Luis Benitez and David Brooks are talking about upcoming capabilities in the next version of IBM Connections. Some notes:

1. Connections is part of a wider platform. Have been doing this for 6 years. Will continue to evolve the platform. The basis of the platform is people.

1a. The wider platform is the IBM Platform for Social Business – including social networking, social analytics, social content, and one more.

1b. Future versions – (a) advancing the platform, (b) social analytics, (c) mobile and social everywhere, and (d) social business solutions, from business partners.

2. In Connections Next:
– revised style sheets, for making Connections look like a corporate brand.
– @(Name) view – to show all messages directed to you.
– New option in Ideation Blog – to Export Ideas. Takes them to a spreadsheet, for roll-out or reporting.
– Can merge ideas in the Ideation Blog. Integrates the vote count. Marks one as duplicated, and takes it out of the open ideas view.
– Activity stream updates take be “liked” in stream. You don’t have to open the item first.
– Can add multiple libraries to a single community. Can then edit library settings directly in line, on the Overview page.
– Content Types for required metadata, on documents in a library.
– Review / approval process for new documents. If you are the reviewer, you have buttons displaying inline to tell you what you need to do (eg., Approve, Reject, Stop Review).
– Folders and nested folders for organizing files, in a library.
– Can share something to a person’s profile.
– Surveys are coming in first half of 2013 – natively integrated support for surveys. Results can be graphically depicted, in a variety of ways. Surveys can have questions of different types (date, text, tick box, etc.)
– Can customize the look and feel of profiles.
– Inline viewing of slide decks. Can open a file page in Connections, and click the View button. Don’t have to download the slide deck first.
– files that are shared with someone will be automatically downloaded to the user’s computer, using IBM Connections File Sync.
– … for Windows users, there is integration directly into Windows Explorer, for sharing files with other people. Can be shared with people outside of Connections, too.
– … added a sidebar to Microsoft Outlook, for getting access to IBM Connections. Eg., can send a link to a file in Connections.
– … round trip editing.
– On iPad:
– … file sync for new files. Differential changes are sync’d, not the whole thing again.
– … files are download and encrypted.
– … from Connections, you can do a remote wipe of a lost or stolen iPad.
– … documents can be previewed before downloading the whole thing. Can edit in IBM Docs.
– … the apps for mobile devices can be configured by administrators; eg., adding new apps down the left hand side.
– Bringing the IBM BPM experience into Connections – for workflow, for embedded experiences.

3. Connections 4.5 will ship in March – end of Q1. Six months after the release of Connections 4.

3a. There’s a new fix pack, that delivers the @Mentions capability.

4. Single codestream on SmartCloud and on-premises. Will be fully realized this year.