Collaborate on projects in Internet meetings

Collaborate on projects in Internet meetings

Zatni Arbi, Columnist, Jakarta, zatni@cbn.net.id

A 24-hour broadband connection to the Internet is definitely a
boon for home workers. For one thing, there is no meter running,
so we can calmly work on things that take hours to finish. With a
dial-up connection, this can be done, too, of course, but there
is always an urge to get offline immediately because the longer
we stay online the more we will have to pay -- both to the ISP
and the telephone operator.

One of the things that can be done if we have always-on access
to the Internet is to work together with one or more people
persons on a project. If you have a multimedia PC, complete with
a Webcam, you can also hold video conferences to facilitate your
communication.

Paid or Free Services?

I grew more interested in finding ways to hold a meeting over
the Web when I was in charge of coordinating a research project.
One of my team members happened to be in Vancouver, Canada.
Besides, I have become so inundated with other work that having a
"real-world" meeting increasingly seems to be an time-consuming
activity. An online meeting, where everyone can participate and
contribute without having to brave the traffic of Jakarta, is an
alternative that we all should pursue.

I was quite surprised to discover that there are several paid
services that allow people to collaborate online. The fees they
charge still vary, as this is obviously a new type of Internet
service. Needless to say, after the 9-11 tragedy a lot of people
chose to video conference rather than fly to meetings, and this
situation might have been one of the impetuses of the Internet-
based meeting solutions offered by these companies.

Some of the paid services are Webex (www.webex.com), Obidicut
(www.obidicut.com) and eBLVD (www.eblvd.com).

Webex offers a free trial service if you want to get a taste
of Internet meetings. It also offers a pay-per-use service for
people who need to hold Internet meetings quickly.

One of the free services is Microsoft NetMeeting. I explored
this one and thought it had all the basic tools for a fairly
effective meeting. As more and more free Web services become
commercial services, though, we may expect that even Microsoft
will eventually charge us for this service.

A Hands-On Trial

I used both my wife's HP Pavilion and my own PC to learn how
NetMeeting worked. I downloaded Microsoft NetMeeting applications
on both computers, which were connected to the Internet.

I initiated a NetMeeting session from my wife's PC. The reason
was that it still runs on Windows Me (I still have not saved
enough money to buy the upgrade version of Windows XP for it). I
figured initiating the NetMeeting from an older OS would create
less hassle, as Windows XP has sometimes told me to upgrade the
other computer to XP before I can use certain home network
features.

Then I clicked on NetMeeting's "Find Someone in a Directory"
button, and my wife's computer then accessed Microsoft's Internet
Directory. After a few seconds, it showed my name as one of my
wife's contacts. I clicked on my name and moved over to my own
PC. There, the NetMeeting was loaded. It told me that my wife was
inviting me to have an online meeting with her. I accepted the
invitation, and the two computers were connected via the Web.

I then moved back and forth between my wife's and my PC,
typing the questions and answers as if there were two people
chatting over the Web.

By the way, a Benq pocket digital camera was also attached to
my wife's Pavilion, and the video was shown on the NetMeeting
panel on my PC. If my wife were there to assist me in this
experiment, we would have had a real audio-video conference.

The essential part of the NetMeeting is the Whiteboard, which
is also a common feature offered by all the paid services. Using
the whiteboard, which in the Microsoft NetMeeting looks exactly
like the Paint applet, I created a diagram to illustrate the
assumption of the research I was involved in. As I added the
boxes, circles, text and lines on my PC, the same elements of the
diagrams also appeared on my wife's PC. Conversely, if I made
some modifications to the diagram using my wife's PC, the
modifications appeared on my PC. The update was instantaneous.

During the online meeting, I was also able to send files back
and forth. All I needed to do was click on the Transfer Files
button. We can actually send multiple files at once. NetMeeting
on Windows XP-based PCs also allows application sharing. This was
not possible during my test, though, as one of the PCs was not on
XP.

Various Possibilities

Microsoft NetMeeting is not always available. Sometimes I get
a warning that it will be shut down for maintenance. I guess it
is the continuous availability of the online meeting services
that we pay for if we subscribe to paid services such as Webex
and Obidicut.

Other things that these commercial services offer include more
tools such as scheduling and calendaring, message boxes and
online storage space for your team's work. Some more advanced
services also offer 128-bit encryption for security.

Meeting on the Internet may not be as crucial as it was in the
period immediately following 9-11, as people return to the skies,
but the possibilities are still compelling. Seminars (one-to-many
conferencing), sales presentations, collaboration and, certainly,
joint research activities are good candidates for this type of
Web service. E-Learning, which allows people to enrich their
lives through remote education, is another.

By the way, as we are getting closer to 2004, when the next
general election here will be held, and we could avoid a lot of
loss -- lives and property -- if political party leaders would
campaign through Internet conferencing. At the same time, it
would educate more people -- including the country's power elite
-- about all the marvelous things the Internet can do.