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thing 18: web applications
It has been a while since I seriously looked at Zoho Writer, preferring Google Docs mainly for the convenience (I always have Gmail open in a tab, so it’s easy to one-click open Google Docs from there). Zoho Writer seems to have more editing and layout tools, or at least, displays them more like MS Word.
I have been dabbling with web applications like document editors and spreadsheet creators mostly because I don’t like the ones that I purchased with my iMac. I probably would like the Mac versions more if I were more familiar with their quirks, but I’m so used to Microsoft Office products that remembering what I can and can’t do in the Mac environment is too frustrating. While Google Docs isn’t quite the same as Microsoft Office, it’s more-so than iWork ‘08.
Playing with Zoho Writer, however, reminded me that I need to work around my Google bias. Particularly since the Zoho products seem to have the productivity functions that make my life easier.
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I’ll admit that I bought MSOffice for Mac. You’ve just pretty much gotta have it, these days. Fortunately, as an educator, you could get a good discount on it ($149, I think). And that lets you install it on 3 machines. 2008 is out now (like Office 07 for Win—”open” xml file formats, but if you managed to find 2004, there’s a patch that lets you open those files, just like there was for Office 03 for Win.
Or you can just keep using GoogleDocs, which I also like, though I really don’t use it much.