Collaber Blog

With in last 1 month we have very good progress in Collaber On Web. By the end of this week we are planning to finish all major functionality.It is available for public access at http://www.collaber.net If you want security then you can use HTTPS also.  HTTPS version will be little slower then the HTTP version due to well known reasons.

Even though we don’t suggest to do any actions on production workspaces, you can normally check the following tools already.

• Files Tool
• Chat Tool
• Notepad Tool
• Task Tool
• Calendar Tool
• Discussion Tool
• Wiki Tool
• Picture Tool
• Shared Folder Tool

Rest of the tools will be available by this week end.

Happy Collaboration.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up, Progress CollaberOnWeb

Before v1.2.0 we used to have a tool called “Applications”. Even though we have released it long time back, none of the users actually know how to use it. It is primary targetted for developers to develop their own collaborative applications on the top of Collaber.

We have disabled the tool in v1.2 to fix some important bugs in it. Today we have finished all the issues with the tool and we are ready to declare them as production ready.

We have developed two new applications using this tool.

• Sites

  Sites is a complex application to develop. But for end users it is very easy simple to use. It is similar to Googe Sites. It captures most of the functionality of Goolge Sites.

  We have chosen to develop this application because we want to show the power of Applications Tool to the other developers. We want to tell them it is possible to build very complex application on Applications Tool. Source code of this application will be released soon.

• Meetings

  Groove 2007 have a tool which is not present in Collaber. That is Meetings Tool. So we thought of developing it on Applications tool. And we have successfully completed it with the least amount of code. It is very easy to use straight forward application.

Here are the screen shots of the both the applications. They will be availble for download after next release of Collaber.

We will develop more applications in future. Collaber will have Application Store, similar to Apple’s Apps Store for IPhone Applications. Developer can write their own applications and sell them in Collaber Application Store.

For more information of Application development on Collaber contact us.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up

Here are some screen-shots of Collaber On Web during its development stage. One of the interesting point of this project is that Collaber On Web will look exactly like Collaber Client on Desktop. We have chosen this GUI to minimize the development time and give uniqueness about our Collaber. If you are a developer you will notice that it is done using GWT.

If you are not aware of Collaber On Web here are the short list of features.

• Use your same Collaber login to access all your data from any place.
• Same user interface to minimize the transition.
• No need to download, No plugins required. Just a click and go.
• Will be part of Collaber Server package. No need to purchase anything extra.
• Now Collaber is ready to compete with big giants and with 100s of on-line applications.
• One software, One Account, multiple access. No other software supports so many operating systems. (Windows, Linux, Mac, Web and Mobile**)
• Do anything you can do from your Desktop Client.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up, Progress

While total world is celebrating Christmas, we on the other side busy with doing bug fixes and enhancements to final beta of Collaber. After this version Collaber will go into non-beta stage and will be ready to be purchased from website.

What’s new:

• Multi Calendar View
  Impressed by Google App’s Calendar and expecting similar functionality in Collaber? Yes, we heard you. Now you can see all your Calendars from within any workspace. This view will enable you to check colliding events easily.
• Improved HTML Editing
  Worried about how to insert Image? In consistency in edit and view mode? No more. Now Collaber Rich Editors are capable of providing best rich editing functions available in market. Improved Image dialog, Link dialogs makes its the task very easy.
• Complete with keyboard short cuts
  All Collaber actions can now be performed using keyboard. You can even customize the actions if required.
• Advanced Alerts
  No more fast changing alert windows which automatically close before you even see them. Our improved alert solution works much better than existing products out there.
• Reminder support for Calendar Events
  Now you can add reminders and notifications will be displayed to you on the present reminder time. Never miss an appointment from now.
• Applications Store
  Looking for custom solutions developed on Collaber? Now our new Applications store integrates downloading and installing of such tools right within your Collaber Window.
• Filters View
  Our new filters view will enable filtering items using Tags, By Date, By Members, By Status and many more. It really proves the power of Collaber on Desktop.
• Collaber On Web-Beta
  Our much awaited release of Collaber On Web(COW) will also coincide with the final beta release. Now access/share/work on all your Collaber data without downloading Collaber. Right with in your browser.

We will be back to you in 2009 with this update.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up, New Ideas, Progress Add new tag

Backup Tool

Till now users of Collaber has one problem. How to backup the workspace and restore it when some thing unwanted happens?

We are introducing new Backup Tool that will work like your system restore point.(If you are using Windows). Similar to Windows system restore point, you can create restore points in Backup Tool. Every time a restore point is created, all your workspace data at that time is securely backed-up in the server. This data involves every aspect of your workspace, including all files and attachments.

At any point of time in future you can restore your workspace to any restore point you have created. Immediately all members of this workspace will be switched back to previous restore point.

This tool will be released in next major release, and mostly will be offered in premium packages only. (Packages are not finalized yet).

Application Tool

This is the tool that puts Collaber ahead of many other competitors. Application Tool is Collaber’s answer to Groove’s Forms tool.
Application Tool is an environment to develop your own tools. It is similar to any server side scripting environments like PHP,JSP,ASP etc.

The main difference is that Collaber Application Tool uses Javascript as its server side scripting language. This has tremendous advantage. Developers just need to know HTML, Javascript to develop rich collaborative applications.

Collaber Application Tool contains built in Javascript engine(Rhino from Mozilla) and have all Collaber objects exported to this Javascript engine.

You are not limited to just Forms and Views, but develop any application ranging from simple Javascript based Game to a full fledged web application using Collaber as your backend database.

You like Javascript frameworks likes JQuery, Prototype? Great, continue using them inside Collaber. Use all latest Web2.0 technologies and even AJAX if required.

Interested? What to know more? Get in touch with us in Collaber.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up

Hello Everyone,

We are going to release Collaber 1.1 Beta version on 9th May.

There is a lot of change in the Architecture of Collaber for this version.The main points are as follows.

• All data is also stored in the server.
• There is no Collaber Relay Server. From now onwards it is called Collaber Live Server.
• Server is not just a transportar of data. It is like an device. Maintains all the state of all users.
• Similar to workspace synchronization, even devices synchronize them self.
• Users can access his/her data from any system by importing the account from the server.
• This architecture enables us to provide Collaber data for Web & Mobile access as-well.

This version of Collaber will have the following limitations.

• Shared Folder Tool, Backup Tool are not available in this release. (Work is in progress)
• Web & Mobile access are not yet developed.
• P2P data transfer is disabled. Everything goes through server. (Will be re-enabled in next version)
• Scripting, Remote Access API are disabled. (Will be re-enabled in next version)
• All files/attachments are downloaded asynchronously.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up, Progress

Today we have implemented a new RPC layer over Collaber. This will enable collaber to be integrated with applications written in any language. (.NET, Java, Ruby, C++) etc. We will be providing a simple protocol and a reference implementation for this new RPC layer. Developers can then extend this interface to replicate every other Collaber Interfaces.

We will be using this mainly to integrate with Windows Shell which will be written in C++/COM. We can also use this to automate all Collaber testing on the network.

We hope that the developers will love this RPC layer.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up

“Copy As Link” is one of the main features we are going to introduce in Collaber 1.0.8

This action is available in right-click menu of any Collaber Object(Workspaces, Contacts, Members, All Tools, Files, Notes, Tasks, Calander Evets, Pictures etc etc..) Click on this action will copy a link to that object into the Clipboard.

This can be pasted in any HTML enabled component (Chat, Messages, Discussion, Notes ) or even to the external files like Ms Word etc.

When that link is clicked the corresponding object will be highlighted in its tool/view.

These links work even outside Collaber (only in windows) as long as Collaber is running. They can be sent to other users. They will work anywhere as long as the linked object is available at that user’s Collaber.

We hope this feature will reduce small gap between Collaber and Groove. We are working hard to bring all such features into Collaber. We hope all Collaber users will be happy with this feature.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up, New Ideas

We are happy to release v1.0.6 version of Collaber.
Even though there are many new features in this version, we consider it as a big fixing version. We have fixed so many bugs that our users are not able to detect yet. Mainly our focus was to make sure workspace is synchronized automatically always.

As we have announced before Collaber is now scriptable. You can write javascript to interact with Collaber.
For example you can send messages to every one in your contact list using..

var identity=collaber.account.identity;
for (int i=0;i<identity.contactsCount;i++) {
var contact=identity.getContactAtIndex(i);
var friends=new Array();
friends[0]=contact;
var msg=identity.createMessage(friends);
msg.content=”hii, how ru?”;
identity.sendMessage(msg);
}

We have done some clever way of file associations with Workspace Invitation and Contact Files with Collaber. Now you can just Double Click then in your windows explorer to open them with Collaber

We have shifted to new Eclipse RCP 3.3. It gives us new GUI layout for maximization of Views and Editors.
Due to this shifting to eclipse 3.3 we are unable to provide update from previous versions. Users are requested to install New version after un-installing the previous version.

Collaber now supports Vista. Users don’t need to be administrators. Any user can use Collaber. Installer will create Shorts for all users now.

Lot of bugs related to permission checking, data synchronization have been fixed in all the tools.

Member activity plugin will enable users to see how many members are active in a given workspace at any instance of time. This is part of our grand initiative towards real-time collaboration.

We have finished development of new voice features which will enable users to make Voice calls just like Skype, Gtalk, Yahoo Messenger. But we will be releasing it as a open-source software which can not be shipped with Collaber. It will be available(on Monday) on the website with instructions to install it.

New Features/ Enhancements:

• Scripting Support for Collaber (JavaScript)
• Native File support for Contact File, And Workspace Invitation. Double click will open in the invitation file.(on windows only)
• Member Activity display in Space View and in Start Page
• Edit support for Old Discussion Topics
• Improved Notepad View
• Support for Vista
• Improved Views and GUI Layout
• All known bugs have been fixed.

Next Step:

This version will be last beta release. There will be small minor updates depending on the bugs found and the importance of the fixes. From now onwards we will work towards first non-beta release of Collaber. This is a big task for us. We want to release non-beta version by starting of next month (Aug 2007).

We are unable to spend time in releasing Relay Server along with 1.0.6. We will be releasing it along with non-beta release of Collaber.

We thank every Collaber user for spending their time in evaluating our software. We are very thank full for those valuable users who have sent us bug reports and suggestions, specially chris, phil, ymir, bcherne, legand.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up, Progress

Today we made collaber scriptable. We have made new plugin which will allow scripting of Collaber objects. This plugin will consist of a Script Server which listens on TCP port 7690 on localhost.

Any one can connect to it and send commands to run any javascript file. You can do anything in Collaber(almost) by writing appropriate script.

This will open endless possibilities for the developers and administrators.

Interesting thing is it just took one day for us to implement it.

Rajesh Akkineni Coming Up