amware simplifies setup and security to allow team members to build, use, and tear down their work flows as needed across organizational boundaries.
Teamware augments existing user-interaction tools, such as e-mail, newsgroups, voice conferencing, and videoconferencing, while freeing network managers from the burden of setup and maintenance. It also obviates the need for network administrators to manage teams and team resources themselves, and it supports team-oriented activities, such as brainstorming, group discussions, scheduling, and polling, or voting.
Teamware also provides the coordination and data storage needed for team-oriented work. Conventional applications, such as word processors, are still used to create do
cuments that might be stored as part of a team's resources. When a team is all done with a project and ready to move onto a new one, the old team room can be shut down.
The problem with just using e-mail is that each user must maintain a copy of all relevant information and determine who should be sent a copy. Newsgroups help alleviate this problem, but they normally require configuration by the network administrator, and they don't address other teamware actions, such as polling and scheduling. Real-time conferencing tools, such as a whiteboard, audio conferencing, and videoconferencing, typically augment teamware products, providing long-distance, real-time interaction.
I reviewed five
teamware servers
that offer out-of-the box operation with no programming required: Changepoint's involv Intranet, Facilitate.com's Facilitate.com, Instinctive Technology's eRoom, Lotus's InstantTeamRoom, and TeamWave Software's TeamWave Workplace. Instinctive's eRoom requires Microsoft Intern
et Information Server (IIS) or Personal Web Server (PWS) and supports only Windows clients, while involv Intranet and InstantTeamRoom run on top of the Lotus Domino server and can handle most Web clients. Facilitate.com runs on IIS or any Web server that supports CGI/NSAPI, both on Windows and the Mac, while TeamWave Workplace is a dedicated client/server application that runs both client and server on Mac, Windows, and Unix platforms. Lotus offers InstantTeamRoom service directly, as well as through other ISPs over the Internet -- billed at a flat monthly rate and requiring only a Web browser as the client.
At Your Service Provider
Based on TCP/IP, these teamware
products work
equally well over intranets or the Internet. Using teamware through an ISP makes sense for small, mobile groups, especially those whose members belong to different organizations.
A team room can be set up in 15 minutes or less. There's no additional ISP configuration needed, and participation
in a team room is by invitation only. All five products are available for intranet use except for Lotus InstantTeamRoom, which is initially available only through ISPs providing InstantTeamRoom services.
Large organizations might find that hosting their own teamware server makes economic sense. These servers typically need a minimal amount of maintenance, unlike Web servers, which have regular content updates. Organizations of all sizes can benefit from an intranet teamware installation.
Facilitate.com 4.5
Facilitate.com displays all the polish of a mature product, particularly in its administration and customization tools, which were among the best of the products reviewed. You can use any Web browser that's compatible with Navigator 2.0 or higher with Facilitate.com. I tested it with both Microsoft Internet Explorer (MSIE) and Netscape Navigator 4.0.
Topics (Facilitate.com's default name for team rooms) are configured by a team facilitator who has facilitator privileges. The serve
r's administrator can limit the kinds of topics that can be created, as well as use the administrative program running on the Windows NT server to tweak options such as display fonts, and thus configure the look of Facilitate.com pages. The configuration of individual topics is handled through a browser interface.
The program lets you have three types of users: administrators, facilitators, and users. Administrators and facilitators can create topics, while everyone can access them if they have the passphrase. Each conference consists of a list of topics and subtopics that contain items, each of which can have a description as well as a URL and a file attachment. Graphical file attachments can be displayed directly within an item; a team member doesn't have to click on an icon to view a file.
Facilitate.com conferences can have different modes, depending on what function a team is doing at a given time. For example, the conference can be set to brainstorming mode to allow members to share their id
eas, or to voting mode when it's time to come to a team decision. A chat mode is also available in Facilitate.com, although it can be a bit slow, and there's an option to send group broadcasts to relay messages to all team members.
Facilitate.com's lack of a scheduling option is a drawback, but it also tends to make the program easier to use and manage. Likewise, the use of conference mode-shifting might seem odd at first, but it works surprisingly smoothly.
eRoom 1.0
Despite its recent entry into the market, Instinctive Technology's eRoom sports one of the sharpest interfaces and some of the best features of the bunch, although its interface depends on the Microsoft ActiveX interface and requires clients to run32-bit Windows and MSIE3.0 or higher; users of Navigator 3.0 and higher must use a plug-in. An updated plug-in for the current version of Navigator wasn't ready in time for my testing, nor was support for MSIE 4.0. Likewise, the server runs only on Microsoft IIS or PWS.
Insti
nctive Technology's use of ActiveX might limit users to these supported platforms, but it significantly improves the user interface, adding juicy features such as the drag-and-drop addition of file attachments. Rooms in eRoom present a list of objects that have been added to a room, which can include folders, discussions, files, notes, URLs, polls, and versioned files. Folders can, in turn, contain any other objects, including more folders. Versioned files allow multiple iterations of the same document to be stored and accessed as necessary. Polls are single-question surveys with up to eight choices and an optional write-in vote. Multiple-poll objects can be in any room or folder, but chat and scheduling are not supported. The eRoom program supports e-mail notification of changes and invitations, with support for full-room or read-only participation.
The eRoom user interface will be very familiar to Windows users; the program's object-creation process uses a wizard-style approach, and the icons look lik
e Windows icons. Of the products reviewed, I found eRoom to be the easiest to use. For a first release, it's a very polished program.
involv Intranet 2.0
Changepoint's use of Lotus Domino as the engine for involv Intranet has several implications, which will also be applicable to Lotus's own InstantTeamRoom product when it's made available to organizations. First, involv takes on important Domino features -- in particular, the ability to replicate information across servers. Second, workgroup-application developers can tackle more sophisticated applications with Domino's programming environment. Likewise, involv can integrate existing Domino applications with additional programming and configuration.
Most involv installations will probably not make use of these features initially. Instead, involv's extensive features set and excellent user interface make it an impressive addition to any intranet, or even the Internet, right out of the box.
The program employs a tabbed notebook prese
ntation, using a Web browser that supports frames. The multiframe interface makes it extremely easy to navigate, but a 1024- by 768-pixel resolution is necessary to keep the sometimes-smallish and vertically tabbed text legible.
The program provides each user with a workspace that can be populated by tools shared among users. These include tools for document management, event planning, project management, and team collaboration; available tools can be viewed and selected by category, name, or type. The program sends e-mail to notify users of group-membership changes as well as to invite them to join applications. The impressive tool set still lacks real-time interaction except for its basic chat support, but it offers the most complete scheduling support of all the products reviewed.
Domino requires some hefty processing resources, and involv only adds to that need. Luckily, Domino supports multiprocessing systems, so large involv sites are possible. Although Lotus has lowered the high cost of inv
esting in Domino, the expense of setting up Domino plus involv on a high-end system might be more than some organizations can justify -- particularly if they already have a significant investment in other intranet infrastructure products based on Windows or Unix. A Domino server will operate in a mixed environment, but Domino-based applications may not interoperate well -- if at all -- with other legacy systems.
At $5000 per server and as much as $90 per user, involv Intranet can get pricey, but it's still a hands-down, no-brainer choice for Domino installations with deep pockets. Others should consider it but also check out alternatives if Microsoft IIS or budget constraints are a part of the puzzle.
InstantTeamRoom 1.0
Lotus designed InstantTeamRoom as a service that ISPs could deliver as a value-added service to their customers, but the company might make an intranet version available to organizations as early as this year. The service is now available from ISPs Interliant, Netcom, and
U.S. West, and it's also available directly from Lotus. The going rate is $14.95 per user, per month, with no limitations on the number of conferences created or the amount of storage used for file attachments. All you need to get started is a credit card and a browser that supports Java (Navigator 3.0 or higher or MSIE4.0 or higher, on any platform).
Once you're set up, you can start creating TeamRooms simply by inviting participants, although the Room's creator pays for all invitees to the Room, whether they participate or not. Included with the package but hidden from users are support for customer tracking and billing. Invitations are easy to make as long as you've got all the invitees' e-mail addresses. InstantTeamRoom generates and sends each participant (and only those participants) a message with a log-on name and password.
Like involv Intranet, InstantTeamRoom runs on top of Domino. It provides basic discussion, brainstorming, and file-sharing support, but it lacks involv's sophisticatio
n and the real-time support found in TeamWave Workplace. On the plus side, the product's limited functionality simplifies the user interface. Unlike the other products reviewed, InstantTeamRoom links anyone with a browser and e-mail from anywhere; it's an ideal extranet solution for small workgroups spanning different organizations.
If you and your workgroup can access the Internet, then you can get up and running on InstantTeamRoom with a minimal investment of time and money. Expect ISPs to jump on the teamware bandwagon once users see how easy InstantTeamRoom can be to set up and use.
TeamWave Workplace 2.1
TeamWave Software's TeamWave Workplace server/client software runs on a variety of platforms, including Windows 95 and NT, the Mac, and assorted Unix flavors. For now, TeamWave Workplace is strictly TCP/IP client/server, meaning it works over the Internet or any intranet; Web-client support, via a plug-in, and integrated MAPI e-mail support are planned for sometime in the future.
Price is key to TeamWave's success. At $50 per user -- comparable to about three months of Lotus InstantTeamRoom -- TeamWave includes asynchronous interaction with bulletin boards and brainstorming, as well as live interaction with chat and support for whiteboarding. Like eRoom, TeamWave allows any number of objects to be created and placed in a workgroup room. One deficiency is that objects cannot be viewed in a list mode, nor can you search for them. On the other hand, the graphical display of objects on the whiteboard allows users to see multiple objects at one time. You can add annotations directly to the whiteboard, and there are even sticky-note objects.
TeamWave's object list is extensive, with everything from calendars to discussion groups supported. Polling objects handle only a single question at a time, but multiple polling objects can be created. A chat window is standard and sits at the bottom of the screen so users can dispense with telephone contact but still interact with each other i
n real time. Application developers can even customize TeamWave with the Tcl scripting language.
One major drawback hobbles TeamWave: an out-of-date client interface. It uses Unix Motif-style windows management: You move windows by dragging on their edges, and you resize them by dragging on corners. TeamWave objects are functional but limited. For example, the database object allows you to add any number of fields, but it has only rudimentary forms support.
Balancing out these significant drawbacks, however, are some nice features. For instance, the program lets you know in real time who else is visiting a room. It also offers TeamWave URL and door objects, which allow users to move quickly to Web pages or other TeamWave rooms by double-clicking on the object.
TeamWave is a reasonable option for small workgroups looking for a single teamware solution, as long as they don't mind adding yet another client to their desktop. TeamWave could use a good bit of polish, but it's a diamond in the rou
gh that's worth checking out.
Joining the Teamware
Each reviewed product fits into a distinctive group, which may make your purchasing selection a bit easier. For instance, InstantTeamRoom is currently the only choice for hosted Internet support. Installations already using Domino are likely to choose Changepoint's involv Intranet or Lotus's InstantTeamRoom. Likewise, people using Windows NT Server with IIS might gravitate to Facilitate.com or Instinctive Technology's eRoom.
Meanwhile, TeamWave Software's TeamWave Workplace is the only product that provides full real-time whiteboard support as part of the basic package. TeamWave's lack of Windows NT service support might present a security issue, but it's still a workable solution.
Finally, firewall issues might eliminate some products. For organizations that strictly use a Web server via HTTP, InstantTeamRoom and involv Intranet will work best. Organizations interested in providing fee-based teamware services should check out invo
lv Intranet, InstantTeamRoom, Facilitate.com, and eRoom.
Where to Find
eRoom 1.0..................................$ 645.00 for a five-user starter kit
(Microsoft IIS or PWS)
Instinctive Technology, Inc.
Cambridge, MA
Phone: 617-497-6300
Internet: http://www.instinctive.com
Team-Building on the Fly
