fog computing

When Content Circles was formed in 2007, our goal was to address some major gaps in the current state of Enterprise Content Management systems. In particular, these systems assume:

• ECM requires large expensive systems that are purchased, installed, and managed by central IT
• Users will adhere to a rigorous upload/download discipline for keeping the central repository up to date
• All users who need to collaborate on a project can access the central repository
• Users work primarily in the office and do not need remote access to their repository

The result of our efforts is Content Circles which was launched in January 2009. It is a Rich Internet Application (RIA) combined with a hosted web service in the cloud and provided as a subscription SaaS.
Content Circles enables:

• Collaboration in Circles where content is only shared with the specific members you have invited
• Uses P2P synchronization so no content is held in the cloud to further enhance content security
• Works across firewalls and cross platform so there are no barriers about who can participate
• Direct access to popular ECM systems including Microsoft Sharepoint, Xerox DocuShare, and Alfresco
• Online and Offline access to your content since you always have the latest copy synchronized to your desktop
• Automatic tracking and audibility of content so you know what everyone is working on in the Circle
• Instant messaging is integrated with the app so you don’t have to leave the tool to chat with other members

Everyone here was excited to see the announcement of Google Wave last week at the Google IO conference. Even though Google set out to redefine how email and instant messaging work, we find many similarities between Google Wave and Content Circles including:

• A Wave and a Circle are defined as a set of users working on a specific project who always need the latest state shared amongst all members
• Focus is on the workgroup and the work they need to complete rather than the constraints of a traditional ECM system
• Support for Mac and Windows based users
• Commenting and Instant messaging integrated with team collaboration around the documents
• Change tracking with the ability to track the history of project from the beginning to current day
• The results of collaboration in one Wave/Circle can be published to another
• We envision a rich ecosystem of extensions built on top of our APIs to expand the use of the system beyond the current implementation

The differences between our approaches include:

• Google Wave is a pure cloud / browser delivery whereas Content Circles is fog computing
• Google Wave has direct, character by character editing of shared documents by the multiple participants in the Wave
• Content Circles allows continued use of your desktop applications rather than having to move everything to the cloud and browser based interfaces
• Content Circles integrates with existing ECM systems to preserve corporate investments and allow access to historic content and ongoing projects
• Content Circles allows offline productivity since you always have your content with you and can synchronize updates when you are back online
• Content Circles is available today for production use

We look forward to helping users break out from the constraints of traditional systems and leverage the power of these innovative new systems like Content Circles and Google Wave to better address the needs of the modern workgroup. Together we can change the document collaboration world for the better. Catch the wave.

With all the hype these days around Cloud Computing, it is hard for people to remember there was a time before Amazon, Google, and Salesforce with their huge data centers and application hosting. It is also hard for people to believe there will be something after Cloud Computing.

Cloud Computing is not the solution to every problem. Users must ignore their inner voice and trust these remote applications and data centers are secure with their precious, private data. Users of Cloud Computing must accept they can only use the service when they are online. And one of the biggest flaws in Cloud Computing is the incredible power of the desktop being wasted by hosting a plain, old, kiosk browser. What we need is a way to bring the cloud to the desktop - to make it Fog Computing.

Content Circles enables Fog Computing with a rich-internet application (RIA) that integrates with your native applications to enable seamless content collaboration on documents. Instead of moving your favorite office, engineering, and creative applications to the cloud, Content Circles shares your local updates automatically with the other trusted members of your circles. Everyone gets a copy of the latest documents without having to download from the cloud and the files are stored locally so even when you are offline you have the most recent content with you. The service works both within and outside of corporate firewalls so there are no restrictions on who can participate in your circles for file sharing. And since everyone has a copy of the content, there is built-in backup/restore whenever someone loses their computer and must rebuild their circles.

For cases where not everyone is online at the same time, you can install Content Circles on a desktop that is always on as a store-and-forward. With this store-and-forward node as a member of a circle, it will always synchronize the latest content and will make it available to other members when they come online. In doing so, you still maintain complete control of your content without having to let it be hosted in the cloud, but still get the benefits of immediate synchronization when members of the circle come online.

By blending the best of Cloud Computing with the strength of the desktop, we feel Fog Computing with Content Circles is the best solution for team collaboration around content. Long live the Fog!