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rdf8585

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 15, 2006
129
0
Has anyone dumped MS Office, Neo Office, Open Office and the like and relied on web-based spreadsheets and word processors?

Considering it.
 
I didn't know web based ones exist, but no, I'd never do that. Sounds like it would be a huge mess.

The only office suite I've used is MS Office. It has its annoyances, but it isn't too bad, much better than its Windows couterpart.
 
yg17 said:
I didn't know web based ones exist, but no, I'd never do that. Sounds like it would be a huge mess.

The only office suite I've used is MS Office. It has its annoyances, but it isn't too bad, much better than its Windows couterpart.

There's Google Spreadsheets I'm not aware of any other.

I gave MS Office the flick for iWork '06 I'm looking forward to what version '07 has to offer.
 
Never. Too risky. I quite like office- I couldn't be a mac user without this. Windows compatibility is #1 for me when it comes to offic suites. Also, I liked the office bundle- not just word and excel. I don't know why'd you want to do this- :confused:
 
I got the office suite when I first started using my powerbook and I really can't imagine being without it. I use it frequently to open files sent to me by friends and family.

Why on earth would you want to take a 'good thing' (office suite and sheer 'compatibility') and lower your adaptibility? :confused:
 
rdf8585 said:
Has anyone dumped MS Office, Neo Office, Open Office and the like and relied on web-based spreadsheets and word processors?

Considering it.
I like and use MS Office for the Mac and Windows.

Web-based sounds okay. At this time I prefer to be able to use my apps without connectivity to the Internet so I prefer the stand along types -- especially when traveling.
 
No, but I'm curious. Confidentiality issues mostly prevent me from doing it. I think it's a neat idea though, and it could be revolutionary for casual users....
 
I guess I fall into the "casual user" range. I just keep a few spreadsheets and do a word doc from time to time for school. Neo Office is alright, but its slow and clunky.

Google recently bought Writerly, and there's ZoHo Writer too.
 
celebrian23 said:
...I don't know why'd you want to do this- :confused:

It's atractive because you can work on a document and then save it. Then fly halfway around the world sit down at some random computer in (say a Tokyo bookstore) and bring up you document and continue working on if. All you have to do is trust Google to do good backups and keep your stuff private. Goggle is actually quite good at this.

One more thing, you and several others who are spread out geographically can all work on the document at once. Yes at the same time and do edits and markups in real time.

Taken to logical conclusion you would never need to install any software on your computer and every conputer in the world could given the right passwod, have access to the same data and documents. No need ever again to "send" a file and no need ever again the "sync" a notebook computer. Globally accessable and available storage is a great idea. If you can trust the people who store it for you.
 
I guess it's just a matter of getting used to, for most people who're worried about privacy. There are millions who take their web based email accounts on yahoo, gmail and the like for granted. They send personal photos, personal emails, documents and all kinds of stuff you'd be scared to expose to the external world. Corporates may not encourage this unless they can create specific contracts and agreements with web based office suite providers. But for personal use, a little common sense in what kind of information is entered would help make web based office suites a very useful tool for sharing stuff.

Sharing, collaborating and accessibility from almost anywhere in the world are the advantages for such systems - in our networked world, these outweigh any other disadvantages.
 
I find Office on my 1GB PowerBook Pro (Intel) to be so slow! Especially slow with any graphics. It also crashes occasionally. I can't wait for the Universal Binary version...

I've investigated alternative office suites, but none are compatible enough with DOC files. RTF may be a work-around for this though.

If you want an Office compatible (mostly) web client, try www.thinkfree.com - quite good if if you want this sort of thing.

Andrew
 
And if you don't have an internet connection...

Just save all your work to an FTP server. Then you get the benefits of a desktop suite with the ability to download from anywhere.
 
mkrishnan said:
No, but I'm curious. Confidentiality issues mostly prevent me from doing it. I think it's a neat idea though, and it could be revolutionary for casual users....


I agree. It is a pretty cool app, but privacy keeps me from using it. There is also the fact that I have to depend on my WAN link to access my spreedsheets which isn't a good idea in you have your router/switches ip's and logins on a spreedsheet in google.
 
Relying on a connection

Using web based apps you are relying on a connection. Here at my work we use web based applications and on Friday we had a power surge and we didn't have access to the network so we just sat around and waited for our connection to come back. I like the idea but it's a risk to have only web based spreadsheets and calendars.

Guy
 
rdf8585 said:
Has anyone dumped MS Office, Neo Office, Open Office and the like and relied on web-based spreadsheets and word processors? Considering it.

I never knew web based word processors count, unless you are refering to the likes of the enhanced text area provided in Yahoo Email or Hotmail.

Google Spreadsheets is alright, but you cannot always have an internet connection everywhere anytime. Eg. even broadband from our own ISPs fail at times.
 
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