Groupware software (or collaborative software) is designed to enable users to collaborate, regardless of location, via the internet or a corporate intranet and to work together in a virtual atmosphere.
In an organisation, productivity rests on the intranet, and a groupware or collaboration server is what helps to make the intranet productive. This type of software provides critical services like email and address books, and establish communication via instant messaging.
Groupware solutions heavy on the feature-set are often not suitable for more than a few hundred users. However, software which offers only basic groupware functionalities, such as e-mail, contact and calendaring, are likely to meet the requirements of large deployments.
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