Google has updated its interface for their Docs & Spreadsheets application. Besides the visual improvements, they’ve also “replaced” tags with folders, and added a “Google Suggest” function to the search box, that finds matches as you type. (Neat!)

While some may consider the move from tags back to folders a step backwards, the change is really superficial - under the hood, it’s still the same old tagging system. The only difference is how most users will interpret it.

The old ways

As TechCrunch indicates, there are still many people who prefer the traditional folder model over the tagging model. Tagging is a more recent phenomenon, made popular by sites like Del.icio.us at the growing crowd of “Web 2.0″ sites. Most people are familiar with folders for organization, since it’s a feature the user would have gotten used to in using a computer’s file system. Even though tags, (or “labels”, as Google calls them) are preferred by some, including myself, clearly Google has had research indicate to them that folders would work well for more people.

However, the change to folders wasn’t really a total overhaul - as you can tell from this quote from their announcement:

Even cooler, our new folders continue to work like the tags they’ve replaced - your old tags are automatically converted to folders and documents can live in more than one folder at a time.

This is confirmed by using the new Docs & Spreadsheets - though the icons look like folders, they can be made to behave like tags. They’ve tried to make some aspects like traditional folders; for example, when you’re in folder view and you drag a file to another folder, it is “moved” to that new folder - but what’s really happened is that the first folder/tag is dropped, and replaced by the new one. (In the “All Items” view, dragging an item to a folder merely adds the item to the new folder, without removing it from other folders it was in - just like tagging)

Folders in the application do not operate in the traditional sense, since you cannot create sub-folders, at least not at present. (I got a “server error” when trying to move a folder into another one) This betrays the true nature of the folders - they’re just tags in folder’s clothing. The interface has merely been re-designed to promote a folder-centric view of tags.

This isn’t something I’m against, as since I’ve indicated I prefer tags over folders. In fact, I think that this is a good move for Google, since they can accommodate both types of users - those who prefer the old folder organization, and those who prefer organization by tags. The present system gives a good illusion of folders (albeit without sub-folder support), but can easily be made to work as a tagging system. Some have also speculated that this change could be a harbinger of things to come for Gmail. Perhaps they’re rolling out this system to see how it does with the smaller Docs & Spreadsheets crowd before moving it into big-time action with the Gmail userbase.

Pretty sights

The visual side of the interface has also been given a facelift. With this, it looks and operates more like a traditional desktop application. This contrast with Google’s approach to Gmail, and resembles more Yahoo!’s approach to their mail client. Could this be another indication of Google wanting to make interface changes to Gmail, perhaps making it more like a desktop mail client in order to compete with Yahoo! Mail better? They’ve certainly done a good job with Docs & Spreadsheets, as the interface is pretty but not overdone. Furthermore, the “Back” button functionality is not broken and drag & drop works like a charm

One improvement they could make would be taken from Gmail’s interface - allow adding of items to folders/tags on-the-fly, without having to create the folder beforehand.

Security and Privacy concerns

Docs & Spreadsheets is undoubtedly very useful for collaboration across distances, or really for any project work in general. The prospect of no longer having to physically bring files between computers using sneakernet is a compelling enough reason, and I believe most people, especially students, would use this service, so as long as they knew about it. (I still think Google has to get out more knowledge of this service)

However, I’m less excited about this service when it comes to business use. So far, companies have been reluctant to store sensitive information with third parties, and for good reason - you may just never know who has access to your data, and furthermore, the risks of data loss may not be known. For personal use, these concerns also have merit. For businesses, something like Google Apps Premier Edition, a paid service with guarantees, would probably be better. Some of their services may even allow you to host the data behind your firewall.

A competitor to Microsoft Office?

While Google Docs is a great tool, I hardly think it’s a competitor to Microsoft Office. The two are really in separate markets. So far, online word processors can’t match the functionality of desktop ones, but are still good for a lot of what you’d need to do with documents. A closer competitor to Google Docs would probably be Microsoft’s Office Live, another suite of online tools. This service also has free and paid subscriptions. The service still has some way to go before it can be considered a serious contender in the office/work productivity arena, that is, if Google ever intends it to be.

While I am impressed by the features offered by Writely (and in general, what’s possibly with technologies like Ajax), it doesn’t offer anything, feature-wise, that would make it a killer of current online word processors, such as Zoho Writer. Don’t get me wrong - Writely does seem like a good web-app, but if it’s going to eat into the market share of its competitors, it’ll probably be because of the Google brand name.

Features

Firstly, a little background. Online word-processors with interactive user interfaces on-par with regular desktop applications would not be possible if it weren’t for things like Ajax, which make updating selective parts of the web page possible, rather than having to reload the entire page for every change. This allows web pages, which were typically “static”, (that is, once they were loaded, they couldn’t do anything else but be read), to be used as interfaces to more complex things like web-based applications.

Writely is an online word-processor based on these principles. Now, you might ask, “Why would I use Writely when I have MS Word right here?” Well, there are a few reasons: Firstly, it’s free. Secondly, because it works on the web, it’s available anywhere you have access to the Internet, and you can save all of your documents online in your account there, so they’re automatically available where you are as well - no more having to carry your files back and forth or e-mail them to yourself.

Being an online application also allows it to incorporate some features not available on traditional, desktop apps. For example, like Google’s Calendar and SpreadSheets (and most other online office programs), documents can be made public or shared among a list of trusted users. Furthermore, more than one person can be working on, or editing a document, at one time. These features can be very useful for collaboration - no more having to e-mail or IM the person you’re working on a document with, bouncing multiple copies of the same document back and forth! All of these features are designed to use the Internet to its full advantage, to better allow for the flow of information an ideas.

Technicalities

Technical-wise, Writely is very good. Right-clicks open up a custom context menu, replacing the standard browser one with a menu that’s more appropriate for a word-processor. Standard keyboard shortcuts like bold (ctrl-b), italics (ctrl-i), save (ctrl-s), undo (ctrl-z) and redo (ctrl-y), work well, and documents are auto-saved as you type. All of this makes for an experience that’s very close to that of a desktop-application.

The interface is quite plain, and very basic, though it gets the job done. I’m very surprised that Google didn’t change it to make it look more “Google-ish”. Indeed, the product name is still Writely and not something like “Google Writer or “Google Writely”. It isn’t even listed on Google’s services page, or their Labs’ site, as far as I can tell. You still use a separate account to log into Writely, not your Google account, though I suspect this may change very soon. This current lack of integration with other Google services may be an indication that they’re still working on improving it before it goes “primetime”, but it’s somewhat weird. Sometimes, Google fully integrates the companies that they buy (such as what they did for Google Earth), but other times they keep the brand name if it’s popular enough, as was the case with Blogger.

Can it compete?

While the list of features from Writely is impressive - it’s a real example of the neat stuff that can be done on the web today - it’s far from being a unique or “first-time” feature set. Zoho Writer offers many of the same features, and is part of a full online office suite that Google has yet to get out the door. For people who have been using Zoho Writer a lot, there will be little incentive to switch to Writely, save the promise of being part of Google’s huge service and product list.

I think the biggest thing Writely has going for it right now is the fact that it’s backed by Google - and that’s a huge advantage. When Google wants to promote one of its services, it will almost certainly do well - when Google Video was linked off of the main Google home page (a move designed put the pressure on YouTube), traffic jumped almost immediately. Now, I’m not saying Writely will gain that sort of sway just yet, but the very fact that it carries the Google title means it will generate more buzz than a similar products. Reading the topic and comments over at TechCrunch, (who are normally less than enthusiastic about Google products), you get the idea that many people are insanely excited about Writely, and it being “another good Google service”.

Now, don’t get me wrong - I think Google has a lot of good services - Google Maps and Gmail come to mind, but not everything they release can possible be the best in its class. However, I do think it’s good that they’re active in all areas, as it indicates they’re keen of what’s going on around them.

The question remains

Even with all this talk about features and “web 2.0″ and the like, one big question remains - are there enough users to support having services like Writely? While I like the application and could probable be persuaded to use it for a few things, there are issues remaining that prevent wide adoption. Firstly, no one’s going to want to use this to store private and sensitive documents and information. While there’s a reasonable guarantee of security on your account, storing something online on a server is inherently less secure than physically storing it on your own computer. Furthermore, since you’re storing it online, all data is sent over the Internet, further complicating security.

But, perhaps more importantly, is convincing users why to switch. Currently, I don’t think there’s much incentive to. Despite the aforementioned features of online collaboration, that by itself is not enough to sway most people, especially in the corporate environment where the majority has standardized around Microsoft Office, and are reluctant to update to even a new version of MS Office, for fear of the new interface causing user problems. Most people don’t use web-applications beyond webmail, and would probably find something like an online word-processor confusing. Furthermore, online word processors still don’t have all the features that desktop ones do, so for some work, an online word-processor just not going to cut it.

Mixed Emotions

I have mixed feelings towards Writely, and online applications in general. Some, I believe, are very useful (such as webmail), and I simply couldn’t do without them. Others, while being very technically spiffy and cool, have limited functionality in the real-world, it seems. I don’t want to seem like pessimist, as even if a web-app doesn’t have practical value right now, it does its part by showing was is possible, and improving the technology so that something that does have practical value can be developed later on. I give props to the people behind Writely, as they’ve done a great job. I’ll be checking up on it periodically to see what’s being added or changed.

Luckily, the folks over at Microsoft have realized this and are making attempts to change this. The markup the beta version generates is not perfect yet, but they admit this and are working to fix this. Currently, the beta of Word 2007 supports posting to services like Blogger and MSN Spaces (of course), among a few others, but the coolest thing is that Microsoft should be providing an API for the posting service, so it’s conceivable that platforms like WordPress (which I use for this site) could have plugins available that make posting from Word a reality. Once the bugs are worked out, and customization of the markup it outputs is made available, I think it could work.

However, I’m pretty happy with the editor in WordPress right now; it’s TinyMCE, and for the most part it works quite well at generating sensible markup.