Collaboration is where two or more people work together with a shared aim. Successful collaboration requires good communication and co-ordination. Collaboration is an extremely relevant factor in the modern work place as many jobs involve attending many meetings, communicating with fellow staff, talking to clients etc...

Problems can arise if shared access to resources is limited. Also, good collaboration requires the individuals involved to have a shared focus. This can only happen if everyone is aware of the overall goal and progress, otherwise conflicts of interest may arise and unresolved disagreements will cause ongoing problems.

Groupware and Teamware support CSCW and there are three ways in which this can be done. Firstly, they can enable bidirectional communication between users (which can be synchronous or asynchronous). Secondly, they can provide an environment for decision making and idea generating. Thirdly, Groupware or Teamware can allow the sharing of virtual objects within a Collaborative Virtual Environment. For example, two or more users can be editing different parts of the same text document at the same time from different geographical locations.

There are various properties associated with Groupware that affect how it is designed. As already mentioned, users can be distributed geographically far apart from each other. This means they would be working "remotely". The opposite of this would be "co-located" workers who are on the same site. Another factor is whether the communications involved are synchronous or asynchronous. Synchronous communication or interaction refers to activity that takes place at the same time. An example of synchronous communication would be speaking on the telephone or using an Instant Messaging (IM) system. Asynchronous actions take place one after the other. An example of asynchronous communication would be the use of email or using sticky notes to convey messages to fellow workers.

Communication can also be formal (e.g. in meetings or letters) or informal (chatting on a coffee break or leaving scribbled notes for someone). Informal communication is often as powerful as formal communication, if not more so. It is often the case though, that typical system designs do not take into consideration these channels of informal communication.

Search for "Collaboration, Groupware and Teamware" on: Google | Kelkoo | Amazon | eBay (UK) | eBay (US)

Search for "Collaboration, Groupware and Teamware" on the rest of Computing Students: Collaboration, Groupware and Teamware