Computer-implemented method for emulating a physical, open-office environment, uc application for carrying out the method, and communication for real-time communication and collaboration

A computer-implemented method for emulating a physical, open-office environment in which a plurality of teams are working, each team having a plurality of team members, wherein at least one team member of a first team is working remotely, and wherein the at least one remotely working team member is connected to the other team members and to other teams by using a Unified Communications (UC) application for collaborating and communicating with the other team members and the other teams, the method comprising:

• providing a list of team members, wherein the team members are grouped according to the team they are working with;
• establishing a virtual floor plan comprising a location of every team in a virtual office, wherein the location of every team on the virtual floor plan corresponds to an arrangement of the teams in a real physical office building;
• determining a distance between the teams on the virtual floor plan according to a distance between the teams in the real physical office building;
• detecting conversations of the teams;
• and
• outputting the conversations of the teams such that the conversations is outputtable at an output device located at the at least one remotely working team member, wherein a volume of the conversations of the teams outputted via the output device is adapted according to the distance between the teams to provide a working atmosphere according to the real physical office building.

A communication system for real time communication and collaboration, comprising:

• a server having a processor connected to a non-transitory computer readable medium, the server being communicatively connectable to a plurality of clients, the non-transitory computer readable medium having an application stored thereon such that the server performs a method defined by the application when the processor runs the application, the method comprising:
• providing a list of team members for a plurality of teams, each of the team members being grouped according to a team they are associated with;
• establishing a virtual floor plan comprising a location of every team in a virtual office, wherein the location of every team on the virtual floor plan corresponds to an arrangement of the teams in a real physical office building;
• determining a distance between the teams on the virtual floor plan according to a distance between the teams in the real physical office building;
• detecting conversations of the teams;
• and
• outputting the conversations of the teams such that the conversations are outputtable via at least one output device located at at least one remotely working team member of the teams, wherein a volume of the conversations of the teams outputted via the output device is adapted according to the distance between the teams to provide a working atmosphere according to the real physical office building.