Cool Tools: Web 2.0 Collaboration Technology

Earlier I wrote about an investigation Interim Technical  Management is conducting into collaborative software development tools, a marriage of Web 2.0 and software development lifecycle management. Specifically, it’s a portal platform with:

• collaboration spaces like wikis;
• communication via forums, blogs and notifications;
• identity tools for managing subscriptions, permissions and searching for others with particular areas of expertise;
• SDLC tools for version control, repository oversight, bug tracking, and build and release management;
• and workflow management to stream it all together.

Wow, I wish I could have harnessed this kind of technology prowess in my programming days!

So what’s out there? As a relatively new approach to software development, just a few vendors, with new feature development on the fast track.

Atlassian offers a suite of supported open-source applications that includes version control (Subversion), issue tracking (Jira), collaboration wikis (Confluence), repository monitoring (FishEye), and single sign-on capabilities across the suite (Crowd). It has a very cool user interface and a huge library of plug-ins, 90% of which are free. However, what they sell are individual applications, so even though you can log on once to access them all, the user interface and systems administration are separate for each. In simpler environments, Atlassian’s Confluence can act as a portal layer through which you can deliver a consistent user interface, but if you plan to run multiple enterprise applications through your portal, architecturally this approach may not suffice. As with all open-source, expect to pay less for the product and more for systems administration and maintenance over the lifetime of ownership.

CollabNet is best known for sponsoring Subversion and SourceForge, which was repackaged as TeamForge not long ago. They do deserve a lot of credit for these products, especially the enormously successful Subversion. But CollabNet’s issue tracking tool is limited, integration is cumbersome and its user interface is not easy to navigate. With Subversion included in most collaboration offerings and Jira doing a much better job of issue management, there’s no real reason to go here.

Intland’s CodeBeamer offers much of the same capabilities in an integrated suite that Atlassian offers as individual applications. They are competing directly with their feature sets. CodeBeamer includes Subversion for version control, and tabs for build/release management, issue tracking, document management, identity management, communications and collaboration,  and more. It is easy to use once you get used to it, albeit with a slightly clumsier user interface than Atlassian’s products. It has an open API but is not open source-based, hence pricing is higher out of the box in exchange for very nominal systems administration costs over the lifetime of ownership.

Digité is the sleeper product. It has all of the capabilities mentioned above except wikis, and that is the company’s top priority for their next release. Digité has an exceptionally easy user interface, and is serious about offering capabilities that enable software development at high CMMI levels. Traceability – from inception through documentation and specific, released executables – is excellent, as is its drag and drop workflow automation tool. It even includes a feature that makes meeting minutes a piece of cake to generate and distribute to the team. Once wiki capability is released, and if this company can figure out how to compete with the bigger players in marketing, Digité is capable of giving current industry leaders a good run for their money.

If you’re interested in seeing what the buzz is about, check these companies out!