International Business Machines Corporation

Charles Robert Hill

Sami Mohammed Shalabi

Miguel A Estrada

Maurice B Shore

Terry June Linsey

Andrew Lewis Schirmer

Michael Muller

Joseph Anthony Russo

Scott Howard Prager

Julio Estrada

Eric M Wilcox

Sandra Louise Kogan

Martin T Moore

David E Wilson

Hong Dai

Antonio Estrada

Raymond T Tang

Mustansir Bantwala

Patrick J Shaughnessy

William R Rodrick

Sami M Shalbi

Embodiments of the present invention address deficiencies of the art in respect to project management tools and provide a method, system and computer program product for an activity-centric project management tool. In one embodiment of the invention, an activity-centric project management tool data processing system can be provided. The system can include an activity-centric project management tool, one or more ad-hoc communications tools externally coupled to the activity-centric project management tool, and ad hoc communications activity objectification logic coupled to both the activity-centric project management tool and the ad-hoc communications tools. The logic can include program code enabled to integrate external ad-hoc communications among task nodes of an activity hierarchy modeling a project plan.

Activity centric project management tool

A method, system and apparatus for publishing activity tasks in a collaborative environment can include the step of publishing selected activity tasks for status viewing by other collaborators in the collaborative environment. In one aspect of the invention, the publishing step can include the step of publishing selected activity tasks for viewing by a subset of the collaborators in the collaborative environment. In another aspect of the invention, the publishing step can include the step of publishing selected activity tasks for viewing by the collaborators in the collaborative environment only for a specified duration. In yet another aspect of the invention, the publishing step can include both publishing selected activity tasks for viewing by the collaborators in the collaborative environment, and periodically updating a status for each of the selected activity tasks.

Publishing activity tasks in a collaborative environment

A method and computer program product for defining a plurality of tags, each of which is associated with a discrete process executable on activity content. At least one of the plurality of tags is associated with a piece of content within an activity, thus defining one or more associated tags.

System and method for initiating the execution of a process

The present invention is a method, system and apparatus for the policy based provisioning and management of a collaborative context. A policy based application provisioning system for use in a collaborative environment can include a policy having rules for limiting collaborative context creation and operation in the collaborative environment. A context provisioning process can be coupled to the policy and configured to create collaborative contexts in the collaborative environment limited by the rules in the policy. Finally, a context management process can be coupled to a data store of usage data for created ones of created collaborative contexts in the collaborative environment.

Policy based application provisioning in a collaborative computing environment

A system for integrating project events with personal calendar and scheduling clients, includes a first server including a place database having a member profiles database and an events database; a place server, and an email transport facility including an email application; a client including a calendar and scheduling program; the member profiles database being responsive to member input for storing member subscriptions to the calendar and scheduling program; the place server responsive to said email transport facility receiving a create, update, or delete event from a member of the place database for creating in the events database a project event; the place server responsive to a create, update, or delete event for determining from the member profiles database those members subscribing to each of a plurality of calendar and scheduling programs; said place server further for sending to each member subscribing to a calendar and scheduling program an email notification of the project event personalized to the calendar and scheduling program to which the member has subscribed.

System and method for integrating projects events with personal calendar and scheduling clients

A method, system and apparatus for automated management and validation of access permissions to referenced shared resources. A method for access validation and management of access permissions to referenced shared resources in a networked environment can include incorporating a reference to an underlying shared resource within a primary shared resource configured for distribution in the networked environment and specifying a designated viewer for the primary shared resource. It can be determined whether the designated viewer is permitted to access the underlying shared resource. Before providing the primary shared resource to the designated viewer, however, an author of the primary shared resource can be notified when the designated viewer is determined not to be permitted to access the underlying shared resource.

Access validation and management of access permissions to referenced shared resources in a networked environment

A system for central refresh of a place includes a source place; a place type; a child place; each place comprising a plurality of place objects implemented as documents, logic, and associated design note, each design note including a plurality of items; some of the items being content items descriptive of content of the objects. A central refresh execution module determines whether an inherited place object is modified in a place by assigning to each item a sequence indicia indicative of change activity with respect to the item; generating and storing a stored checksum of sequence indicia generated for the content items; and responsive to a refresh operation with respect to the child place, and calculating a refresh checksum of sequence indicia for the content items. The central refresh execution module is responsive to the stored checksum and the refresh checksum being unequal for refreshing the child place.

System and method for central refresh of place objects

A system and method is provided for command line administration of project spaces using extensible markup language objects including a data store for storing project data, the data store including a project catalog database and a plurality of objects in project spaces; a command line element for receiving a first user command including an output command and arguments with respect to an object in the data store; a first command processor for executing the first user command against the object in the data store to generate a first extensible markup language file; a second command processor for receiving at least one subsequent user commands, each subsequent user command including an input command, and executing a first subsequent second user command against the first extensible markup language file and the data store to manage the objects in the data store and generate a resultant output extensible markup language file when needed for reentrant processing.

System and method for command line administration of project spaces using XML objects

Browsing in collaboration space is done by presenting to a user an interface to collaboration space. Responsive to the user opening a main window, presenting a selector and results of a search in the main window. Responsive to selection of the selector, a separate quick browse window is opened and objects searched to generate a set of hits which are linked to the main window without losing context. Context is displayed in the quick browse window in a hypertext markup language format, with an entry for each item in the set of hits. Responsive to user selection of an item in the quick browse window, paging controls redirect the main window to a linked page for displaying the quick browse window while the user browses target pages and accesses local settings of the target page to display context of the target page.

Method and system for providing a separate browser window with information from the main window in a simpler format

A theme is defined and associated with a collaboration space user interface. The theme includes a predetermined set of files including a cascading style sheet and a predetermined set of layout files, with a layout file for each of a plurality of view modes of operation. Bach layout file specifies content and layout of a plurality of skin components including logo, table of contents, action bar, tool bar, and page content skin components. The set of layout files contains five layout tiles for page view mode layout, list folder view layout, headline folder view layout, slide show layout, and page edit mode. The cascading style sheet includes a common style sheet and a skin style sheet, with the common style sheet specifying font, size and color style for page content skin components common to each view mode of operation.

Method and system for designing a theme and associating it with a collaboration space user interface

Collaboration space object model provides for a place consisting of rooms created by users interacting with a client browser. A skin (i.e., theme) may be used as template for creating places. PlaceBots (i.e., agents) provide for accessing, processing and managing data in a place. HTML may be dragged and dropped into a place, where it is parsed and corresponding place fields created. MS Excel or Word documents may be dragged and dropped into a place, which creates a corresponding form, and users may create new documents using that form. A place type comprising a template of an entire place, or collaboration space, may be used to create new places. Changes made to a place may be reported, subject to security controls, by selecting what's new. Task fields are provided allowing web browser creation of forms for work flow. Place enabled objects are provided for synchronous communications. A quick browse feature provides a simplified format for browser windows based on selection of HTML links. MS Office documents may launched within a place for in place editing and importing the resulting document into the place.

Method and system for importing MS office forms

A system for aggregating user information on a plurality of projects and servers includes a project catalog; a project catalog server; a plurality of project servers; a plurality of project databases; a project database being associated with each project server; an entry in the project catalog for each project server and each project database; and a my projects procedure responsive to user entry of a my projects request for accessing the project catalog server to obtain markup language representations of entries in the project catalog for the user for display at a terminal.

System and method for aggregating user project information in a multi-server system

Collaboration space object model provides for a place consisting of rooms created by users interacting with a client browser. A skin (i.e., theme) may be used as template for creating places. PlaceBots (i.e., agents) provide for accessing, processing and managing data in a place. HTML may be dragged and dropped into a place, where it is parsed and corresponding place fields created. MS Excel or Word documents may be dragged and dropped into a place, which creates a corresponding form, and users may create new documents using that form. A place type comprising a template of an entire place, or collaboration space, may be used to create new places. Changes made to a place may be reported, subject to security controls, by selecting what's new. Task fields are provided allowing web browser creation of forms for work flow. Place enabled objects are provided for synchronous communications.

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Belmont, MA, United States of America

Charles Robert Hill