Web 2.0 Online
Collaboration
Collaborative Virtual Environments
Daniel Livingstone

Web 2.0?
Term coined by Tim O'Reilly (of O'Reilly
books) in 2004
Not a new technology
But may use new technlogies or
solutions (c.f. AJAX)
Cover all term for wide range of 'new' ways
of using the web focussing on
collaboration, sharing, creativity

Blogs - Review
You have all been asked to create a blog. Why?
* Reflective practice. What do you think of things...
opinions and reasons
* Progress reporting
* Record links and 'found' things that you might
want to revisit - or other people might want to see
How much should you write?
* I would suggest 1-3 entries per week.
From 50 to 500 words per entry.

Blogs and RSS
Reading 15 blogs time consuming
Even just checking for updates when there are
none!
Aggregate all new updates with RSS readers
RSS presents simplified content of web page
without the formatting
Eg:
BBC News front page
vs. BBC News front page RSS

Reading Blogs
Keep up with
all your
colleagues
using Google
Reader /
Bloglines
One page to
lookup for all
updates -
instead of
dozens!

Some Tools for Online
Collaborative Groupwork
VLE / LMS - e.g. Blackboard or Moodle
Using this already - forums etc.
Want to look at other tech
Blogs - Limited amounts of collaboration
Wiki's
Google Groups / Yahoo Groups
Google Docs / Zoho
Ning / ELGG

Also see: WikiSpaces - Free online wiki hosting
No need to have your own server or install wiki software
Supports WYSIWYG style editing - No need to learn peculiar
WIKI markup languages

Wiki's For Collaborative Working
Project homepage
Can control access
Who is able to read, who is able to edit
Allow multiple contributors
Talk pages allow discussion on content without
changing it
History stored - allowing all versions of a page to
be viewed
History also allows individual contributions to be
seen

Google Groups / Yahoo Groups / etc.
Some functionality based on previous generations
of intranet/internet groupware
Limited compared to 'true' groupware solutions
c.f. Lotus Notes of over 10 years ago
Google Groups features:
Discussion forum (can use via email)
Member lists/profiles
File sharing
'Pages' - Online documents with collaborative
editing and revision history

Office Tools
Office Software is also often used for collaborative
work
Typical workflow:
Someone edits document, enables change
tracking
Email to 2nd contributor
Contributor makes edits, email back
Original author checks edits, makes further
revisions, emails back again
etc., etc., ...
Possibly replace email with online file store
Still convoluted workflow

The End of Microsoft Office?
Can Office be replaced by a suite of web-
based applications?
Google thinks so... Google Docs gives
you web based word-processing, spread
sheets and presentations. Add Google
Calendar and Gmail against Microsoft
Outlook, a web-page creator and blogs
against Frontpage...
And Google are not the only ones...

zoho.com

The Google Office
Google Docs - http://docs.google.com
Word processing, Spreadsheet, Presentation software
All very limited functionality compared to MS Office
But do somethings MS Office can't do! Print pdf files, ...
Easy to share documents with others for collaborative
editing - or to give an online presentation
Multiple users can edit the one document at the same
time!
Google Calendar - http://www.google.com/calendar/
Allow you to publish your calendar (or only parts of it!)
making your diary/availabilty checkable online EXAMPLE
Can view multiple calendars in one view
e.g. Personal, work, colleagues, public events
One member of staff uses this to show football fixtures
alongside his own diary!

Social Networks
Social Networks also have interesting features for
collaboration... can go beyond lists of friends!
Messaging, updates, content sharing
Information about group members
Can add custom applications
e.g. Updates from Blogs, Calendars etc
Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Orkut, etc...
Only useful when information can sensibly be made
public
Downsides of Social Networking?
Many studies show people are unware of how public
information really is... and act as if they are sharing with
only their friends.
What are the risks?

Custom Social Networks
Can Social Networks be put to more purposeful use?
NING
Create your own social network online
Theme, brand a social network and invite people in
Can control membership (optional)
No costs, but adverts placed on pages
E.g. Commercial: Dub Magazine
Education: ICT in Education
ELGG
Open source social networking software
Theme, brand and customise social network
Host on own servers, free software
Could add adverts for own revenue
E.g. Commun-IT - Social network for Ontario Educators

And there's more...
Twitter
Online status updates
Can update from mobile phone
Reported value: Instant contacts, updates,
meetings
Podcasts
iTunes U
YouTube
YouTube University!
http://webcast.berkeley.edu/
MIT OpenCourseware gave large boost to
open education resources trend
OpenLearn in the UK

Behind the Scenes
AJAX
Asynchronous Javascript and XML
Web development technique for web apps
Make web pages feel more responsive by exchanging small
amounts of data with server behind the scenes, so the entire
web page does not have to be reloaded each time the user
requests a change.
Increase the web page interactivity, speed, and
usability.
Not a technology in itself, but a term that refers to the use of a
group of technologies, See e.g.:
Script.aluco.us
Ruby on Rails

And there's more...
Slideshare
Scribd
flickr
digg
and on and on and on...
As in this portentious video

What to do with all of this?
This lecture has listed a range of web-based
collaborative software applications
You should use some of these for your group
project
Which ones? And why?
One not on this list?
Group should make sensible use of these technologies...
What information be public? Private workspaces?
Ease of use vs. richness of applications
Creation of web-based resources as part of & in
support of your class project (more on this later!) will
be graded