Google relaunches Writely and Spreadsheets as Google Docs and Spreadsheets

Google inches closer to Microsoft Office with its relaunched versions of Writely and Spreadsheets.

The relaunch of Google Docs & Spreadsheets – still in beta – has brought together the previously separate services on a common platform. Now, once you log in with your Google account, both spreadsheets and the word processor are available in the same interface.

Google Docs & Spreadsheets follows in the same path as Google’s other services, offering hosted services for free. So far, Docs & Spreadsheets do not have any ads at all, unlike Gmail which has related text ads in the interface.

The Docs and Spreadsheets tools will easily lets you bring in a group working on projects and documents. Importing and exporting of file formats is possible, includes Microsoft’s Word and Excel files. There are lots of things you can do with these documents. Users can share it with group to edit or view. Documents can also be published online for public use for blogs.

Does Google Docs & Spreadsheets take it closer to Microsoft Office? If you look at features, no. MS Office offers a wide range of applications, which offer more features. Industry sources say, though Microsoft is nice and high, Google is inching towards making its own full-fledged office suit. But Google seems to be taking it a step at a time, clarifying that not threatening the existence of Microsoft Office suit and are in no way a direct competition to them. 

According to Google, they just compiled both the services, based on feedback from users. Google has also come out clean that these services lack some advanced features and compliment the desktop products. The company said that they are sticking to its strategy of giving common platform to its many individual online services into a fewer sets. There is a possibility that other products from Google labs might join the Writely and Spreadsheets group. The obvious ones that come to mind that Google Calendar, Google Page Creator and Google Reader. So far, we have not heard about any plans for a an online presentation app similar to Powerpoint from Google.

Google launched Google Apps for Your Domain, in August this year. A suit of hosted applications aimed for small and medium-sized organizations. This free suit offers Gmail Web mail service, online calendar, Talk instant messaging service and Page Creator. But, for large organizations this will be made fee-based. It’s not clear Google Docs and Spreadsheets will be included in it. 

There is a slight concern among the top executives of Google, that people are not able to keep tack of what services Google are coming up with. With the speed of product ad service realize Google does, this was bound to happen someday. The relaunch of Writely and Spreadsheets as Google Docs & Spreadsheets can be seen as a reaction to this – an effort to add and refine features instead of coming out with new products.

Dial G for Google the Doctor.

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