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Motivation for Collaborative Applications

Collaborative applications enable Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). Why provide computer support for collaboration when people have been working together for ages without the computer?

While these may be well-argued reasons for CSCW, they have to be taken with a pinch of salt, since this area is still at the research stage and collaborative applications have not yet been deployed and tested extensively. Thus, we cannot say, based on actual usage, how important these reasons actually are. We can mainly argue, based mainly on hypothetical scenarios and lab experience, about the importance and nature of collaborative applications. In this respect, this course will be in the spirit of other advanced graduate courses discussing several untested concepts that have not yet made it to the commercial marketplace.

Nontheless, there are several trends that indicate that the potential impact of CSCW would in fact be great:



next up previous
Next: Views of Collaboration Up: Introduction Previous: Definition of a



Prasun Dewan
Mon Jan 13 14:41:48 EST 1997