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If Office doesn't innovate in the space of collaboration / versioning, they won't be around in a meaningful way in 5-10 years, I can almost guarantee it. And th

If Office doesn't innovate in the space of collaboration / versioning, they won't be around in a meaningful way in 5-10 years, I can almost guarantee it. And this is working in a place (a university) not known for fast change (just try getting faculty to start using a new ANYTHING). Right now, all collab suites I've seen, and I've been approached by more than I care to count (though undoubtedly not all), are kludge-y addons to move FILES around. The beauty of what Google's doing (and a lot of their playing is creating a pointillist map) is in this space: they're making it so I can get (right now mostly) text from one place to another through multiple streams to a final display regardless of ANYTHING. There are still some places file metaphors exist (docs), but that's fading in their newer products. Add robust lines of demarcation (privacy/security via groups) and the 'features' of Word don't beat the 'killer app' of portable, trackable, malleable information that people can collaborate on without effort. So: watch out, Office. (Though I love what you're doing in Excel)

arethuza 16y ago
Excel isn't going anywhere - it is the basis for so many business systems. Pretty much every other Office app (perhaps with the exception of Outlook) could be replaced without too many noticing, but Excel is the key business application for decision makers in most organizations.
- blrgeek 16y ago
  Imagine Excel with automatic cell-level revisions, with safe shared editing & control, with better automatic error checking. If someone does that, I'll guarantee you that 'decision-makers' will switch very very fast. You know the main problem with Excel? Finding out what changes were made, keeping updates between multiple teams/people in sync, sending the correct version of the doc. once updated, etc. If Google Docs Excel was as good as Excel today (it still lacks quite a bit, esp in UI), we'd never use Excel, simply to save a huge amount of time syncing everybody.
  - arethuza 16y ago
    Oh I agree that Excel has problems. However, there is a huge ecosystem around Excel - lots of enterprise apps have tight Excel integration and an amazing amount of complex stuff gets done in VBA in Excel. As to your other point, I've actually persuaded quite a few (very bright) finance people how to use TortoiseSVN and they picked it up pretty easily and seems to work very well for them. Wire it up so that you use a sensible diff tool to show differences between revisions and it actually is pretty civilised. Almost like real code! ;-)
- boredguy8 16y ago
  Hence why I say, literally, "Though I love what you're doing in Excel". And it goes beyond just network effect: some of the data manipulation and collaborative editing changes are encouraging. We'll see where things go. But it's by no means the only option if they fall behind.

arethuza 16y ago

Excel isn't going anywhere - it is the basis for so many business systems. Pretty much every other Office app (perhaps with the exception of Outlook) could be replaced without too many noticing, but Excel is the key business application for decision makers in most organizations.

blrgeek 16y ago
Imagine Excel with automatic cell-level revisions, with safe shared editing & control, with better automatic error checking. If someone does that, I'll guarantee you that 'decision-makers' will switch very very fast. You know the main problem with Excel? Finding out what changes were made, keeping updates between multiple teams/people in sync, sending the correct version of the doc. once updated, etc. If Google Docs Excel was as good as Excel today (it still lacks quite a bit, esp in UI), we'd never use Excel, simply to save a huge amount of time syncing everybody.
- arethuza 16y ago
  Oh I agree that Excel has problems. However, there is a huge ecosystem around Excel - lots of enterprise apps have tight Excel integration and an amazing amount of complex stuff gets done in VBA in Excel. As to your other point, I've actually persuaded quite a few (very bright) finance people how to use TortoiseSVN and they picked it up pretty easily and seems to work very well for them. Wire it up so that you use a sensible diff tool to show differences between revisions and it actually is pretty civilised. Almost like real code! ;-)
boredguy8 16y ago
Hence why I say, literally, "Though I love what you're doing in Excel". And it goes beyond just network effect: some of the data manipulation and collaborative editing changes are encouraging. We'll see where things go. But it's by no means the only option if they fall behind.