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Everyone knows about what is project management. It’s nothing but planning, organizing and managing the resources.But how to do? What is the right way to do it. Are there any tools available for project management and collaboration. How these tools can be useful and what are the features. These are the things we are going to analyze in this article. We will see best project collaboration tools available on web to manage projects easily.
Pros and Cons of Project Collaboration Tools
- Online project management lets you collaborate with project resources, manage project users, analyze risks, assign tasks, coordinate schedules and make your project a success from anywhere in the world.
- These project management apps are here to save you time, but they can also be very time-consuming and not intuitive.
- If you have a team who works with you remotely, then this is the right choice.
Project management process and its approach
Projects were generally managed by creative architects and engineers themselves. Major process steps are initiation, planning or development, production or execution, monitoring and controlling . To handle these process number of approaches are there like:
- Traditional approach
- Critical chain project management
- Extreme project management
- Event chain methodology
- Prince2 (Structured approach)
- Process based management.
1.Teambox
Teambox is listed first because it’s the application we are currently using for 1stwebdesigner, but don’t let that sway you. This is a place for your team in twitter like project collaboration tool. You can share tasks, messages, attach files and Notification by email.And also it’s an open source project.Teambox offers up to three projects free and offers 2000 projects for premium plans.And it’s very easy to use.
Advantages
- Easy to setup in 1 minute.
- Access from anywhere, anytime.
- Secure and backup of your data.
- Updating new features constantly.
- Notified by mails.
2.Basecamp
This is a project management,Collaboration and task web-based tool trusted by millions of users.The features are Share files, Meet deadlines, Assign tasks, Centralize feedback, Basecamp tackles project management from an entirely different angle: A focus on communication and collaboration. They have some extras and addons also.Four price planning is available , Each and every plan has30 days trial period.
Advantages
- Dashboard
- To-do lists
- File sharing
- Message boards
- Milestones
- Time tracking
- Project overview and comments on messages
3.Activecollab
A project management and collaboration tool.It will make your work and cooperation with your team, clients, suppliers and others much easier. Useful to keep projects on track, Email support, Extend and integrate of modules,Collaborate,Save time.And new added features are invoice,subversion integration,Global documents,Drag and drop task management, Improved visual editor and much more…
Advantages
- Dashboard
- Manage projects
- Invoicing
- Track time
- Share files
- Email integration etc…
4.DeskAway
It’s an online project management, project collaboration,Task & issue tracking software.Easy to use for virtual,distributed and global teams.The main reasons why you have to use Deskaway are simple & affordable,Less email clutter,Delegation and tracking, Control is in your hand, Nothing to download and install,Backup of your data in daily basis,No risk and little more.Please read their FAQ’s and it will be very useful before your picking this tool.
Advantages
- Track work
- Delegate
- Share
- Collaborate
5.Teamwork
Web-based project management tool that helps managers,staff and clients work together more productivity online.Stay on track,Share & collaborate,work faster and host it yourself.you get room for 2 projects, free storage space and you can instantly upgrade to a paid plan at any time.
Benefits
- Manage projects
- Manage task lists
- Schedule milestones
- Add messages
- Time tracking
- Upload files
- Manage people
- E-mail integration
- Multi language support
6.5pm
5pm is an intuitive web-based project management tool.It is flexible and easy to use.you can request a custom plan here through mail.Backup your data nightly.256-bit high grade encryption for data security.Desktop tracker widget is available.Filter users in time line and much more features are available with multi language support.
Benefits
- Manage projects and tasks online.
- Share notes and files.
- Track time
- E-mail integration
- Customized reports
- Interactive timeline
7.Wrike
Project planning,management and tracking software.Can easily track your project.It gives you the full insight to your business.Your project plans are always up to date.30 day free trial pack is available for plans.Outlook synchronization,Windows mobile sync, icalendar and rss feeds are available for a reasonable price.
Benefits
- Complete picture for your business.
- Unique control
- More productive
- Very easy to use
- Intelligent email engine, So it works with any email software.
8.Wridea
Free online idea management and collaboration service.It’s a web-based service first to avoid your ideas being forgotten and organize your ideas.It’s already being used by more than 40,000 users.With the help of this tool, you can store your ideas, manage and organize them, collaborate with your friends over your ideas, etc. Wridea provides you all required tools and services for organizing your ideas.
Wridea Features
- Categorize your ideas under different pages.
- Share your ideas.
- Commenting on ideas.
- Customized environment.
9.ZOHO projects
A centralized place where relevant project documents and contents are stored, updates are posted, everyone exchange ideas and get work done.Top reasons to choose ZOHO projects.Beyond your planning …get projects done,Planning,Works smarter,Reporting and value for your money.The updates of ZOHO are project stream, Dedicated wiki, Group chat MS project integration.Free for one project with unlimited users.
Features
- Task dependency
- Milestones for a project
- Meetings
- Document sharing
- Dashboard and time tracking.
10.onstage
Team collaboration,Project management,File sharing and task software.Your business and communication can be more efficient and better organized.Easy file sharing,A free version forever, not just for 30 days. Plus, an unlimited number of users at no extra cost!
Technical features
- Document preview with ipaper from scribd.
- Optimized for PDA’s
- Multi language
- SSL encryption
11.Springloops
Source code management tool for web developers.You can do code in parallel and share it safely.Ultimate work flow,Easy management,Unique code browser and Basecamp integration are the main features in this tool.It’s free for 100MB only.
12.Rememberthemilk
This is an online to do list and task management.You can manage tasks quickly and easily.Get remind anywhere and you can locate your tasks here too.Remembermilk providing more number of services for their users like sync with Blackberry, Gmail, Android, for twitter , Manage your remember through google calendar and third party applitication or services etc…
13.Comindwork
Tools for Collaboration,Communication,Tracking and project management too.Comindwork SaaS improves the knowledge work productivity in projects performed by teams in professional service firms (e.g. software, advertising & marketing, consulting, lawyers, NGO) and by divisions within enterprises (e.g. support, marketing, R&D, upper management).More benefits for project manager, to team and for your clients.Free for 20MB
Customizable features are
- Personal and project dashboards
- Business wiki and files with permissions
- Time tracking
- To-do lists,Milestones and notifications
- Report in Gantt charts.
- Customizable work flow and business rules
- Project level settings and lot more 250+customizable features.
14.Central Desktop
Central desktop “Over 375,000 users around the globe rely on Central Desktop every day to accelerate their business, connect their people, and manage their projects.” Free usage for 25 MB.
- Quick setup
- Enterprise grade search.
- Real-time collaboration
- Centralized communication
- Team accountability
15.Ajaxworkspace
AJAXworkspace offers more than 10 powerful online project management and collaboration features such as project dashboard, tracking software, task management, document management, file sharing, and discussion board.It consists of an integrated suite of simple and easy-to-use collaboration functionality.This is an ideal tool for any type of project management regardless of whether you are working in a company or a freelancer from home.
Other Features
- Bookmark
- Personalization
- Security access control
- Event calendar
- Graphical reporting tool
More tools
Let us know what are your favorite project collaboration tools and tips.
I will add http://www.agreedo.com . Unlike all others here on this great list it really let people be more efficient when it comes to meetings of any type. Whether they meet live or online agreedo.com let people prepare for the meeting, run the meeting and followup the results. I think they are still beta. It’s really cool stuff!
[...] 15+ Amazing Project Management and Collaboration Tools | Graphic and Web Design Blog- Kan vara en bra början om du vill titta närmre på hur ditt team ska samarbeta i framtiden. Jag har jobbat i och utvärderat de flesta på listan så har du några frågetecken är det bara skrika till. [...]
A very useful article. I think it can be very helpful for those who are looking for a PM tool.
We’ve been using Wrike for a few months already. Email integration is awesome! A lot of time is saved on typing emails. Wrike is easy to adopt, that’s a big advantage when you need to invite external collaborators.
One thing that I miss is an iPhone app, but they told they’d be releasing it this year.
I’ve used Basecamp and I am very satisfied! Basecamp no longer supports Internet Explorer 6. They won’t even let you use the site if you are on it. But lots of other people are moving the same way.
For me, the best project management tool is InTask (www.intaskrnd.com) – fast, intuitive, lots of features, outlook synchronization, calendar view, import/export from excel, document management and state of the art reports editor. Most important – it’s free!!
my second best is MS Project – lots of options, fairly simple and non-web based which is a big advantage in my opinion
To collaborate with my partners and share confidential infromation I use Sironta ( http://www.sironta.com ).
It’s P2P, so confidential docs are only on my PC, not on an external server. It has Open Office embedded so you can work on the documents even if you are offline and synchronize with your partners once you reach the net.
It’s the first software I have seen where I can share, edit or create files of any type and any size, without limitations, restrictions or information leakage.
hello, Thank you so much for this article. I really appreciate your assistance and I would like to inform you that we are also maintaining one business consultant which provides blogs too. That site is “http://www.mavenlink.com/” . I hope it will be referred…
I agree Mavenlink is new, but they have some serious potential.
I don’t think the tools are listed in order of importance.
.-= PM Hut´s last blog ..Great Project Managers – General George S. Patton =-.
This is a really great post, and has some awesome insights. At ProjectSpaces (www.projectspaces.com), we believe strongly in fighting against the con you list — “These project management apps are here to save you time, but they can also be very time-consuming and not intuitive.” We have strived for simplicity over some of the flashy features of the other tools, while making sure to still include everything you need. Check us out and sign up for a free trial today. We’d love to hear from you.
Thank you so much for this article. It comes just in time as we are looking for productivity tools @ work. Have a good day!
- andy
Thx for this list :), I must admit I’ve been using PlanningForce Express Premium for a long time and I’m very happy with it :) Don’t hesitate to add it to your list ;)
http://www.planningforce-express.com – Cheers and keep posting :)
This is very neat and detailed. Expect more from you! :D
The guys over at templatic have modded the P2 wordpress theme to work as a basic twitter like wordpress based collaboration tool. We use it at Outpost all the time for client projects. Its good because it eliminates all the clutter. It looks a lot like Teambox but bare bones.
And its free!
http://templatic.com/news/how-we-used-and-modded-p2-theme-to-enhance-productivity-at-templatic