I recently received an invite to Google wave, so as any other anxious developer, I tried it out right away. Overall it’s great! The real-time collaboration is definitely a step forward, especially for project teams. There are also, however, a few things that I really hope Google implements soon or before the full release. I’ll go over the pros and cons from my point of view.

For those who don’t know, Google wave is a real-time collaboration tool. Unlike other real-time tools such as Etherpad, Google Wave has the ability to embed widgets into “waves”. You can use already made widgets such as syntax highlighting for code, or since wave is open source you can create your own widget. This opens Google wave to endless possibility as far a functionality goes.

Pros:

• Real Time collaboration – The ability to edit the same document in real time with team members in a project is a huge plus. And when I say real-time i mean character by character changes. For a project team of developers it’s especially useful for helping peers out with code help, or reviewing code that was written before implementation.
• Ability to embed custom widgets – Since Google Wave’s release, the amount of widgets has gone up substantially. Although there are still quite a few widgets that could be created, it’s a great start for such a new application.
• Problems – If at any point in time while “waving”, if a problem arises and Google wave is forced to close, I still have yet to lose more data than my last character typed. Good work on this one Google!
• Mute Feature – If you have a busy wave with say 75 participants, your inbox can get extremely busy very quickly with updates. A simple mute of the wave will stop those updates and keep your inbox clear.

Cons

• Settings – Google has decided that absolutely everything is done using waves. This means that changing your profile settings are also done in waves. I have to say,  I would really appreciate a section dedicated to changing your settings.
• Folder System – So far, I have found the folder system a little bit harder to use than anticipated. Sorting Wave’s become a task of adding tags to wave’s and then searching for a certain tag. I would like to see the ability to drag and drop wave’s into folders implemented in the near future.
• Group Waves – I would like to see the ability to automatically create a wave with a group of members already invited by default. This would be especially helpful with large project teams that are using wave as their main collaboration tool.

Overall I’m very impressed with Google wave and I’m excited to see the changes that will be implemented in the future. There are some things that I hope Google changes some things before launch but I’m sure they will take the feedback given and implement as many features as they can.

Cheers