In November 2007 I hosted my first Office Live meeting but it was a dismal failure. 1) No audio. Are they kidding? 2) Application sharing fails. In simple terms: no sharing of PowerPoint or whatever is on screen. 3) Regarding the latter, I was referred to a web page for more information. The web page is non-existent. Considering these deficiencies, I had to say that Office Live Meeting Web Access was a non-starter. I'm all for this type of technology when it works - reliably - but Microsoft's offering is certainly not reliable enough. I'm not alone…

Installs but fails to run in Darwine. I wonder whether MoonEdit is more compatible with CrossOver Mac.

Not available through MacPorts.

The Acrobat.com beta suite (Buzzword, ConnectNow, Create PDF, Share, My Files) from Adobe is most impressive. I often run a mile from Adobe installations (and un-installtions) but the online nature of these services go a long way to reducing my horror of Adobe software. ConnectNow seems to work remarkably well, though I have not tried any aspect of the suite in anything other than solo test situations. Of greatest concern is Adobe's confusion concerning accounts and identities. It proved terribly difficult to have my credentials recognised in the proper places.

The June 2008 issue of World Wine News (WWN) announced version 1.0 of Wine, upon which products such as Darwine and CrossOver Mac are based. Related interviews are on my reading list.

For programs that traditionally require Microsoft Widows: users of Mac OS X and Linux may consider CodeWeavers products as lighter and more maintainable alternatives to the entire Microsoft operating system. CodeWeavers base their CrossOver products on Wine.

A build of Darwine for Mac OS X.

For programs that traditionally require Microsoft Widows: users of Mac OS X may consider Darwine as a free, open source, lighter and more maintainable alternative to the entire Microsoft operating system. Builds of Darwine are available here and elsewhere.

Zoho Writer is appealing. I have never tried concurrent edits with multiple users … I might take the Zoho expression "Lock your documents while in shared mode" to mean that whilst multiple users may access a document, no more than one at a time may edit (not true concurrency).

Zoho Forums, a primary means of support, is exceptionally difficult to use, a great disappoinment compared to some other aspects of Zoho. However, to their credit: the writers there are both responsive and pollite.

In the forums we are advised that support for OpenID should arise "within a couple of months".

Home to the UNA real-time collaborative development environment.

UNA envrionment is for software engineers.

Whether I tested SynchroEdit in the past, I can't recall.

Exceptionally smart software for Mac OS X only.

I might have experimented with Shared Page briefly, a year or two ago. If I did, I can't recall anything about the experience.

XMPP client for real-time collaborative whiteboarding. Whiteboard menu | Instant Messaging… presents the Pedro XMPP client. With such clients, multiple users of Inkscape can collaborate in Jabber instant messaging/chat environments. This feature originated from the 2005 inclusion of Inkboard. For users of Mac OS X who find that Inkscape.app lacks the Whiteboard menu, a more inclusive compilation may be gained… (details submitted to the Wikipedia page for Inkscape).

Appealing, but the WYWIWYG in-browser editor is not wholly compatible with WebKit/Safari.

For as long as a Google account is the only means of collaborative editing here, I should not make Google Docs a top recommendation. (Compare with the Zoho suite, which is moving towards OpenID.)

I recall, a few days ago, an invitation to review the Access Grid software. I'll check my Inboxes…

When I last reviewed Gobby, alongside ACE (both in the context of Access Grid), I found pros and cons to both.

Smart chap. A blog to watch.

Another exceptionally fine project from the Open University.

Beautifully implemented software from the Open University.

Very neat. It's some time since a looked at this. For Freeman Centre, the predominantly open plan building in which I work, I like notions of 'enhanced presence' and mapping faces to places.