Collaboration and Coordination Through Basic Internet Tools: a Case Study

In this paper we report on a case study of a distributed software development project supported with basic Internet tools. In particular we focus on how these basic tools have and could be used for supporting the collaboration among the involved parties, as well as the coordination of the distributed activities. We sketch some observations, presenting advantages and disadvantages of using such a basic infrastructure for supporting distributed projects. Finally we highlight some requirements for lightweight groupware systems that we believe could overcome the described drawbacks.