doc

A to-do list slip-up, not new a Google Docs app

OK, Google watchers, you can slow down your pulse. That to-do list posting on the Google Docs blog appears to have been an innocent mix-up.

Google marketing manager Andrew Chang inadvertently published his to-do list on a blog while testing his posting software. It wasn't a hastily removed preview of a new Google online to-do list application, a possibility some raised.

"I was testing out a feature that allows you to create and edit blog posts in Docs and publish them directly to your blog," Chang said in a follow-up post afterward. "One button click later, … Read more

Gadgets open door to Google's enterprise apps

Correction: the original article misattributed comments to the two Google executives I interviewed. The attributions have been changed.

Google's move on Wednesday to open up an online shop for third-party Google Apps add-ons, called Google Solutions Marketplace, may make more people take Web widgets more seriously--even enterprise developers.

Widgets, or gadgets, allow people to embed small applets within a Web page for things like displaying the weather, or set alarms on a PC or other Web device.

But Google Gadgets is also one way that Google encourages software developers to customize Google Apps.

In March, Google launched a visualization API (… Read more

Google Docs Offline: It works, sort of

I finally got access to Google Docs offline, the launch of which I covered yesterday. I understand why Google is pitching it as a safety net for a flaky online connection, as opposed to an honest-to-goodness offline application. As we noted yesterday, you cannot yet create a new document when offline. And something we weren't told: when working offline, you can't insert a picture into a file nor review its revision history.

Furthermore, offline edit reconciliation isn't quite what I was told it would be. I fired up a shared Docs file, pulled the Ethernet plug on … Read more

Google Docs getting offline access

Google Docs' word processor is finally getting offline access. Using the free Google Gears extension, users will soon be able to read and edit their files even when they have no Internet connection.

The Gears-enabled version of Google Docs will roll out to users over the next few weeks, starting Monday. If you don't have access to the feature, just keep trying, Google Docs product manager Ken Norton told me. You'll know you have the feature when you see a little "offline" menu item in the upper right of your document window in Google Docs.

Offline … Read more

Google Docs: Now with more Word 2003

Google today updated the menu structure of the word processor in Google Docs. Gone are the menus that change the toolbars underneath. Gone are the useful but unusual "revision" and "tag" items. What we have now is familiar to anyone who's used Microsoft Word 2003. In fact, the five menu items have the same names as items on the menu bar of Word 2003.

Google is saying that Microsoft got it right in 2003. Ironically, with the 2007 Office suite, Microsoft itself has moved on to a prettier, but not universally loved menu structure that … Read more

Does Microsoft need a value menu?

Microsoft has been tight-lipped about the "Albany" product that it has just started testing, but ZDNet blogger Mary Jo Foley hears it might be a consumer bundle that includes Windows Live OneCare, Office Live Workspace, and Office Home and Student Edition.

The product, which apparently also goes by the name "ValueBox" may be an attempt to beef up the consumer version of Office amid stepped-up competition from Google Docs and other free and online competitors.

It strikes me, though, that Microsoft may be looking at ways to protect the Home and Student version of Office, a … Read more

Microsoft heads to 'Albany'

Microsoft confirmed Friday that it has started testing for a product code-named "Albany" but would not offer further details on the product, which may or may not be its ad-funded version of Works.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley posted a report earlier Friday saying that Albany is a consumer product in the Office family. She didn't get anything concrete out of Redmond either, but has some informed speculation of what it might be.

Microsoft said last year that it plans to test an ad-funded version of Works, following several years of exploring the idea. However, it is … Read more

DocSyncer helps wean users from Microsoft Office

In my preview of the Under the Radar conference I questioned the business viability of the document management product DocSyncer, which, among other things, takes users' Microsoft Office files (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint) and synchronizes them into a Google Docs or Google Apps account.

After taking a closer look at this business, I think there's something very valuable here, at least for the short term. Businesses that don't want to install Office on all employees' machines can, with this tool, still give them easy access to the files that the high-zoot Office users are working on. Of course, … Read more

Use Google Docs to share, manage your NCAA basketball pool

For the next three weeks, office workers across the country will have visions of buzzer-beaters dancing in their heads.

It's NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament time, and that means brackets will be zipping through e-mail systems in organizations large and small. There are dozens of sites that let you make your tournament choices online, whether to test your basketball-prediction acumen against the masses, or to recruit friends and coworkers in a private pool.

You can even use Google's Basketball Bracket Battle gadget to place your choices on your iGoogle page. After you select the "Create a bracket … Read more

gDocsBar now turns Google Docs into a Web archiving tool

Remember gDocsBar (download), that handy Firefox extension we checked out a few months back? It got a pretty neat update today that lets you do things that might not have been originally intended for Google's Documents and Spreadsheets service. The first is called Webclips, which is a fancy way of saying automatic copy and paste. If you find a big chunk of content you like, you can simple copy it, then drag it into the toolbar. gDocsBar will create a new document out of whatever you've highlighted, and preserve, as much as possible, the formatting and links.

The … Read more