We've just released a major new update to our Kollaborate cloud workflow platform for video professionals, with a lot of new features and important changes.

Workflows

Workflows are an extremely powerful new feature that tells Kollaborate to perform certain tasks on a file when it is assigned a specific workflow. The tasks can range from labelling or marking the file to moving it to a specific folder. It's an easy way of quickly sorting files so they are easier for your team to access.

They are also the new way of getting file approvals from other people on your team. This is considerably more powerful than before and allows you to target specific people or departments as being able to approve files, rather than everyone with approval rights. You can also specify that every single marked person must approve the file before it is considered approved, as opposed to the old system where it was approved simply by the first person to approve it.

Each approval workflow has options for running another workflow when it is approved or rejected, so you could for example run another workflow to automatically highlight approved files and move them to an Approved folder. It also means you can chain approvals together so that an approval on one workflow triggers another approval workflow, allowing a file to filter up to higher members of your team for a decision before it is finally approved.

Another way you could use this is to implement milestones. So Milestone 1 would move the file to a particular project or department, someone works on the file and they then assign it Milestone 2, which moves it onto someone else to work on. Then they assign it Milestone 3 which asks a manager to approve it and then if it is approved it is automatically assigned an Approved status which moves the file to an Approved Files folder.

That's just an example - you can set it up however you like and it's extremely flexible.

We have lots of plans for this in future and are keen to know how customers plan to incorporate this feature into their workflows.

Upload Requests

Need some files from a vendor but don't want to add the person to the project? Send them an upload link. Upload links work just like sharing links but show a file upload page instead of a video player.

Team overhaul

The Team page has been completely overhauled. Each department now has a text box at the bottom that allows you to type in an email address to invite a team member. This is a considerably quicker and simpler way of setting up your team than the previous version.

Positions have been replaced by Roles, which apply a set of default permissions to a user. In a future update you will be able to add your own roles.

Inviting new users to the service is easier than before. Rather than assigning the user a default password, they now receive an activation link. Upon clicking the link they will be asked to choose a password for their account. We feel this is a more user-friendly way of doing things that should result in fewer forgotten passwords. You can also choose to manually send a user the activation link rather than having our system send it if you want to add a personal message.

Another change is that departments are no longer required to have users inside them. This is useful if you just want a private storage area for Admins, as they are not required to be part of a department to see inside it.

Project muting

Don't want to receive alerts from a specific project but still receive alerts from others? You can now mute it. Hover over the project on the Projects page and click the bell icon next to its name.

Subtitle support

You can now view SRT subtitles in the video player. Here's how to do it:

1. Upload both the video and SRT caption file to your project.
2. Right-click on the video file on the Files page and click Relationship Editor or go to Actions > Related Files > Relationship Editor.
3. Click New Relationship.
4. Browse to the SRT file and choose Subtitles as the relationship type.
5. Save and go back to the video. You'll now see a green icon at the bottom of the player that will allow you to toggle the captions on and off.

We plan to support additional caption formats in future.

Other Changes

• File color coding
• Batch metadata editing
• New filters on the Files page - show unviewed, with comments, without comments, with revisions and since my last visit
• Metadata tags are now matched when searching from the Files page (previously you could only do this from the Advanced Search page)
• Previously if you wanted to see detailed viewing statistics about a link, you would need to send it via the site so it could match the stats to the user's email address. Now in cases where the link is emailed manually and Kollaborate doesn't know who clicked it, the site will show viewing statistics by IP address instead.
• If you're not viewing a playable file, the comment box is now selected by default to make note-taking easier
• Many UI changes plus an overhaul of the email skin

The site has also had a complete architecture overhaul where every single page was modified and optimized. We're also running on faster servers and cache data more aggressively which should result in the site being faster than before.

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. To find out more, see the overview or register for the free trial.

Kollaborate Folder Watcher 1.2 is a significant update to our automatic file uploader for our Kollaborate cloud platform.

Finder progress bars

Based on your feedback, encoding and uploading now displays progress bars directly in Finder, allowing you to see at a glance the progress of any file.

Improved network drive support

Kollaborate Folder Watcher works by listening for messages from macOS that tell it when changes to a folder have occurred. These messages do not get sent on network drives so before now the app didn't work with such drives. Now it manually scans for changes too so it will detect changes on these drives, albeit with a delay compared to a local drive.

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. To find out more, see the overview or register for the free trial.

We've given Kollaborate subscribers a massive free storage space boost. Kollaborate was already one of the best-value review platforms on the market due to the fact you get 5 team members and all features on the base plan, in addition to free access to several of our products, and this increases the value even more.

Additionally, our higher-level plans now come with unlimited team members.

You can view the full list of package benefits, including pricing, here.

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. To find out more, see the overview or register for the free trial.

Earlier this week we released Kollaborate Server 2.0.3, a minor update to our in-house version of our Kollaborate cloud workflow platform. These fixes have already been rolled out to users of the cloud version.

Kollaborate Server can now be run on PHP 7, as well as PHP 5.6. You will need to make sure you have the very latest version of the Ioncube Loader to do this. Even if you are not using PHP 7 you may still need to update the loader if you are using a very old version.

Other changes

• When emailing out a link through the site, the user's name is populated from their email address so they no longer need to enter it before commenting
• Users can hold down Shift to prevent the comment overlay showing in full screen
• Uploads from the FCPX plugin are now matched for revisions based on their title, not filename
• Black thumbnails are now shown instead of the "unknown document" icon if a video thumbnail is pending
• Prevented comments on archived projects
• The comments box is now sized proportionally to the height of your browser
• Added a popup alert to ask the user if they want to reset their password if they get it wrong too many times
• API - Shared links generated by apps now take the file's title instead of appearing as Untitled
• Forward and back slashes are now stripped from file titles
• Extended OAuth token expiration dates to prevent infrequent users from constantly having to reauthorize
• Improved the browser compatibility of annotation drawing
• Fixed an issue where admins could not email a link created by another user
• Fixed an issue on OS X where multiple link reminder emails may be sent
• Fixed an issue where admins could not add Approval permissions to other users
• Fixed an issue where revision uploads could fail if the parent folder contained invalid characters
• Fixed an issue where aliases may not be playable
• API: Fixed an issue where the server could choose the original file instead of the proxy when playing an alias
• Fixed an error that could occur when trying to move thumbnails for a file type that does not intrinsically support thumbnails
• Fixed an issue where comments may not show when a task with Japanese characters in the title is attached to it
• Fixed an issue where invisible users could exist and not be able to be removed from a project
• Fixed an issue where encoding jobs may not be distributed evenly across encoding servers
• Security improvements
• UI tweaks
• Various other minor bug fixes and improvements

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. Kollaborate Server allows you to host the platform in-house on your own servers and storage. To find out more, see the Kollaborate Server overview or register for the free cloud trial (Server trials are available on request).

Kolloaborate Server 2.0.2 is now out, a minor update to our self-hosted in-house cloud workflow platform. (These changes have already made their way to the cloud version of the site.)

The biggest change in this release is that MXFs, FLVs and AVIs are recognized as video files so thumbnails will be generated for them and if you have Kollaborate Encoder these files will automatically be converted to MP4s for playback in the browser. This only applies to files uploaded from now on.

Other changes

• When drawing over a video in full screen near to the right edge, hold down shift to prevent the comment overlay from appearing
• Limited the screen area required to trigger the full screen comment overlay on larger monitors
• Fixed an issue where annotations couldn't be submitted
• If no other encoders are responding, send to the first available encoder even if the current file is longer than the encoder's maximum duration
• Fixed an issue where deleting a file would result in it still being selected invisibly, producing an error if you tried to delete something else
• Fixed an issue where clients would try to reconnect too often if the socket server was offline
• Double quotes are now prohibited from file titles
• Reduced logging when processing webhook events
• Several fixes to thumbnail generation
• Various other bug fixes and tweaks

This is a free update for all customers with valid maintenance and upgrade instructions are available in the installation guide included in the download shown after logging in.

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. Kollaborate Server allows you to host the platform in-house on your own servers and storage. To find out more, see the Kollaborate Server overview or register for the free cloud trial (Server trials are available on request).

Kollaborate Server 2.0.1 and Encoder 1.1.2 are now available for registered and trial customers of Kollaborate Server. This is intended as a bug fix release and the changes were already made available on the cloud version of the service.

Changes in Kollaborate Server 2.0.1

• Various fixes for project / file subscriptions
• Fixed an issue where hoverscrub thumbs may not appear
• Fixed an issue where the Files view could appear empty
• Fixed an issue where subfolders in shared folders could be inaccessible to shared links
• Comment streams now show timecoded comments
• Various UI improvements to comment streams
• Improved reliability when disabling multi-factor authentication
• Fixed an issue where file titles could appear blank in certain situations in the email digest
• Improved support for importing comments with special characters into the Adobe Premiere panel
• Fixed an issue where Synced Sessions could stall for clients
• Fixed an issue where thumbnails may not be generated for videos shorter than 1 second
• Fixed an issue where newlines may not appear in certain comments
• Security improvements
• Various other bug fixes, tweaks and optimizations

Changes in Kollaborate Encoder 1.1.2

• If getting the queue fails on the first try, it retries up to 3 times. This is useful if loading at startup before the server has an internet connection.

Upgrade instructions

Full upgrade instructions are located in the Quick Start Guide but the basic workflow is as follows:

1. Download the new update (available after logging in).

2. Copy the contents of the Installation Files folder except the config folder to the root folder of your web server, overwriting any existing files.

3. Visit yoursite.com/upgrade in your web browser and click Upgrade.

4. Delete the "upgrade" and "install" folders from the root folder of your web server.

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. Kollaborate Server allows you to host the platform in-house on your own servers and storage. To find out more, see the Kollaborate Server overview or register for the free cloud trial (Server trials are available on request).

We've just launched Kollaborate Server 2.0 - a major update to our in-house workflow platform for video professionals. This is the in-house companion to Kollaborate 2.0 that launched on the cloud last month.

File management improvements


We've rebuilt the Files page to behave more like a desktop browser like OS X Finder, including arrow key navigation, click to select, shift-click to select a range of files, etc.


QuickLook is also back but this time it behaves a lot more like the one in OS X. Press Space on a selected file to preview it without opening it. You can even QuickLook folders to peek inside them.




Notification Changes

One of the key goals of Kollaborate is keeping people informed, but with the old system it could sometimes be difficult to balance the needs of people who wanted to know about every single change vs those who wanted a much looser connection to the project.

So we’ve now introduced the concept of subscriptions. By default, everyone will receive a periodic digest summarizing recent changes to the project in a single email. You can choose to receive this once an hour, every few hours, once a day or not at all. (If there are no changes to the project in that time you won’t receive an email.)

If you want to receive instant alerts like in the previous version, you can subscribe to a project, file or task. Subscribing to a project makes the behavior identical to the previous version and can be done by clicking the dropdown next to the project on the Projects page.

Subscribing to a file or task alerts you to instant changes involving that item but without switching on alerts for other files or tasks in the project. Some actions automatically subscribe you to a file - such as uploading or commenting on it. You can click the Subscribe button again on the file to unsubscribe.

 

Thumbnail view and hoverscrub

You can now toggle between the traditional list view and a new thumbnail view. This provides fewer power user options but is a great way of graphically browsing through your files. 


We've also added hoverscrub thumbnails like in FCPX so you can browse through a file just by scrubbing your cursor over it. You also get a thumbnail view when you hover your mouse over the playhead in the player.


Additionally, audio files now show a thumbnail of their waveform instead of a generic icon.

(Note: hoverscrub thumbs are currently only created by Kollaborate Encoder and the latest beta of Kollaborate Transfer.)

To-Do Comments


Tap the checkbox icon in a comment to turn it into a to-do comment, then tap it again to mark it done. 


You can filter by to-do and choose to only export to-do comments to your NLE. 


Adobe Premiere panel


We've also launched an extension for Adobe Premiere that functions as both a file browser and task manager.

You can browse files in the cloud and download them directly into your project by double-clicking them. You can also import  markers into your current sequence. 


View your current to-dos, click on them to jump to that position in your timeline and then click the tick to mark them as complete.

The extension is supported on Mac and Windows and Kollaborate Server is supported by version 1.0.2 and higher.

Dashboard

Dashboard is back - view recent project changes, assigned tasks, favorites, to-do comments and more at a glance. 


Web Hooks (Beta)

Kollaborate Server can send events such as uploads or new comments to a custom script either on the same server or another server for integrating with in-house databases and task managers.

Some examples of what you could use it for:

• Logging every file uploaded to a database
• Adding new tasks to your calendar management software
• Adding comments or tasks to your in-house work tracking system
• Sending custom email alerts to users
• Creating keywords or hashtags in comments that trigger certain behavior in your in-house systems

Note that web hook events are not immediate and will normally arrive after a few minutes. This is a beta feature so we're keen to hear how customers plan to use this feature and what additional data they need for integrating in-house.

Web Hooks can be switched on from the Configure page in the admin area. Only super admins can access this page.

Major architectural overhaul


We've made significant under-the-hood modifications to the software, not all of which are immediately noticeable to users, but they pave the way for significant features in the future.

If you are upgrading from a previous version, be aware that this version moves a lot of things around so please be patient if the upgrade script takes a while. Playable proxies are now stored separately from original media files and thumbnails are now stored in your media storage area (expect thumbnails to take up 2-3 times more space than before due to the new sizes and hoverscrub options).

Another area we've made significant changes to is our API. This improves security by allowing you to approve or deny access to your account on a per-app basis. Did your laptop get stolen? Did you log into an app on your friend’s computer and accidentally forget to log out again? Not a problem - you will be able to revoke access on those devices remotely once we fully switch over to the new API.

We’ve made the changes in such a way that the current apps still work, but this is only intended to be temporary. We currently have beta versions of our apps available that support the new API and will be revoking access to older versions in the next few months. We’ll make a public announcement when that date is set so that users know when to update to newer versions.

Kollaborate Encoder 1.1

A corresponding Kollaborate Encoder update has been released that supports Kollaborate Server 2.0, can generate hoverscrub thumbnails and also fixes some bugs from the previous version. This is an essential update for Kollaborate Server 2.0 users with an encoding license.

Upgrade instructions

Full upgrade instructions are located in the Quick Start Guide but the basic workflow is as follows:

1. Download the new update (available after logging in).

2. Copy the contents of the Installation Files folder except the config folder to the root folder of your web server, overwriting any .

3. Visit yoursite.com/upgrade in your web browser and click Upgrade.

4. Delete the "upgrade" and "install" folders from the root folder of your web server.

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. Kollaborate Server allows you to host the platform in-house on your own servers and storage. To find out more, see the Kollaborate Server overview or register for the free cloud trial.

We've just launched Kollaborate 2.0 - a major update to our cloud workflow platform for video professionals.

Notification Changes

One of the key goals of Kollaborate is keeping people informed, but with the old system it could sometimes be difficult to balance the needs of people who wanted to know about every single change vs those who wanted a much looser connection to the project.

So we’ve now introduced the concept of subscriptions. By default, everyone will receive a periodic digest summarizing recent changes to the project in a single email. You can choose to receive this once an hour, every few hours, once a day or not at all. (If there are no changes to the project in that time you won’t receive an email.)

If you want to receive instant alerts like in the previous version, you can subscribe to a project, file or task. Subscribing to a project makes the behavior identical to the previous version and can be done by clicking the dropdown next to the project on the Projects page.

Subscribing to a file or task alerts you to instant changes involving that item but without switching on alerts for other files or tasks in the project. Some actions automatically subscribe you to a file - such as uploading or commenting on it. You can click the Subscribe button again on the file to unsubscribe.

File management improvements


We've rebuilt the Files page to behave more like a desktop browser like OS X Finder, including arrow key navigation, click to select, shift-click to select a range of files, etc.


QuickLook is also back but this time it behaves a lot more like the one in OS X. Press Space on a selected file to preview it without opening it. You can even QuickLook folders to peek inside them.




Thumbnail view and hoverscrub

You can now toggle between the traditional list view and a new thumbnail view. This provides fewer power user options but is a great way of graphically browsing through your files. 


We've also added hoverscrub thumbnails like in FCPX so you can browse through a file just by scrubbing your cursor over it. You also get a thumbnail view when you hover your mouse over the playhead in the player.


Additionally, audio files now show a thumbnail of their waveform instead of a generic icon.

(Note: we're still converting some of the existing files on the server so it might be a day or two before you see the hoverscrub thumbs show up for files you've already uploaded.)


To-Do Comments


Tap the checkbox icon in a comment to turn it into a to-do comment, then tap it again to mark it done. 


You can filter by to-do and choose to only export to-do comments to your NLE. 


Adobe Premiere panel


We've also launched an extension for Adobe Premiere that functions as both a file browser and task manager.

You can browse files in the cloud and download them directly into your project by double-clicking them. You can also import  markers into your current sequence. 


View your current to-dos, click on them to jump to that position in your timeline and then click the tick to mark them as complete.

The extension is currently Mac-only but will be available for Windows soon.

Dashboard

Dashboard is back - view recent project changes, assigned tasks, favorites, to-do comments and more at a glance. 


Storage boost

We've given both subscribers and trial users a storage boost.

Web Hooks (Beta)

Kollaborate can send events such as uploads or new comments to a third-party server for integrating with in-house databases and task managers.

Some examples of what you could use it for:

• Logging every file uploaded to a database
• Adding new tasks to your calendar management software
• Adding comments or tasks to your in-house work tracking system
• Sending custom email alerts to users
• Creating keywords or hashtags in comments that trigger certain behavior in your in-house systems

Note that web hook events are not immediate and will normally arrive after a few minutes. This is a beta feature so we're keen to hear how customers plan to use this feature and what additional data they need for integrating in-house.

Web Hooks can be switched on from your profile page and will only apply to projects you own.

Major architectural overhaul


We've made significant under-the-hood modifications to the service, not all of which are immediately noticeable to users, but they pave the way for significant features in the future.

One area we've made significant changes to is our API. This improves security by allowing you to approve or deny access to your account on a per-app basis. Did your laptop get stolen? Did you log into an app on your friend’s computer and accidentally forget to log out again? Not a problem - you will be able to revoke access on those devices remotely.

We’ve made the changes in such a way that the current apps still work, but this is only intended to be temporary. We will be releasing new versions of our apps in the coming weeks that support the new API and will be revoking access to older versions in the next few months. We’ll make a public announcement when that date is set so that users know when to update to newer versions.

As always, we take all feedback on board so please let us know what you think using the Feedback link on the site or by contacting us.

Kollaborate is an essential cloud workflow platform that allows you to share files with clients and team members while integrating with Digital Rebellion apps and services. To find out more, see the overview or register for the free trial.

Today we launched Kollaborate Folder Watcher, a free tool to automatically upload files to the Kollaborate cloud platform from your desktop.

Choose a folder on your system to watch for modifications - you can watch multiple folders and link them to different projects, or even to different departments or subfolders within a project. You can also set various preferences such as choosing between automatically converting all videos to playable copies or uploading the files as-is.

The app works on OS X 10.8 and higher but users running OS X 10.10 and above benefit from Finder integration. This allows you to see color-coded file statuses (green = uploaded, orange = upload in progress, red = error, no icon = not queued for upload) and adds right-click options such as manually uploading files within a watch folder and viewing an uploaded file in your web browser.

Kollaborate is a cloud workflow platform to make sharing files and working with colleagues easy. To find out more, check out the quick overview, view the feature list or try the 15-day free trial.

We've just released Kollaborate Server 1.4 and Kollaborate Encoder 1.0.2, which offer major new features that customers can use in-house on their own servers and storage.

Team overhaul

Inviting users to a project is now quicker and simpler. Add as many email addresses as you like, then setup positions and email preferences and invite them to the project in one step.

You can also duplicate users into another department without having to re-invite them.

Full-screen commenting

Hover over the right-hand side of the video in full screen to view comments, add new ones and annotate the image.

Compare revision notes

View comments from previous revisions to check that your notes on the previous cut have been addressed in the new one.

Drag and drop uploading

Easily upload files to Kollaborate by dropping them directly into a department or folder from your operating system.

Other changes

We've improved the color accuracy of Kollaborate Encoder and made several changes to improve reliability and performance.

We've also made some major architectural changes to Kollaborate Server to prepare it for PHP 7. We're not declaring it fully compatible yet but this is the largest change we needed to make and we will continue to make smaller changes in future versions to improve compatibility. It's likely that we will make PHP 7 the minimum requirement once we're fully compatible.

Kollaborate is a cloud workflow platform designed to help you work better with colleagues and clients. Upload files to the cloud, have them reviewed by others and then export their notes back to your editing application.

Kollaborate Server gives you all of those features in-house on your own servers and storage. To find out more, view the feature list or sign up for the free no-obligation 15-day cloud trial (no credit card needed). Trials of Kollaborate Server are available on request.