Web 2.0 CE - Week 5: Web Office Tools

Last week, in the MLA Web 2.0 CE course, we learned about web-based office tools (Google Docs, Zoho Office Suite, etc). I definitely see the advantages to web-based office tools. I love that you can easily share and edit documents with others without having to send attachments or work from the same computer. It's also nice to be able to work on presentations, spreadsheets, and word processing when you're not using a document that's saved to your home or office computer. That being said, it was obvious to me that especially with Google Docs, these web based office tools don't have as many features. As an example, there were only a few different presentation templates to choose from.

In addition to trying Google Docs, I signed up for and tried using Zoho Office Suite. It seemed like Zoho had a few more editing and formatting features. I also noticed with Zoho, you can work off line, which would be nice when you're on a flight or somewhere without internet access. Since I use gmail for my primary email, however, I would most likely use Google Docs more frequently.

It's hard for me to say if web office tools are the future of all software products. Like I said, I can definitely see the advantages of these tools, but I also think there's room for improvement. Also, people stick with what they know, and for some, it could be hard to transition to web-based tools.