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FOSS Multicast Document Sharing?
Jawdy writes "I am currently leading a small game development project with artists and developers scattered all over the country. Getting together is somewhat difficult, but we try to do this every couple of months.
We often share all kinds of documents with each other, and even do so while using IM clients (GTalk and MSN), but this winds up being a tedious process of: send document; read and edit; send back; rinse and repeat.
What I wanted to ask fellow slashdotters is, if anyone knows of any FOSS software that can handle IM (or even voice chat), Whiteboard and document sharing — where we can all see the document, pass around 'editing rights' and edit live. Even several small apps that handle the individual components would help out!"
Google "revision control".
Abiword has an experimental plugin to allow collaborative document editing. Otherwise, I'd suggest just using Google Docs.
What about Google Docs?
It's not an F/OSS solution, but it supports ODT, DOC, and just about everything else, and allows for the cooperative editing that you're looking for.
Plus, you have the added advantage of not needing to host and upkeep some app.
Google documents or Zoho or some other gratis (but typically proprietary) "cloud" solution might be reasonable.
If you're fine with text-only, you have a lot of options. VIM and EMACS both allow collaborative editing, you can share a screen session, or you can get a specialized collaborative editor (such as Gobby and ACE) or a specialized framework, such as DocSynch
If you need light-weight word processing, Abiword has a plugin for real-time collaboration.
Heavier weight word processing of DOCX can be done with Plutext.
If you need more graphical documents & the above doesn't seem to fit AND if you have a small group of friends who you trust, I'd just go "simple" & host with VNC or some other remote desktop protocol.
As far as other pieces, there is a lot of good F/OSS voice/IM/whiteboard software. Coccinella and ekiga are good examples.
OpenH323 is basically Netmeeting, but OSS version. Mind you, it uses (surprise) H.323 protocol, and not all firewalls like it (since it requires connectivity to both directions).
http://openh323.sourceforge.net/
I'd try google docs first. You can share live copies of documents (word processing files + spreadsheets), including keeping revision history and simultaneous live edits.
Well, for the "document sharing" and "editing rights" part you could use Dropbox.
... and liked it. Share your doc or xls file, modify it and everybody will immediately see it. you can also use the integrated chat board
gobby , does exactly what you are looking for in gnome. I'm sure there are KDE and Windows and OSX Clients too
My coworker is often out of the country and I need to work on code with him. We use iChat to share documents and workspace to work on code at the same time and share ideas. It has voice and video as well. I highly recommend this to everyone who has to telecommute.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
www.gotomeeting.com has worked for me in the past--it's not free, you need a good network connection--and of course it only works with windows which makes it miserable in any suitable environment. But I did get it set up for the executive types, and between its ability to broadcast the desktop, and shift focus between individuals it worked pretty well.
http://abicollab.net/ ?
I haven't tried it personally, but if it's any help, yeah. (:
For really simple interactivity, I would suggest something along the lines of
http://sourceforge.net/projects/vnc-reflector/
Let one person do the application hosting and get your committee to VNC to that host. Then everybody can do everything, including applications that don't have shared edit features built in.
-- The morphemes of your disquisition are ascertainable, but they have eschewed an ambit of transpicuous exposition.
Any number of VNC server/clients can do this, though passing control is probably not as easy as with something designed for meetings.
But as others have said, use a version control system for anything offline. I recommend Subversion if you want FOSS, but there are tons of alternatives such as Git, Mercurial, etc.
You could start a VNC server on a computer running applications that you'd use in your meeting, such as office applications. Then have everyone connect using a shared session. TightVNC is what I use, but the feature is standard across any VNC implementation. In the options dialog, you can "Request Shared Session."
If you are serious about developing this game, you *will* need to be in touch with non-nerd crowd.
I would dance with the devil and choose Sharepoint - as a service. There are several service providers who provide Sharepoint sites for you for mere 10-15 euros per month.
trac / subversion / wikimedia?
Stephan
http://stephan.sugarmotor.org
Check out Dabbleboard. It was written by a friend of mine. There is a video showing you how it works.
http://www.dabbleboard.com
Gobby is an open source client-server application which supports multiple documents in one session, document synchronisation on request, password protection and an IRC-like chat for communication.
Icecore now known kablink may be what you need.
http://www.kablink.org/
It's the opensource version of Teaming + Conferencing now owned by Novell (used to be SiteScape)
Disclaimer. I work for them and I've not used this software.
ECF is an integrated Jabber (XMPP)-based protocol that allows collaborative work. Introduction here. "Real-time communication and collaboration features for teams using Eclipse such as peer-to-peer file sharing, remote opening of Eclipse views, screen capture sharing, and real-time shared editing."
Other Jabber products you might find useful are Coccinella with whiteboarding, etc.
you had me at #!
I've used Trac a lot for distributed projects - the integration is very nice.
This guy seemed to want real time colloboration, though, which is why I referenced Eclipse Communication Framework in other post, rather than a wiki.
you had me at #!
One more alternative you can look at: SharedView. It works over the firewall unlike several other apps.
Not exactly what you want, but Opendocman works very well for document sharing and control: http://www.opendocman.com/
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Have you considered setting up a password protected wiki?
Online editing, version control, and you can upload any documents (at least with mediawiki, if you change LocalSettings to allow uploads of .doc or .pdf files).
The "write" activity on olpc supports collaborative editing out of the box using Jabber as a transport. I think it is a derivative of Abiword - but in any case it is open source.
I actually use it quite often, having a group document is a favorite activity among the olpc g1g1 kids - the usual take turns adding a sentence to a silly story type thing. (I never fully grew up.)
This is only for whiteboarding (not document sharing), but Inkscape can share a workspace over XMPP (Jabber) protocol. The feature is sometimes called Inkboard.
More info here: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/WhiteBoard and here: http://inkboard.sourceforge.net/
-molo
Using your sig line to advertise for friends is lame.
37signals has a number of apps that do these things. Campfire is web IM (with logging, file upload, etc.) and Basecamp is essentially a personal wiki with calendaring and other features.
Use Alfresco for document sharing.
There are three possibilities that I see here:
i) Use a revision control system. There are a bunch of good ones: git, monotone, darcs, bzr, subversion... This will give you ability to have people edit and share the documents.
It'll work better if you use document formats that are text based. e.g. unzipped ODF or latex for 'word processing'
These systems are very much collaborative, but are move away from 'instant' communications to 'parallel' editing with an assisted merge step.
ii) If you move away from RCS based thoughts to direct collaborative editing, then things get more complex. I only know of collaborative editors that edit one type of document. (and there is good reason for this - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operational_transformation )
I know that inkscape (FOSS SVG editor) has a collaborative editing module based on Jabber comms. There are numerous collaborative text editors that people might point you towards.
iii) The third option is Google docs. For text this is ok. For images you can try to use their presentation software, but it is clunky for that purpose - use inkscape instead.
I'd recommend DropBox. Not, FOSS I know, but you get 2Gigs of storage gratis, and it is great. Skype is going to be the obvious solution for IM and voice, leaving you witj whiteboarding
http://docs.google.com/
Especially works great if you're using other Google stuff like Gmail & GTalk.
Slightly OT, but how is Abiword these days? I'm running KDE 3.5, so I won't really have a chance to run it again until KDE-4 is really stable enough for my desktop. The last time I tried it a few years ago, it was alright, but I seem to remember having formatting problems. Has it matured a good bit in the last two years or so?
I'm really excited about the new koffice, but is Abiword worth a look, as well?
If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
Very sweet solution if you have access to OS X. SubEthaEdit has very nice integration with iChat and will likely do much of what you ask right out of the box including multi-person live editing. Good luck
Argh. The laws of science be a harsh mistress.
If you collaborate on documents I would seriously consider a wiki - http://www.dokuwiki.org/dokuwiki is extremely simple to set up. You get revision control - Plug In structure for ODF/PDF export, easy editing etc. Plus a wiki is accessible even from a simple mobile browser with no extra installation needed. Multicast... well - More or less accessible to all at the same time. Looking forward to see this thread develop, as it could prove to be immensely helpful for any FOSS organization/project.
MS, ALS, Aphasia ? http://globability.org - Me http://einarpetersen.com
monotone -- a distributed revision control system -- everyone has a copy of the entire repository. The style of use is to commit frequently, even before any kind of code review, sync frequently, and decide which of the things committed and synced are in the final system later, after discussion, by certifying the revisions you decide to use.
If you can handle the limited nature of their word processor.
The red5 opensource flash application server along with the openmeetings video conference / whiteboard application might help for organizing voice + video meetings. Clients just require a flash 10 plugin in their browser. opeenmeetings allows for uploading/sharing office files with live preview using openoffice + pdf2swf and image files with imagemagick and also add a nice desktop sharing feature.
but subethaedit has some cool text editing collaboration functionality.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
How is that not just Wiki + IM?
Set up a Wiki with authorization required to do anything, maybe put it on an odd port too.
The wiki will tell you if someone else is editing a document if you click edit.
You always have stuff published with the newest changes.
You will have history to check changes etc.
You can comment on documents without it changing the document.
You can attach files to your documents.
The only thing it won't really do without some added plugins is live multiedit and whiteboard for pictures/diagrams etc.
IM ... well, you already said it can be multiple programs.
The only wiki I've done any kind of work with is JSPWiki, and that has the above mentioned functionality. Others may have more/less features, so just find one that fits your needs and programming skills (if you want to make new plugins that help your team)
Here you go... http://www.vmukti.com/ It integrates with Asterisk and it has Video Conferencing capabilities.
Why not use something like a Project Wonderland https://lg3d-wonderland.dev.java.net/? It gives you application sharing (VNC on win32 and X on Linux, etc). Also gives you 3D audio, chat, an avatar, a whiteboard and even the ability to phone into the world from a landline (hardware allowing). You can customize the area, add photos using Flickr http://blogs.sun.com/wonderland/entry/flickr_friday. Worth considering IMHO.
it's freeware, and it's working great!
Dropbox
Try https://www.acrobat.com./ It gives you access to Buzzword, ConnectNow, My Files (file locker) and the ability to create and share documents... and best of all, its all FREE.
There is an application called CoWord & CoOffice (http://cooffice.ntu.edu.sg/coword/) that sounds like it will do what you are needing to do. It requires M$ Word, but it was the only thing we found that allowed multi-user simultaneous document editing. Maybe one day this same functionality will show up in OpenOffice (HINT HINT!)
nVidia binary drivers != stable. For an exercise in frustration, though, try ATI's fglrx^&$%$%+++carrier lost
use a wiki.
i've been using confluence for a couple of years now, and cant imagine any sort of collaborative document writing without it.
there are plenty of plugins, including a recent whiteboard thing ( havent used it myself ), and you can always use skype/msn/other instant messaging in the background.
You might have a look at http://kablink.org/ from the former SiteScape (now Novell). I'm not sure if their current open source offering includes the voice collaboration server. I think it used to. Also lots of collaboration tools, although id does not seem to include a collaborative white board in the FOSS version.
Busy helping non technical users of OpenOffice.org - http://plan-b-for-openoffice.org/
DimDim.com seems to have most of what you are looking for and is open source.
I wrote almost exactly that spec at an internship a few years back. It was a generic collaboration package, had whiteboard, chat, "email", hooks for writing new modules, even a crappy voice chat (raw PCM over UDP, since I never could figure out how to make the Java Speex module work). The only real problem was that the primary deployment was LAN-only, so I never had to optimize it for internet speeds/latencies. I have no idea who the code belongs to, I was working for a civilian agency in DoD (the Army Research Institute), so I suppose there's a chance it falls under one of the "government products are public domain" rules.
Media that can be recorded and distributed can be recorded and distributed.
-kfg
(Warning: self-link.)
Draftastic is a web-based collaborative editor that avoids lock contention issues and works without JavaScript, among other good things.
It's free for a single document. Paid accounts get more documents, a permission system, and so on.
(Not OSS, but built using mostly open-source technology. We've contributed a few patches already, and are hoping to find other ways to "give back to the community".)
try dimdim
I like Wikis.
Haven't used it in a while, but I used PBWiki to organize all of my online table-top RPGs.
This is not exactly a direct response to the question as asked, since it's not F/OSS. That aside, Mac users can use SubEthaEdit http://www.codingmonkeys.de/subethaedit/, and share a single document with each user's focus and changes being highlighted with a selected color. It uses the Apple "bonjour" protocol, but the concept shouldn't be all that difficult to implement in other software. I'm not aware of any at the moment, however.
http://thinkofit.com/webconf/workspaces.htm
Make an account at www.assembla.com it features everything you need. Supports: Direct filesharing, SVN, IM jabber server, Wiki, Scrum, Trac, Mercury aso Its without doubt the best alternative for low-budget or no-budget software development.
Install skype and try out whiteboardmeeting.
More info at http://www.whiteboardmeeting.com
Plus there are other whiteboard programs for skype aswell that you can try and that allow simultaneous editing of one document.
Have you given Lotus "Bluehouse" a try. It is a SaaS collaborative offering from IBM. As of now in Beta mode but supports versioned document sharing and provides sametime for chat. As it is a SaaS offering you would just need your browser + sametime client install.
You can go here - https://bluehouse.lotus.com to check it out
Hi There,
Zimbra is an open source email platform which has a document store and wiki-esq functionality. The latest version also has an instant messenger etc.
http://www.opencroquet.org
Some Moderators seriously do NOT understand the use of the "redundant" modifier in answers to a "Ask Slashdot" topic.
The parent topinc is NOT redundant. It answers the topic, with a good answer (google docs) and brings some further information to the table (simultaneous live edits)
Although it sometimes can be annoying to see multiple posts with the same suggestion (similar to a "me too"). However in this case, if you look carefully you can see the parent post, and most others who suggested Google Docs, have all posted at the same time (around 8:22pm). It is therefore reasonable to assume that this is not intended to be a "me too" post. Therefore it is unfair to mark this as redundant.
Also take into account, the person who asked the question may be looking at popularity,a nd many people suggesting "google docs", together with WHY, may help that person make a better decision.
I hope the "redundant" mod given to the parent is properly meta moderated, as it is unfair.
Have a nice day!
And the answer we're using is MediaWiki. Before we used MediaWiki we used GoogleDocs, but MediaWiki suits us better.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
Years ago there used to be a collection of FOSS software that did just what the poster was describing. I don't know the status of those pieces of software are today, but its all been done before.
__________________________________
Free your mind - Flush your toilet
Dang, looks like perhaps the Gobby Web site went down under the load. Anyone have a mirror? I just set up a Gobby server and want my coworkers using Windows and Mac to be able to try it out, if clients exist for those platforms.
http://www.campfirenow.com/
I have never had to use it... looks pretty good...I use the "Ta-Da Lists" site...
just a suggestion...
I hadn't even thought about using VNC for "multicast" purposes. Heck, I didn't even know it could be done! This one will definately help regarding some of the more obscure or cpu-hungry apps and editors that we have to use. Thanks!
use a wiki instead of documents
www.zimbra.com
- Email
- Tasks
- Docs
- calendar
- Zimblets
- Briefcase
And have Ajax UI, HTML and Mobile as well :)
You can collaborate pretty well with Zimbra. I am a happy Zimbra customer.
webhuddle does application sharing, text chat, and voice chat. (There is some support for slide markup. But once you have application sharing an arbitrary drawing application can be used for whiteboard as well.)
https://www.webhuddle.com/
and
http://sourceforge.net/projects/webhuddle
a few years ago I proposed this at the software company I was at and was laughed out (thanks jeff, ryan, shaun) I have some code for a modular, scriptable (python) concurrent editng system, but it dosn't do much yet, I fully expect one of you to beat me to the punch. the idea is (oh you all go ahead and start laughing now) that one client opens a document, people connect to it, each with THEIR OWN INDEPENTANT cursor, and concurrently edit the document, each person able to save a local copy. servership is passed till the parting of the last client. I agree there are only particular scenarios where it works, but I fully belive it would enable a large team to work on a small project really efficiently.
Maybe a Wiki will help you. As for exchanging files, a perhaps an FTP/HTTP/Samba server? Or each one of your running such an app?