Economic Crisys and Google Office

Economic crisys is upon us. All of us. Wherever we are. In the intangled world of today noone is exampt from feeling it. To cope one has to cut spending to what is necessary. This much is trivial.

I predict that in that environment more people then usual will want to try Google Docs which I like to call Google Office. Google got gMail and Calendar, Documents (word editor), Spreadsheets, and Presentation. They all are web 2.0 applications, which I call HTML/CSS/Javascript applications doing enough on client and use Ajax well enough to create good responsiveness.



So far I did not see users giving up on their Microsoft Office or even Open Office and marching on to Google Office.

I am working on a Google Docs integrated Project like appliction to fill the void Google left in that area. Our team made decision to use Google Docs exclusively. It was and still is a right decision. Because now I know first hands the good the bad and the ugly sides of them.

I belive that in down economy one should try it. It is free. I encourage you to do so. It allows collaboration, which is important when travel budgets are slashed.
On the same breath, I want to manage your expectations a bit. You might discover it is too early for you.

(Added on 2008-11-15, I just found the fresh Business Week article saying the same thing:

CHEAP TECH FOR HARD TIMES
By Steve Hamm

As the U.S. enters what appears likely to be a painful recession, a major shift is taking place in how businesses assess technology products. They’re under terrific pressure to cut costs. According to a newly revised forecast from market researcher IDC, growth in U.S. tech spending will decline to 0.9% in 2009, down from a previous forecast of 4.9% growth. But rather than just slice budgets across the board, many companies are switching to a handful of new technologies that save them money. These technologies existed during the last recession, but they were immature. Now they’re established, and the downturn seems likely to hasten their adoption. Chief among them are software delivered over the Internet, known as cloud computing, such as Google Apps...)



Google Office - the Good The Bad and The Ugly.

The good - it is online. It runs on every major browser and every OS. It passes the minimal requirements test in terms of usability and features. It is free. It is highly collaborative. It is, to a degree, integrated. It is constantly evolving and improving. It is versioned (Docs, Spreadsheets) meaning you can get back to old versions. It got API, meaning 3rd party applications can be added to make use of the core set and complement the missing features.

The bad - some applications are more mature then others. gMail, Calendar and Spreadsheets are better then the rest (In My Humble Opinion). Ajax, the technology Google use limits what is easy or even possible to do. No use of Flash or Silverlight makes it run on every browser with nothing else installed, but limits in many ways.

The ugly - sometimes the limitations of Ajax make you cry. Many bugs. Long documents are very hard to edit in Documents. For some reason Documents renamed my internal bookmarks. It all means that Google Office is for early adopters, not mainstream and not for enterprise where reliability is crucial.

I am prepared to live with bad and the ugly. I am set to improve it where I can (see www.gganttic.com). That is because it evolves. I see improvements all the time. Being early adopter I am more tolerant to rough edges, hoping to win by being first to ride the paradigm shift.

Wheter Google Office is right for you I can not say. And you can not say either, unless you try. Do it.