Microsoft Office 2010 Web Applications

Google doc is the free online word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, form and data storage service offered by Google has managed to not only attract, but also satisfy and retain many users. For three years after the launch of Google Docs, Microsoft offered no competing product until June 2010. The software giant form Redmond announced the stable release of Office Web Apps this summer. Currently, Office Web Apps includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote.

In order to get started with Office Web Apps, you need a Windows Live account. The documents are stored on SkyDrive a Microsoft service that provide 25 gigabytes of free, online, file storage space. Office Web Apps provides users two options to work with documents; either create a new document online, or upload a document from the PC to work.
Also, user can take full advantage of Office Web App only i they have Office 2010 installed; it does not work with previous iterations of Microsoft Office.

Another peeve with the service, which Microsoft prefers to call a design feature, is that by default, users can only work on one documents at a time. This is in contrast to Google Docs, where documents can be opened in different tabs, enabling users to work on different documents simultaneously. To force-open individual files in separate tabs, users need to right click and then opt to open another document in a new tab in the browser.

The viewing mode of Office Web Apps is its relatively stronger feature. The World Wide App immaculately preservers the formatting in basic to average level compound documents, and close to 100 per cent formatting of even the most advance level documents. While the World Web App does an excellent job of retaining formatting and accurately displays almost all items, Excel Web App fails to properly display even some of the most commonly used elements like pictures, drawing shapes or WordArt.

Though Ms Office suites on the desktop have an exceptionally well established customer base, the requirements and expectations from a cloud-based service are completely different. It seems that Microsoft strategically evaded the embarrassment of launching bug-filled software by simply limiting numerous features. Office Web Apps would indeed serve as "companion" only if you have Office 2010 and Silverlight installed on the computer, use Internet Explorer 7 or above, and have an excellent internet connection wherever and whenever you access the files.