JotSpot wiki 2

CNET editors' rating: 3.5 stars Very good
Detailed editors' rating
Setup and interface: 7.0
Features: 8.0
Performance: 0.0
Service and support: 7.0
Overall score: 7.3 (3.5 stars)
• Average user rating:
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Product summary

CNET editors' review

• Reviewed by: Elsa Wenzel
• Edited by: Robert Vamosi
• Reviewed on: 07/25/2006

JotSpot wiki 2 is an online tool that allows you to create private Web pages, maintain a calendar and other tools with fellow users, and attach photos and other files to your projects. The wiki-making service includes access to a basic online word processor and spreadsheet application, as well as blogs, photo galleries, and customizable databases, as well as project-management tools well suited for a company Intranet.

We visited jotspot.com and set up our free wiki within a few minutes. With our login and new JotSpot URL ready, we started adding content immediately. Free accounts allow only five users, 10 pages, and 100MB of storage. To maintain a larger wiki and share it with more people, JotSpot offers a range of rates. The four paid plans range from $9.95 per month for 10 users and 100 pages, to as much as $199.95 monthly for unlimited users and pages. Businesses are waking up to the usefulness of wikis; eBay and Intel are among the better known JotSpot customers.

The JotSpot layout is pretty simple, with major functions along the narrow left column and a large pane in the center to display content. You can choose from among several free JotSpot templates, or add your own logo and additional customization with a paid plan. We found that getting started with JotSpot requires about as much savvy as opening a blog with, say, TypePad. Most functions are intuitive; its's easy to double-click section titles, calendar days, and other elements to edit them. Unless you're already familiar with wikis, however, you should spend some time with the Help section before building your JotSpot pages.

The word processor within JotSpot's WikiHome screen includes Microsoft Word-like icons for the basic formatting functions, as well as for adding Web links and images. But if you're looking for an online word processor for personal use, ThinkFree online, Google's Writely beta, or ZohoWriter are better built for that purpose. JotSpot's photo pages were easy to figure out, but we could upload pictures only one at a time. Similarly, JotSpot File Cabinets let you save files--one at a time. And searching the Cabinets will sift through only the file description, not the file name or its text contents.

We like JotSpot's Spreadsheets, which allow you to use some of the same formulas as in Microsoft Excel and should come in handy if you need to crunch numbers with other users. The layout is both minimal and simple, which is a plus as it is with Google Spreadsheets. Unfortunately, JotSpot crashed when we pasted a 310-row text spreadsheet from Microsoft Excel. You can, however, link dynamic maps to chart addresses within your spreadsheets, thanks to JotSpot's integration with Yahoo Maps beta.

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