In addition, most online collaboration and wiki products can integrate with Active Directory or LDAP. They also use SSL or TLS to encrypt content in transit and have basic access control features to prevent unauthorized users from viewing particular content.
Another compelling feature is the audit trail. Most systems log changes made to content on these sites, including the user who made the changes. Users and administrators can compare different versions of content side by side, and unwanted changes are easily removed. These products also can log user activity to see who uploaded or downloaded content or documents. An audit trail has value to IT because it can monitor logs for unwanted behavior and track down policy and compliance offenders.LIMITED USEFULNESS
Despite these nods to enterprise IT, there are still drawbacks to corporate versions of these products. For one, administrative workflows may be primitive. For instance, while Central Desktop provides a dashboard to manage workspaces and users, administrators have to provision and deprovision users one at a time. This may not be burdensome for a dozen accounts, but it will get annoying fast as numbers grow.
For its part, PBwiki has limited control over documents. While content owners can assign, read, and edit rights to users of wiki pages, those controls don't extend to documents. Any user with access to a collaboration area has full access to any documents posted inside that area. "We are hearing more requests for file-based access control," says Chris Yeh, VP of enterprise marketing for PBwiki.
Companies not comfortable with the service model or startups also have options. Microsoft SharePoint sits at the top of the heap for enterprise collaboration. IBM offerings, including Lotus Connections and Lotus Quickr, provide collaboration and Web 2.0 features such as tagging. BEA's CollabraSuite creates virtual meeting spaces and offers features such as a shared whiteboard and the ability to store shared and personal files. And EMC Documentum's eRoom is a well-established collaboration system with a strong focus on document management. It integrates with Microsoft Office to let users upload and share files.
These in-house options may be attractive to IT for their extended security and management capabilities. For instance, SharePoint lets administrators create data disposition policies for information inside SharePoint servers, such as ensuring that business contracts be retained for seven years. IBM Lotus Quickr's content repository lets employees and business partners share documents and files while also providing strong change management features, such as check-in and check-out functions.
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