“Over the next five years this will start sweeping through companies. In the same ways that Rypple has taken this model of social networking as a fundamental design point and applied it to performance management systems, I think you’re going to see it apply to a lot of systems, whether it’s recruiting, compensation or learning systems. I think it will eventually hit things like your financial budgeting and planning systems, your project systems, anything where the work is inherently social,” he said.

That’s a lot of social. But hopefully, in Saleforce’s vision of how things unfold, not a lot of different social tools. We spoke with to Dave King, director of product marketing for Chatter, about new real-time chat and screen sharing features for enterprise social network Chatter that the company is announcing today, and he explained that the overarching aim of the new additions to the product is to integrate “islands of communication” so that employees need not switch through multiple tools but can access this growing array of social processes through Chatter. Salesforce wants, in effect, to link these islands together and create a Pangaea of social with Chatter at its center.

Looking very much like a Gchat within Chatter, the new messaging tool lets workers message others, either singly or in groups of up to ten, within the organization (i.e. other Chatter users at the company) without having to switch windows or open another application. Your buddy list is automatically generated from all those you’re already connected to on Chatter. The in-browser screen sharing application is designed to replace the likes of WebEx for internal discussions. Both tools are freely available to all existing customers as of today, as well as those using the free version of the product.

This additional functionality is good news for current users, but it’s also interesting in what it indicates about where Salesforce sees social tools going. “Every business process has a combination of unstructured or social processes and structured processes,” King explains. “Let’s take recruiting. When I’m recruiting maybe I email a PDF of the resume around and I’m IMing people who interviewed the candidate to get their feedback, but all of those things are in different places.”

Chatter wants to be your portal into all those actions and to the increasing array of business areas that Wookey predicted are getting a social overhaul. “We think it all needs to be united. So let’s say your files are in SharePoint and maybe you have an HR system in a different place, Chatter, with our Chatter Connect API, can be the unifying social layer that really brings all those things together,” King says, who added that Salesforce is also hoping to enable collaboration with those external to Chatter through the platform in the future.

Rather than tools proliferating as more processes go social, Salesforce wants all of those additional functions to integrate with Chatter. That’s good for the company, of course, as their products become more tightly woven into ever more aspects of your business, but the message out of Salesforce is it’s also a matter of increased efficiency for the user.

Do you see an integrated platform model dominating the future of social, or are we more likely to see a profusion of “social islands” dominate the scene for a good while yet?

Image courtesy of Salesforce.

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The new feature is built into the latest version of the GoToMeeting software, and doesn’t require any fancy equipment — any webcam and microphone will do, although headsets will most likely be needed to keep room noise down, or users can choose to dial into an audio bridge. Each stream can be displayed at a resolution of 640 x 480 pixels, for a total maximum resolution of 1920 x 960 pixels.

I attended a demo with four attendees, and found it to be easy to use, and the quality to be very good. If you’ve used GoToMeeting before, you know that the software (available for Windows or Mac) is  quick to download, and doesn’t generally require any fiddling with settings. Audio was perfect, and video quality was quite acceptable for standard “talking head” meetings. The folks at GoToMeeting told me that they decided to limit the service to six simultaneous users in order to maintain video quality — plus, with more users, the video thumbnails for each person would be pretty hard to see.

The program automatically displays a split screen divided into the appropriate number of boxes need to show each participant, and a screen sharing space when desired. GoToMeeting has added some useful touches, like a subtle white outline that shows who’s talking at any given moment, and the ability to resize the viewable area to maximize the shared desktop if desired.

The new service occupies a niche between Skype and some of the higher-end video conferencing options that require sophisticated hardware. For organizations and individuals that won’t use the service often enough to justify GoToMeeting’s cost, similar technology will be available later in the year through Skype, since Citrix will be powering Skype’s upcoming web conferencing service.

HDFaces is available to existing GoToMeeting customers and trial users at no additional cost over the service’s standard pricing, which begins at $49/month or $468/year. A 30-day free online trial is available at the service’s website.

Do you use GoToMeeting? Will the addition of video capabilities make the service more attractive?

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The new features allow for the creation of “companies,” based on email domain names, which give users the ability to share presentations and meeting recordings with individuals and groups with the company for evaluation and training purposes. Meeting recordings include both notes taken during the meeting and audio; these recording are synchronized with the presentation during playback. Video recordings are planned for a future version.

The app also now provides administrators with more sophisticated tools to review, analyze and manage how presentations are used. There is also a completely new system to search and filter content by customer or employee, with more filters are being developed in response to the feedback of beta users. These new features will allow organizations to evaluate in detail how effective presentations — and even specific slides — are. They can also be used to set up A/B testing to compare presentations.

CrunchConnect is currently in private beta, but invitations are available to WebWorkerDaily readers here. The service is free for now; after the beta period has ended, users will be able to choose from free and paid plans.

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CrunchConnect’s web conferencing and screen-sharing system has some useful features, including:

• Dedicated web addresses and phone conference numbers (users can also have the service call them directly)
• Option for participants to sign in via LinkedIn, so others can see their profiles; the system also displays participants’ Twitter profiles
• A “waiting room,” where participants can communicate before an event begins
• Ability for hosts to upload presentations in advance
• Ability to record meetings
• Analytics tools, to track what parts of presentations are viewed and for how long.

CrunchConnect was developed with sales in mind, so it has some SlideRocket-like features, such as being able to update presentations even after they’ve been shared. A “company” function will shortly be added, for creating libraries of slides that can be shared and updated centrally. CrunchConnect doesn’t have the sophisticated online editing functions of SlideRocket, though; you’ll need to create your presentations offline and upload them. The service supports PowerPoint (.ppt, .pptx) formats, as well as JPG, PNG, and GIF images. PDF support will be added soon.

I experimented a little with CrunchConnect as a presenter and as a meeting participant, and so far, I’ve found the web-based system works pretty smoothly. It doesn’t require any software to be downloaded, which is helpful. There’s not much documentation yet, although I haven’t really felt the need for it.

CrunchConnect is currently in private beta, but the developer has provided 500 WebWorkerDaily readers with access. You can sign up here. The service is free for now; after the beta period has ended, users will be able to choose from free and paid plans.

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I downloaded the Mac version of the new beta to try it out, and it works well; the HTML viewer is even usable on my iPhone’s browser. I can imagine the new whiteboard feature, which enables participants to draw directly on the screen, being especially useful in collaborative design sessions, for example. However, despite apparently having redesigned the user interface, I don’t think the company has addressed all Imran’s original concerns about the app’s design and ease of use. Many of the other screen sharing and conferencing apps available — YuuGuu and join.me, for example — are very easy to use. Mikogo’s interface makes use of lots of difficult to decipher icons, and even with plenty of  pop-up help windows, the app is less intuitive than I would like. I’m also not sure why the Mac version has only one download for both initiating and viewing sessions, while Windows users have two separate downloads.

For casual, off-the-cuff, screen sharing sessions, I’d recommend the simpler join.me instead, especially as it also allows participants to join sessions only using a web browser. That said, while it might take a bit of getting used to, Mikogo does offer many useful additional features over join.me, such as multi-monitor support, multi-user whiteboarding and  allowing participants to remotely control the host’s mouse pointer and keyboard, which may make it a better option in certain situations, such as remote support or collaborating on design work (although I should note that it looks like participants using the HTML viewer cannot contribute to whiteboarding sessions or remotely control the host’s computer; they’ll need to download the app to do so).

Mikogo is free; you don’t even have to register to use it, although some features, like the Scheduler, require you to set up an account. You can download the beta of Mikogo 4.0 here.

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TeamViewer can be set up in different ways. If you want to share your screen for presentations or training, you can install the software on your machine, and then share your ID with your audience, who can view your desktop in a web browser. The software is not intended to support large numbers of viewers, so it would not be suitable for webinars.

TeamViewer can also be used for troubleshooting remote computers, similar to CrossLoop, LogMeIn Rescue, or the “remote assistance” functions built into Windows and Mac OS X. In this configuration, you ask the client to download and run the TeamViewer QuickSupport module (it doesn’t need to be installed). The client gives you the ID and password that the QuickSupport module creates, which you can enter into your copy of the software or use the web version.

The TeamViewer software, which is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux, can also be used to connect remotely to unattended computers. It’s also possible to connect on the go via iOS and Android apps.

One nice feature of TeamViewer is that (as with LogMeIn and similar products) it can create connections behind firewalls, meaning that it doesn’t take the sort of setup that VNC does. A chat and file transfer system is included.

All in all, TeamViewer is a well-developed product that can be used for many needs faced by those of us with remote workforces. I confess, though, that I got a bit of sticker shock from TeamViewer’s pricing structure, which starts at $729 for one workstation. But since TeamViewer is priced as a one-time payment with no monthly subscription fees, it may be a good buy for some organizations. Note that TeamViewer is free for non-commercial use, and also offers free trials.

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The web conferencing market has changed considerably since our 2007 WWD roundup, but here are a few options that we’ve covered in the past.

• Fuze Meeting. This service is entirely browser-based, and offers many features, although it doesn’t have a free option.
• Skype. Simon reminded us that this is a good alternative for small meetings, and it has both video and screen-sharing capabilities.
• Yugma. This app includes some sophisticated features, but still offers a free version.
• Yuuguu. Doriano liked this IM-based service because it doesn’t require those you’re sharing screens with to download or install anything.

Here are some of the other solutions available. Prices, features and usability vary greatly.

• Adobe Web Conferencing
• Live Meeting
• GoToMeeting
• WebEx
• Zoho Meeting

What will you use to replace Dimdim?

Image courtesy Flickr user vivevans

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Like a lot of small-business owners, it won’t be possible for me to disconnect entirely; I’ll need to be on call, and to have access to my work. But I want to carry as little as possible, and make the transition from the office to the train as painless as I can.

Luckily, I’ve been taking advantage of cloud services, so preparing for this trip has been easier than those in the past. I recently bought a 13″ MacBook Pro at around the same time Scott did, but since I’ve been using a Mac mini as my primary machine for the past couple of years, transferring my data and settings to the laptop was pretty easy.

For mail, I have several IMAP-based Google Apps and Gmail accounts, and I was able to use the Migration Assistant to transfer my Apple Mail settings. It was actually easier to re-download the messages from Google’s servers than to copy several gigabytes of messages from the old mini.

Similarly, it was easy to back up and restore calendar and Address Book settings; I did make an abbu file backup, then restore it to the new machine, since Apple includes some data that Google Contacts doesn’t.

For IM, it was easy to copy Adium settings. For passwords, I had already set up Dropbox to sync 1Password data; as backup, I also use the cloud-based Lastpass. I use Xmarks to sync Firefox history, and I could have copied other settings too, although I chose not to, in order to do a little spring cleaning.

Once I’m on the road, I’ll stay connected to the mini in my office through Apple’s Screen Sharing and to my company’s Windows servers through Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Connection. I’ll be using the Sprint Overdrive hotspot for connectivity, and although I’m sure that there will be places with no signal, Sprint has just activated 4G service in a couple of the places I’ll be.

I’ll also be taking the Bookeen Cybook Opus e-book reader, which has grown on me since I wrote about it, and a Belkin surge protector/USB charger; Amtrak has pretty reliable power, but it never hurts to be safe.

Of course, lots of things can go wrong, but I think that I’m pretty well prepared for my trip. So…all aboard! I’ll let you know how it goes.

How do you prepare for travel?

Amtrak image by Flickr user lazytom.

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Current Dimdim customers — including users of the free level — may see a dialog box next time they enter their Dimdim account suggesting that they download the myScreen plugin. Pro users can lock their meeting, meaning they can specify a key for participants to use to make the meeting private.

An icon on the menu bar (Mac) or system tray (PC) starts sharing your screen with anyone who has your Smart URL, which is based on your Dimdim ID (for example, http://my.dimdim.com/DimdimID). If you are already running a meeting, the Smart URL lets people instantly see your shared desktop, but if you aren’t running a meeting, people are pointed to your myScreen profile page where they can either wait for a meeting to begin or sign up for future meetings or webinars you have planned.

Once you share your desktop through myScreen, a handy screen controller appears that you can use to play or pause screen sharing (and is also a very visible reminder that you are sharing your screen). If you leave the meeting or if your browser has trouble, myScreen remains functional for your meeting attendees until you return to the Smart URL and resume your presentation.

When it comes to web conferencing, I’ve had the opportunity to try a number of the high-end soultions and the lower-end ones, and I still return to Dimdim amazed at how much functionality is packed into the free level. With the new myScreen feature, easy screen sharing is just a Smart URL away.

What are you using these days for your web conferencing, and how is it working for you?

To get started, just go to the LogMeIn Express site, and click the “Share” button. You’ll need to download and run a small application (unfortunately, the helper application appears to be Windows-only at the moment). Once the client app is up and running, a small window appears at the top of your screen. It contains a unique 12-digit code that you can send to everyone with which you want to share your screen. Helpfully there’s a “copy to clipboard” button to make it even easier to share the code with others over IM or email. (Note: the first time I tried using the app, it seemed to have trouble acquiring a session code — restarting the app fixed that).

The LogMeIn Express control panel window in the screenshot above shows the window in its expanded state — after a short delay it rolls up to an unobtrusive bar, so it won’t get in the way.

The viewers (the people that you’d like to share your screen with) then just need to go to the LogMeIn Express site and type in the session code that you’ve sent them (unfortunately, it doesn’t seem possible to paste the code in the box, which means that they’ll have to type it out by hand). There’s no need for them to download anything — it all runs in the browser via Flash. Here’s a screenshot of my Windows laptop, shared with my MacBook:

The presenter and the viewers can communicate via a built-in chat window. The shared screen is clear on the viewer’s browser, but — as with all screen sharing services — there is a little lag and the screens don’t keep completely in sync, especially if lots of stuff is happening. However, as long as you keep movements fairly controlled, the lag isn’t very noticeable.

In addition, the presenter can enable a useful “remote control” mode, whereby the viewers can take control of the mouse pointer on the presenter’s screen (I tested this and it works pretty well), and can also send files to the viewers via the app.

As the downloadable client application is currently Windows-only and I mainly use a Mac, it’s not suitable for me at the moment — I think I’ll stick with Skype for my simple screen sharing needs. However, if you’re looking for a simple and fast way to share your Windows screen, it’s worth checking out.

What do you use when you need to share your screen with other people?

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