Collaboration in Slack – Major Update to a 30 year Old Tool Copyleft1 Mark Smith, @W4CHL @C3HTech [email protected] [email protected] fb.com/w4chl Hashtags: #17nct4g #ibmnctec 2017-06-06 1 GNU copyleft: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html Anyone is permitted to copy and distribute copies of this document as long this original author information is included. in Slack – Major Update to a 30 year Old Tool Copyleft1 Mark Smith, @W4CHL @C3HTech [email protected] [email protected] fb.com/w4chl Hashtags: #17nct4g #ibmnctec 2017-06-06 1 GNU copyleft: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html Anyone is permitted to copy and distribute copies of this document as long this original author information is included. Slack – Update to Old Tool: Agenda [1] Ignite your interest in Collaboration Tools

Reference to Slack’s predecessor: IRC

Slack – major features: Chat, File Sharing Integration: e-Mail, project mgmt, other apps

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 3 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Agenda [2] Ignite your interest in Collaboration Tools

Reference to Slack’s predecessor: IRC

Slack – major features: Chat, File Sharing Integration: e-Mail, project mgmt, other apps

You can start using Slack right now! nct4g.slack.com Domain names to @TriadEVNC(not gmail, yahoo.com, hotmail)

Summary and References Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 4 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Ignite [1] Ignite your interest in Collaboration Tools How many have ?

How many here use an e-mail group or Listserv?

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 5 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Ignite [3] Ignite your interest in Collaboration Tools How many have Instant Messaging ?

How many here use an e-mail group or Listserv?

How many here work on e-mail?

Collaboration tools unify all of the above

How many on a Collaboration tool now? Slack, Cisco Spark, HipChat, Glip, others Copyleft : Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 6

Slack – Update to Old Tool: IRC [1] How many ever used IRC?

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) First appeared circa 1988 from Finland

Spread rapidly among Unix Geeks; some channels 100K users/day

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 7 Slack – Update to Old Tool: IRC [2] How many ever used IRC?

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) First appeared circa 1988 from Finland

Spread rapidly among Unix Geeks; some channels 100K users/day

Favorite place for IT administrators: build a network (before was popular) and we were often on IRC chat!

History on irc.org

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 8 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Slack Intro [1] Slack short history Publically available 1Q2014, privately for 2 years prior

Slack = “Searchable Log of All Conversation and Knowledge”

Growth through open API, keeping partners involved and happy!

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 9 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Slack Intro [2] Slack short history Publically available 1Q2014, privately for 2 years prior

Slack = “Searchable Log of All Conversation and Knowledge”

Growth through open API, keeping partners involved and happy!

Within 1 year in mid-2015 total active users/day exceeded peak IRC server users at over 1 million active users/day Estimated 2Q2017 at 3.5 million/day!

How? Bring IRC features into modern world partnering to bring nirvana for many: Single Pane of Glass Dashboard for Projects! Copyleft : Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 10

Slack – Update to Old Tool: Features [1] Slack Features: Accessible via Client or Web browser; same look-and-feel for single team; many IRC features included

Client supports multiple teams, in background here and prior page, can switch from one team to another.

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 11 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Features [2] Slack Features: Accessible via Client or Web browser; same look-and-feel for single team; many IRC features included

Client supports multiple teams, in background here and prior page, can switch from one team to another

Multiple client platforms: Windows, OSX (Mac), Linux, Android, and iOS (iPad, iPhone); very similar look-and-feel

Organized as Slack Teams (formerly called Slack Domains): team-name.slack.com

Copyleft : Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 12

Slack – Update to Old Tool: Features [3] Slack Features: Apps available to you: team-name.slack.com/apps

Each Slack team decides which to activate for their team

Over 400 apps available, over 50% are free apps

Built-in integration with Google Drive and box.com

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 13 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Features [4] World of difference from IRC: well done interface for non-techies!

Essential Slack Client shortcuts: bit.ly/slack-shortcuts From Slack Client command line: Ctrl-/ (Windows) or -/ (Mac)

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 14 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Features [5] World of difference from IRC: well done interface for non-techies!

Essential Slack Client shortcuts: bit.ly/slack-shortcuts From Slack Client command line: Ctrl-/ (Windows) or -/ (Mac)

Client command line entry shortcuts: “/” and next character shows list of options. Options for commands also pop up

Copyleft : Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 15

Slack – Update to Old Tool: Features [6] Single Pane of Glass for documents, images, spreadsheets, and integrated apps

Document integration: Example with Google Drive

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 16 Slack – Update to Old Tool: Features [7] Single Pane of Glass for documents, images, spreadsheets, and integrated apps

Document integration: Example with Google Drive

Slack displays a thumbnail and some meta-data from links to apps, shown here as thumbnail for Screencast player. Exploits features of app such as version management or multimedia players.

Copyleft : Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected] 17

Slack – Update to Old Tool: Summary Slack enhancement of old IRC tool can integrate Instant Messaging, Document Sharing, team project collaboration, and more.

Free Slack team option includes 9/10 of core features, lacking mainly Enterprise integration

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected]

Slack – Update to Old Tool: Summary Slack enhancement of old IRC tool can integrate Instant Messaging, Document Sharing, team project collaboration, and more.

Free Slack team option includes 9/10 of core features, lacking mainly Enterprise integration

Try it now: join at this link nct4g.slack.com/join/signup after tweet e-mail domain to @TriadEVNC (except no gmail or yahoo.com or hotmail, sorry!)

What do I miss? Whacking someone with a fish! (/slap)

Copyleft: Mark Smith, @W4CHL, @C3HTech, [email protected], [email protected]

Slack – Update to Old Tool: References IRC History: irc.org

Slack site, with good reference information: slack.com get.slack.help

Trello card with more details and refs from this presentation: bit.ly/slack-irc-on-roids

Alternative Collaboration tools to Slack: bit.ly/nct4g-slack-alt