45 Collaborating on Documents

Almost every enterprise spends a lot of time collaborating on documents. This includes joint authoring, sharing, reviewing, approving, editing, and so on. WebCenter Spaces provides several ways to collaborate on documents, as described in the following sections:

• Section 45.1, "Collaborating on Documents Using the Documents Service"

• Section 45.2, "Collaborating on Documents through Workflows"

• Section 45.3, "Collaborating on Documents Using Oracle AutoVue"

Note:

The Documents service is exposed on the Documents page and administration settings in a Space only with Oracle Content Server 11g. If the connected content repository is Oracle Content Server 10g, the Documents page is not shown in a Space, and the Documents service is not available in the Space administration settings (Services and Roles). To use the Documents service functionality in 10g, you can create a page in a Space and add Documents service task flows to the page.

Audience

This chapter is intended for WebCenter Spaces users interested in sharing and collaborating on documents in a WebCenter Spaces application.

45.1 Collaborating on Documents Using the Documents Service

The Documents service provides features for accessing, adding, and managing folders and files; configuring and viewing file and folder properties; and searching file and folder content in the connected content repositories.

Within the context of managing documents, the Documents service provides features for collaborating on documents. These features include:

• Viewing a document in-place. See Section 41.10, "Opening a File."

• Tagging a document. See Section 41.19.1, "Working with Tags."

• Linking to supporting documents. See Section 41.19.2, "Working with Links."

• Viewing recommendations for similar documents. See Section 41.19.3, "Working with Recommendations."

• Commenting on a document. See Section 41.20, "Viewing, Entering, and Deleting Comments on a File."

• Sharing the link to a document. See Section 41.24, "Sharing the URL for a Folder or File."

• Subscribing to a document. See Section 41.26, "Subscribing to a File."

• Liking a document. See Section 41.27, "Liking and Unliking a File."

• Adding a document to your list of favorites. See Section 41.28, "Adding a File to Your Favorites."

You can also add wiki documents to a WebCenter application that people can use to collaborate to create content that is relevant, useful, and up-to-date. End users without appropriate permissions can create wiki documents by using either of the two methods: New Wiki Document method or the Wiki page style method. For complete information about wiki documents in WebCenter Spaces, see Chapter 47, "Working with Wiki Documents."

45.2 Collaborating on Documents through Workflows

While a document is being developed, it must typically be reviewed and approved by a number of people. To assist in managing this process, WebCenter Spaces provides a built-in workflow capability to move a document through required approvals by assigned approvers. This capability is available when the connected content repository is Oracle Content Server.

For information about assigning, viewing, updating, and participating in document workflows, see Chapter 43, "Working with Workflow-Enabled Content."

45.3 Collaborating on Documents Using Oracle AutoVue

In addition to the wide range of functionality offered by WebCenter Spaces to manage and collaborate on documents through workflows, wiki documents, and Spaces, you also have the option to use Oracle AutoVue.

Note:

To enable Oracle AutoVue functionality, both of the following two requirements must be met:

• You must access the WebCenter Spaces application through Oracle HTTP Server (OHS) to expose Oracle Content Server and the WebCenter Spaces application under the same host and port. For information about setting up OHS as the frontend to WebCenter Spaces, see "Oracle Content Server - Configuration" in Oracle Fusion Middleware Administrator's Guide for Oracle WebCenter.

• WebCenter Spaces must be connected to an Oracle Content Server repository, with the webContextRoot parameter set to an Oracle Content Server host name. For information on setting webContextRoot, see "Registering Content Repositories" in Oracle Fusion Middleware Administrator's Guide for Oracle WebCenter. To set webContextRoot through WLST, see "createJCRContentServerConnection" and "setJCRContentServerConnection" in Oracle Fusion Middleware WebLogic Scripting Tool Command Reference.

Oracle AutoVue, packaged separately from WebCenter Spaces, integrates easily with an Oracle Content Server back-end repository to provide document review and collaboration features. AutoVue supports a wide range of file types, including Word, Excel, PDF, as well as 2D and 3D CAD file types. For more information about Oracle AutoVue, see http://www.oracle.com/applications/autovue/index.html.

To use Oracle AutoVue to review and collaborate on a file:

1. In the Document Viewer preview pane, click the File menu and choose Annotate with AutoVue.

   The Oracle Content Server login screen opens.

2. Log in to Oracle Content Server to open the file in the AutoVue file viewer, where you can provide comments and individualized mark-up.

3. To view the file containing the AutoVue markup, click the AutoVue icon in the Document Viewer preview pane Sidebar (Figure 45-1).

   Figure 45-1 AutoVue Icon