The present invention provides a computer implemented 
collaboration system and method for accessing 
multiple domain data sources and allowing data from those sources to be analyzed and manipulated within a multi-user distributed environment where all 
visualization, 
processing, and agent applications work collaboratively. In one embodiment, the 
collaboration system (10) is organized into an N-tier infrastructure including a 
data management tier (50), an 
information access tier (52), a services tier (54), and a 
user interface tier (56). The infrastructure of the 
collaboration system (10) rides upon a CORBA communications framework. The 
data management tier (50) includes data sources (112) and provides 
data management capabilities normally supplied by 
database management systems. The repository tier (52) is comprised of repository servers (12) and provides 
adaptive services to make the data maintained within the data sources (112) available to services in the services tier (54) and the 
client tools in the 
user interface tier (56). The services tier (54) is comprised of 
data channel servers (14), a 
library server (16), a participant 
server (24), a 
context server (26), and a document 
server (28). The services tier (54) maintains the majority of the 
business logic as applied to a specific domain problem. The 
user interface tier (56) is comprised of 
thin client tools (18) that allow the user to interact with the data in the data sources (112).