Google Docs is fast becoming my text editor of choice simply because the collaborative advantages it gives me are far beyond what passing a Word document back and forth over email allows me to do. No longer do I have to do with improperly formatted documents, nor do I have to worry that each document I do receive is going to mess up my version of Word.
Sometimes I still use Word because I’m more familiar with it and I know the cool shortcuts. (Though, as Rick points out, many of those work for Google Docs as well.) But now I don’t have to choose, or even manually convert my Word (or Powerpoint or Excel) docs to Google docs. I downloaded DocSyncer, which batch processes every office document on my computer and saves it as a Google doc. As TechCrunch points out, this service—which automatically updates your Google Docs with the latest version of your offline file—allows you to work on a file either as a Google Doc or as an Office file and not have to worry about having the latest version wherever you are at all times.
I’m pretty happy with it so far, though there are still a few bugs to be worked out during the beta stage (and it’s still a little slow). The coolest thing I’ve found, though, is that it also serves as an automatic backup of every Office file I work with. If for some reason my computer fails before its weekly backup, at least all of my newest files are safe online.
(As DocSyncer is still in beta, you have to ask for an invitation on its homepage to use the service. Mine came in two days…)
