Network configuration diagrams

Widgets provide read and write awareness during collaborative text editing, respectively. The write widget indicates the exact place where the user is editing the text and is represented by the icon of a right hand placed near the last changed character. The right hand icon is filled with a color that identifies the user and is presented as a left hand icon in the shared workspace of the other users. The read widget indicates the part of the text that the user is reading and is pictured by the icon of the user’s silhouette filled with the user’s color positioned in the part of the text that is visible to the user, i.e. the paragraph that is visible on the screen.

network configuration diagrams is an widget that changes the visualization of the shared workspace modifying the size of the objects contained in the document, such as words in a text or drawing elements in a diagram. When a user is located in a specific place of the document, named focal point, every object near this point has its sizes increased while other objects that are far from the focal point have their sizes reduced. With this visualization the users see the shared workspace distorted, since the objects near the focal point become bigger and the objects far from the focal point become smaller.