Connections 5 CR1 Brings Yet More Features

October 21, 2014 Alex Woodie

Two weeks ago, we told you about Connections 5, the new IBM i-supported release of the business-oriented social media tool from IBM. Just as version 5 was going out the door, IBM announced Connections 5.0 CR1, which brings yet more features.

Connections is a social media tool designed for team collaboration. The software functions similar to Facebook and other social media websites by allowing users to follow and track people and entities, as well as discover new people and entities through the use of hashtags. It also hooks into Lotus email, contacts, calendar capabilities, and software; integrates with IBM’s various BI and content management systems; and is supported on a variety of mobile devices.

With Connections 5.0 CR1, IBM has rolled up a number of fixes in the product, but it has also delivered some new functionality, including: an updated file preview design and the capability to play uploaded movies in the Activity stream, which is the continually updated stream of updates from a user’s business network. It also brings the capability to view a full file from a thumbnail; a new option to repeat events on a monthly basis; and the capability to copy and paste images in the rich text editor.

IBM delivered new social media capabilities for businesses with Connections 5.0 CR1.

The behavior of the product’s “@mentions” functionality has also changed. @mentions work similar to hashtags on Twitter–by allowing users to track items of interest as they’re mentioned across the business network. With this release, IBM supports @mentions in a Linked Library, thereby widening the potential audience that @mentions can reach. IBM is also developing metric reports for Linked Libraries, enabling organizations to track people, participation, and content over periods of time.

For more information on Connections 5.0 CR1, see http://planetlotus.org/profiles/luis-benitez_129057_ibm-connections-5-0-cr1-is-now-available.