Collaborative software or groupware is application software designed to help people working on a common task to attain their goals. One of the earliest definitions of groupware is "intentional group processes plus software to support them."
Computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW) is the study of how people utilize technology collaboratively, often towards a shared goal. CSCW addresses how computer systems can support collaborative activity and coordination. More specifically, the field of CSCW seeks to analyze and draw connections between currently understood human psychological and social behaviors and available collaborative tools, or groupware. Often the goal of CSCW is to help promote and utilize technology in a collaborative way, and help create new tools to succeed in that goal. These parallels allow CSCW research to inform future design patterns or assist in the development of entirely new tools.
A collaboration tool helps people to collaborate. The purpose of a collaboration tool is to support a group of two or more individuals to accomplish a common goal or objective. Collaboration tools can be either of a non-technological nature such as paper, flipcharts, post-it notes or whiteboards. They can also include software tools and applications such as collaborative software.
A collaboratory, as defined by William Wulf in 1989, is a “center without walls, in which the nation’s researchers can perform their research without regard to physical location, interacting with colleagues, accessing instrumentation, sharing data and computational resources, [and] accessing information in digital libraries”.
Enterprise content management (ECM) extends the concept of content management by adding a timeline for each content item and, possibly, enforcing processes for its creation, approval, and distribution. Systems using ECM generally provide a secure repository for managed items, analog or digital. They also include one methods for importing content to bring manage new items, and several presentation methods to make items available for use. Although ECM content may be protected by digital rights management (DRM), it is not required. ECM is distinguished from general content management by its cognizance of the processes and procedures of the enterprise for which it is created.
A web content management system is a software content management system (CMS) specifically for web content. It provides website authoring, collaboration, and administration tools that help users with little knowledge of web programming languages or markup languages create and manage website content. A WCMS provides the foundation for collaboration, providing users the ability to manage documents and output for multiple author editing and participation. Most systems use a content repository or a database to store page content, metadata, and other information assets the system needs.
Collaborative product development (CPD) is a business strategy, work process and collection of software applications that facilitates different organizations to work together on the development of a product. It is also known as collaborative product definition management (cPDM).
Organizational intelligence (OI) is the capability of an organization to comprehend and create knowledge relevant to its purpose; in other words, it is the intellectual capacity of the entire organization. With relevant organizational intelligence comes great potential value for companies and organizations to figure out where their strengths and weaknesses lie in responding to change and complexity.
A collaborative working environment (CWE) supports people, such as e-professionals, in their individual and cooperative work. Research in CWE involves focusing on organizational, technical, and social issues.
Virtual collaboration is the method of collaboration between virtual team members that is carried out via technology-mediated communication. Virtual collaboration follows the same process as collaboration, but the parties involved in virtual collaboration do not physically interact and communicate exclusively through technological channels. Distributed teams use virtual collaboration to simulate the information transfer present in face-to-face meetings, communicating virtually through verbal, visual, written, and digital means.
Adobe LiveCycle Enterprise Suite (ES4) is a service-oriented architecture Java EE server software product from Adobe Systems used to build applications that automate a broad range of business processes for enterprises and government agencies. LiveCycle ES4 is an enterprise document and form platform that allows capturing and processing information, delivering personalized communications, and protecting and tracking sensitive information. It is used for purposes such as account opening, services, and benefits enrollment, correspondence management, requests for proposal processes, and other manual-based workflows. LiveCycle ES4 incorporates new features with a particular focus on mobile devices. LiveCycle applications also function in both online and offline environments. These capabilities are enabled through the use of Adobe Reader, HTML/PhoneGap, and Flash Player clients to reach desktop computers and mobile devices.
Kepler is a free software system for designing, executing, reusing, evolving, archiving, and sharing scientific workflows. Kepler's facilities provide process and data monitoring, provenance information, and high-speed data movement. Workflows in general, and scientific workflows in particular, are directed graphs where the nodes represent discrete computational components, and the edges represent paths along which data and results can flow between components. In Kepler, the nodes are called 'Actors' and the edges are called 'channels'. Kepler includes a graphical user interface for composing workflows in a desktop environment, a runtime engine for executing workflows within the GUI and independently from a command-line, and a distributed computing option that allows workflow tasks to be distributed among compute nodes in a computer cluster or computing grid. The Kepler system principally targets the use of a workflow metaphor for organizing computational tasks that are directed towards particular scientific analysis and modeling goals. Thus, Kepler scientific workflows generally model the flow of data from one step to another in a series of computations that achieve some scientific goal.
An intranet portal is the gateway that unifies access to enterprise information and applications on an intranet. It is a tool that helps a company manage its data, applications, and information more easily through personalized views. Some portal solutions are able to integrate legacy applications, objects from other portals, and handle thousands of user requests. In a corporate enterprise environment, it is also known as an enterprise portal.
A distributed workforce is a workforce that conducts remote work. A distributed workforce is dispersed geographically over a wide area – domestically or internationally. Via technology, distributed companies enable employees located anywhere to access all of the company's resources and software such as applications, data and e-mail without working within the confines of an office.
Business process management (BPM) is the discipline in which people use various methods to discover, model, analyze, measure, improve, optimize, and automate business processes. Any combination of methods used to manage a company's business processes is BPM. Processes can be structured and repeatable or unstructured and variable. Though not required, enabling technologies are often used with BPM.
Collaborative information seeking (CIS) is a field of research that involves studying situations, motivations, and methods for people working in collaborative groups for information seeking projects, as well as building systems for supporting such activities. Such projects often involve information searching or information retrieval (IR), information gathering, and information sharing. Beyond that, CIS can extend to collaborative information synthesis and collaborative sense-making.
Collaborative workflow is the convergence of social software with service management (workflow) software. As the definition implies, collaborative workflow is derived from both workflow software and social software such as chat, instant messaging, and document collaboration.
The Collective Knowledge (CK) project is an open-source framework and repository to enable collaborative, reproducible and sustainable research and development of complex computational systems. CK is a small, portable, customizable and decentralized infrastructure helping researchers and practitioners:
Collabora Online is an open source online office suite built on LibreOffice Technology, enabling web-based collaborative real-time editing of word processing documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and vector graphics. Optional apps are available for desktops, laptops, tablets, smartphones and Chromebooks.
