I know that this is a Linux technical list, but I hope that readers will forgive me for coming here to seek more general advice from a local source of advanced technical expertise.
I want to set up a web-based collaboration and "project management" facility for a late middle-age engaged couple living 250 km apart to track plans for their wedding and for redecorating a newly-purchased old house. The trap lies with the fiancee: she is very bright and relatively computer-literate. But she has spent her entire computing life in a Windows-based world and has the typical resistance to new ways of doing things. Given the long-distance relationship, softening these tendencies will take time and a gentle approach. If she sees "complication" in a new tool, she is at risk of quietly "never getting around" to using it. The fiance is a civil servant with policy rather than IT responsibilities. He is not an IT professional but, during a long period on medical disability, he learned at least advanced intermediate Linux skills. Returning to work has led to some decline in those skills, but he is generally a quick learner and is used to following instructions and troubleshooting when things do not go perfectly. I hesitate to use the words "project management," because it conjures up images of complexity which might require a maintainer working full-time to manage the software. That is overkill in these circumstances. The scope of what I envision is roughly the following: - two indexed tables, one for the wedding, one for the redecoration project; - indexes on action dates, completion dates, person responsible, questions for answer; - desirable, but not mandatory: e-mail notification when one party posts a change. The obvious traditional and amateur approach is a spreadsheet or a flat database file. An obvious locale is Google Apps. However, when I added "collaboration" to a Google search phrase, all I got was information on the fee-paid business service. Does the free implementation of Google Apps allow sharing? Or is there a more appropriate web-based service for this task? Does anyone know a simple web-based tool for this kind of task which would be better than the traditional office productivity tools such as spreadsheet or a database? I personally have never used even online note-taking, note sharing apps (like Evernote, for example, or its Linux-based competitors) and have no idea whether they might (or might not) hit the sweet spot of functionality and simplicity. All ideas would be welcome. -- Bruce Miller, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada br...@brmiller.ca; (613) 745-1151 In archaeology you uncover the unknown. In diplomacy you cover the known. attributed to Thomas Pickering, retired US diplomat, born 1931 _______________________________________________ Linux mailing list Linux@lists.oclug.on.ca http://oclug.on.ca/mailman/listinfo/linux
