CoShare: a Multi-Pointer Collaborative Screen Sharing Tool

BackgroundIn the French West-Indies, few studies have been performed on fertility and sexual problems in cancer survivors, which are frequent and recurring issues reported by surveys on unmet needs. Additionally, mutualizing human and material resources and promoting cooperation through a collaborative platform are the most appropriate response to complex health pathways in the Caribbean territories. Implementation of such a collaborative platform will help to launch a strategic Caribbean partnership to transfer theoretical and technical skills and care standards in oncofertility and oncosexuality.MethodsWe propose to set up a collaborative digital platform to strengthen, from the French expertise, Cuban health professionals’ knowledge, know-how, and skills in oncofertility and oncosexuality. The project will be coordinated by a coordinating, scientific, and supervisory committee, and the main activities will include:Theoretical training in e-learning adapted to low-speed Internet.Practical training in fertility preservation and sexual rehabilitation.Digital multidisciplinary consultation meetings for medical decisions to be taken for complex clinical cases.The platform will benefit from a recurrent evaluation, by the two cancer registries of Martinique and Cuba, with the following performance indicators: number of Cuban professionals trained, number of professionals sensitized, hourly volumes (or number of training courses provided), satisfaction of trained professionals, number of e-RCPs carried out online and number of missionaries supported. These indicators will be set up and analyzed by the registers.This project meets the Cuban and French health policies (cancer plans and national sexual health strategies) and will be implemented in liaison with the Health Agencies of both countries and the Embassy of France in Cuba.DiscussionThis project aims to provide support through bilateral exchanges to improve reproductive and sexual health in Cuba’s cancer patients. This collaboration will be based on a long-lasting French expertise and a solid Cuban health system. Consequently, this collaborative digital platform will contribute to data collection for cancer surveillance, and the two participating countries will ultimately be identified in the Caribbean as having centers of competence and excellence in oncofertility and oncosexuality with care standards.

The innovative spirit and practical ability are graduates' core competitiveness of employment. A innovative teaching mode can facilitate the promotion of the innovation capability of college students, based on the collaborative teaching activities between students, teachers on campus and engineers off campus. However, at present, there is still lack of effective support software platform for collaborative practice teaching. In this paper, we present an approach for constructing such a platform based on Social Networking Services (SNS) and mobile client applications. Using SNS, this system enables learners and instructors to easily organize their creative activities. In addition, participants of creative activities can more effectively interact with each other, commit themselves to collaborative teaching and learning, relying on the platform's smart mobile application.

: A fundamental problem in reaping the benefits of using an Open Architecture (OA) approach to developing integrated warfare systems (IWS) is the requirement for the multiple parties involved to collaborate. This was less of a problem when single vendors managed the entire acquisition life cycle. To take advantage of the potential of OA to use common off the shelf software modules, multiple vendors, greater access and involvement of the acquisition professional and future users of the IWS, collaborative information technology is a necessary ingredient. And, to make collaborative tools useful in the IWS acquisition life cycle, users must leverage their competence with the collaborative tools.. To shed light on this requirement, this paper introduces the construct of 'Collaborative IT Tools Leveraging Competence' as the ability of various OA work groups involved in the IWS acquisition life cycle to effectively leverage collaborative IT tools to enhance their group performance. Collaborative IT Tools Leveraging Competence is conceptualized as a second-order construct formed by the group?s effective use of the following six key IT functionalities: workspace sharing, conferencing, file sharing, scheduling, chat, and email.

Access control for rural medical and health collaborative working platform

This article describes the design of a collaborative learning tool. The idea of developing a tool for collaboration has been generated through extensive brainstorming and discussions. In this paper author has included the theoretical knowledge underpinning the process of learning through collaboration and the attributes of meaningful learning. A discussion on different types of electronic tools available for learning justifies the need for an appropriate visual tool for collaboration. The author had also realized that none of the digital concept-mapping tools are suitable for online as well as real time collaboration. Hence a conceptual framework for a computer based tool for synchronous and asynchronous collaboration on the Web has been envisaged. An illustration with explanation on different features of the conceived collaboration tool for cognitive mapping has been included in this article. This will be a useful tool for online collaboration particularly for a group of people from different parts of the globe.

The article analyses selected legal aspects of the functioning of collaborative economy platforms in the internal market of the European Union. The objective is to analyse the scope of the competences left to the Member States to regulate the operation of collaborative economy platforms, both these established on their territories and these benefitting from the freedom to provide crossborder services, after the adoption of the Digital Services Act. The article covers the evolution of EU law concerning online platforms (including collaborative economy platforms), interpretation of information society services, as well as scrutinises provisions of the E-commerce Directive and the Digital Services Act. Free movement of services, internal market, collaborative economy, sharing economy, collaborative platforms

Purpose Current consumption patterns have aggravated environmental degradation. In response, collaborative consumption (CC) through collaborative platforms (CPs) has emerged as a sustainable alternative. Although CPs can support sustainability, their environmental benefits remain contested, following the observation of consumerism rebound effects. Given education’s potential to increase knowledge about the importance of sustainability, this study aims to explore the impact of sustainable development education (SDE) on the extrinsic motivations (functional utility, economic utility, moral utility and hedonic utility) and intrinsic motivations (ecological awareness, eco-anxiety, green orientation and consumerism) that improve attitudes toward CPs and increase intentions to use them. Design/methodology/approach This research is based on two studies, each using a different sample: one of high school students (N = 232) and one of older people enrolled in a lifelong learning program (N = 157). A questionnaire collected the data that were analyzed to test the research hypotheses. Findings SDE significantly influences intrinsic and extrinsic motivations. The results suggest that CPs are primarily used for commercial rather than sustainability purposes because attitudes are predominantly shaped by extrinsic motivations. In addition, motivators play a mediating role in the proposed model. Practical implications This study highlights critical social and practical implications by emphasizing the need for educational systems that promote responsible consumption and challenge students’ consumeristic and materialistic tendencies. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to examine the influence of SDE on CC and comprehensively explore the roles of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations in the context of CPs, shedding light on the CC paradox.

Social and collaborative tools such as instant messaging, e-mail, Facebook and the myriad of other social technology tools that support the 21st-century economies and their business communities, particularly the project teams, are redefining ways how they communicate today. Social media, for example, has not only broadened communication scope but has also helped to intensify global business development and competition. The paper reports the research experience of project managers in training on their field research into project teams that adopted collaborative and social media tools for project communication. The teams that were investigated represented organisations in consumer services, real estate and banking and finance. Two of the organisations are located in North Carolina (USA) and the other two organisations are located in Asia (Vietnam/Cambodia) and Mexico (South America). In the study, it was found that technology innovations such as collaborative and social media tools such as Skype, NetMeeting, SharePoint, Yammer and Twitter enabled the project teams to effectively communicate as well as support their development initiatives and information sharing. The banking organisation in Asia (Vietnam and Cambodia) in particular significantly deployed Skype, Yammer and SharePoint as low-cost alternatives and more economically effective tools for project communication and team work.

Contents: M. Riel, Foreword: Conceptual Order and Collaborative Tools--Creating Intellectual Identity. Preface. C.J. Bonk, K.S. King, Introduction to Electronic Collaborators. Part I:Theoretical and Technological Foundations. C.J. Bonk, K.S. King, Computer Conferencing and Collaborative Writing Tools: Starting a Dialogue About Student Dialogue. C.J. Bonk, D.J. Cunningham, Searching for Learner-Centered, Constructivist, and Sociocultural Components of Collaborative Educational Learning Tools. T.M. Duffy, B. Dueber, C.L. Hawley, Critical Thinking in a Distributed Environment: A Pedagogical Base for the Design of Conferencing Systems. Part II:Stand-Alone System Collaboration. C. Angeli, D.J. Cunningham, Bubble Dialogue: Tools for Supporting Literacy and Mind. J.R. Savery, Fostering Ownership for Learning With Computer-Supported Collaborative Writing in an Undergraduate Business Communication Course. Part III:Asynchronous Electronic Conferencing. W.A. Sugar, C.J. Bonk, Student Role Play in the World Forum: Analyses of an Arctic Adventure Learning Apprenticeship. S-M. Chong, Models of Asynchronous Computer Conferencing for Collaborative Learning in Large College Classes. R. Althauser, J.M. Matuga, On the Pedagogy of Electronic Instruction. S.E. Kirkley, J.R. Savery, M.M. Grabner-Hagen, Electronic Teaching: Extending Classroom Dialogue and Assistance Through E-mail Communication. E. Zhu, Learning and Mentoring: Electronic Discussion in a Distance Learning Course. Part IV:Multiconferencing: Asynchronous and Synchronous Classrooms. D.H. Cooney, Sharing Aspects Within Aspects: Real-Time Collaboration in the High School English Classroom. C.J. Bonk, E.J. Hansen, M.M. Garbner-Hagen, S.A. Lazar, C. Mirabelli, Time to Connect: Synchronous and Asynchronous Case-Based Dialogue Among Preservice Teachers. I. King, The Use of Computer-Mediated Communication: Electronic Collaboration and Interactivity. Part V:Looking Back and Glancing Ahead. M.A. Siegel, S.E. Kirkley, Adventure Learning as a Vision of the Digital Learning Environment. K.S. King, Designing 21st-Century Educational Networlds: Structuring Electronic Social Spaces.

Feature interaction in a federated communications-enabled collaboration platform

OVERVIEW:Information technology (IT) is the cornerstone of the modern new product development (NPD) process. A new generation of communication and collaboration tools has propagated into nearly all aspects of NPD. To better understand how these collaborative tools, such as wikis, cloud-based file sharing, social networking, blogs, and microblogging platforms like Twitter, are being used in NPD and what influence they have on NPD outcomes, we undertook a global study of collaborative IT tool use in 443 firms. We found that the usage frequency of these collaborative tools is currently low, but it is positively correlated with project performance. Our results also show that the best-performing projects use all of these tools more intensively than poorer-performing projects. In addition, the usage frequency of these tools differentiated the best from the rest in smaller and medium-sized firms but not in larger firms. Our findings suggest that NPD managers should encourage the use of new forms of communication and collaboration and should embolden and empower the migration toward these collaborative tools. Author Tucker J. Marion will host an IRI-sponsored webinar on this subject on April 1, 2016 at 12 pm EDT. Register to attend at https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/6567583436205158658.

User experience (UX) has undergone a revolution in collaborative practices,\ndue to tools that enable quick feedback and continuous collaboration with a\nvaried team across a design's lifecycle. However, it is unclear how this shift\nin collaboration has been received in professional UX practice, and whether new\npain points have arisen. To this end, we conducted a survey (N=114) with UX\npractitioners at software organizations based in the U.S. to better understand\ntheir collaborative practices and tools used throughout the design process. We\nfound that while an increase in collaborative activity enhanced many aspects of\nUX work, some long-standing challenges -- such as handing off designs to\ndevelopers -- still persist. Moreover, we observed new challenges emerging from\nactivities enabled by collaborative tools such as design system management.\nBased on our findings, we discuss how UX practices can improve collaboration\nmoving forward and provide concrete design implications for collaborative UX\ntools.\n

This study aims to identify practical issues and concerns about collaborative learning in the workplace. For this purpose, the study examines perceptions of corporate personnel including learning managers and instructional designers related to workplace collaboration and associated technology tools that might foster or enhance it. First, we identify future research interests and concerns related to collaboration and collaborative tools as revealed from an online survey of 97 respondents. Second, we verify the primary collaboration issues and concerns in corporations through an open discussion forum in which 30 corporate personnel participated. Findings indicate that the use of collaborative tools is growing in importance in the workplace as is collaboration in general. Further, participants in the survey appear highly interested in wikis as collaborative tools. In addition, group discussions reveal five main collaboration concerns in corporations including factors to consider when selecting and using collaborative tools. Based on those findings, significant implications for future research on workplace collaborative learning are offered.

Real-time distributed groupware systems are computer applications that allow people to work together at the same time, but from different places. These systems provide shared computational workspaces, akin to tabletops and whiteboards, where collaborators can manipulate work artifacts. Unfortunately, when compared with working face-to-face, collaboration through groupware seems clumsy, stilted, and artificial. One of the problems with current groupware systems is that they make it difficult for people to stay aware of one another. Awareness is taken for granted in everyday face-to-face environments, but when the setting changes to distributed groupware, many of the normal cues and information sources that people use to maintain awareness are gone. Helping people maintain awareness of one another can improve the usability of groupware. In this research, I explore one kind of awareness called workspace awareness, and investigate techniques for supporting it in groupware interfaces. Workspace awareness is the up-to-the-moment understanding of another person's interaction with a shared workspace; it involves knowledge about such things as who is in the workspace, where they are working, and what they are doing. I investigate the use of workspace awareness in improving groupware usability by following a three-part process: operationalize the concept, apply it to the design of groupware interfaces, and evaluate the usability of resulting systems. I operationalize workspace awareness using a conceptual framework and an analysis of the problems posed by current groupware systems. First, I construct a conceptual framework of workspace awareness that sets out the elements of knowledge that people track, the process by which they maintain awareness, and collaborative activities in which workspace awareness is useful. Second, I identify issues encountered in supporting workspace awareness in real-time distributed groupware, and describe the tasks that a designer must undertake--collecting, distributing, and displaying information--in order to support workspace awareness in a groupware system. I apply this knowledge about workspace awareness to the design and construction of several example awareness displays. I concentrate on techniques that answer who, what, and where questions, and on approaches that provide awareness information in the context of the workspace. I also consider displays that show unseen parts of the workspace, and look specifically at one of these displays called the radar view. I evaluate the effects of supporting workspace awareness in groupware in two studies: an exploratory usability study, and a controlled experiment. The usability study showed that awareness information is valuable in a realistic groupware system, and provided design feedback for improving the awareness displays. The primary results of the experiment are that information about others' locations and activities can significantly improve completion times and verbal efficiency for some types of tasks. Both studies also showed that participants greatly preferred systems where additional workspace awareness information was available. These results imply that supporting workspace awareness can improve groupware usability, and that groupware developers should change the way that they design multi-user systems. This research provides them with tools to effect that change.

If collaborative tools and platforms facilitate collaboration in principle, they don't do so every time. While organizations invest significantly in implementing collaborative tools, employees often prefer using communication channels they have developed and not those recommended by the organization. 
 After presenting various investigations describing the issues related to participating in virtual communities of practice, we present an example of implementing this innovative practice in an academic context. We began by putting into place a pilot project with a view to conducting a preliminary quantitative analysis taking into account facilitation strategies as the determining variable in participation and success. A second qualitative analysis based on participant interviews reveals the importance of the concept of usefulness, perceived as a determinant variable in participation. 
 Our study highlights the social and cognitive dimensions related to participating in collaborative platforms and more precisely describe the factors that encourage or discourage participation.