February 28, 2003
Groove increases prices for non US customers
I'm having a real hard time understanding the sudden price increase by Groove for non-US customers. I cannot find any other examples of companies who charge different amounts for a downloadable product and even if there are, i think a overnight change that creates a 40% disparity for the normal version (49$-69$) and a 25% for the professional version (149$-189$) is not going to help the adoption of Groove outside the US but instead frustate it severely. So what's the deal here ?
Why should a small company in Holland or China interested in the starterkit for Small businesses pay 2315$ compared to a 1795$ for a US customer. That's a 500$ difference for exactly the same 10 license-keys ordered by credit card and downloaded via the web. I don't see it and haven't heard any "understandable" explanation yet. Please somebody help me out here.....Exposing a webservice for a custom Groove tool
Tim Knip : After checking the Groove Access Point for remote access to my computer running Groove Workspace resolved the last missing link: exposing a Web Service for a custom Groove Tool. This means that any Groove tool can be queried from a remote location (from your PocketPC for example).
Cool Tim !! Step by step we are collecting all the pieces of the puzzle we are working on. Next step: Flash and GWS for graphical input and visualisation of complex data.Real time, real value ?
A .NET Groovetool, Quest for sanity
Blaine Anderson wrote a very useful tutorial for developers who are interested in creating a Groovetool using .NET
Groovesphere weblog
Carlos Araujo is back with a Brazilian Groove Weblog using our Bloggertool.
February 27, 2003
Collaborative content creation
Paresh Suthar : There have been many references to Tim Knip's Interop tool - a very cool application that uses Web Services to push/pull data to/from Groove to publish blog entries. The more I thought about this, the more I started to see what could be a paradigm shift with respect to content creation and publication........
February 26, 2003
Microsoft , P2P and Groove
Internetnews : Microsoft gives P2P a chance
"By supporting both decentralized and centralized models of computing and information sharing, Microsoft can best address the high-level needs of its business customers, who need to be more agile, more flexible and more responsive to customer needs," said Jack Ozzie, vice president of developer services at desktop collaboration software maker Groove Networks. "the enhanced peer-to-peer support for Windows XP will enable developers to more easily build decentralized applications."February 25, 2003
GrooveRadio Teamblogging is catching on
Joseph Ruvel : Let's see if tis post shows up. I am posting this via a groove shared space and am using Tim Knip's Groove Interop tool to connect to radio (Woh it actually worked - nice - I just wrote to my weblog from a brand new piece of software that is made for colaboration from a team of people. cool stuff)
Three Degrees Beta is available
The Three Degrees beta (Microsoft's Groove for Teens) is available. I haven't installed it yet but from reading the first reactions on the forum it seems that the current functionality is rather dissapointing. Maybe i'll better wait till this product matures a bit before installing because some testers are reporting severe connection problems after the install.
Activenet and Groove onramps
Bizink : Tacit Announces ActiveNet Software for Coordinated Enterprise Collaboration
ActiveNet is a browser-based application with an integrated feature set
designed to make collaboration easy and effective. ActiveNet features include:
February 24, 2003
nice feedback
Ray Ozzie seems to like our latest GWS experiments :-)
Daniel Shurman has a Weblog
Daniel Shurman started blogging. Daniel and i virtually met via Groove over a year ago. In April 2002 he decided to attend the Rotterdam Groove Conference we organized. Being one of the only non-developers there, he gave a great presentation putting all the geek stuff in the right perspective. After the conference we had a lot of fun exploring Rotterdam , Dordrecht en ofcourse Delft where we ate some delicious tomatosoup.
February 23, 2003
Groove Access Point in action
Tim is doing some very interesting stuff with Groove Access Point. Check out this and this page to see some remote Groove access in action.
Bekkers, Burkhardt and Pope worldtour 2003
Eric Snowdeal : nearly everyday i look towards the groove constellation of links in my "blogroll" and laugh a little laugh to myself when i see bekkers , burkhardt and pope . rather than work at groove , i think they need to form a prog rock band named "bekkers, burkhardt and pope" and start touring with king crimson.
ROFL, Sounds like a good plan to me. Only problem i don't work at Groove and live on the other side of the pond but the next time i visit Groove HQ i'll might be bringing my guitar.February 22, 2003
XDocs/Infopath and Groove
Jon Udell : 10 things you need to know about XDocs
KAGroove : Our Forms Tool priorities for v3.0, our next major release, are specific to optimizing for Groove Mobile Workspace and integration with xDocs, plus some general performance improvements.February 21, 2003
Expectations Meltdown
Hugh Pyle : Of course everything is "just bits", copy-and-pasteable to some extent, but we can build environments like your Inbox in which "private" is virtually indistinguishable from "public", and also tools like Groove in which the private sphere reigns by default. Thus also my fascination with Groove-Web interop, in which the technology to blur that boundary proves quite easily tractable, but hints to support and reinforce the appropriate social norms need to be present too.
February 19, 2003
Microsoft Three Degrees/Softie
Boing Boing : Microsoft unveils Groove for teens
MSFT has shipped a kiddee-Groove, a file-sharing/IM/collaboration tech aimed at teens, called Softie. The project sounds kind of neat, until you realize that it's got an assload of DRM built into it and, in the end, does less than Napster did. ( via Hugh Pyle )Making Groove the lead dog ?
As always , SB Chatterjee is on the hunt for more information :
I picked up this trail from Hugh Pyle's weblog. Hugh, as you know, is one of the Wizards of Beverly. Robert Faletra in CRN [02.14.03] purports "making Groove the lead dog" in Microsoft's Real Time Collaboration (RTC) strategy in light of Microsoft's purchase of PlaceWare. He puts the ubiquitions MS Office as the core competitive advantage that MS can leverage.
Pimm Fox in ComputerWorld [02.10.03] sees it differently - he views the PlaceWare acquisition still falls short in the MS RTC strategy. While the desktop is one side of the Enterprise System coin, the other side is simply, the *Enterprise Application - the ERPs, the CRMs, DB2/Oracle apps, CICS (many of those still linger) et al. Mr. Fox skirted on this crucial point but with no elaboration - it's the 'building links' to the *EA that defines the other side of RTC.
February 18, 2003
Groovelets 0.8.2
Mark Smith wrote me : Version 0.8.2 of Groovelets is now on our web site. This fixes a few small errors and adds 'Save to HTML'. We're really getting into gear now, with users from Iceland to Germany, Brazil to Japan and all points in between!
February 17, 2003
More on PTC and Groove
Mass High Tech : PTC gets into the Groove by collaborating on collaboration
Google, Weblogs and Groove
Lots of talk today on the Google-Pyra deal. A comment on Anil Dash's Google's first mistake made by a Pyra employee particularly caught my attention :
But what no one has mentioned, and may really be the key, is that Pyra has/is about to have a version of Blogger written more or less completely in Java that can be deployed on any server. The Globo deal was just the tip of the iceberg, they (Ev and Jason) wanted to sell this into corporations for a few $k per server. Combine that with Google search appliance and maybe another odd piece or two and you have a very sophisticated, valuable Intranet addition.
btw: Since the Groove Rotterdam Conference of april last year we have a bloggertool for Groove available but because the bloggerserver seems to be down a lot this tool never was widely used. I'm sure the Googledeal will mean a big improvement in stability of blogspot so more Groovers start using this tool for some, no hassle, team blogging......
February 16, 2003
"work in" and "work with"
Hugh Pyle : Here's the piece which I particularly want to expand on: interoperability. In particular the SharePoint Team Services glue, which debuts in Groove 2.5 (and I hope will expand going forward). For once, I don't think Jon completely "gets it".
Our new PR guy ?
Tnx Neil, for making my day :-)
Now if this were 1999 I'd be betting on bidding war between Groove and Userland for Suite 75. Followed about 15 seconds later by Microsoft acquiring Groove and Yahoo buying Userland.
Jeroen and Tim here's a ready-made quote from a popular BBC drama: "You may say that. I couldn't possibly comment."
February 15, 2003
Groove/Radio Interop screenshot
Dave Winer : Fascinating screen shot from Jon Udell.
Groove 2.5 review by Infoworld
An Infoworld review of Groove 2.5 by Jon Udell.
What the Groove Workspace has delivered since Version 1.0, and steadily refined through Version 2.5 released last week, is a seamless and comprehensive environment for collaboration. It defines what Microsoft and Apple will be lucky to achieve by 2006.
Nice detail: in the article he briefly mentions our Groove/Radio interoptool and uses a screenshot. On his weblog he talks about it some more :
The scenario shown in the screenshot uses Tim Knip's Groove interop tool -- a Radio UserLand add-in based on Groove Web Services -- to create a genuinely new experience of team blogging. Until now, team blogging has meant that a group of folks post to a common weblog. This setup does that too, but it also does something I find much more powerful -- it synchronizes the inputs to the collaborative process, as well as the output. In this case, the input is the combined set of RSS feeds subscribed to by the members of the shared space. Everyone knows that everyone else is seeing the same feeds. Discussion can grow around items in those feeds, and can take various forms: replies to the forum that receives the feeds, IM-style text chat, Roger Wilco-style voice chat.
From an enterprise IT perspective, I realize, the term "team blog" sounds a little vague. So let's nail it down. Those inbound RSS feeds needn't be only internal or external weblogs. They can also deliver customer feedback, system status reports, business intelligence -- you name it. And the output needn't be a weblog that you hope will make the Daypop Top 40. Think of it, instead, as an internal "k-log" that selectively exposes team activity to the larger organization.
Groove Web Services is the enabler here, but I hope we'll soon get over the novelty of that and focus where we should: on finding the right ways to manage context, presence, and attention in all kinds of people- and information-intensive scenarios.
February 14, 2003
Jiri Ludvik discovers Groove
Jiri Ludvik : When compared with email and a shared network drive hell we would normally use, Groove helps you to be consistent and up-to date. When compared with Lotus Notes, which I was using in the past for similar purposes, it is much easier to setup and use, much more integrated and much intuitive.
February 13, 2003
John Bristowe is discovering Groove
John Bristowe : Sweet Jesus! This is one of the coolest collaboration applications I've ever seen.
GWS Access Point Preview
Matt Pope announces the availability of the GWS Access Point preview
A number of people have been playing with localhost GWS - including Tim and Jon - since we released the beta late last year, at which time the AP was not available. Now it is, so you can access Groove data and components from, for example, your Mac or your Pocket PC or your Linux box.February 12, 2003
Groovelets
Virtual Methods releases the first preview of Groovelets. Groovelets is a set of productivity tools for the Groove Workspace collaboration platform. Groovelets are XML based and very flexible. The current preview version can be used for a number of purposes : Event Manager , Task tracker, Forums and Risk Manager. Congratulations to Mark and Graham with this major milestone !!!
TeamDirection for Groove 2.5
US Navy starts Grooving
Computer Government news : Military's newest secret weapon : Instant Messaging
While offline aboard ships or planes, Navy Medical Corps physician Eric Rasmussen continues working in his Groove Workspace collaboration groups. When he’s back online in Kuwait or at Central Command in Florida, his 45 coworkers know via instant messages, and any file changes he has made are securely updated.Groove and VS.NET plugin
Groove Press Release : Groove Networks Ships "Production Ready" Add-In Toolkit For Microsoft Visual Studio .NET
TabletPC in education
An interesting article on the Boston.com website about a project on Bentley College where research shows that the Tablet PC is on it's way to become the technology of choice for both students and staff. The project is being managed using Groove Workspace.
testing threaded view
Testing the Groove/Radio interoptool 0.5 with threaded views. Responses on a topic in the Groove discussiontool are displayed as comments on the original post rather then new blog entries . Nice work Tim !!!
February 11, 2003
Groove and VS.NET
Internetnews.com : Microsoft Partners Rally Around Visual Studio .NET
Groove Networks, said its toolkit for the Redmond, Wash. outfit's VS .NET environment is ready for production.
The kit now includes drag-and-drop access from within a VS .NET toolbox to Groove software's data components and synchronization capabilities, and managed code frameworks that make Groove software's API set easier for developers.GWS Access Point
EContent : Groove Workspace Incorporates Web Services
The Groove Web Service Access Point provides remote access to Groove collaboration services by acting as a bridge between Groove software running on a user's PC and a SOAP-compliant application or system that's running elsewhere, but is accessible on a network.more on the Groove/Radio interoptool
Tim Knip : Replies to a Groove Discussion's topic are now rendered as a threaded-view. This means that only the top-level entry in a Groove Discussion will be seen as a Radio-post.
Ashok has been busy....
Good news from India. There is a new version available of GXL (Excel in Groove) and Ashok's team is also working on the development of a new Databasetool for Groove called Gbase.
February 10, 2003
Work as if Groove was a part of the latest windows file sytem
Peter Kaplan requests in the Groove forums:
I want to have the link capabilities of windows files system in groove so that I perceive that I only have one instance of a file and I can locate it other places as links. I want the file to be able to be (the original instance) in either groove or mydocs. I want to be able to put a link in the other place. I don't care if groove behind the scenes makes the link into an encrypted copyof the file and maintains the sync but to me I am only maintaining one instance and then as many links as I need to it.
I strongly agree. This particular functionality has been requested recently by a number of our clients who are using or considering the use of Groove. "Being forced" to keep multiple copies of a document on their local PC or network, is slowing down and some cases even preventing the widespread acceptance and adoption of Groove in their organisations.
I think it's important this issue should be adressed in future versions of the Groove Workspace somehow but i can't help wondering if in the meantime GWS could offer some sort of short term solution ?Coordinating proces
SB Chatterjee : What category of 'C' does The GrooveLounge fall into ?
February 08, 2003
Flashy Groovetools and Groovy Flashapps
Thank you Matt for pointing to this very interesting discussion initiated by John Dowdell on Groove and Flash.
In the past year our company has been steadily investigating the possibilities of Flash and Groove and built various prototypes of rich userfriendly flashtools to be used standalone on the web or collaborative within a Groovespace. I've blogged about this earlier including links to some of the stuff we made till then.In april last year, with the release of Groove 2.0, we made our first Architect0r-prototypetool generally available and have been workin
g on some other prototypes since then and i think the results and potential are extremely exciting. The use of flash in Groovetools within a workspace for realtime collaboration without the need of a server or building rich Groove connected Flashapps delivered by the browser on all sorts of devices PC, Mac, en PDA's etc. and using Groove Web Services to get data in and out specific spaces. It's all very powerful stuff in my opinion.
February 07, 2003
Data Delegate Components
John also points to some essential reading material for Groove developers about the Data Model Delegate
Recursive blogging
John Burkhardt on the Groovelounge Weblog : Since this blog is subcsribed to my blog when I post there it shows up here. (Sounds like Dr. Seuss). Now, if we published the feed back to a blog, and then subscribed to that blog or this one from the subscribed discussion tool and then fed that back up we could... it would... As Keanu Reeves would say: "Whoa"
Tyco and Groove
SearchWin2000 : Tyco healthcare hopes to get its Groove back with collaboration tool
Tyco Healthcare , which for years had grown through acquisitions, is now mandated by its new management to focus on developing products from within the company. Groove Workspace 2.5, to be released today, will play a key role in that mandate.Groovelounge is catching on
The Groovelounge is picking up speed. More then 15 people joined within 24 hours after the public announcement and a number of people have installed our Groove/Radio interoptool and started experimenting with it :-)
KC Bolton : The set up is straight forward. Once set up anyone who can figure out Groove, and 99% of folks who use computers can figure that out, will be blogging in minutes. Zero need to know HTML code. Zero. This IS your father's weblog tool.
Forrest Duncan : Well, that was easy-peasy lemon squeezy. Well done Tim. Now to get my head round what it means. :-)
Matt Pope : Now I can post and upload files to my blog from within Groove, as well as receive RSS feeds into Groove. Of course, this means I can blog from any one of my computers! I guess it goes without saying, but this post is coming from a Groove discussion tool.
SB Chatterjee : The Dutch Wizards have done it again - this time it's the integration of Groove to Radio Weblog. Worth checking out their GrooveLounge.
February 06, 2003
Groove/Radio Interop 0.4
Tim just uploaded a new version of the Groove/Radio interoptool If you are upgrading from a previous version, then please run the setup again because the old setup is not compatible with version 0.4.
Outlook get in the Groove
PC World : Microsoft Outlook gets in the Groove
The Groovelounge
Today the Groovelounge goes public. The Groovelounge is a new public Groovespace where you can meet other Grooveusers, extend the discussions that take place in the Blogosphere and initiate new projects. From within the space you can read Grooverelated RSS newsfeeds and write directly to a the Groovelounge Weblog using Tim's new Groove/Radio interoptool.
Anyone who's interested can join this space by clicking here for the invitationfile. See you there ..........
February 05, 2003
Pioneering Geeks and Thoughtful explainers
Dave Winer : Now Groove can be used in a publishing system. Nice. I hope the work here continues, and that Jon keeps explaining it. When technology is complicated you need both things -- pioneering geeks like Tim, and thoughtful explainers like Jon.
Groove Radio interoptool
Jon Udell installed our new GrooveRadiointerop tool, that Tim has been building using GWS, and reports about it on his weblog:
More on Groove 2.5
Tnx to Paresh for linking more Groove 2.5 press releases and coverage
Groove 2.5 official release
Groove 2.5 has been officially released with a lot of press coverage:
- Infoworld : Groove bolsters collaboration
- Internetweek : Groove plans upgrade to its P2P collaboration software
- CRN : Groove updates software with better Sharepoint links
- News.com : Groove adds Web services links
February 04, 2003
Roscoe, the Groovy polar bear
I just noticed that KC Bolton picked up his weblog in which he mainly writes about Groove and the medical industry. I particularly liked the following story :-)
I have been using Groove for some time now and try to think of creative ways to implement the program. One of my ideas will probably never amount to anything but it sure has been a hoot. Groove as a platform to tell a story in serial format.
I have wonderful nieces and nephews, God has certainly blessed me in that area. Well, my brother-in-law is a consistent Groove user and has started sending Groove voice mails with my niece sending us messages professing her love. Very cute. To do something back for her I have created a story about a polar bear who dreams of warm weather (hey, we ALL dream of it in Interior Alaska!). She now can't wait for each week's installment of the story.
With Groove I can make a story come alive by adding links to photos in the Pictures tools, sound files in the Files tool and so on. The base tool used is Notepad which allows me to publish a chapter per page. I also created an identity for the polar bear (Roscoe) who is the manager of the space. My niece can chat real-time with Roscoe and ask him questions.
Kind of silly but really neat. Roscoe is now getting more voice mail than I am! And I am having a great time doing this. The kicker is that it really only takes me about 20 minutes or so to crank out a chapter and yet the benefits are lasting.
February 03, 2003
PTC Wildfire and Groove
Ink Chat for Groove 2.5 is available
The Groove Ink chat tool can now be downloaded from Groove's website. I can't wait to testdrive it with someone using a Tablet PC.
Althought this tool is developed for use on the Tablet PC it also works fine for non-tabletPC users like me who can use it to add an extra chat to a space and use the normal chat for general smalltalk and the chattool for ontopic discussions.
Mobile Workspace for Sharepoint toolset
Lots of discussion on the Grooveforums on the availability and functionality of the Mobile Workspace for Sharepoint toolkit. Bottomline: the licenses for this toolkit will be available tomorrow....
February 02, 2003
Bloggertool on 2.5
Joe O'Laughlin : My test blog on blogger shows a reduction of errors in posting from Tim Knip's bloggertool from Groove 2.5.
Message intercept
Michael Helfrich reflects on a 2 year old article by Ray Ozzie
The drag of IT mediation of business connectivity was forcing real knowledge workers to use alternate channels of communications which were non-optimized for getting the job done, and inherently non-secure. A secure collaborative application platform that allowed the business user 'always-on" encryption and authentication services at the application layer, while riding on commodity, massively available, pervasive infrastructure (the internet) would define business nirvana. All of this was achievable then, as it is nowThis Weblog is not affiliated with Groove Networks
Groove Workspace, Edge services and related terms are trademarks of Groove Networks.
