Creating and using workspaces
Overview
Collaborative project workspaces are secure, customizable home pages for research and design projects that enable teams to share files, blog about research progress, and track upcoming milestones.
The goal of this section of our collaboration suite is to provide a secure (and, if desired, private) space for sharing knowledge among members of a research and design team, particularly when team members are located in different departments, organizations, or geographic locations, and/or when they may work on a project at different times of the day or week. A workspace serves as an archive of progress, including key decision points, for a collaboration and can:
- enable multi-disciplinary, multi-institution, team-based research and design initiatives;
- provide time-stamped information for a patent disclosure;
- facilitate the passage of a project from one student design (e.g., Capstone) class to another; and
- serve as a portfolio that demonstrates the quality of work and experience of a student to prospective employers.
Viewing and navigating workspaces
The main page of the workspaces section lists active workspaces, by default ordered according to activity level (i.e., a function of the number of active uses, shared files, blog posts, and milestones). The activity level is represented by the number of stars that are assigned to a workspace, on a scale of one star for minimal activity to five stars for maximal activity. For each workspace, a project title and brief (one to two sentences) summary is provided, along with the name of the creator of the workspace, the date of last activity, and the number of blog posts or "comments" that have been entered. You can explore a workspace by clicking on its title. You can also view workspaces on the main page of this section according to most popular workspaces, recent workspaces, my workspaces (i.e., workspaces you have created), or all workspaces by clicking on the corresponding links on the right side of the page. In addition, all workspaces are overlaid on a map of the world; when you click on "world map," you can mouse over any nation and a tooltip will appear that will list the latest count of active workspaces. Clicking on this number of active workspaces will take you to a page that will list workspaces for just that nation, again in order of activity level.
Upon creation of a workspace, you may specify the visibility (or privacy) of the workspace according to any one of three categories: "public" if its contents may be viewed by anyone, including non-members of BMEplanet; "members" if its contents may be viewed only by members of BMEplanet when they are logged into the Web site; and "private" if its contents may be viewed only by you and the individuals whom you designate as "teammates." Consequently, when you click to view a workspace, you will see its title, creator, visibility, and teammates, as well as a brief (one to two sentences) summary followed by a more detailed but non-enabling description or abstract. If the workspace has "public" or "members" visibility, you will also see any project content, such as files that have been shared, comments that have been posted in the discussion area, and milestones that have been specified. The contents of "private" workspaces are restricted to members of the workspace team.
Creating a workspace
To create a workspace, click on the "create a workspace" button on the right side of the page and complete the ensuing form. We ask that you provide some or all of the following information (required fields are denoted by a red asterisk on the form):
- a brief name for the workspace (that will be viewable on the main page of the workspaces section);
- tags, or short phrases separated by commas that serve as keywords/descriptors for the project;
- a brief (one to two sentences) summary of the project (should a user want to skim over the project briefly to gauge whether it is of further interest);
- a detailed description of the project that will be viewable to users if they click on the workspace and therefore must be non-enabling;
- the visibility for the workspace ("private" indicates that the contents of the workspace, including shared files, blog posts, and milestones, etc., are visible only to you and the teammates whom you specify; "members" indicates that the contents of the workspace are visible only to members of BMEplanet (i.e., the BMEplanet community, or registered users who must log in); and "public" indicates that the contents of the workspace are visible to anyone (and may be indexed by search engines such as Google or Bing));
- whether the workspace is for a student design (e.g., Capstone) project, a requirement of many academic bioengineering programs within the US; and
- any teammates for the project, including responsibilities that they will have for the workspace ("post comments" implies that the teammate can post comments into the discussion area; "share files implies that the teammate can share files; and "co-owner" implies that the teammate effectively has all privileges as the creator, including the ability to update the settings of the workspace, invite new teammates, broaden or narrow its visibility, etc.).
You must agree to the terms and conditions of use of the workspaces section of BMEplanet upon creating a new workspace.
Editing workspaces
Once you create a workspace, you can go back and edit it by modifying any of the fields described above (click on "Update settings" on the right side when viewing the workspace). Note that you will only be able to edit workspaces for which you are a co-owner. When editing workspaces, you will also be able to customize it by specifying a unique logo, color theme, and style. Logos can be uploaded by project teams, and new color themes and styles will be made available periodically.
Using workspaces
When you are associated with a workspace, you will be able to update its settings (see "Editing workspaces" above), including the publicly accessible project summary and project description; upload and download files such as Microsoft Office documents, images, and videos, etc.; and post comments such as a description of an analysis or a suggestion for a subsequent experiment in the discussion area. Note that, depending on your access privileges (e.g., whether you are a co-owner or can only post comments or share files or both), you may be able to do some or all of these things. To upload a file, click "attach" under "files," choose the file on your computer that you wish to upload, and then click on "upload." To leave a comment in the discussion area, enter your message in the "Post a comment" box and click "post." Note that you can edit (click on "Edit my comment") or delete (click on the trash can icon) any comments that you post and also delete any files that you upload (click on the trash can icon next to the file).
For additional help
Have any questions? E-mail support@bmeplanet.org. Alt ernatively, e-mail us at feedback@bmeplanet.org if you have recommendations for improving this feature.
