Abstract: The invention provides a system adapted to enable contextual collaboration within a computer network. The invention provides a collaboration manager that supports manipulation of collaboration spaces. The collaboration spaces contain one or more collaboration elements that have potentially different collaboration modalities. The context manager maintains resources and resource interrelationships within contexts. The resources can include collaboration elements, processes, tasks, business objects, users, and/or roles. A view generator selects a set of the resources to be displayed to a user of the computer network. The invention also includes an interface adapted to allow applications to specify commands to manipulate collaboration spaces, commands to maintain resources and resource interrelationships within contexts, and queries for context-sensitive views.

Abstract: Standardized support for management of contextual relationships, which includes specification of the context hierarchy, association of relationships with a particular context, and derivation of transitive dependencies, is provided with a Context Manager service. The Context Manager provides a programmatic interface for defining contexts and the relationships therein. The Context Manager saves the relationship facts in one or more context stores, which are organized by contexts. The Context Manager interfaces with the Ontology Manager that processes queries on relationships with respect to a given set of contexts. The Context Manager provides a high-level abstraction for relationship management in a context. Developers of business solutions can then focus on the core business logic, without worrying about the details of storing and inferencing relationships.

Abstract: A conversation support framework supports long running human interactions with conversation-enabled applications installed at remote locations. The conversation support may be provided for a user's personal computer (PC) or personal digital assistant (PDA), either as a “thick” or “thin” client implementation. The framework includes conversation support communicating with a browser installed on the user PC or PDA to support the user's side of a conversation with the conversation-enabled applications. Presentation support communicates with the browser to show the user a state of the conversation and options for selection by the user. The user selects an available option and fills in message content that conforms with the conversation policy in use by the conversation-enabled applications.

Abstract: A Web browser is augmented with collaborative features to support community aware browsing sessions. The augmentation provided includes a data mining plug-in for the browser to establish collaborative context based on Uniform Resource Locator (URL) meta data keywords, or mined topics, and a collaboration co-browser (explorer bar) which displays a collaboration space, called CollabSpace, corresponding to the document that is displayed in the main browser. With this augmented browser, a user can perform various collaboration functions from the collaboration explorer bar, including viewing the online status of members of the CollabSpace, communicate with members of the CollabSpace via electronic mail (e-mail), instant messaging or discussion threads, and register as a member of the CollabSpace. CollabSpaces can be established and associated with one or more Web documents, meta data keywords or topics.

Abstract: A method and system for collaborative development environments allows members of a team which are physically separated to effectively work together. A Collaborative Development Environment (CDE) as a virtual space wherein all the stakeholders of a project—even if distributed by time or distance—may negotiate, brainstorm, discuss, share knowledge, and generally labor together to carry out some task, most often to create an executable deliverable and its supporting artifacts. The CDE allows people to interact with each other without shifting applications or transitioning to a different user interface, and the CDE encourages solving problems as they arise rather than waiting until the problem grows. The CDE may encompass a large variety of resources that range from role players and information items to tasks and development artifacts, but only those resources are relevant to a user's task at hand are presented.

Abstract: An enterprise system includes a plurality of artifacts (e.g., persons, objects, databases, autonomous elements, intelligent agents, information systems, etc), and a smart distance (e.g., a distance which may optimize the performance of the enterprise system) between the plurality of artifacts.

Abstract: The invention provides a system adapted to enable contextual collaboration within a computer network. In invention, a collaboration manager supports manipulation of collaboration spaces. The collaboration spaces contain one or more collaboration elements that have potentially different collaboration modalities. The context manager maintains resources and resource interrelationships within contexts. The resources can include collaboration elements, processes, tasks, business objects, users, and/or roles. A view generator selects a set of the resources to be displayed to a user of the computer network. The invention also includes an interface adapted to allow applications to specify commands to manipulate collaboration spaces, commands to maintain resources and resource interrelationships within contexts, and queries for context-sensitive views.