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It Is 2009. Why Is "Groupware" Still So Hard?
- metabrew 17y agoBecause it's not a sexy problem to work on, so no-one really wants to spend any time making it better.
- dustingetz 17y agoeverything is sexy to someone--otherwise we wouldn't have craigslist singles
- thwarted 17y agoThe existence of craigslist singles doesn't support the assertion that everything sexy to someone, it supports the assertion that there are a bunch of people who have not found someone who finds them sexy -- in fact, that it exists at all and has new postings could almost be proof that there are things that are globally considered non-sexy. If everyone on craigslist singles, 100%, found a match, that would support that everything is sexy to someone.
- Tawheed 17y agoI think Basecamp is pretty good, so is Basecamp, when it comes to GroupWare. We're also "sort of" building better GroupWare: http://askmybraintrust.com http://askmybraintrust.com
- mrshoe 17y agoSince each company has unique needs, I actually think it's a horrible idea to try to design one piece of software that works for everyone. You'll end up with SharePoint. With ShopTalk, we're trying to solve just one (very important) piece of the puzzle: real-time communication. We don't want to own the group, though, as the article says. Since most organizations have some sort of LDAP server (MS Active Directory being the most common), we'll be rolling out LDAP integration soon, so that you only have to add/remove/update users in one place and they only have to remember one password. SSO ftw.
- robin_reala 17y agoAt this point it’s obligatory to link to JWZ’s groupware essay: http://www.jwz.org/doc/groupware.html http://www.jwz.org/doc/groupware.html Salient point: If you want to do something that's going to change the world, build software that people want to use instead of software that managers want to buy
- sjs382 17y agoBecause everyone's needs and workflows are different.
- joe_the_user 17y agoI would expand that to "everyone's needs are different and the domain of 'groupware' is tying the different workflows together globally" - an inherently hard problem.
- dustingetz 17y agonot necessarily even true--email and telephone are global--its possible the killer execution just hasn't been innovated yet.
- teeja 17y ago"groups come in all forms and as a result have very different requirements.... The response of the service providers has compounded this problem ... they all seem to want to own the group and lock it in." I guess the title was a rhetorical question! It's hard for a small design group to understand the universe; the imagined 'solutions' are limited. And it's hard to design a set of tools that people can use to evolve their own solutions. But it's a hard problem. Simplistic 'answers' will fail. I'm reminded of many attempts at educational software. Too often the programmers clearly had a limited view of what constitutes education. You can't design your way out of your own limited perspective. Research has to precede theory; else you wind up with solutions to the wrong problems. Proprietary solutions tend to be more passionate about making money than at helping people. Bass-ackwards.