Real-time collaboration - overview

The real-time collaboration with track changes and comments feature for CKEditor 5 makes it possible for multiple users to work on the same document at once. Thanks to the robustness of the implemented solution, the collaborative editing process may take place not only in the same document but even in the same part of it, without content locking.

The real-time collaboration feature also provides change tracking that can be followed live and comments on the go, turning the online editing process into a real-life discussion. This provides a fast, efficient, collaborative editing experience like no other.

All the above features are customizable, allowing you to present the user interaction in a variety of creative ways. This makes implementing real-time collaborative editing within your application a tailored out-of-the-box experience.

You can read more about it and see the demo on the real-time collaborative editing product page.

# Real-time collaboration implementation

The real-time collaboration functionality is achieved through the blazing-fast CKEditor Cloud Services backend, communicating in real-time with end users and synchronizing all the content. It is accompanied by the following plugins on the CKEditor 5 side:

• Real-time collaborative editing – Allows multiple users to simultaneously edit the same document. It also automatically resolves all conflicts if users make changes at the same time.
• Real-time collaborative comments – Make it possible to add comments to any part of the content in the editor.
• Real-time collaborative track changes – Changes to the content are saved as suggestions that can be accepted or discarded later.
• Revision history – A document versioning tool that allows users to create and view the chronological revision history of their content.
• Users selection and presence list – Show the selection of other users live and let you view the list of users currently editing the content in the editor.

The cloud service needs a commercial license (which you can test in this trial) and the plugins need to be added to the CKEditor 5 WYSIWYG editor build before using it.

The CKEditor 5 Collaboration Features plugins can be integrated with any CKEditor 5 build to provide a fully flexible and customizable experience. This can be achieved with either the online builder (the easy and fast way) or by installing the plugins by hand (the advanced way).

# Offline plugins

Collaborative editing can also be achieved in an asynchronous, non-real-time way thanks to the standalone track changes and comments offline plugins, also available in this trial bundle.

# Using the Real-time collaboration feature

Please refer to the Quick start guide for information on how to start using the feature.