Most existing groupware products are either too passive or very intrusive. They either passively wait for user action or actively interfere with normal workstation activity by intruding on the user's screen; they are one-sided push or pull mechanisms.

The Active Mail architecture obviates the dilemma with a protocol that enables a groupware application to involve a new user in a way which is non-intrusive, tolerates delayed response, and requires little effort on the user's part.

Active Mail uses ordinary electronic mail to establish direct (not electronic-mail-based) interactive connections between users and groupware applications. Active Mail piggybacks on ordinary electronic mail, thus retaining all the features that have made it so successful.

Groupware applications already realized within the Active Mail framework include a text conversation tool, a collaborative writing facility with a floor passing protocol and revision control management, an interactive meeting scheduler, and some distributed multi-participant interactive games.

In this talk we describe the Active Mail architecture, present some of its applications, and discuss our preliminary experience with it.

Joint work with Yaron Goldberg, Marilyn Safran, and Bill Silverman.