Collaborative document editing is a process in which multiple people are able to edit a document using different computers. It replace the need to have a face to face document editing and multiple copies of the same document been edit individually.
Let’s start with the wiki. It is a web-based software that allow viewers of the site to edit the content of the page online using a browser. Wiki was first known of in 1995, the first wiki called WikiWikiWeb, today there are over 200 wikis they are sometime call wiki clones, to name a few are UseModWiki, MoinMoin, PhpWiki, WakkaWiki, etc. Wiki has been used: 1) in a closed work group or 2) directed to everybody over the World Wide Web. Wiki can be utilised in many ways as “an open, web-based content management system (CMS) for the editing and management of web presence or to supplement an existing CMS…” or “as your internationally accessible notepad or as discussion forums for general and specialised discussions”.[1] Social perspective is attack as most people find uncomfortable when they first started to use wiki, they felt that “…contribution from “others” will destroy…” their work. A Swedish data systems specialist Lars Aronsson still support the wiki system as she writes: “Most people, when they first learn about the wiki concept, assume that a website that can be edited by anybody would soon be rendered useless by destructive input…Still, it seems to work very well.”[2]
For this particular assignment we will have a feel of how wiki works as we use it for the group’s combine work. A useful feature of wiki is its history tool; it allows user to go all the way back to the first version of the file, however this might be narrowed due to limited space. This tool is handy for the group work when there are any coordination problems; any mistake could be undo easily. Some wikis offered what is called a “Diff” command, this tool is used to compare changes in two versions. This command will be a fast and efficient tool for the group to retrieve any deleted information that might be needed in the future. Another effective tool provided by wiki is a recent changes page, it provide an outline of recent changes to wiki pages within a certain time period, this will allow other team members to see and keep a record of changes done by others. [3] However there is short coming to wiki, some editors does not support concurrent editing. A user who is involved in writing projects and reports that involved collaboration noticed that if an online document was accidentally edited by two people at the same time it could cause one to lose all their edited work.[4]
Google Documents is another collaborative document editing program that is well known; it is very much similar to a wiki. Google Documents originated from a product called Writely and became Google Documents in March 2006 when it was bought by Google.[5] Many people who have experienced Google Documents would agree with Gordon McKinlay comment, that this is a great collaborative program for “allowing people to work together on a paper when they are not anywhere near each other.” [6] An advantage of this product is that it allows simultaneous editing however changes are only refresh every 30seconds (approximately). [7]
MoonEdit(ME) take one step further by allowing multiple members to edit a document in real-time, it does this by providing each member a cursor with a unique colour for differentiation on the screen, every single text changed are visible at real-time. It has a keyboard typing sound simulation that make a sound when someone else is making a change to the document. It has a history tool similar to wiki, it show what changes occurred when they last access it.[8] MoonEdit could be used as a collaborative text forum when trying to combine thoughts of different team members; taking advantage of its real-time feature we create something that is similar to a face to face meeting but even better.
Another one of this real time editor is SubEthaEdit. It basically promotes the same idea as the MoonEdit by allowing multiple people to edit a document at the same time and changes are refresh instantly. A user of this editor has described the experience this way “The effect is one of literally seeing multiple cursors on the page with everyone typing at once. It’s extremely cool”. However they also felt that there are some down sides to this product, they found to be confusing when there are too many people working on the document with no clean cut purpose which was hard to keep a track of who did what. And the product is only available for Mac OS X. [9] There are quite a few other products that offer real-time editing such as CoWord, ACE, UNA, to name a few that supports different computers.
In conclusion we see the commonality between those programs as it allow for collaborative document editing without the user been anywhere close to each other. What contrasts them is their add on commands and their different approach to attract different markets. Feature such as real-time editing found in MoonEdit and SubEthaEdit distinguish them from programs such as Google Documents and some wiki editors.
Click for video explaination of wiki
Click for video explaination of Google Documents
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[1] Ebersbach Anja et al., “The Wiki Concept”, in Reading in Wiki: Web Collaboration, (Berlin; New York : Springer Science & Business Media, 2006).
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Good Robin, "Collaborative Document Review Online: PleaseReview", Masternewmedia, (Thursday, June 2 2005), viewed on 26 March 2008, http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2005/06/02/collaborative_document_review_online_pleasereview.htm
[5] Wikipedia, “Collaborative real-time editor”, Wikipedia, (19 March 2008), viewed on 26 March 2008, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_real-time_editor.
[6] Ramblings Gordon, "Collaborative Documents", Gordon's Ramblings blog, (09 March 2007), viewed on 26 March 2008, http://gordonsramblings.blogspot.com/2007/03/collaborative-documents.html
[7] Wikipedia, op. cit.
[8] Rossi L C D, "Synchronous Collaborative Text Document Editing Online: MoonEdit", Masternewmedia, (20 February 2005), viewed on 26 March 2008, http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2005/02/20/synchronous_collaborative_text_document_editing.htm
[9] McLellan Drew, "Collaborative Document Editing", All In The Head, (28 May 2004), viewed on 26 March 2008, http://allinthehead.com/retro/205/collaborative-document-editing.
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