly into each individual topic, and, through TeamTalk's OLE 2.0 support, objects created in other applications can be included in comments. Any TeamTalk member can review and add to public topics, and they can join topics so they are notified of new additions. If you would like to begin a new conversation based on an existing conversation, it is simple to create a new topic within an existing one. TeamTalk is hierarchical; you can add topics within topics, down as many levels as necessary. Thus, topics can get more and more specific. And since each topic has a separate membership, you read only those you are interested in. For confidential conversations, TeamTalk offers private topics. Only topic members know they exist and can review them. TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS * IBM compatible PC, 80286 or higher CPU * 4 Megabytes of memory * 5 Megabytes of disk space * Microsoft Windows 3.1 or higher * Any network that supports DOS shared files (i.e., Microsoft Windows for Workgroups or Windows NT, Novell NetWare, LAN Manager, Artisoft LANtastic) TEAMTALK PRICES 5 User Pack $ 395 25 User Pack $ 1,775 50 User Pack $ 3,450 100 User Pack $ 6,700 250 User Pack $16,250 500 User Pack $31,500 1000 User Pack $61,000 TO ORDER OR FOR MORE INFORMATION, CALL TRAX AT 800 367-8729 (800 FOR-TRAX), or 310-649-5800, or send e-mail to info@traxsoft.com, or fax 310-649-6200. From: dmittleman@bpavms.bpa.arizona.edu (Daniel Mittleman) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: Looking for lite, fast, Conferencing system... Date: 27 Jan 1995 09:09 MST On the subject of inexpensive conferencing systems I just want to note: many people have dismissed GroupSystems as an inexpensive conferencing system because of its price, while at the same time acknowledging it to be the Rolls Royce of conferencing systems (or something like that.) Two or three years ago the list price for GroupSystems was about $44,000 which placed it out of many people's pocketbooks. Now, GroupSystems for Windows has a list price of $8,950 for a ten user license and a two user proof-of-concept license is $995 (with that $995 counting towards the purchase of a future large scale license if one chooses to adopt and upgrade.) So it still isn't chicken feed, but it brings the software down to the price range of many more people. (It should also be noted that there is a program to support low-cost or no-cost licensing for academic researchers doing EMS studies with it.) The conferencing supported on it is much more structured and sophisticated that most other (all other?) products on the market. And GroupSystems will run over a LAN for local conferencing or a WAN for distance conferencing. The June 14, 1994 _PC Magazine_ reviews GroupSystems (DOS version) and several other meeting and conferencing systems. This issue is a must read for someone trying to decide what kind and what brand of conferencing groupware to purchase. (Disclaimer: while I don't work for Ventana - the marketer of GroupSystems - my dissertation advisor is CEO of the company, so I have obvious biases.) From: cloutier@eisner.decus.org (Steve Cloutier - Notes 'R Us) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Web Forums Anyone? Check out WebNotes Date: 1 Feb 95 16:58:14 -0500 Web Conferencing anyone? We have created WebNotes, a Web interface to our NetNotes Forums and Conferencing system. NetNotes and WebNotes are organized into topics and replies. Binary attachments to notes are supported. NetNotes features multi-level security, but is very easy to set up and manage. The NetNotes / WebNotes server has a built-in text retrieval system. All notes are indexed "live" as they are entered. Note: Although WebNotes is quite usable and functional, it is still - as they say on the Web - "Undergoing some Construction" - so this is a good time to make comments, suggestions, etc. before everything is "frozen". The URL to WebNotes is: http://webnotes.ostech.com Be sure the check out the 'Read This First' before proceeding too far! Please place any bug reports, suggestions, etc in the NetNotes conference (using WebNotes or NetNotes), or if you cannot do that for some reason, please send mail to: webnotes@ostech.com NetNotes is a superset of DEC Notes and Vax Notes (hence the name), for those who are familiar with DEC Notes... We released the first NetNotes product almost 5 years ago. The Web implementation is farily recent. www group annotations --------------------- From: Marc-Andre Schenk Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: WDA: www group annotations Date: 19 Jan 1995 21:25:05 GMT I already announced this the last week of December. Sorry for those of you who were working during that period. I have written a small prototype allowing group annotations of Web documents. A draft of an article describing WDA is at URL http://eliot.unil.ch:8085/docs/wda-article.html I'd really appreciate your comments (annotations) on this article (I take all comments, good or bad). On another subject: For those of you who do not yet know Ubique's Virtual Places(TM), I *strongly* urge you to check the URL http://www.ubique.com/ This is certainly THE BEST groupware tool on the Web. Download their sesame viewer if you have a UNIX box, we will be able to meet "in some Web document" and I'll take you for a ride on my bus. Hurry up Ubique is going to be very successful. Regards, Marc-Andre Schenk GroupKit -------- From: roseman@janu.cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Mark Roseman) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: permissions in GroupKit Date: 18 Oct 94 13:51:55 > In GrouKit you can send commands with 4gk_toAll4 or 4gk_toUserNr4. > I want to make a command like 4gk_toGroup4. Each participant of a > conference is a member of a special usergroup. So when you send a command > with 4gk_toGroup4 only the members of this group will receive the message. > If there is anybody out there you have informations about this topic or > knows where to get informations about it, please tell me! look at the code in gk_toAll from conf.tcl; you'll need to write a function that determines if a particular user is in the group, then simply call this function within the loop to determine if you want to send that person the message. From: roseman@cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Mark Roseman) Newsgroups: comp.groupware,comp.lang.tcl Subject: ANNOUNCE: GroupKit 3.0 available for ftp Date: 6 Feb 1995 23:34:27 GMT Version 3.0 of GroupKit is available for ftp at: ftp::/ftp.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/pub/projects/grouplab/software/groupkit-3.0.tar.Z There is also a compiled version available if you happen to be running on a Sun workstation under SunOS 4.1.3. What is GroupKit? ----------------- GroupKit is a freely-available toolkit for developing real-time groupware systems such as shared text editors, drawing programs, meeting support tools and so on. GroupKit runs on Unix systems under X11, and is based on the Tcl/Tk language (also freely available) from UC Berkeley. GroupKit is designed to make developing groupware tools only "slightly harder" than single user tools, and has a very quick learning time, even if you don't know Tcl or Tk. Its been used in a number of HCI/CSCW courses at different universities for example. Whats New in Version 3.0? ------------------------- There's been some fairly substantial changes since version 2.2, mainly to do with events and environments. Events let you know when "interesting" things happen in the groupware conference, and environments provide a shareable data structure for exchanging information between conferences. As well, there is a "class builder" for designing new compound widgets (several, such as a multi-user scrollbar are included), and support for building new conference management systems has been completely overhauled. Where do I go for more info? ---------------------------- Please check out the information on our World Wide Web page: http://www.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/projects/grouplab/projects/groupkit There is also a mailing list, groupkit-users@cpsc.ucalgary.ca, which anyone using GroupKit should probably join; drop a note to groupkit-users-request@cpsc.ucalgary.ca. Bug reports and other comments should be addressed to groupkit-bugs@cpsc.ucalgary.ca. Also, if you're doing anything particularly interesting with GroupKit we'd like to hear about it. Mark -- Mark Roseman, Research Associate phone: (403) 220-3532 / 220-6087 Dept. of Computer Science fax: (403) 284-4707 University of Calgary email: roseman@cpsc.ucalgary.ca Calgary, Alta CANADA T2N 1N4 http://www.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/~roseman Quality at Work --------------- From: schneider@horus Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: QDM Date: Mon, 13 Feb 1995 16:29:13 In article <3heidf$oes@News1.mcs.com> Paul Gustafson writes: >From: Paul Gustafson >Subject: QDM >Date: 10 Feb 1995 02:18:23 GMT >Looking for any info on the QDM "Quality at Work" groupware product ... Quality Decision Management, Inc. 200 Sutton Street, Suite 225 North Andover, MA 01845 (508)688-8266 Uli Schneider, Siemens Nixdorf AG, Munich, Germany Whiteboard ---------- From: feher@nosc.mil (Bela Feher) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: Wanted: Whiteboard for Mac/PC Date: Thu, 9 Jun 1994 00:27:05 GMT Contact Group Logic, Inc. at 1408 N. Fillmore St., Suite 10, Arlington V 22201 (703) 528-1555 or (703) 528-3296 (fax) re: their product "Whiteboard". It is a cross-platform commercial product recently available and I'm sure they would be glad to provide info about it. Bela Feher 619/553-9226 (voice) NCCOSC RDTE Div 44210 619/553-9229 (fax) San Diego CA 92152-7252 feher@nosc.mil From: mdplusch@mit.edu (Mike Plusch) Subject: Inexpensive shared computer whiteboard for Macs Newsgroups: comp.groupware Date: Fri, 8 Jul 1994 22:42:08 GMT In my company, we've implemented a relatively cheap computer whiteboard with off-the-shelf hardware and applications. Summary: - runs on Macs or PCs - allows multiple users to share a computer (via Timbuktu) - computer whiteboard using pen tablets (Walcom, or MacHandwriter) and a shareware application called LightningPaint Sample scenario of ad-hoc global meeting: There is a tablet at each site that anybody can use. When you want a inter-site meeting with a shared whiteboard, you borrow a tablet at your site, then conference call the participants (it's best with a full-duplex speaker phone). Then use Timbuktu to get people connected to one shared machine running a paint program (and any other program you want to share). Participants can also run other applications on their local machine for a private workspace. Since current applications only support one cursor, set the protocol that you have control of the shared-computer when you are talking, and you give up control when the cursor stops moving. The paint program provides a good whiteboard although you can share any application on the computer. Assumptions: - a pen-based tablet at each site that can be moved between computers. - all computers have Timbuktu installed. - the shared computer has a simple paint program LightningPaint is a cheap, fast paint program called that works well with the tablets and free-hand drawings/text. You can easily annotate a screen by taking a screen snapshot using command-shift-3, then opening the Screen1 document with LightningPaint. With Timbuktu it's easy to let someone share your computer on an ad-hoc basis by admitting temporary guests. Software and hardware used with prices and suppliers. LightningPaint 1.1, $14 available via ftp from sumex.stanford.edu by Humayun Lari, 14117 Frontier Ln, Burnsville MN 55337 USA Walcom tablets, MacHandwriter from MacConnection/MacWarehouse about $325 Timbuktu Pro from MacConnection/MacWarehouse for $43 per license in a 30-pack. From: dmittleman@bpavms.bpa.arizona.edu (Daniel Mittleman) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: Whiteboard capability needed Date: 26 Feb 1995 16:18 MST In article <3iqp6s$42l@earth.usa.net>, crc@earth (John Graaff/Cheyenne Research Corp) writes... >What capabilities are available for a small business consulting firm to >offer same time/different place whiteboard capabilities? We would like to >offer more than just text. Consider IBM's Person2Person, Intel's ProShare, and Ventana's GroupSystems for Windows all of which contain whiteboard modules which will work in same time/different place environments. Groupsystems contains lots of other packaged software (for brainstorming, group discussions, voting, and meeting management) which you haven't indicated you are interested in (and therefore costs more money), so if you want just a whiteboard either of the two former products might be the right solution for you. All three products have some differences among what kinds of transport environments they function in (LAN, WAN, ISDN, Internet, etc.), P2P and ProShare support full motion video, P2P and ProShare are only point to point right now (I think) while Groupsystems is multi-point, and all three have different application suites so you might want to check them all out to see which best meets your needs. Intel can be reached at: 800-538-3373 in the US and Canada +44-793-431155 in Europe +1-503-629-7354 from other locations Ventana can be reached at: 800-368-6338 in the US 1-602-325-8228 from other locations sales@ventana.com via internet And depending upon your specific planned use of the environment, you might want to consider including Xerox's Liveboard or Smart Technology's SmartSystem 2000. Both would give you a 4x6 foot white board in each conference room which your meeting participants could sketch on. =========================================================================== daniel david mittleman - danny@arizona.edu - (602) 621-2932 [disclaimer: I don't work for any of these three companies, but I do work for the CEO of Ventana so have bias in that direction.] From: paulw@world.std.com (Insitu Inc.) Subject: Re: Whiteboard capability needed Organization: Insitu Inc. Date: Mon, 27 Feb 1995 03:13:59 GMT John Graaff/Cheyenne Research Corp (crc@earth) wrote: : What capabilities are available for a small business consulting firm to : offer same time/different place whiteboard capabilities? We would like to : offer more than just text. Insitu has released a distributed real time document/object editing suite which incorporates OLE 2.0, Windows Sockets & TAPI. This means a group of you can edit a document from MS Word, for example, in realtime and each retain a copy afterwards. A 30-day demo copy is available on our BBS at +1 (617) 279 3118 and via anonymous FTP (email sales@insitu.com for details) Insitu Conference is the first Microsoft Windows document conferencing software to fully utilize the power and potential of Object Linking & Embedding 2.0 (OLE) via a TCP/IP network. Insitu Conference forms the bridge between the integrated office computing environment (through OLE) and networked PCP2s (TCP/IP). The Product Insitu Conference combines .M OLE 2.0 Distributed Container .M Industry standard Windows Sockets 1.1 TCP/IP networking .M Shared Whiteboard for annotating documents and images .M Integrated Telephony through Microsoft/Intel Rg TAPI Object Linking & Embedding Insitu Conference is an OLE 2.0 compliant container, allowing users to simultaneously comment on and edit documents created by other applications from within Insitu ConferenceP2s familiar interface. The power of OLE 2.0 is enhanced through the implementation of a "distributed" container, giving people the ability to freely distribute and edit documents over the TCP/IP link. Windows Sockets 1.1 Networking connectivity has been implemented through the Windows Sockets 1.1 API guaranteeing TCP/IP vendor independent compatibility. Annotation tools The Insitu Conference environment supports capturing any image present on the Windows desktop. Conferences can be formal, with a chairman or moderator controlling the synchronization and flow of workspaces or a general free for all. Telephony The voice link is integrated into Insitu Conference through the Microsoft/Intel Telephony API. From: mikee@sys8.wfc.com (Mike Eggleston) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: Whiteboard capability needed Date: 27 Feb 1995 14:39:31 GMT >>>>> "John" == John Graaff/Cheyenne Research Corp writes: In article <3iqp6s$42l@earth.usa.net> crc@earth (John Graaff/Cheyenne Research Corp) writes: > What capabilities are available for a small business consulting firm > to offer same time/different place whiteboard capabilities? We > would like to offer more than just text. It would be simplest to me to use the Tk/Tcl system with the TkDP (Distributed Processing) extensions that come with a white board application as part of the extensions. Tk/Tcl: ftp.cs.berkeley.edu:/ucb/tcl (you need tcl and tk file both) TkDP: ftp.aud.alcatel.edu:/pub/tcl? (look for tkdp I think) After all, its free and it works well. BTW, this is for Unix and X-Windows. -- -- Mike Eggleston Walker Financial, Inc. (817)732-0398 3909 Hulen Street (817)735-1726 (FAX) Fort Worth, Texas 76107 Market mechanism for e-mail volume ---------------------------------- From: fullerr@bacalao.usc.edu (Rodney Fuller) Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: Market mechanism for e-mail volume Date: 10 Jun 1994 12:49:07 -0700 In article , rthomas@netcom.com (Russell Thomas) writes: |> I have an idea for controlling e-mail traffic volume based on a market |> approach. |> |> rodney fuller (fullerr@bacalao.usc.edu) wrote: |> > There are different ways to measure communication and coordination costs, |> > and a good productivity analysis needs to look at several. |> |> Why not control e-mail traffic volume by making the communication and |> coordination costs visible in the system as a form of real-time control? This is actually what my dissertation is on--finding adaptive metrics of coordination. Won't be done for a year or so, but It's nice to hear people talking about the ideas for use in general DSS applications. |> Imagine this: Each user of e-mail starts out with a "bank account" for |> e-mail (some function of # messages, message size, # recipients, etc.). |> Each message sent would have a "cost" deducted from the "bank account". |> Each sender's "bank account" is replenshed by the "credits" which come |> back from recipients, who in essense vote on the value of the message. |> The entire "accounting" system could be managed by the mail system, e.g. |> the mail reader/client could have a simple mechanism for recording the |> vote and forwarding it back to the sender's account. |> |> Thus, people who send fewer, shorter, higher-valued messages would be |> rewarded and junk e-mailers would soon be deprived of the capacity to |> send anything. |> |> The system could be extended to include e-mail screening. I think screening and allowing are two different issues--and there are many dynamics to it. The system you propose will LIMIT without selectively attending to differences in communication style, linguistic use of experts and novices, brainstorming and consensus making activities while allowing for some serious conflicts. The situations where those kinds of characteristics are beneficial are limited (but the US military before 1974 and today's HMO come to mind--organizations that resist change will be your best market for such a tool). Or! You could just be a bit more selective in how you limit communication and get a really great tool that allows for sustained coordination within a dynamic environment. You might want to read some semiotics for ideas--Claude Vogel comes to mind if you read french, but only because he is sitting behind me right now. |> What do you think? Does any mail or conferencing system do this? I have a few firms asking me to develop this based on my published papers. There seems to be a lot of interest into the application of coordination metrics. Rodney Fuller fullerr@cgsvax.claremont.edu or fullerr@usc.edu From: Kevin_Lacobie@agoric.com Newsgroups: comp.groupware Subject: Re: Market mechanism for e-mail volume Date: 15 Jun 1994 18:30:07 -0500 Russell Thomas writes, "What do you think? Does any mail or conferencing system do this?" in reference to his market mechanism for e-mail volume. The American Information Exchange Corporation, a subsidiary of Autodesk, was an electronic market system service. AMiX had a regular email system, but it also had a negotiable contracting feature (you post a Request or Propose to another party, come to an Agreement, and then the system would automatically track contract terms (payment and delivery times) and handle the account management (debit/credit, with periodic clearings; i.e., they served as an account clearinghouse for multiple parties). As system usage evolved, the negotiable contracting feature turned out be a nice feature for email. While it did not replace the use of the regular email system (to nitpick just a little with Michael Rothschild's article in a recent _Forbes ASAP_), it was popularly used to pay someone to read or pay attention to one's email, in such terms as "OFFER: $1 for reading and replying to my query about ...". Of course, the contracting feature was used for substantial dollar amounts as well, such as online mini-consulting as originally envisioned by the designers. Currently, Agorics, Inc. in Los Altos is developing computational market solutions. A recent demo at Sun Microsystem's Interop booth showed computational markets in use to allocate network bandwidth -- to bid for higher Quality of Service (larger window, more colors, less compression) for real-time video, for example. Kevin Lacobie Agoric Enterprises, Inc. klacobie@agoric.com ===================================================================== David S. Stodolsky Euromath Center University of Copenhagen david@euromath.dk Tel.: +45 38 33 03 30 Fax: +45 38 33 88 80 (C)