All to often I need a tool to manage information, collaboration and project management through shared workspace, forums and a library for common knowledge for teams. Not long ago you needed several installed applications for this, a local server park, and most of the time these applications did not integrate without much programming and adaptation. For many users this was simply out of reach, as we are not programmers nor wish to be. We just want to get the job done, as costeffective and fast as possible. Because content is king.
For such tools to be really usabel and effective, they have to be webbased and they have to be all-in-one, seemless integrated. And hosted.
A simpel wiki was not what I was looking for. I discovered Jotspot, but was to late to make use of it before Google accuired the Jotspot company and closed it for new accounts. Since late 2006 Jotspot has been out of reach for new users, thus out of reach for me.
Centraldesktop in the meantime
In the meantime I have been using Centraldesktop, in many ways an excellent tool. The «drawback» is that using all of its features costs money. Not so much maybe if my employer would pay for it, but since I am paying for it myself – both for my private and professional use, I really think it is a waste. Furthermore, centraldesktop is only in engslish and does not fully support the use of the norwegian characters (æåø). So, I am waiting for Google to relaunch Jotspot as a part of the Google portfolio – wich I already use to great extent. And, Google har already statet that all Jotspot features will be free of charge. How great is that?!
Application Gallery
Looking at the Jotspot Application Gallery tells me that Jotspot is what I`ve been searching for. Of course, there are several similar products that do many of these things. However, I am looking for a service that contains all this, is hosted and is «free». We have reason to belive that this service from Google will be costeffective, as most of their portfolio, and that it will be integrated with already excisting features as Google Groups, Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Google Apps, Gmail and Google Calendar.
Google has committed to letting third party developers and partners contribute to the develpoment of Jotspot, wich will ensure that needs not yet met will be adressed either by Google or others. Or both, giving users the option of both. It would really be excellent if Google relaunches Jotspot as a wiki-based project management system, with the same option to use third party products as with the Google widgets.
Lets hope relaunch is not so far away.
Ingen andre relevante poster.
