SB/All -
I'm pretty sure that what you see now is what you're going to get.
In the past I've been a bit ambivalent about it but after a lot of
thought I've come to the conclusion that ALL text-based tools should be
based on Forms. The reasons for this are:
1. Concentration of effort: By putting all the effort into making the
Forms tool work well in Groove 2007, all tool templates based on
Forms stand to gain from the enhanced features/speed/reliability etc.
2. Data access: Traditionally, Groove tools have stubbornly refused
to share their data with the outside world. Whether data
accessibility should have been 'included in' to the Groove core
architecture is a moot point. It is included in Forms, so from a
data accessibility point of view, I'm happy. This also means that
all your Groove data is accessible to Toucan Reporter and WebGVO
which is no bad thing
3. Simplicity of customization: If a standard Groove tool didn't do
what you wanted, or lacked fields you needed, its was very tough
to get Groove Networks to do anything about it. Now, if you need a
Forms-based tool to do something, or you need to add some fields,
you can just dive in and do it, or pay someone else to do it for you.
Now these are all well and good, but are they sufficient to justify
Groove's continued existence? I don't know but what I do know is that
Groove needs to do those things that web-based tools just cannot do
well. Think interactive maps. Think collaborative CAD. Think
team-enhanced mind-mapping. Think interactive remote diagnosis tools.
All working in the context of a Groove space so everyone knows what is
happening. All of these are/were present through third parties and
Groove needs to bring them back.
--
Regards
Mark Smith
Information Patterns
http://www.infopatterns.net
Toucan Reporter: Free Reporting tool for Groove Forms:
http://www.infopatterns.net/Products/ToucanReporter.html