SAN FRANCISCO – Google Docs editing for Android, iPhone and iPad isn’t all that it could be, but it’s a start.

The long-awaited editing features are rolling out over the next few days for Android 2.2 and above, and for iOS 3 and above.
Once enabled, you’ll see an Edit button in the top right corner of any document. Tapping it takes you out of read-only mode so you can start writing.

I haven’t received the rollout yet, but judging from Google’s blog post and demonstration video, editing appears to be primitive compared to proper office apps, with only the ability to write text in the document’s current font, edit spread sheets and add bullet points. I do like how edits appear in real time, so you can collaborate from the road.

The list of missing features is still pretty long. You can’t create new documents, change fonts or styles, add hyperlinks, format text, add images, or do any other advanced editing that Google Docs already allows on the desktop. Spreadsheet editing is also completely absent.

For Android users, mobile Docs editing does add one neat feature — the capability to input text by voice — but considering everything you can’t do with Google Docs on mobile phones, it’s hard to recommend it over a proper document app if you plan to do a lot of work.

For iPad, I still like Office2 HD, which syncs to Google Docs and has most of the editing and document creation features that Google Docs Mobile omits. I haven’t had much of a reason to edit documents on the phone, so I’ll default to PC World’s App Guide, which gave high marks to QuickOffice Mobile Suite. That app, available for iPhone and Android, syncs to Google Docs and other services.

Still, you can’t argue with the free service Google is offering, and I have a feeling this isn’t the last we’ll hear of mobile document editing from Google.

SAN FRANCISCO – These are frugal times for business, and an organization starting out might have very little money to spend on IT. Even if you’re part of an established business, you’re probably feeling the pinch.

Here are five extremely useful computing resources that are free of charge for small business users–unlike some “free” services you might see that are only for home users. These choices have few if any restrictions, and are established services unlikely to shut up shop anytime soon.

1. Google Apps For Business

If your organization has under 50 employees, then Google Apps for Business (formerly called Google Apps for Domains) is for you. It offers free e-mail under the umbrella of your own organization’s domain name (You can pay Google $10 to reserve a domain name, if you don’t already have one). You can also have your own private Google Docs system along with your own Google Calendar system.

In use, the e-mail system looks and feels just like regular Gmail, except that your own organization’s e-mail addresses are used rather than a Gmail one (such as, bob.smith@yourdomain.com, rather than something like bob.smith1964@gmail.com). One nice touch is that the e-mail address book is shared automatically amongst your users.

It’s all hosted on Google’s computers, so you won’t need your own mail server computer. You’ll benefit from almost zero configuration and maintenance, plus a promised 99.9 percent uptime guarantee. Put simply, Google takes care of everything for you. The spam filtering is the same excellent system as Gmail, which is to say your employees just won’t be bothered by anything dodgy.

There are some limitations on the free version. As well as the 50 user limit, each user account can send e-mails to only 500 recipients per day. This won’t be an issue for most of us, but it’s easy to imagine an enthusiastic sales person hitting that ceiling now and again. You also can’t send attachments larger than 25MB, although this will only be an issue for those working in the media industries who have to ship around large photographs or video files.

Even if you have to pay to upgrade to the Premier Edition, which allows unlimited users and a host of other benefits, it’ll only cost $50 per year. Who can argue with that kind of value?

Some service providers, such as Dreamhost, offer free-of-charge one-click configuration of Google Apps for any domains you have registered with them.

2. Dropbox

Dropbox is a sync and backup tool that makes use of the cloud to remotely store files. Once the Dropbox software is installed, you’ll find a new Dropbox folder on your hard disk. Anything stored in this folder is instantly transferred to Dropbox’s cloud storage system. This is done invisibly, and using the Dropbox folder is just like using any other folder on your hard disk.

The benefits are that you can then install Dropbox on another computer and, using the same login details, recreate your Dropbox folder. Anything saved in the folder on computer A will automatically appear in computer B’s Dropbox folder, and vice versa. Indeed, you can add-in computers C, D, E, and so on, and even mobile devices can get in on the action. There’s a Web interface that allows access to files, too.

Perhaps the chief benefit for business is that, should a notebook get stolen or lost, restoring its files is as simple as installing Dropbox on a new computer, entering the username, and letting it sync the contents (provided your employees have been trained to always save their files in the Dropbox folder, of course).

Dropbox offers free 2GB of storage per user, which is enough for hundreds of modest office documents, and I couldn’t find any restrictions on business users signing-up for free accounts. All you need is to download the client software and sign up during the installation process, using your e-mail address.

Before you ask, yes, it’s massively secure. SSL connections are used to make the transfer of data to and from the cloud, and all data is stored using AES-256 encryption. Even if a stranger were to somehow pull your data from the cloud, it would be gibberish.

Each user can make the leap to 50GB of storage for $10 per month, or 100GB for $20. This isn’t a huge amount of money, although it could add up once your organization starts to grow.

My colleague Rick Broida discussed a similar new service called SugarSync, which offers 5GB of free storage – 3GB more than Dropbox. However, my personal preference is to stick with the long-established Dropbox.
3. Microsoft Security Essentials

License fees for antivirus software are taxing for those who use Windows. We’d rather not pay, but there’s no way of getting around it. Most free antivirus products, such as AVG, are free only for home users.

However, Microsoft has recently opened-up its Security Essentials software for free small business usage (It was previously free only for home users.). Alas, the license agreement states you can only use it on up to 10 computers in a corporate environment, but this is still better than nothing. If nothing else, it means that you’ll have 10 fewer antivirus licenses to pay for. (For larger organizations, Microsoft offers its Forefront product range, which has various licensing systems.)
The new Security Essentials looks good. It’s certainly good at spotting viruses, although it can be a little slow when scanning compared to competitors. However, considering the $0 price tag, I’m sure we can all live with this. Security Essentials is available for all recent versions of Windows, from XP up.

4. Linux

Don’t worry. I’m not going to advise you switch to Linux on your desktop computers. From a purely financial standpoint this has rarely made much sense for smaller businesses, considering they usually pay for Windows licenses without any choice when they buy a new PC.

Instead, I’m going to recommend Linux for your file servers. This avoids the need to pay for expensive Windows Server licenses. If you go with something like Ubuntu, the most popular form of Linux, you’ll pay nothing at all for an installation serving an unlimited number of client computers.

Ubuntu’s other chief advantage is that, as a popular form of Linux, support is never far away. Googling any problem will almost certainly reveal somebody else who’s had the issue, or you can head over the hugely popular Ubuntu Forums to ask for help.

In terms of technology, Ubuntu offers Samba, which can effectively recreate a modest Windows-like file and printer sharing setup. Both Macs and Windows computers will have no problems connecting, and will be unaware that they’re not connecting to a Windows server.

If you have an old PC you can mess around on, try downloading Ubuntu Server and giving it a try. You might have to reach back into your memory to remember those Unix 101 classes, but there’s a wealth of free documentation out there to help you get started.

5. Go-OO office suite

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you probably already know about OpenOffice.org, the open source (and therefore free-of-charge) office suite. This keeps getting better with each release and is now a definite contender for lighter-weight office tasks. If you haven’t looked at it recently, it’s well worth a trial.
I find it very useful for those upgrading from an older version of Office and who are confused by the ribbon-based user interface, found on recent releases of Microsoft Office.

However, it’s been a busy time in the world of OpenOffice.org, and Oracle’s acquisition of Sun–owners of OpenOffice.org–has dropped a bomb from which the dust is still settling. The LibreOffice project has picked-up the reins but is still in beta testing stage, so at the moment I recommend the existing version of Go-OO as the best free-of-charge office suite around. Based on OpenOffice.org with some useful tweaks here and there, its chief advantage is support for Microsoft’s newer XML-based file format (such as the DOCX, XLSX, and PPTX file extensions), which is the default in all recent releases of Microsoft Office.

SAN FRANCISCO – Google announced that it will soon roll out updates to Google Docs that will enable editing from the iPad or from Android smartphones. The move is long overdue and increases the value of Google Docs, as well as the productivity of the iPad tablet.

The promise of Google Docs is the ability to work with documents in real-time from the cloud anywhere that you can get an Internet connection. Sadly, that promise has been only partially fulfilled when it comes to smartphones and tablets.

Since Apple launched the iPad, there has been significant debate between fans of the tablet and PC purists over whether the iPad offers any intrinsic value for mobile business professionals, or if it is merely a consumer gadget with no productive purpose. The iWorks for iPad apps such as Pages and Numbers offer some functionality, but without a local file system the iPad relies on cloud-based storage to work with data.

Google Docs has been viewable on the iPad, and the Google Docs spreadsheet app has offered some rudimentary editing functions, but the lack of a fully functional Google Docs has been a major roadblock for both Google Docs and the Apple iPad.

Tools like Memeo Connect have helped to bridge the gap some, but having to work with various apps to try and work with files in some sort of Band-Aid approach goes against the sort of simple intuitive experience that users expect from an Apple device. The reason that this move by Google is so important is that it simultaneously increases the productive value of both Google Docs and the iPad. Mobile computing from tablets and smartphones takes on a whole new meaning with access to a fully functional Google Docs environment.

Of course, Google Docs is still a pale, stripped down shell of what Microsoft Word is capable of, and despite claims of document fidelity files that are moved between Word and Google Docs have a good chance of having the formatting jacked. Mobile editing of Google Docs is great for businesses that already use Google Docs, but organizations that rely on Microsoft Office are still better off with Documents To Go.

Unfortunately, Documents To Go was recently purchased by RIM and its future on platforms outside of BlackBerry is uncertain. The ball is in Microsoft’s court to follow Google’s lead and enhance its mobile Docs.com offering to enable editing from the iPad and/or upcoming Android tablets.

By Paul Venezia
July 07, 2010

By Tony Bradley
May 4, 2010

By James A. Martin
February 2, 2010

By David Coursey
January 22, 2009

By Tony Bradley
January 15, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO – Google has unveiled plans today to allow Google Docs to store any type of files, and revealed a new tool from Memeo to enable users to access, migrate, and synchronize files between their desktop and Google Docs. These announcements signify a broader strategy by Google to help business customers bridge the gap between the desktop and the cloud.
Google has been aggressively vying for business customers to adopt its various cloud-based products and services as alternatives to the traditional Microsoft culture: Gmail instead of Exchange and Outlook, Google Docs instead of Microsoft Office, Chrome instead of Internet Explorer, etc.

Even Google, though, as dominant and powerful as they are in many areas of technology, can not ignore the fact that Microsoft occupies a comfortably dominant share of the enterprise messaging and business productivity software segments. As compelling as its products are, Google’s customers still have to operate in and interact with a Microsoft world.

Many customers see appeal in what cloud-based applications and services have to offer, but they are reluctant to trust the cloud. Businesses rely on the availability of messaging and business productivity applications and there have been enough outage stories to give potential customers reason for concern. Trusting all data to the cloud with no local or alternate backups is also like playing Russian roulette.

As much as Google might wish for a mass exodus away from Microsoft, it has recognized that customers can not simply turn off or walk away from Microsoft entirely, and that customers are tentative about putting too much trust in the cloud too soon.

To address those issues, Google has shifted its strategy some and embraced third-party partners to enable customers to take advantage of what Google has to offer in the cloud without giving up the tools and software they use on their desktops.

I interviewed Spencer Chen, director of corporate communications for Memeo, who explained “There have been more than one proofpoint and market research study surrounding how businesses intend on deploying Google Apps. The overwhelming feedback points to a hybrid-model–where [customers] need to continue their investment in office productivity suites like Microsoft Office (since it is such a prevalent standard), but intended on taking advantage of unique online collaboration capabilities that only Google Apps can offer. It really was the best of both worlds for SMBs and enterprises.”

Chen added “Believe me, Google knows this intimately and are leveraging it with customers to gain beachheads into some big customers!”

Allowing users to upload files of any type into Google Docs, and expanding the maximum file size as high as 250Mb for most file types provides users with a means of sharing and collaborating on files that are far too large to be sent via email. The default storage space is only 1Gb, though, so users that plan on heavy use of Google Docs as a file storage or collaboration solution will have to pay Google for additional space.

Memeo Connect for Google Apps lets users migrate and sync data between desktop-based applications like Microsoft Office and Google Docs. Manymoon provides users with an online project management solution. Syncplicity gives users the tools they need to manage files and automate backups.

Each of these partners fills a unique gap in the services provided by Google, and makes it easier for potential business customers to leverage the benefits of what Google has to offer without abandoning the investment in, and familiarity with, existing products and applications.

Chen described the interaction dealing with Google “In our 10-plus months working with Google on this particular initiative, one thing was evident: These are really smart people. Even though their world revolves around being on-demand and online, they were extremely conscious of the complete user experience–online and desktop. They clearly understood that the user experience didn’t merely end when someone closed their browser. We–as a software application company–were surprised…pleasantly surprised.”

The day may eventually come when customers can cut the proverbial cord and sever themselves completely from Microsoft Office if they choose. Until that day arrives, though, Google is taking steps in the right direction to give potential customers the latitude to embrace the cloud without surrendering the desktop.

By Tony Bradley
January 14, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO – Memeo, a privately-held company focused on helping users share, manage, and protect their data, announced the launch of Memeo Connect for Google Apps. The new tool enables Google Apps Premier customers to access, migrate, and synchronize files between their desktop and Google Docs.

Google has been courting business customers with its products and services, but most enterprises, and even small and medium businesses, rely on the applications in the Microsoft Office suite for business productivity software. While Google Apps is a robust solution on its own merits, customers need tools that help them leverage Google Apps in a world dominated by Microsoft Office.

In a press release announcing the new tool, Matthew Glotzbach, product management director for Google, said “More than 3,000 businesses sign up for Google Apps every day, and many of them are interested in a tool that effectively assists in the import and management of their existing files and documents between Google Docs and the desktop environment.”
Glotzbach added “Memeo Connect for Google Apps presents our customers with an attractive option to integrate or migrate all of their files into Google Docs.”

I interviewed Spencer Chen, director of corporate communications for Memeo. He explained that “Google has always been oriented around the cloud, but most enterprises possess a legacy of coming from an on-premise environment.”

Chen continued “Memeo has a great track record in providing rich, desktop applications with leading technology partners, so it was a natural fit for Memeo to jointly develop a solution that integrates that divide between the cloud and the desktop environment. Memeo Connect for Google Apps will enable customers to switch back and forth and manage any file type without limitations between these two environments.”

Alternative software like Google Docs, StarOffice, or OpenOffice offer options for businesses looking for cost effective business productivity software. The success of these products, though, relies on being compatible with Microsoft Office formats and conventions.

Even if a business is willing and able to sever itself completely from Microsoft Office, it can’t ignore the fact that Microsoft Office is the dominant software used by partners, vendors, and customers. These businesses need tools that help them straddle the line and transition seamlessly from desktop to cloud, and from Microsoft Office to Google Docs.

The addition of Memeo Connect for Google Apps, which will cost $9 per user per year, makes it easier for business customers to seriously consider transitioning to Google Apps without having to factor in the headache of trying to convert or migrate all existing Microsoft Office data to do so.

The Memeo announcement is indicative of a shift in strategy by Google to recognize that business customers aren’t ready to simply abandon the desktop or ditch Microsoft Office entirely, and to embrace third-party partners to help it fill in the gaps and deliver the functionality customers need.