Patent ID: 6564246
Filing Date: 2003-05-13
Classification: G06Q

Abstract:
A computer implemented process which provides a synchronous, real-time collaboration environment in which multiple and possibly independent views of a common workspace are allowed to each participant, said process comprising the steps of:establishing a set of clients for any session of real-time collaboration, wherein said clients provide synchronous access to a shared workspace of said session, support one or more said workspaces, and make one or more synchronous views of said shared workspace available to individual participants; verifying that initial copies of said workspace for each said client prior to collaboration are the same; serializing workspace modifications generated by said clients, wherein each said workspace modification is tagged by the identity of a view associated with a client interest group including a said individual participant in which said workspace modification was created and serialization is based on input modification sequences received from said clients; communicating to said clients said serialized workspace modifications, including client interest group status; updating each said client's shared workspace, wherein each said client's said workspace is a synchronous copy; and ensuring that the stream of serialized modifications for each said workspace copy is the same.