Writing/Editing Tools for Collaboration

We outlined our Taxonomy of Collaboration Tools in an earlier post. In the jungle of hundreds, if not thousands, of collaboration tools, the taxonomy helps us select appropriate tools based on our needs as opposed to the feature functionality of tools; that is, a selection based on what we want to do with the tools as opposed to what the tools can do for us.

In this post, we focus on writing/editing tools for collaboration. For each type of writing/editing tool, we offer a brief description of its purpose and a list of such tools. A couple caveats to keep in mind before we address this topic. First, a tool may fit into more than one category. And second, we make no effort here to address the age-old question whether the best-of-breed or suite approach is better for your own individual situation.

We now outline writing/editing tools for collaboration.

Wikis

• Purpose: Creating and editing a document as a website using a WYSIWYG text editor. Wikis typically track the changes by time and editors. Changes can be undone, accepted, or rejected based on privileges.
• Tools: PBWorks, WetPaint, wikidot, mediawiki, Wikispaces, Socialtext, Zoho, Mindtouch, KnowledgePlaza, Mixedink, SharePoint, Google Docs, Google Wave, Google Sites

Reviewing

• Purpose: Annotating, commenting on documents
• Tools: Backboard, Creately, A.nnotate, uptogo, ReviewBasics, ConceptShare, Octopz, Cozimo, ProofHQ, Colaab, Revizr

Which tools do you use? What is your assessment of various writing/editing tools for collaboration? Which other tools would you add to this list and to which category?

We would also love get your case studies that we can share with our audience!

Update on 25 December 2010 by Lokesh Datta

See Related Posts:

• Communication Tools for Collaboration
• Organization Tools for Collaboration
• Engaging/Networking Tools for Collaboration
• A Continuum of Collaboration Solutions
• Keep it simple on the collaboration tools
• Open Letter to Collaboration Tool Providers

Comments

[John]

Interesting articles. In reading both this article and the Taxonomy, I was curious where an application like LucidChart would fit? It's in the content creation space but is graphical, rather than text, so "writing/editing" doesn't quite fit either. Maybe something to consider if you come back to take a second look at the taxonomy.