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You have a copy of the original document on your computer, and you upload it to an online word processor -- let's say, Adobe Buzzword -- and invite your fellow committee members as collaborators. Now, each committee member can make changes to the document, or notes with suggestions for changes, and everyone can take a look at the document at their own convenience.
As the deadline approaches, with several key changes having been made or suggested by committee members, you clean up the document and send out a followup e-mail: "Does this look OK, with the changes everyone has suggested?"
Possible benefit
The potential for collaboration is one benefit to online word processors, spreadsheets and application suites. Some of the best-known names are Adobe Buzzword, Google Documents or the "Web Apps" version of Microsoft Office, which is now in preview. There are a number of others out there as well.
Online word processors won't necessarily replace the word processor that runs on your desktop computer, but they can be handy tools, especially for collaboration or if a user needs to access the same document from multiple computers. If a document is on a web server, you can get to it wherever you are -- home, work, the library, a Wi-Fi hotspot, what have you.
An online word processor, ideally, works very much like the local word processor running on your machine. You edit the files from a web page, or from a very small desktop client. The controls look pretty similar to those on your normal desktop word processor, but the heavy lifting is being done on a server somewhere, not on your local computer. Actual performance can be affected by the speed of your computer and the speed of your internet connection. The files aren't stored on your computer; they're stored on a web server. But there's usually a way to download a copy of the file to your computer. You can also upload a file from your computer to the web-based application.
When I was working on a novel last fall, I wrote it on a word processor on my home computer. But I used Google Documents as a way of backing up the document; every so often, I would upload a copy of my work from the home computer to Google Documents. If my hard drive had crashed, I would still have had the online backup copy.
Google docs
Until now, any file you uploaded to Google Documents was converted into its proprietary format and had to be stored that way. But last week, Google announced an expansion of Google Documents which will allow files of all sorts to be stored in their original formats. That means Google Documents can be used as an online backup site for your documents. Anything up to one gigabyte of storage is free, according to The Associated Press, and you can pay for additional storage if you need it.
The new capacity will be phased in by the end of the month, reports AP.
There are a number of online word processors from which to choose. I've used Google Documents and Buzzword, and had good experiences with each.
Cloud computing
This idea of moving applications and data from home computers onto the Internet is sometimes referred to as "cloud computing." There's been a lot of hyperbole both for and against the idea. Proponents seem to think it's the way of the future and the solution to numerous computing problems; nay-sayers think it will never work as well as locally-based documents and software and that it's nothing but hype.
The truth, as is often the case, is probably somewhere between the extremes. Online applications may never completely replace desktop applications, but they're definitely a useful tool with which you need to be familiar.
Online applications
--John I. Carney is city editor of the Times-Gazette and covers county government. He is also the author of the self-published novel "Soapstone." His personal web site is lakeneuron.com.
