Zoho Writer today launched the possibility of opening office documents that you find online in their online editor. This completely cuts out the desktop application. Previously users would have to download the document and then open it in their word processor. To me at least this new way of getting at documents sounds like it is going to be quicker. And if you are using Zoho Writer to make and edit all of your documents then obviously it is best to get your documents straight into Zoho rather than having to upload it later.

How Does It Work

You download a plugin to use in your browser (IE and Firefox) and then you can right click to get the option to open the file in Zoho Writer. The plugin has a nice options window that lets you decide whether you want it opening in a new tab, a new window, or the tab you were in. It works on .doc, .rtf, .odt, or .sxw files. Similar services for their spreadsheet and powerpoint systems are also being released today.

Performance Tests

Of the file formats that work .doc is the most common you see on the web, so I decided to use it for the test. I uploaded a small document of 32 kb to my web server and then I tried to open it via both of the methods. I started with Microsoft Word closed as that is my normal state. Here is the link to the document so that you can submit your findings in terms of times to load in the comments:

• test1.doc - (if you don’t have the Zoho Writer plugin then click here for the Zoho Writer test).

My timings from the time I clicked to the time I could read the document were:

Microsoft Word - 9 seconds.
Zoho Writer - 6 seconds.

Now lets try something a little different. Something a little harder. This time the file is 204 pages long and 960 kb. You can download them using these links:

• test2.doc - (if you don’t have the Zoho Writer plugin then click here for the Zoho Writer test).

I got:

Microsoft Word - 14 seconds.
Zoho Writer - 24 seconds.

So it looks like Zoho Writer is much slower than Microsoft Word with longer documents. Hopefully they can work on the script that they have running their end to try to get this time down. But significantly the time is comparable to using Word, and therefore if you were using Zoho for all your writing this would be a good solution. Since if the time for Word had to include reuploading and importing into Zoho then the direct Zoho import would definately win out.*

Problems For Zoho

Google and Zoho seem to me to now be the two companies most advanced down the Office 2.0 line. But Google already has a lot of people grabbed. And it’s products are getting more and more sticky. The day we see this particular tool appear for Google’s word processor, Writely, then Google could put the link right next to the Word document in the Gmail message. This sort of cornering is not available to Zoho. Obviously using plugins like those they have released you could always right click to get it in Zoho. But it is one more click. We’ll have to wait and see how it works out. Integration often comes at the expense of a free market.

*Note that right now it is not actually possible to directly import the content to your Zoho account using the new tools. But Arvind of Zoho assures me that this is coming soon.

As Arvind commented on the previous Zoho post, Zoho have just released their newest product. They fill the final whole they had in their office set, and release a slideshow tool: ZohoShow. And boy they have done a terrific job. It is like nothing I have seen before. It makes Writely look like a typewriter and puts Google Spreadsheets to shame on pure desktop feel and usability. But wait. They aren’t powerpoint products, lets be fair and compare like to like. How does it compare with ThumbStacks? It basically buries it.

Now I will be the first to admit that they have probably taken a lot of Thumbstacks in the producing of this tool. The Flickr integration idea for images is very similar, as is the overall UI. But ZohoShow beats ThumbStacks for the overall implementation. It is much slicker, and much more desktopy. I actually feel that it may be easier to make slideshows using this tool that in Powerpoint. I think that speaks volumes.

If you want to give it a quick feel then there is a demo account so you can try it in one click, or you can fill out four fields and register for an account. I would seriously urge you to. But say you are even lazier than that. Just click here to check the very quick presentation I made about the service. Thank you very much Zoho, you continue to raise the bar in the very competitive word of web office. Things are getting better and better.

TechCrunch have now got Zoho as a sponsor of the blog. This is a big commitment from the company since the spot costs $10,000 per month and there is a minimum term of 2 months (although I am sure that Omnidrive somehow slipped away before this). I love Zoho. I don’t use their products regularly at all but I used them briefly to write a review in which I found that their services were the most usable out there.

And not only that the unique (or at least near unique) thing about Zoho is that they are offering multiple services. In what could become a complete solution to your online office system. They need to tie them all together and make the UI’s really consistent, make it a single logon for all of them and then: bingo! Who needs Microsoft Office? Ok. Maybe the usability that Zoho can provide at this stage doesn’t quite match that of Office but it is improving and the convience of having yor documents stored online is immense. The only other companies that look set to do something like this are Google and Microsoft. But the fact of the matter is simple: Right now Zoho has everything but a slideshow tool, Google has one application up and only in limited test form and Microsoft has nothing. One up to Zoho.

Another area that is hotting up like the calendars is the online office space. That is applications that allow online editing and saving of documents. These range from standard word processors up to spreadsheet applications and online slideshow tools. Systems like these are all set to become the next generation of office tools. The next Microsoft Office. As I write Microsoft are preparing their take on the scene. I am not sure of the exact name but I am sure it will have Live in somewhere, definately a beta, maybe a Windows too. Rumours are rife that Google is preparing a suite to compete with all of these services, and the recent acquiring of Writely only serves as evidence for this case.

At this point it is key to note that the race is still on. No one has made a full office system that works totally via your browser all locked up under a single login. I know a blog that is devoted to this one aim, where a recent victory was celebrated when for the first time every office service became available online. The next step is getting it all with a consistent layout and interface, with one logon, from one company. As you’d expect Google and Microsoft are the big names that are up for this. But there are smaller new companies that have started to offer office services. Some just offer one or two, but Zoho is going full out to cover everything. And whilst Google and Microsoft are preparing theirs, Zoho has some services online now. So you can go and word process online right now with ZohoWriter or plan events with ZohoPlanner or (coming really soon) calculate things, and organise data with ZohoSheet.

When I first heard about this online office idea I was skeptical. It would always be too jerky I thought for it to ever be reasonable to use. And when I found ZohoWriter I was anixious to see if it would be smooth enough to be usable. Let me tell you: it is. It is not exactly like Word. It is not as feature rich, it is not quite as intuitive and it is a little more jerky. But it is usable. And most importantly it works completely in your browser. ZohoWriter also takes advantage of its webbased position. Whilst it keeps in touch with the obviously dominant desktop side of word processing, allowing the import and export of documents (as Word or Open Office going in and as Word, OO or PDF going out), it also adds new functionality. It lets you share documents with friends and you can chose to allow them to view or allow them to contribute to the document too. This is great for group projects. But don’t worry about someone (even if they are a “friend”) deleting some content that you wanted. ZohoWriter supports versioning. Every save is saved with a version number and you can always switch back to any previous version in two clicks. The whole interface is written in AJAX to make everything super smooth and it is relatively bug free. The initial loading time for the application is significant. It even has a loading bar — but once it is done the rest of the processes are wait free. It supports tabs allowing you to have multiple documents open at once without windows all over the place and it autosaves for you. It has a great full screen feature that probably offers me more typing space than Word can. There are a few hitches with the import of documents and the loss of some formatting but overall it is what you expect — Word in your browser.

[ View Full Sized ]

The other two applications from Zoho that are directly linked with the office, that is the Spreadsheet and Planning services, are very similar. ZohoSheet is very new and is currently only in a private beta. When I tried it I found it to be impressive at first. Just like with the Writer product it seemed like Excel in the browser. But it lacked serious functionality. It could calculate things, and it could work with basic formulae. It however doesn’t allow for the extremely useful dragging of formulae or numbers across many cells to avoid lots of arduous work entering the same (or a similar) things again and again. It also can’t graph yet but I am told that this feature is on the way. I certainly hope so. It is much nicer to see your numbers in a picture than as endless rows of data. Again you can import data and you can share your ZohoSheet once you have it uploaded with or without write permissions. And again the interface is slick (and consistent) and fast. This product still needs a fair bit of work, and I do hope that it gets it, but then it will be brilliant.

ZohoPlanner is an older product. But simpler too. It is not really immediately comparable with anything that is found in Microsoft Office but it allows you to make day to day to do lists in a very neat way. It will add them to a calendar, remind you of events (if you wish), and produce page summaries of what you have going on. It is not by any means a calendar application. It is strictly centred around to dos rather than having boxes of days. I made a page quickly enough of things that I would like to do with my website and shared it publicly (i.e. with everyone). The page produced it this. It allows for comments on the list and when I have done one I can tick it off on the list. It is all very nice. Simple, but nice.

Overall I think that Zoho is a company that is doing great things. It is innovating in a space that is about to be hit by the web giants. But notice Zoho have beaten them to it, they are there now whereas the others are only coming soon. I hope that Zoho keep building and start to integrate their services into one suite. I know that would make Ismael very happy.