Google Docs & Spreadsheets

Going by the trend of my posts, you can see that I'm bit of a Google fan. So what if they are going to dominate the world? As long as they continue to provide easy-to-use, free services, I really wouldn't care less.

A couple of weeks ago, Google came up with Docs and Spreadsheets. Obviously, you can use it to write a document (with Docs) or create a spreadsheet to keep your finances intact with erm, Spreadsheets.

Let's first take a look at Docs.

Docs looks like what you'll get if you log on to Google's own Blogger. You have your typical cut/copy-n-paste buttons, the undo/redo buttons, alignment setting buttons, bullet points, numbered lists, spelling checker, etc. Pretty standard fare for a word processor. I wouldn't expect anything less.

The standard array of word processing tools in Docs

The compelling feature of Docs, apart from the fact that it's free, is that you can invite “Collaborators” to edit the document with you, in real time. I can see this being very useful for group projects, where the group needs to come up with a single report. In addition, you can publish the document directly to Blogger (which is what I'll be doing). It's good to see features and services from the same company work seamlessly together.

Update: Sigh..I spoke too soon. I tried, but couldn't publish it to Blogger.

An Error occurred while publishing this document to Tech Miser

If you don't have a blog, you can simply to publish it online. Google will give it a dedicated URL, then anybody can view it online.

Invite people to edit your document (in real time) in Docs

It's a pity that Google didn't incorporate Google Talk or any chat function into Docs as most probably, you'll need to talk to your project mates to tell them why you decide to edit the document this way or that.

While the "Docs" don't have a chat feature, Spreadsheets has one. This only shows that Docs and Spreadsheets are done by 2 different teams. But I'll expect Google to sort them out sooner than later.

Similar to Docs, you can invite Collaborators to edit your spreadsheet in Spreadsheet. Apart from that, you have the usually array of "spreadsheet" functions, and a decent amount of formulas. I don't really use spreadsheets other than doing comparison reports where you need neat tables, but from the looks of it, the typical accountant should find the features sufficient for his or her calculations.

Google Spreadsheets: Pretty mean set of calculation tools for a web-based application

It's good to note that Docs and Spreadsheet, like a lot of things now, are web-based. In other words, there's no need for messy, HDD space occupying, registry cluttering installations. Another great thing about it being web-based is that you can use Docs and Spreadsheet as long as you have a browser and an Internet connection.

Docs and Spreadsheet's portability, ease-of-use and the fact that it's free ranks high on my list of recommended "software". In fact, I'm going to write all my blog entries using Docs starting from this post onwards. I will even skip MS Word and Excel (as they cost money) and Open Office Writer and Calc (as they're sluggish) altogether!

Try out Docs and Spreadsheets, here