Patent ID: 8543926

Claim:
A method executed at least in part in a computing device for managing item access in a network environment, the method comprising: providing an interactive user interface through a display for enabling one or more users to collaborate on one or more items associated with a collaborative workspace, wherein the collaborative workspace defines a linked collection of one or more of: members, permissions, items, activities, notifications, and messages and wherein items include one or more of: word processing document items, spreadsheet document items, presentation-related document items, data items, discussion items; displaying on the display a menu part on the interactive user interface presenting a plurality of functions available for managing the collaborative workspace; displaying on the display a list of users associated with the collaborative workspace on the interactive user interface; displaying on the display the one or more items associated with the collaborative workspace in an item presentation part of the interactive user interface, wherein the workspace stores the items as one or more of: an actual copy included in the workspace and a virtual copy with a reference pointer pointing to where the items are stored; enabling a user with administrative rights to add and remove items from the collaborative workspace utilizing a workspace management module wherein addition of an item to the collaborative workspace places the item in a shared location; displaying on the display tasks associated with the collaborative workspace on an activity panel implemented by an activity management module on the interactive user interface for enabling the user with administrative rights to set up tasks for one or more users associated with the collaborative workspace; displaying on the display a message thread in a discussion management module on the interactive user interface for enabling the one or more users associated with the collaborative workspace to exchange messages; and upon detection of an instruction through an input device from the user with administrative rights to manage the one or more items associated with the collaborative workspace, providing an item user interface in a separate window overlapping with the interactive user interface on the display enabling the user with administrative rights to view one or more candidate items for associating with the collaborative workspace without losing a context associated with the collaborative workspace.