Timewarp: Techniques for autonomous collaboration

Abstract

This paper presents a set of techniques for supporting autonomous collaboration - collaboration where participants work independently for periods, and then join together to integrate their efforts. This paper posits that autonomous collaboration can be well-supported by systems in which the notion of time is made both explicit and editable, so that the parallel but divergent states of a shared artifact are exposed in the interface. We have developed a system, called timewarp, that explores these ideas, and provides support for distribution, awareness, and conflict resolution in an application-independent fashion.