A Web-based Tool for Collaborative Access to Scientific Instruments in Cyberinfrastructures

Cyberinfrastructures that are being built in the United States and in Europe have the goal of enabling large-scale distributed science and engineering collaborations. However, there is still the need for effective groupware tools that will enable distributed and heterogeneous teams of people to effectively collaborate within these global scenarios. This chapter presents a Web-based groupware tool that is being developed in the context of the GRIDCC European project, whose purpose is to extend current cyberinfrastructures to enable shared access to and control of distributed instrumentation. We discuss the challenges in developing groupware solutions for different social and organizational contexts, and present the main features of a prototype we have designed.