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Department of Computer Science, Queen Mary, University of London. |
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Funded 1996-1997 by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, under its Multimedia and Networking Applications programme, Grant GR/L14602 |
Click here for information about our new research into Shared Multimedia Workspaces for Diabetic Patient Care.
Mushroom is a generic software framework that supports collaboration and group interaction for the Internet. Mushroom provides Mrooms: working spaces for groups of collaborating users. Mrooms contain representations of the users who are present in them, and they contain information objects that these users share, such as documents, multimedia presentations and whiteboards. Users also share tools for communication with other users in the Mroom. Information objects include group-aware objects written in Java, as well as 'legacy' objects such as conventional documents. For example, in distance-learning a lecturer may create interactive objects for student experiments in a shared 'laboratory'. The lecturer can also add text files containing lecture notes in HTML format, which the students browse with a standard Web browser.
Users work or interact in Mrooms at the same or different times, and an Mroom and its contents persist even when no user is present. Unlike the Web, if a user updates an object, then others see the change almost immediately. Mushroom makes the objects stored in Mrooms highly available despite network delays, disconnection or single server failure.
To avoid conflicts and promote collaboration, it provides users with information about one another's activity within Mrooms. Mushroom provides mechanisms for integrity and access control, for when users attempt to import objects into an Mroom. It provides general concurrency control mechanisms, for when users update shared objects in Mrooms. It provides security and privacy guarantees. Mushroom is open with respect to the types of application and object that can be shared in Mrooms, and with respect to the security and integrity control policies that Mroom users choose to apply.
A number of publications resulting from the project give more information.
This is a screen shot from the current version of the Mushroom user interface. It shows a single Mroom with representations of 2 users, some files, a chat tool - TypeTalk, a facility to log all user activity and some links to other Mrooms. The user representations include a 'pager' icon which shows whether the user has enabled the Mushroom pager (a notification device).
To obtain requirements for group collaboration and interaction, we have formulated a questionnaire. We would like to receive answers from all kinds of users involved in any type of collaboration or joint interaction.
For more information on Mushroom, contact Pat Healey.
References: other collaborative systems and interesting papers.
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Last updated 14th Augustl 2000.
