10 Free Tools for Collaboration
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With and then many people working from home, it's no surprise that the last few years have seen pregnant increases in the range of collaboration tools available online. They didn't just capitalize on a growing tendency; they helped to propel it. Here are ten great, gratis tools for collaboration, including some of those we use hither at Lifehack.
Ta-da List
Ta-da List is a collaborative list awarding. If yous need to make up any kind of list with your team, this app is free and does a practiced job, primarily considering in that location'south no feature-creep and information technology's not bloated software. This is what we use at Lifehack to keep a list of article topics going amongst the editorial team, and besides a convenient way to receive article assignments in a loose format.
TimeBridge
TimeBridge is a scheduling app that integrates with your Google Calendar, Substitution or Outlook availability and enables easy scheduling of meetings across timezones. This is some other app nosotros apply at Lifehack to schedule meetings across four different time zones, which we and then hold in…
Campfire
Campfire, from the makers of Basecamp and Backpack, is a web-based cross between instant messenger and chat room that has been designed for business concern groups and collaborative teams. The free account only allows four simultaneous chatters, which is enough for our editorial meetings. Campfire has i of the best transcript storage features I've seen.
If you're looking to have a free discussion with more than than iv squad members, I've found Skype to be decent at the job — except for its poor transcript implementation (if you Skype guys are reading, a transcript feature makeover would be smashing!).
Google Docs & Spreadsheets
The giant in any collaborative tools list. Google Docs has one of the best web-based collaborative document editing implementations around. That said, I reckon 50% of a proficient collaborative give-and-take processor is a loud and obnoxious note that tells you someone else is working on the document already! These days Google Docs as well has quite an extensive collection of templates that'll aid you shave off a few minutes of bones document setup time.
Writeboard
If yous want something a little less heavy than Google Docs, Writeboard is lightweight and simple yet provides excellent control over the revision history of your document and allows you lot collaborate with others on a elementary document in a fluid and intuitive way. It's impossible to ever lose a great idea using Writeboard, which is 1 of the few gratuitous offerings from 37signals (the makers of Bivouac, Basecamp and other products).
Evernote
Evernote, the fantastic notation taking software, has sharing capabilities so you can bounce documents back and forth with other users. You can mankind out ideas or fifty-fifty write entire collaborative books this manner. While you can exercise this with Google Docs also, it'due south a huge hassle to go notes from one app to the other when it's non necessary (and Docs, while handy, is not optimal for taking notes).
Mixin
While TimeBridge is very handy for scheduling meetings across timezones, it relies on everybody selecting a few times they can make a meeting and then the software picks the best matches. Mixin takes some of the guesswork out of the process and instead of forcing you to effort and "experience out" where your collaborator's gaps and availabilities may be, allows you to see it all visually. It doesn't supplant TimeBridge, only it's very useful peculiarly when nobody in the group can seem to find a fourth dimension that works for everyone.
Task2Gather
There are heaps of task managers that are spider web-based. I don't recall yous could count them all if you lot tried. But Task2Gather is an option that is improve suited to project management and team collaboration than most other options out at that place. If you want the app that marries projection management for teams, with personal task management, try this one.
MediaWiki
The wiki software that powers Wikipedia is well-known amongst geeks as one of the ultimate collaborative systems, allowing you to do everything form interact on documents to get out messages for each other that are fastened to those particular documents. If you're the type who gets an email almost a projection but forgets all about it by the time y'all go to work on the projection adjacent, that particular frustration disappears with the assistance of the Talk page.
I've likewise plant MediaWiki first-class in setting up training documentation for teams. Use a wiki to tell your team of bloggers how to format their entries correctly and which CSS classes to utilise in images, and provide a mode guide while you lot're at it.
MediaWiki requires a chip of geekery and knowledge to go ready, but it's worth the try if you're willing to put the time and try into learning information technology.
Delicious
If you piece of work in whatsoever kind of environment where links wing back and forth for people to review, Delicious is more useful than you may think. The bookmarking service that once had a agglomeration of dots peppered throughout its proper noun has multiple collaborative uses.
Many bloggers, myself included, allow readers to tag their bookmarks as for:username (such as for:joelfalconer) so nosotros can review them in batches. Bloggers constantly become readers and other bloggers suggesting links, well-nigh often for cocky-promo, and it's very helpful to our job but frequently is hard to manage.
Well-nigh fields require that teams be up to engagement on news, new products, manufacture stance and so on and Delicious' for: tagging organisation allows the people in your team to go along each other up to date without throwing links in their inbox every five minutes.
WordPress
If you're looking for a collaboration-friendly blog, WordPress recently got some neat upgrades that make it an excellent choice. I wouldn't propose annihilation else for a multi-author web log. As I mentioned earlier, half of a adept collaborative system is a warning that someone else is editing the article in question, and WordPress supplies that. But even better, it now has a revision history system that allows yous to peck through and find that obscure quote you accidentally deleted while yous were fixing image sizes. Or if a disgruntled blogger on your squad vandalizes everything before leaving, it'southward pretty easy to fix everything up.
Source: https://www.lifehack.org/articles/featured/10-free-tools-for-collaboration.html
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