The BERKOM multimedia collaboration service

The BERKOM Multimedia Collaboration Service is a multi-vendor workstation conferencing solution. It allows users to share applications and to participate in audiovisual conferences from their desktop. A conference manager administrates conferences and controls the assignment of roles to conference participants. A conference directory collects information about users, their roles, and the conferences they participate in. An application sharing component multiplexes the output of a window system based application (e.g., an X or Windows program) to all conference participants and, in turn, allows users to provide input. An audiovisual subsystem establishes communication links among the conference participants in an all-digital form.