The present invention is provides a system and method for interacting with data from a collaboration system over a network. Collaboration data is obtained from the collaboration system and stored locally at the client. Operations such as sorting and filtering may be completed by the local client without any interaction from the collaboration server. When an operation such as adding, changing, and deleting data is performed the collaboration server is contacted to determine whether or not the change is valid. Changes made to the local data automatically update the data at the collaboration server. List controls are added to the browser user interface that are similar to a spreadsheet, such as MS Excel, which enables a user to view, add, change, or delete information corresponding to the data stored by the collaboration system in a manner in which they are familiar.