IBM Connections

IBM Connections is a Web 2.0 enterprise social software application developed by IBM to provide online social networking tools for people associated with a company.

Overview

IBM Connections (or 'Connections' for short) was announced at Lotusphere 2007, and Version 1.0 shipped on June 27 that year.

IBM Connections has the following components:

• Homepage - a portal site which can federate information from many sources.
• Microblogging - primarily used to stay current with updates from across the social network through the home page
• Profiles - a social network service - primarily used to find people in the organization by expertise, current projects, and responsibilities. Home page, microblogs, and tags.
• Communities - a collaborative space for people to work together with a discussion forum space.
• Ideation - Provides the ability to crowdsource ideas
• Media Gallery - Used to share photos and videos and stream those videos from the server
• Blogs - a blogging service.
• Bookmarks - a social bookmarking service.
• Activities - a task management tool for groups of people to work together on a specific project or task.
• Files - a content library for storing, sharing and revision management of computer files.
• Wikis - a Wiki system for publishing and editing content.
• Forums - an Internet forum system where people can ask questions, share their experiences, and discuss topics of common interest.
• Search - for searching across IBM Connections.

At Lotusphere 2010, IBM previewed features being planned for future releases,^[1][2] including

• changes to how user generated content is moderated
• compliance/auditing capabilities
• additional integration with IBM WebSphere Portal and Microsoft SharePoint
• expanded mobile support

IBM Connections uses open standards including ATOM and RSS to integrate with other applications, and provides a REST-like API for developers.^[3] Widgets can be added into IBM Connections, including those from Google Gadgets and other services as well as custom developed ones.^[4]

IBM Connections has been described as the leading product in enterprise social software market^[5][6][7][8] and IDC named it the worldwide leader in marketshare in 2011.

Components

The ten IBM Connections components are built on a set of services according to the service-oriented architecture concept. These components take the form of J2EE applications which are hosted on IBM WebSphere Application Server. This design allows the components to be hosted independently of each other and to support very large scale deployments.

Homepage

The Homepage serves as a portal for user's social collaboration. Out of the box IBM Connections provides 20 widgets^[9] which can be customized by the user.

IT administrators can add new widgets and OpenSocial gadgets for use by users.

The Homepage module also includes a 'recent updates' display which shows changes such as new content posts and status updates which are relevant to the user. A system to update the users status via microblogging is also provided.

Profiles

Profiles provides an online directory of people within an organization. People can be located by criteria such as keywords, names, responsibilities, interests, projects they are part of, expertise, business relationships, tags, or their location^[9]

A person's profile typically contains their name, job role, base location, reporting chain and details about the IBM Connection bookmarks, activities, communities and blogs in which they participate. Profiles can be customized and new fields added^[10]

Bookmarks

Bookmarks is a social bookmarking service which allows people to bookmark web-content, tag it, and share it. Bookmarks can be located via keyword, tags and the person who created the bookmark.

In addition to simple searching, Bookmarks can dynamically refine search results with the user identifying users or other tags of interest to them.

Bookmarks can output bookmarks via standard feeds and provides an API so that third-party tools can integrate with it.^[11] As of Connections 2.0.1, the API can be used for:

• Searching bookmarks
• Getting a list of bookmark tags
• Getting a list of popular bookmarks
• Adding bookmarks to a Web page
• Adding a list of bookmarks to a Web page
• Adding popular bookmarks to a Web page
• Creating bookmarks
• Deleting bookmarks
• Retrieving bookmarks
• Updating bookmarks

Activities

Activities is a task management system which enables groups of people to easily collaborate on a task. Activities are structured in a nested tree hierarchy where entries, to-do items and sections branch off from the root activity.

Any non-section entity in an activity can contain rich-text and custom fields for files, links, text, people and dates. To-Do items can also have a due date and a person the To-do is assigned to.

Wikis

Wikis are a new capability added to IBM Connections 2.5 which facilitate the collaborative creation of web content. Wikis are collections of pages about a particular subject. Wiki members can edit or comment on the pages, or add their own pages. Teams can use wikis to create a central place to collaborate on a project.^[9]

Files

Files is a personal file-sharing service that is part of IBM Connections 2.5, used to upload, share, tag, recommend, and comment on files.^[9]

Communities

Communities enable ad hoc and planned collaboration around a project or area of interest. A Connections Community can have its own media gallery, event calendar, ideation, microblogging, blog, forums, bookmarks, activities, feeds,^[12] member list, Wiki and Files.

Blogs

Blogs provide blogging functionality for groups and individuals.

Forums

Forums is used for discussions. It was added as a component in 3.0, and was previously part of the Communities component.

Plugins

IBM Connections integrates into existing applications via plug-ins. Out-of-the-box, the following plugins are available, most included as part of the license:

• IBM Lotus Notes
• IBM Sametime
• Microsoft Office including Word, PowerPoint, and Excel
• Microsoft Outlook
• Microsoft Windows Explorer
• Microsoft Sharepoint
• RIM BlackBerry
• Apple iPhone / iPad / iPod Touch
• Google Android Phones
• WebSphere Portal

Other integration with Microsoft Sharepoint and Microsoft Office Communications Server has also been done.

ISVs have also integrated into the IBM Connections platform, such as Trilog Group to add Social Project Management for complex projects, ISW & Bunchball to add a gamification layer, Blogsy which serves as a native iPad blogging app for IBM Connections,

References

External links

• IBM Connections version 1.0 Announcement Letter
• IBM Connections Version 1.0.2 Announcement Letter
• IBM Connections - Social software for business
• IBM Connections app catalog
• System Requirements
• THE UC VIEW - Independent resource for Sametime, Connections projects
• THE VIEW - Independent guidance for IBM Collaboration professionals
• List of IBM Software
• IBM Connections Version 4.5 CR1 Fix List
• Mobilize IBM Connections files
• egbs Sweden

Related blogs

• Social Business Insights (IBM)
• IBM Connections Product Team
• Socialize Me
• The Sametime Blog
• The Connections Blog
• Lotusconnections.org
• Statusraden - Sociala intranät i praktiken – om att jobba socialt

File hosting services
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