Constructing a web-based asynchronous and synchronous collaboration environment using WebDAV and Lotus Sametime.

ABSTRACTIn this paper we present our practice of constructing a Web-based asynchronous and synchronous collaboration environment for supporting collaborative distance learning between a German university and a university in Italy. We utilize the recent collaboration-friendly Internet protocol WebDAV to implement a groupware system which can support document-centric asynchronous collaboration activities, e.g., collaborative document authoring, collaborative document management, etc., as well as an industrial strength product Lotus SameTime to provide synchronous collaboration support, e.g., team awareness, instant messaging, shared whiteboard, and IP audio&video conferencing. Our approach has efficiently integrated our own research work on asynchronous collaboration technologies with a high-performance industrial product and as a result, constructed a full-function collaboration environment with relatively low cost and greatly reduced development time.