SAP StreamWork SAP StreamWork, a new cloud-based, software-as a- service (SaaS), collaboration environment to unite people, methods and information. SAP Newsroom: "WALLDORF, Germany - March 30, 2010 - SAP® StreamWork™ - the new on-demand, collaborative decision-making software from SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) - is the company's latest product aimed at transforming the way people work" [3] SAP Business software provider have more that 95,000 customers in more than 120 countries Following the recent SAP® BusinessObjects™ BI OnDemand solution launch, "SAP StreamWork offers people a powerful business tool that requires no training or technical knowledge." [3] Features [1]: ** "Guided decisions, recorded outcomes, defined actions." Save, share and reuse discussions of current case studies to model new problematic issues on. This feature archives a corporate knowledge base of resolutions for future elucidation. In Streamwork, groups end up with a recorded history of how a decision/ outcome was reached. ** Integrates with existing applications like Box.net, Evernote and Scribd. With so many collaboration software available, email, Web 2.0 applications and business systems, work projects can easily become chaotic and hard to follow. Streamwork™ streamlines activities to drive teams toward an outcome or goal. Streamwork are addressing those issues that other collaboration software missed, like tracking and auditing features, territory extensibly covered by SAP's experience in the field of business software. [2] ** Intuitive data exploration and visualization ** Build meeting agendas, create and prioritise lists ** Interactive, build-in tools: Quick poll, SWOT analyses, Pro/Con table, cost effectiveness and Responsibility matrices.

Subscription of the professional version is tiered, starting at US$9.00p/month per user and a free version of limited storage (250MB) is available. The professional edition allows up to 100 activities open, provides 5 GB of storage per user and save closed activities for 2 years.[1] YouTube Video Tutorials available. [1] http://www.sapstreamwork.com/ http://www.sap.com/solutions/sapbusinessobjects/ondemand/streamwork/index.epx [2] Henschen, D 2010SAP Launches Collaboration Cloud. Intelligent Enterprise; Feb2010, Vol. 13 Issue 2, p7-7, 1p Retrieved on 10/4/2010 from: http://intelligent-enterprise.informationweek.com/channels/enterprise_applications/ [3] SAP Media Relations.March 30, 2010:SAP Streamworkhelps companies of all sizes transform the way people work. Accessed on 1-/4/2010 from: http://www.sap.com/about/newsroom/

Combining a couple of online tools; (Shared workspaces, and Connect Pro) for document collaboration, web conferencing, and eLearning. The days of emailing versions of Word or Power Point documents are gone. Sharing, collaborating, creating, is a 24/7 business and participation is potentially unlimited. The starting point for all groups is, choosing a common platform to work on. Most collaboration sites can be customized, has communication options, provide degrees of third-party partnerships, accommodate file sharing and facilitate storage space. [3] Acrobat.com has the lot and a lot more. Acrobat, as stand-alone software for PDF document creation, with its free distribution of the Acrobat Reader to open these documents, is known across multiple time zones. This is not always the case for other collaboration software. Statistics for users of Facebook show the platform is mostly used in the United States and Canada while orkut (www.orkut.com) is the platform preferred by Brazilians, and hi5 (www.hi5.com) is mostly used in the Caribbean.[3] Acrobat.com rebuts diversity by its international acceptance in the market. Acrobat.com Workspaces and Connect Pro is "The next best thing to meeting in person".

**. Workspaces: Online document collaboration, word processing, PDF conversion, spreadsheets sharing. **. Web conferencing: Private team meetings without the travelling cost. IPhone and iPod touch mobile software also available. This service can be hosted with an annual subscription, on-premise with a software licence or managed by a third-party certified Adobe partner. **. eLearning: Create self-paced courses and media-rich virtual classes. Delivery methods for business training are evolving. Economic fluctuations periodically shift sales strategies for example, a consultative approach to selling changes to a more provocative method in recessionary times. Sales managers often have to retrain staff with little warning. The new generation of the workforce; so called Millennials, tend to be more comfortable with online learning. On-line eLearning in real time is engaging, dynamic and interactive, all promoting highly effective sales training. [5] **. Web seminars: Host live web events and training for staff and customers and partners. With a web browser and Adobe Flash Player, create streaming video, animations and interactive content.[4]

[1] Hanyaloglu, A. (2010) Acrobat.com takes a new step today- Workspaces http://blogs.adobe.com/acom/ [2] http://www.adobe.com/acom/ [3] Hastings, R. (2008) Collaborating across time zones. http://web.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.slv.vic.gov.au/ehost/ [4] Product specifications. Retrieved on 5/4/2010 from: http://www.adobe.com/ap/products/acrobatconnectpro/?promoid=BOZMY [5] Canaday, H. How new eLearning tools cut costs and improve results. White paper . Retrieved on 5/4/2010 from http://www.adobe.com/ap/products/acrobatconnectpro/elearning/ Lowensohn, J. 2009. Retrieved on 7/04/2010 from: http://news.cnet.com

ConceptShare is cleverly pursuing like-minded partners at a time when web-based software concepts are becoming exceedingly popular. Partnerships increase the visibility of both parties. **ConceptShare teamed up with Vimeo to create free, basic and advanced tutorials to learn how to use this product prior to purchasing.[1] **Email clients are teamed up to create co-op workspaces by a built in, email system that automatically parse the email list and send invitations to the list members.[1] **Alliance with the Adobe users, multipage PDF documents can be imported which make brochure, instruction pages and other multi-page documents easy to collaborate on. [1] **ConceptShare and Marketbright; a marketing automation platform, teamed up in a mutually beneficial relationship. Creative and marketing professionals can liaise on marketing and advertising campaigns. [1] Retrieved on 5/4/2010 from:http://www.conceptshare.com/tutorials.html [2] Scott , 2010. Marketbright and ConceptShare launch partnership. Retrieved on 5/4/2010 from: http://www.thoughtballoons.net/

Virtual servers, Cloud computing and Software-as-a-service,(SaaS), are all pioneering new innovative value-adding utilities. Gmail, Hotmail, YouTube, are a few SaaS tools already known to most people, but now the Internet is exploding with collaborative services and applications. With peer pressure from Google's Google docs and other web-based software developers, giant software companies like Microsoft, Adobe, SAP etc are all launching into web-based applications. [1] Microsoft's (Light) Office app will be available for free with Office 2010.[2] Even hardware technology are pointing to "slim-down" operating systems like netbooks that have little data storage capabilities, no moving parts and only connects and rely on the internet [1] CRM, Customer Relations Management and ERP; Enterprise Resource Planning are the most popular applications that companies are taking up as web-collaborative applications. ***Now Engineering design are available in the cloud. SolidWorks CEO, Jeff Ray says the one prevailing advantage to all customers is cost. [4]

Web applications to make sharing easy are: *eDrawings Viewer: With eviewer anyone can view, interpret and understand 2D and 3D design data. Free download. *Drawings Now: Another web service from SolidWorks. Upload and share designs with anyone from any browser. Email a link to colleague or client who can pan, zoom and print drawings. Informal collaboration on intermediary models can provide feedback without the encumbrance of a huge file size of the formal design with all the attributes. File types are not limited to SolidWorks files (SLDDRW) but accepts generic CAD, DWG and DXF files as well. *BluePrint Now: Web- based drafting to upload and proof files from anywhere. *Shared Storage: Invite with an email link anyone whom you would like to share drawings with from a space on a secure server provided by SolidWorks. *SolidWorks Community: "Filled with extremely passionate engineers". Connect with engineers, designers, manufacturers and suppliers, as well as certified SolidWorks professionals. [3] *Cloud enabled Data Management will be available in the 2nd half of 2010. [4]

[1] Patrick Stafford 2009 How cloud computing could change your business and save you thousands. Retrieved on 4/4/2010 from:http://www.smartcompany.com.au/ [2] Lia Timson 2010 Word, Excel, Powerpoint-free on the web. Retrieved 4/4/2010 from: http://www.watoday.com.au/technology/ [3]SolidWorks website. Retrieved on 4/4/2010 from: http://www.solidworks.com/sw/products/free-cad-software-downloads.htm [4] Johnson, A. 2010. CAD moves to the clouds. Retrieved on 4/4/2010 from:http://www.manmonthly.com.au/Article/CAD-moves-to-the-clouds/514146.aspx

http://www.swivel.com/ References [1] IPSN'07 Overview. Data sharing and Interoperability on the world-wide Sensor Web. http://research.microsoft.com/ [2] Features page 2010 from: http://www.swivel.com/ [3] Cuff, D et al. 2008 Urban Sensing: Out of the Woods. Communications of the ACM. Vol 51, No 3.Retrieved on 3/4/2010 from: http://web.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.slv.vic.gov.au/ehost/

"Swivel is not a data visualization tool. Swivel is not a data analysis tool. Swivel is the world's first data sharing tool." [2] A multitude of embedded sensing platforms have given rise to abundant statistical data available on request, or in the public domain.[1] Geocoded data, its visualization on the geographic information system Google Earth and "mash-ups" with Google Maps, have reduced the technical barrier to visualize data. Embedded network sensing has gone from the lab to nature and is now in our suburbs. "Urban -sensing" are reaching into the worlds of politics, aesthetics, interpretation and motivation.[3] As a business tool mash-up applications; or, the ability to pull data in from multiple sources and render it into a coherent visual model for presentations to customers or team members, can make a significant difference to the experience.[1]

The Swivel mission statement commits to, "empower the world's data" by turning information into action. Customers range from businesses to clubs or individuals. Cleveland.com, The Huffington Post, U.S. News and The Texas Tribune has embedded the product for journalistic statistical manipulation. Swivel lets people see, understand and share their numbers, visually. Contributing data to the public domain or to a private setting, (group, project, customer-base etc.), allows comments and feedback by way of notes. Swivel can be teamed up with, Salesforce.com, Google docs, Google Analytics, QuickBooks and more.[2] Swivel is user friendly; you can upload Excel files, (97 through to 2007 version), or use Swivel spreadsheets by pasting (or typing) raw data from a file or website. Formatting options are available for font face, size and colour.' One-click' manipulation creates custom charts. Interactive error messages guide and suggest alternatives. A wide range of chart types are available. Most importantly charts and spreadsheets are easily embedded as interactive widgets or static images. Swivel is free for public data or available on a monthly contract for private use. Swivel support is available on email and Twitter. http://www.swivel.com/public , for Public reports, charts and data e.g. "Forbes Top Ten List over the past 10 Years.[2]

Salesforce http://www.salesforce.com/au/ Salesforce.com is a sales and service, customer relationship management (CRM), cloud computing operation. To date, 72,500 Companies have made Salesforce Sales Cloud, Australia's most-popular collaborative sales application. Some corporate customers are: BlueScope Steel, Crocs, Langdon Ingredients, Mission Australia, Australian air Express and many more. Features of the application: Accounts and contracts: An abridged customer overview. Marketing and Leads: Manage multichannel campaigns and turn prospects into sales. Opportunities and Quotes: Real time quote, product tracking, sales process, schedule automatic email reminders to keep teams up to date. Approvals and workflow: Eliminate redundant tasks, modify workflow, respond to order requests, define, administer and analyse territories and alter boundaries easily. Email and productivity: Synchronise or embed Salesforce with Microsoft Outlook, Lotus Notes, Google Apps, Microsoft word and Excel address book, calendar and email. Personalize email with templates. Genius: Share best practices, sales tools, supporting material, case studies, and similar deals from mentors. Content Library: Integrated content library with web features like tagging, search and ranking, find the latest presentations and information and marketing tools. Analytics and Forecasting: Dashboard graphics to display performance indicators at a glance. Generate reports and forecasting from valid data. Partners: Collaborate with partners in real time, sharing leads, opportunities and tasks towards greater loyalty. Mobile: Salesforce comes with free Mobile Lite or upgrade to the full version. Get instant access to vital information and dashboards. Service Cloud: The platform for modern customer service. Service cloud is a Call centre, a customer portal, integrates with Twitter and Fac

Twitter has a more open platform than Facebook and present opportunities for businesses to tap into the online conversations of their customers and initiate micro-interactions with them. (Schindholzer, B 2009) David Markus from Smartcompany .com says functionality, ease of use, stability, price, support, level of integration with other tools and security for cloud computing are the criteria to evaluate web-based collaboration technologies on. Countless case studies confirm that Salesforce.com meet these criteria. Reference Sales Cloud Features Datasheet.( 2010) Retrieved on 1/4/2010 from: http://www.customer-experience-labs.com/2009/06/11/five-use-cases-to-leverage-twitter-for-your-business/ Markus, D.(2010)Retrieved on 30/3/2010 from: http://www.smartcompany.com.au/

Commentary by Louwna. Posted to Diigo on: 1/4/2010 http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/Pages/Default.aspx from a discussion by Craig on 31/03/2010 As recent as November 2009, Microsoft was warning businesses about security, privacy issues specially differing jurisdiction when considering cloud computing as a means of collaboration. "Privacy protections are essential to building the customer trust needed for cloud computing and the internet to reach their full potential." Stafford warns that a lot of cloud computing services don't have their own infrastructure but rent from others. This will necessarily be the smaller companies. Customers of SharePoint can be assured that "sophisticated controls for securing company resources" have been thoroughly integrated into the product as it is backed by years of research from Microsoft. (Stafford, P. 2009) SharePoint encourages 3rd party developers to develop custom modifications or to incorporate SharePoint into existing collaboration software. Microsoft Sharepoint 2010 Social Fest was a, 'competition by invite', to ten, cloud-collaboration, IT companies who each came up with some unique new way of utilizing SharePoint into their own collaborative platforms. SharePoint has a built in editor that allows some customization. SharePoint 2010 will provide deeper integration with Office 2010 soon to be available for retail sales. This version of Office will support Office Web Apps coming with Office 2010. Online support called "SharePoint Online Services" is already supporting more than a million users on line. Microsoft promises; "We're going to be more Internet-focused and cloud focused than ever before." ( Johnston, S.J. 2009) (Stafford, P. 2009) Retrieved on 31/03/10 from: no

Originally suggested by Meryl Olait http://groups.diigo.com/group/net-308-at-oua/content/user/merylolait on: 29/3/2010 .http://venturebeat.com/2007/11/13/huddle-another-online-collaboration-system-for-businesses/ This review is from VentureBeat; a site that covers news and profiles about innovation companies. According to this investment review in 2007, Huddle received US$4million from Eden Ventures; an investment company of "serial entrepreneurs with strong seed investment track record, creating business of lasting value." Huddle's mission statement is "to be the world's best online B2B collaboration platform" Huddle's target market is the corporate market with a impressive list of corporate customers; Boots, Panasonic, Nokia, Kerry Ingredients, Kia Motors and many more. Important features for companies will be Huddle's ability to store Microsoft Word and Excel documents as well as a online office on iPhone application , intranet, extranet, file sharing, team collaboration and project management tools even when they do not operate within the same firewall. Huddle won the Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Social Fest competition for "Leverage SharePoint into [your] existing product". http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/04/microsoft-sharepoint-socialfest/ Huddle received honourable mention in the ReadWriteWeb Top 10 International Web Products of 2009. http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/top_10_international_web_products_of_2009.php