Loading...
 

History: Why Openfire

Preview of version: 3

To properly explain this one, it's important to first distinguish the various "real time" use cases. All use cases need chat, most need audio and screensharing. However, there are some "key distinctive features" which make some tools great at one use case, but poor for another. Some solutions have variations. For example, Adobe has Adobe Connect Meetings, Adobe Connect Learning, Adobe Connect Webinars.

Realtime collaboration use cases chart

Type Predominant mode Key distinctive features Typical app
Ongoing Team collaboration on projects 1 to 1, many to many or emergent Presence, and can escalate to audio / video / screensharing as needed Skype
Meetings / conference calls Many to many Meeting notes (meeting agenda, and live collaborative note taking for decisions) Etherpad + phone call, or Skype
Webinars / Scheduled Course 1 to many Presentation and whiteboard BigBlueButton
Community presence and support many to many web interface and desktop/mobile clients IRC
Help desk for team members 1 to 1, but can be transferred Share screen and remote control Easier to install software on their computer. TeamViewer
Help desk for customers 1 to 1, but can be transferred To route request to someone who is available. Canned responses. Difficult to install software on their computer. Openfire Fastpath
Remote Management 1 to no one or 1 to 1 Remote login and management, even unattended VNC / Guacamole



We picked Openfire for the following reasons:

  • XMPP support, and thus presence
  • WebRTC support (via inclusion of Jitsi Meet)
  • Great admin panel
  • Vast feature set


We ultimately want Openfire / WikiSuite to be awesome at covering all the use cases above.

Why not BigBlueButton

While Openfire Meetings and BigBlueButton broadly share the same feature set (videoconferencing, screensharing, etc), there are fundamental difference.

BigBlueButton is a distance education tool.

  • So the focus is a one to many.
  • No presence feature (it's for a scheduled class, and not ad hoc collaboration)
  • No XMPP support
  • Still in 2017, the Flash version is the main one, and the HTML5 version is not ready for prime time

Why not Etherpad

  • Too few features
  • No XMPP support


Why not Jitsi Meet

  • Jitsi Meet is part of the solution, but alone is not sufficient to cover the desired use cases

Why not OpenMeetings


Why not Spreed


Otalk

So—tl;dr: The only pieces we are not open-sourcing are the UI, glue code, and operationalized infrastructure—but that’s it!

History

Advanced
Information Version
Marc Laporte 36
View
Marc Laporte 35
View
Marc Laporte 34
View
Marc Laporte 33
View
Marc Laporte 32
View
Marc Laporte 31
View
Marc Laporte 30
View
Marc Laporte 29
View
Marc Laporte 28
View
Marc Laporte 27
View
Marc Laporte 26
View
Marc Laporte 25
View
Marc Laporte 24
View
Marc Laporte 23
View
Marc Laporte 22
View
Marc Laporte 21
View
Marc Laporte 20
View
Marc Laporte 19
View
Marc Laporte 18
View
Marc Laporte 17
View
Marc Laporte 16
View
Marc Laporte 15
View
Marc Laporte 14
View
Marc Laporte 13
View
Marc Laporte 12
View
Marc Laporte 11
View
Marc Laporte 10
View
Marc Laporte 9
View
Marc Laporte 8
View
Marc Laporte 7
View
Marc Laporte 6
View
Marc Laporte 5
View
Marc Laporte 4
View
Marc Laporte 3
View
Marc Laporte 2
View
Marc Laporte 1
View
  • 1
  • 2 (current)
  • »