ibm.com: Activity-centric computing-An innovative approach to managing information overflow
April 20 2006
Via Ted Stanton/InsideLotus, an article on ibm.com/lotus about activity-centric computing. The article features several quotes from Lotus CTO Doug Wilson:
"Right now, the 'glue' that associates tasks and objects within an activity remains in the users' heads. But if we're able to create and save the thread of an activity, we should also be able to preserve it as a pattern that others can reuse when performing the same or similar activities. In effect, people will be writing their own programs for executing business processes at the same time as they execute the processes. It's going to make capturing best practices a lot easier for organizations, and it has the potential to change the way organizations think about programming."but then what exactly is the activity-based model?
The "activities" paradigm enables users to manage many disparate items as coordinated projects. Individuals continue to work with the tools and applications they already know. But now they have a simple, unobtrusive way to tame the problem of information overflow. They can easily manage both shared and private aspects of all kinds of activities, becoming more efficient and productive without leaving the comfort of their inboxes. And they can resume interrupted work more quickly because everything related to any particular activity is neatly organized in one place.The more involved I get in the Notes "Hannover" project, the more convinced I am that Activities will be one of the primary drivers for upgrades to the new release (along with composite applications). Yes, the new UI work is incredibly compelling, but it's new UI on the same core client.
Activities delivers fundamentally new innovation into the Notes client, a way to get out from under e-mail overload. To me, Activities is an empowering approach. In shifting the paradigm from e-mail, the user is taking control of their day back. Right now, I, like many people, manage a lot of my work out of my inbox. The problem with that is that I've shifted the responsibility to someone else -- I have to wait for an e-mail to take action. And if I'm left off an e-mail, I might be left out of a work activity overall. With the Activities model being a drag-and-drop away, now I'm working together with my organization, making things happen in a way that isn't just a moment-in-time, but can be captured, studied, learned-from, and re-used.
If all that sounds too dreamy, maybe my brain is still suffering the effects of hearing the hotel's lobby musicians play a muzak-ed version of the Village People's "YMCA" last night. Now that was an interesting activity.
Link: ibm.com: Activity-centric computing-An innovative approach to managing information overflow >
(Fixed this entry so you can now comment on it)
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- 2
Henny Breijer | 4/20/2006 3:34:07 AM
During the 2006 IBM Leadership Forum held in Rome at the beginning of this month, the theme was "Innovation that matters". Clearly, activity-centric computing is one of the innovations that IBM brings forward in this area.
With the great work done by the CUE Research Group at IBM's Watson Research Center in Cambrigde, IBM will stay lightyears ahead of anybody else in the collaborative market-space.
When I was presented with Activity Explorer about two years ago, I was very impressed and could immediately see the added-value as it addresses the issues users are strugling with every single day when trying to get their work done.
Yes, the whole concept is a bit deamy or fluffy if you will Ed, but once people adapt to the paradigm-shift that activity-based computing brings them, it's going to be a whole different ball game and I am convinced that it will make people happy !
Regards,
- Henny
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Mick Moignard http://www.dominopower.com | 4/20/2006 5:13:19 AM
Like Henny @2, I'm quite impressed with Activity Explorer, and like one of the quotes from Doug, I can see how it will enable people to effectively record what they do and then enable others to "play it back", thereby promulgating best practice and stopping more wheel-reinventing. That's a neat idea, and should be part of the sell.
Henny also says "but once people adapt to the paradigm-shift that activity-based computing brings them, it's going to be a whole different ball game and I am convinced that it will make people happy !" and there's the crux. Most people won't just adapt by themselves, but will need to be mind-shifted by someone else. Some will need to be mind-shifted and then trained to use the thing. It's eh same issue as we have faced with collaboration; some companies, some people, get it and some don't. Just hoping that companies and people can adapt to the paradigm-shift isn't going to be enough. It will need the visionaries and evangelists who helped to make such a success of Notes in their companies to do it again. If we, the community, fail to address this issue, Activity Explorer may take quite a while to get off the ground, and might not make it at all. We need to be able to show how to make the shift and why it's of value. We need to do it in a practical and down-to-earth way, with real examples and a real ability to do it in our own companies and our customers. Show someone how they can get benefit on something they do regularly, then the "ah-ha" moment strikes much more quickly. We need to get beyond dreamy and fluffy, real soon now, I would think.
Mick Moignard.
- 4
Duffbert http://www.twduff.com | 4/20/2006 5:58:00 AM
Well, based on this, we should be seeing an announcement for "Activities Live" from Microsoft any day now! :-)
- 5
Ragnar Schierholz | 4/20/2006 7:09:22 AM
Ingo, you are making a bold statement on why concepts like "a unified, consistent UI and a single point of access to all objects related to the activity, such as people, pieces of information and tools to work with those pieces" can only be implemented in a rich client environment.
Can you elaborate why that is the case? Which fundamental properties of web-based UIs prevent these concepts from being implemented there? Isn't e.g. the single point of access to all relevant objects and functionality THE major selling proposition of web-based, portal-like applications?
Actually, the challenge of the rich client you mention is pretty much solved there. Hardly any vendor of an enterprise software will be able to afford not offering integration points to middleware or other integration components. Via these you can make these applications accessible to web-clients.
Don't get me wrong, I do like my rich client currently and I see many webUIs which lag behind in comfort and ease of use. But I do also see webUIs which are catching up very quickly. See Google's calendar for example - based on open standards such as iCal they have managed to integrate virtually any calendar application that is out there and willing to be integrated anywhere. Other web-integration based on RSS can be seen at ziki.com where you can pull together all your RSS feeds and classify them with tags.
What makes the rich client so unique compared to webUIs other than that its offline capabilities?
- 6
Axel | 4/20/2006 9:15:18 AM
@5: I certainly don't want to start religious debate.
Some issues come to my mind where a web client hasn't as satisfactorily an answer:
1. caching (And Notes client is good at that, btw. -> not often mentioned).
2. forward and backward button of browser suck.
3. A lot of apps do have pretty simple requirements. But there are also those more complex apps. And for those is Rich Client. Could you imagine an IDE like Eclipse running in Firefox?
4. you can't interact satisfactorily with user desktop from browser app (unless all users are security expert). Some apps might require to create a special file on C:\meineDokumente .
5. offline capabilities (you mentioned).
I am big friend of current developments in javascript-libraries. Nobody should miss whats going on in prototype, script.aculo.us (Thomas Fuchs rocks), etc.. But from my pov there are certainly areas where non-browser clients do have a place. Especially as we have now technologies for automatic destribution of client code in Eclipse ecosystem (for example) and cheap distribution was the traditional argument pro-browser app.
- 7
Bill Geimer | 4/20/2006 9:57:58 AM
@6 Well said.
I would add that some businesses have a need to roll out just a browser to remote offices and some members of the staff in positions that are hostile to a workstation. Luckily, they can get the activity centric and composite application functionality out of IBM Workplace. Tantalizing thought, is it not? Different parts of the organization getting the same best of breed functionality out of too closely related products, one optomized to enrich the web experience and the other revolutionizing the workstation experience! And nobody fighting about it or predicting the death of one product or another...
- 8
bob | 4/20/2006 10:09:20 AM
Sorry to be off topic....Can anyone verify the info below....need an answer as soon as possible - thanks in advance....
In order to run Lotus Domino 7, do you have to run Server 2003 Enterprise Edition? Currently we run Domino 7 on Server 2003 Standard Edition and was told by IBM that we have to upgrade to Enterprise Edition.
- 9
Ingo Erdmann http://gcc.upb.de | 4/20/2006 10:09:21 AM
Ragnar, that was a misunderstanding. I totally agree that portals offer a single point of access.
And I also agree that you can create nice, interactive web interfaces nowadays.
And I guess that you could expose nice interfaces that utilize AJAX via a portal server in the near future.
My point was: Let's assume there is a need for rich clients of any kind (such as Notes, Word, Photoshop etc.). As soon as a user needs at least one rich client in the work environment, it breaks work consistency and interrupts the current activity.
In this specific scenario, only composite apps make effective and consistent activity centric collaboration happen. And you could still incorporate portlets, but also resurfaced Notes apps, a resurfaced Photoshop UI and a resurfaced Word. And they could interact, in a consistent, integrated UI. In my point of view, the rich client composite app is a superset of portal functionality.
There might be people that don't use any rich client at all. For those, portals are sufficient. In an activity-centric environment, I expect all others to work more efficiently using rich client composites.
- 10
Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 4/20/2006 10:34:42 AM
@8 Bob. In the future, a better place to ask your questions would be the Notes/Domino 6/7 forum: { Link }
The answer according to the release notes
{ Link } is Domino Server4 - Table 1 - Supported operating system versions it lists both Microsoft Windows 2003 Server Standard Edition and Microsoft Windows 2003 Server Enterprise Edition.
- 11
Ted Stanton http://www-03.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/InsideLotus | 4/20/2006 10:48:23 AM
@8 Check the release notes and it will show the supported versions. If the release notes conflicts with what support is telling you, please make sure their technote the difference.
Domino Server
The following are supported platforms for the Domino 7 server:
Windows 2000 Server
Windows 2000 Advanced Server
Windows 2003 Server Standard Edition
Windows 2003 Server Enterprise Edition
- 12
Axel | 4/20/2006 11:01:53 AM
Also interaction of webapps is an issue.
Want to say: To componatize 1 UI out of > 1 webapps.
On the J2EE side thats what JSR-168 portlets are for.
I can assure you that currently developing portlet is different from developing stand alone webapps. There are portlet specific issues to be taken into account.
We might get better flexibility when portal vendors implement ajax features into their products.
Its all about details.
- 13
Dennis Ellison | 4/20/2006 11:38:58 AM
...and what about security? IE is a seive. I've watched fully patched, virus protected and with the firewall PCs on - infect with spyware because a bad URL is entered. The proprietary UI has a place.
- 14
Villi Helgason | 4/20/2006 12:46:55 PM
@3 "Some will need to be mind-shifted and then trained to use the thing" - if this is the case then it will never fly.
It has to be self-explanatory, and have an immediate and obvious benifit. People want to collaborate, and find ways to do so f.x. rss, blogs, and even email.
- 15
Mick Moignard http://www.dominopower.com | 4/20/2006 2:34:31 PM
@14: Exactly my point. But, do all people want to collaborate? Do people know what it means? They might want to, but do they know how to (and I mean by mindset, not by knowing how to use technology). All that comes before the technology.
Mick
- 16
Randall Shimizu | 4/21/2006 12:11:36 AM
Ed-
Activity Explorer status:
I was wondering IBM has announced a release date or plans for Activity Explorer. The last I heard was that the "Activity Explorer" was under the control of the IBM project office. So is Activity Explorer part of Workplace Collaboration Express or does IBM intend to wait until Hannover...??
- 17
Axel | 4/21/2006 2:05:55 AM
This composite apps stuff is more complicated on a second look. I am learning that the hard way, now (in different context).
You need to have very clearly what you mean with composition:
- should security context be integrated or are they separated?
- Performance requirements
- transactions.
One my think: "With web2.0/REST-Webservices we can build our app as a composite from existing app. So we don't need this RichClient composites."
But you get easily into a hammer - nails problem.
Some nails require shared security context (for example). And that might be not viable with Web2.0/Rest (and to slow with SOAP). And way easier with Workplace and/or Hannover.
Premature simplification can cost you a lot of money as unneeded complexity does.
Good to have different architectures to choose from, I say.
- 18
Ragnar Schierholz | 4/21/2006 2:52:25 AM
Guys, thanks for the discussion, that's what I wanted to hear! As I hinted earlier, I don't think that local apps are to be doomed and I clearly have the sound of a system architect from a project I was involved in ring in my ear who yelled "Drecksbrowser" at least twice an hour (and I won't translate that).
But what I'm sometimes missing is the serious thought why that is the case. Too many technology driven people just have their preference for either side and come up with statements why this or that is inferior. But the question whether this or that superior feature of what they like is actually required by the customers of their technology is hardly asked. Mick has brought this question to the point here.
And to be honest, as Mich, I do think that activity-based work organization is not yet ready for mainstream... or vice-versa.
- 19
Mick Moignard http://www.dominopower.com | 4/21/2006 3:44:52 AM
@18: "And to be honest, as Mich, I do think that activity-based work organization is not yet ready for mainstream... or vice-versa." It's the vice-versa. I think that Activity-based work organisation is likely to be ready for mainstream, but the question is whether mainstream is ready for it. If not, what we do to make it ready?
As I said, if we expect it just to happen, then we could be waiting a while. We need to go out and proactively make it happen, by evangelizing and by real-world example.
Mick Moignard
- 20
Axel | 4/21/2006 4:23:23 AM
@18: Share the observation that some "people have preference for either side and come up with statements why this or that is inferior" (though not only technical driven).
Agree 110%
Due to sane time constraints they don't know the other technology very well.
That lack of knowledge doesn't hinder them to make strong negative statements about it.
From my experience: This isn't good.
Wise man does control emotions against such geniuses-in-choice-of-the-one-and-only-correct-hammer (though its often quite hard).
- 21
Jim Bernardo | 4/21/2006 2:24:26 PM
um...can you say...Groove? Not because Microsoft owns it now, but it seems to me that Activity Explorer is Groove without a separate client (OK, good maybe) and with no peer-to-peer capabilities. In fact, when Microsoft acquired Groove, Steve Mills, my favorite IBM PR guy, said, "There've been no major Groove rollouts anywhere in the world; they've all been pilot projects because of the inherent problems associated with those types of very loosely connected environments in a business context." Aside from the accuracy problems in his statement, it's amusing to me that IBM has created a capability which IBM finds to be non-compelling.
Of course, I fully expect a diatribe on why Groove is a messed up technology, and the Activity Explorer is Groove done right, or more likely, Activity Explorer is nothing like Groove, not targeted at the same audience, not targeted at the same business problem, etc., etc., etc....
Let the bashing begin! :)
- 22
Volker Weber http://vowe.net | 4/21/2006 3:01:44 PM
> Let the bashing begin! :)
Sigh. Life must be boring @ MS.
- 23
David Bell | 4/21/2006 4:00:25 PM
@9 - AJAX is much more heavily used in Portal 6.
- 24
Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 4/22/2006 9:10:00 PM
@16 sorry, you got lost in the noise, thanks for the e-mail prompt.
Activity Explorer is a feature in the IBM Workplace Managed Client 2.6, which is publicly available. blockquote IBM Workplace Managed Client capabilities include online and offline access to messaging, documents, instant messaging, Activity Explorer, productivity tools, and data access. /blockquote from { Link }
The next generation of this will be the activities capability in Lotus Notes "Hannover".
Definitely, activity management is the most important functional feature of "Hannover", whereas composite apps is the most important technical feature from a business value proposition perspective.
Even in a world of Web 2.0 techniques, many business scenarios require a richer user interface and a web UI is not sufficient. In these scenarios, activity management and composite apps are not just two separate features. Effective activity management in a rich client environment does not work without composite apps.
Activity-centric collaboration requires a unified, consistent UI and a single point of access to all objects related to the activity, such as people, pieces of information and tools to work with those pieces. Without the need to change between applications. This single point of access can only be implemented generically in a rich client with the concept of composite apps.
The general challenge is, that not every business software vendor will provide eclipse plugins as a rich client frontend to their software. Some will do that, others will provide portlets or plain web interfaces, others desktop apps. An activity management solution can only support all these facets without knowing what customers would like to achieve, if every piece of existing technology can be embraced. And if every piece of surfaced UI can interact with other pieces of the environment.
From what I saw at Lotusphere, this can be achieved by "Hannover" composite apps. I hope that the business partner community will provide a broad set of business solutions utilizing a combination of both, activity management capabilities and composite apps. This can be a huge step forward in office productivity.