Co-browsing is the ability to co-navigate the web with other people at-a-distance. Co-browsing differentiates itself from screen or application sharing because it is not achieved by sending a high rate of screenshots of the presenter screen to one or more participants but by distributing in a synchronous fashion the URL(s) being visited by the presenter to all participants' browsers.

Photo credit: James Isbell

Co-browsing, also known as "web touring" is particularly effective as it allows the co-navigation of many types of web-based content in a highly efficient way. Participants computers need not to be of the latest generation and even with a less than perfect Internet connection everyone can see whichever web pages the presenter/moderator selects.

Since only a very small text string containing the URL address of the web page to be viewed is sent to all connected participants, the resources required to those attending are very small, and the performance in viewing the contents presented is only dependent on each individual participant connection speed, browser performance, monitor and graphic board abilities and so on. That is: each participant is only limited by its own gear limits and by the speed of its connection the Internet.
Web pages visited in a co-browsing session may include PowerPoint presentations previously converted to the HTML format and later uploaded to a web server.

Limitations of a co-browsing session are generally the inability to annotate or mark-up the web page contents being presented (this can normally be done in a screen-sharing or application-sharing session - the negative side of such sessions is that they are very data and CPU intensive as they send multiple times per second screen shots of the presenter computer to all attendees screens).

Here is more information about co-browsing characteristics and tools:

The features and controls available in co-browsing systems usually include:

• Push web pages
  Pushing a web page allows the presenter to force a specific Web page to appear on the end user screen. Pushing Web pages is the very basic level at which co-browsing can be carried out. Some systems force a new browser window on each participant's computer. The use of this feature theoretically leaves participants free to navigate and independently interact with the Web page received.





• Follow-me / Sync-surfing
  Provides a simple means for the presenter/moderator to navigate from link to link and from one Web page to another one while automatically "driving" all attendees. In this fashion all participants' browsers sync-up with whatever URL the presenter goes to. Systems missing this feature require the presenter to
  type and send out each specific web page URL that needs to be accessed by the attendees.





• Favorites / Bookmarks
  The Favorites and Bookmarks feature allow the presenter/moderator to save and manage Web page URLs which need to be easily and rapidly accessed during a live session. In this way, the presenter needs not to type complex Web page URL "on the fly" and can be prepare ahead of time a list of Web page addresses that will need to be presented.





• Preview
  The co-browsing Preview feature allows the presenter/moderator to literally pre-view a Web page before broadcasting it to all of the meeting participants. This maybe very useful to check the availability of a page or the actual content being displayed before showing the page publicly.





• Hand-over control
  The Hand-over control feature allows the presenter/moderator in a co-browsing session to give control of the Web tour to any one of the participants in the session. This is very handy in events and presentations where multiple presenters need to take the stage.

  In most systems, presenters need to be assigned special passwords to access the moderator functions and a unique account must be created for them. The hand-over control feature simplifies this while providing the ability to easily hand-out without prior planning the co-browsing session control to anyone of the participants.





• Pre-caching
  The pre-caching feature allows the automatic and invisible pre-downloading of the web pages to be viewed during a co-browsing session across all attendees. The content of the Web pages is downloaded during idle presentation times and is cached in the memory of each attendees computer. The operation takes place completely in the background, is completely transparent to the user, and can be optionally turned off by attendees.

  This approach allows very fast access to Web pages during a live presentation, and the ability to maintain greater synch with all attendees. This technical ability is presently not available in any web conferencing system available on the market and is one of the over 100 new features that I have identified and described in this new series of upcoming Insider Reports.





• Co-scrolling
  Co-scrolling is probably the most sought after advanced feature by end users participating in a co-browsing session. As the name implies, co-scrolling provides the ability to scroll web pages simultaneously with all meeting participants. When the presenter scrolls a web page, it simultaneously scrolls on all participants' screens.





• Co-filling
  The co-filling feature provides ability to fill out online forms, tests and other interactive documents in a collaborative synchronized fashion. The presenter can fill in fields of an online form live, and have the input appear on all attendees forms. Attendees can independently fill in their forms in the personal sections.





• Shared pointing tool
  A shared pointing tool allows the presenter to show the mouse cursor to participants in real time over the Web page being shown. This technique that is not presently adopted by none of the players in the market is a actually a combination of screen sharing and co-browsing.

  While this feature requires that all participants are forced to view the web page co-browsed in a window that is exactly the same size as the presenter, it does allow the presenter to show a light pointer (its appearance should be available in several formats: laser pointer, arrow, blinking dot, hand pointing, mouse cursor, etc.) moving live over the web page content being displayed.





• History of URLs browsed
  The history of URLs browsed further facilitates the presenter task of going back to Web pages presented during the current or preceding sessions. The feature should allow the history to be shared and be accessed/downloaded by any of the meeting participants.

Co-Browsing tools

Only very few tools exist that limit themselves to provide only a co-browsing facility. Here is a list of the products we have found:

PageShare

PageShare is a co-browsing solution designed for sales and service agents to assist their customers with complex online sales transactions. Once two or more users are using PageShare, they are able to surf the net together using pointers and shared form filling features. PageShare has low bandwidth requirement, form synchronization, shared pointer with same spot scrolling, and cookie and chat support.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: NO


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: YES


• Co-filling: YES


• Shared pointing tool: YES


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free Trial: contact sales department for pricing / NO


• Link: http://www.pageshare.com/

Voxwire

The Voxwire Meeting Room is an unlimited computer-to-computer web conferencing application that allows people to talk to each other, send text-messages, and see the same website or other presentation on their screens - from anywhere in the world. It can be used for private communication or with large groups of participants.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: NO


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: NO


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free Trial: 3 Person Room costs $17 per month; 10 Person Room costs $37 per month / YES *7 days


• Link: http://www.voxwire.com/

Our review:

Voxwire MeetingRoom

iVocalize

iVocalize enables interactive web conference meetings for today's distributed workforce, online seminars, e-learning classrooms and presentations to an audience spanning the globe. Features include synchronized web browsing, integrated whiteboard and presentation recording.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: NO


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: YES


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: from $20/month (5 users) to $1200/month (1000 users) / YES *anytime


• Link: http://www.ivocalize.com/

Our review:

How To Record Audio Interviews Online: SkypeCast vs. iVocalize

HotConference

HotConference is a web conferencing system with built in audio, text chat, webcam, browser, whiteboard and a co-browsing feature that lets you browse web pages with your attendees. The instant messaging feature allows private one-on-one communication for private discussions. You can capture and archive text discussions by saving them as text files.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: NO


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: NO


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: YES


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: setup fee of $14.99, monthly flat rate of $29.99 / YES *anytime


• Link: http://www.hotconference.com/

VoiceCafe' TourMaster

VoiceCafe' is a conferencing solution including voice chat, text chat, whiteboard, video images and more. VoiceCafe' also enables you to integrate real-time voice and video right on your web page and communicate with customers and visitors. Another interesting feature is the one that allows you to start web tours with all the attendees.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: YES


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: YES


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: YES


• Price / Free trial: calculate the price according to your needs / NO


• Link: http://www.voicecafe.com/

FlashMeeting

FlashMeeting is an application based on the Adobe Flash 'plug in' and Flash Media Server. Running in a standard web browser window, it allows a group of people to meet from anywhere in the world with an internet connection. Meetings are pre-booked by a registered user and a URL, containing a unique password for the meeting. Users are provided with video and audio conferencing, along with the ability to perform web tours.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: YES


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: NO


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price: N/A / YES *demo


• Link: http://flashmeeting.open.ac.uk/

Our review:

When Interface Design Makes A Difference: FlashMeeting

Accessing Individual Bits In A Recorded Online Event: FlashMeeting Memo

Elluminate vRoom

Elluminate vRoom is the scaled down version of a popular cross platform live web conferencing tool that provides e-learning solutions for the real-time organization. Elluminate vRoom integrates VoIP, easy-to-use moderator tools and provides support for collaborative web touring.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: NO


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: YES


• Co-filling: YES


• Shared pointing tool: YES


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: FREE (up to three attendees) / N/A


• Link: http://www.elluminate.com/vroom

Our review:

Small Team Web Conferencing Solution Moves To Free Model: Elluminate vRoom

ezWebcar

ezWebcar is an Internet Explorer add-on that seamlessly integrates with your browser. Using ezWebcar you can surf and co-browse any Web site with your team, colleagues and friends, while all seeing simultaneously the same content. No matter where your browsing partners are located physically, you and them would see the same web page at the same time.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: YES


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: YES


• Co-filling: YES


• Shared pointing tool: YES


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: FREE / N/A


• Link: http://tinyurl.com/youzed

Our review:

Review of ezWebCar

Web Conferencing Central

Web Conferencing Central is a share software applications, PowerPoint presentations, or anything running on your PC with others in online meetings. With this tool your viewers see with clarity what you display on your desktop and you can easily start web tours. Alternatively, you can pass control of the meeting and see what they display on their PC.

• Push Web pages: YES


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: NO


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: YES


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: YES


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: monthly plan start at $29 (five participants) / YES *15 days


• Link: http://www.webconcentral.com/

Asynchronous Co-Browsing Tools

The following tools allow you to create web tours that you can share with others.

ezWebtour

ezWebTour is a complementary free product extension to ezWebcar. ezWebTour allows you to compile a list of Web pages from different web sites into a single ezWebTour. All of the pages collected in a WebTour can be accessed through one simple URL link that can be easily mailed to your co-surfing invitees.

• Push Web pages: NO


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: YES


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: NO


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: NO


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: FREE / N/A


• Link: http://tinyurl.com/234ow3

Our review:

Review of ezWebtour

Amberjack

Amberjack is a service that enables you to create effective site tours. By guiding your site visitors, Amberjack tours can greatly improve the usability of your website. You provide the URLs you want to include in your tour, select a skin for your narrative boxes and determine what all the button text and links will be for the interface. The tour wizard then provides a code snippet that you place in the template of your website and code for a button to launch the tour.

• Push Web pages: NO


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: YES


• Favorites / Bookmarks: YES


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: NO


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: NO


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: FREE / N/A


• Link: http://www.amberjack.org

TrailFire

TrailFire allows you to place a 'trail mark' (like a 'post-it' note) on a page with your comments. A trail mark can contain text, images, videos and other media types. When you give several marks the same 'trail name' you are forming your own navigation path on the web. We call this a 'Trail'. Trails can be private or public. Trails can be shared via email, by posting them on any website, or by publishing them on Trailfire.com.

• Push Web pages: NO


• Follow-me / Sync-surfing: NO


• Favorites / Bookmarks: YES


• Preview: NO


• Hand-over control: NO


• Pre-caching: NO


• Co-scrolling: NO


• Co-filling: NO


• Shared pointing tool: NO


• History of URLs browsed: NO


• Price / Free trial: FREE / N/A


• Link: http://trailfire.com/

Resources about Co-Browsing

• SearchCRM.com definition of "co-browsing"

  Collaborative browsing (also known as co-browsing) is a software-enabled technique that allows someone in an enterprise contact center to interact with a customer by using the customer's Web browser to show them something. For example, a B2B customer...





• Definition of "co-browsing" on the Free Dictionary
  Synchronizing browser access to the same sites. As one user browses the Web, the other users trail along automatically and link to and view the same pages from their browsers. Typically accomplished...





• Definition of "co-browsing" on Wikipedia

  Cobrowsing, in the context of web browsing, is the navigation of the Internet by several people accessing the same webpages at the same time. This can be...

Co-Browsing tools comparison chart

Click on the screenshot below to view the full chart.

Co-Browsing News Radar

This information has been researched and collected by Robin Good in conjunction and support of the LANCELOT Language Research Project funded by the European Commission under the LEONARDO DA VINCI, Language Competence II programme.

This mini-guide has been written for online teachers, trainers and language facilitators that need to navigate the vast sea of options and alternatives available to them. In no way this mini-guide intends to be a comprehensive and complete list of all tools and technologies for a specific use.

It is simply an initial starting guide for novice online tutors needing to understand within the least time possible which tools and technologies could be most appropriate for their online language training needs.

Please utilize the Comments section below to add and provide references, info and links to other relevant tools that could be included in this mini-guide.