A collaborative working application employing an instant messaging service
allows a group of members to track the usage of a resource by dynamically
creating an arbitrary resource name representing a resource of any type
or representing a group of existing resource names, reserving and
releasing the resource name in real-time by changing its virtual lock
status, querying the resource status, and queuing against a locked
resource name so as to be notified when the resource becomes available.
The resource names may further be organized in a hierarchy for ease of
management. Other features would also be discussed.