4
1.3 A brief review of some collaborative editing systems
One thread of collaboration research has emerged from the study of writing and writing
pedagogy. This research has concentrated on creating tools to enhance the ability of an
author or group of authors to effectively plan the structure of documents, and tools to pro-
vide explicit techniques to control the process of conceiving, planning, creating, and resiz-
ing documents. While almost any writer’s tool (outliners, spell-checkers, editors, etc) is con-
ceivably relevant to the problem of how people write on computers, the research literature
on this problem is typically grounded in theories of the writing process and analysis of ex-
perimental observations of authors’ activities.
Some systems have concentrated on assistance for specific phases of the writing process.
For example, a number of tools have been designed to support “brainstorming” or “pre-
writing” activities (Applegate, Konsynski et al. 1986; Foster and Stefik 1986). Argumentation
hypertext systems like gIBIS and THOTH-II (Collier 1987; Conklin and Begeman 1987; Conklin
1988)tried to implement formal argument analysis methodologies directly, as an aid in de-
veloping engineering and technical specifications while making design knowledge and the
design process explicit and permanent. Significantly, SHREDIT (a simple text editor sup-
porting simultaneous editing, and no structure) was extremely effective as a group brain-
storming tool (Dourish and Bellotti 1992; Hymes and Olson 1992).
A few systems from the composition teaching community provided integrated support for
a whole structured process of document creation. The idea was that an integrated set of spe-
cialized support tools would be more effective in enabling authors to apply each phase of a
structured writing method, as well as making conformity to the overall method easier. Per-
haps, due to wide variation in individual writing styles, such systems, like the argumenta-
tion support systems, have not been widely used.
1.3 A brief review of some collaborative editing systems
One thread of collaboration research has emerged from the study of writing and writing
pedagogy. This research has concentrated on creating tools to enhance the ability of an
author or group of authors to effectively plan the structure of documents, and tools to pro-
vide explicit techniques to control the process of conceiving, planning, creating, and resiz-
ing documents. While almost any writer’s tool (outliners, spell-checkers, editors, etc) is con-
ceivably relevant to the problem of how people write on computers, the research literature
on this problem is typically grounded in theories of the writing process and analysis of ex-
perimental observations of authors’ activities.
Some systems have concentrated on assistance for specific phases of the writing process.
For example, a number of tools have been designed to support “brainstorming” or “pre-
writing” activities (Applegate, Konsynski et al. 1986; Foster and Stefik 1986). Argumentation
hypertext systems like gIBIS and THOTH-II (Collier 1987; Conklin and Begeman 1987; Conklin
1988)tried to implement formal argument analysis methodologies directly, as an aid in de-
veloping engineering and technical specifications while making design knowledge and the
design process explicit and permanent. Significantly, SHREDIT (a simple text editor sup-
porting simultaneous editing, and no structure) was extremely effective as a group brain-
storming tool (Dourish and Bellotti 1992; Hymes and Olson 1992).
A few systems from the composition teaching community provided integrated support for
a whole structured process of document creation. The idea was that an integrated set of spe-
cialized support tools would be more effective in enabling authors to apply each phase of a
structured writing method, as well as making conformity to the overall method easier. Per-
haps, due to wide variation in individual writing styles, such systems, like the argumenta-
tion support systems, have not been widely used.
