Patent ID: 7953794

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for transitioning between communication modes in a collaborative environment, comprising: accessing, from a first computing device, a shared object to form a first network communication mode, wherein the shared object is a collaborative object, wherein the shared object includes a location identifier that identifies a location of a separate manifest file; determining the location of the manifest file for the shared object based on the location identifier in the accessed shared object; accessing the manifest file using the location identified by the location identifier included with the shared object, wherein the manifest file identifies a network location for each of the concurrently accessed instances of a plurality of instances of the shared object; receiving an indication to change network communication modes; and based on the manifest file identification of network locations for concurrently accessed instance of the plurality of instances of the shared object, automatically and seamlessly transitioning to a second network communication mode, wherein the second network communication mode is different than the first network communication mode.