Information Technology Journal1812-56381812-5646Asian Network for Scientific Information10.3923/itj.2008.1182.1187XuJ. ZhangJ. HarveyT. YoungJ. 8200878This study surveys current asynchronous collaboration
tools and their features. Asynchronous collaboration tools, that allow
users to collaborate at different times, have evolved from email, discussion
board, weblogs and Wiki to advanced tools that integrate multiple functions
to make collaboration more powerful and convenient. A great number of
such tools have been developed that provide a variety of different features.
This study investigates the available features of these tools, the meanings
of these features and identifies common and key features. We organize
features by four major functional categories: communication, information
sharing, electronic calendar and project management. We tested ten asynchronous
collaboration tools that present different ways of collaboration and different
sets of features. Data collected in this study come from our experiments
and online documents. This study will help users gain knowledge of what
current asynchronous collaboration tools have to offer and help them select
right tools based on their needs.]]>Bargeron, D., A. Gupta, J. Grudin, E. Sanocki and F. Li,20012001pp: 1010Kock, N. and J. Nosek,20054819Lefebvre, E., L. Cassivi, L.A. Lefebvre and P.M. Leger,20032003pp: 178178Li, S.F., Q. Stafford-Fraser and A. Hopper,200042633Peden, J., W. Burleson and C. Leonardo,20002000pp: 593596Riboulet, V., P. Marin and J.C. Leon,20022002pp: 128133