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We are working on a full-featured Google Docs alternative - https://writer.zoho.com https://writer.zoho.com . We are already capitalizing canvas technology for
by lewisjoe 5y ago
We are working on a full-featured Google Docs alternative - https://writer.zoho.com https://writer.zoho.com . We are already capitalizing canvas technology for rendering documents across devices, except for the Web which still is DOM.
Having a single codebase that renders across all platforms is our long-term motive, and it does require rendering to a cross-platform canvas backend - like Skia.
I'm assuming Google Docs is already on that direction as well. Would be great if someone from Google can clarify the technical internals.
- cphoover 5y agoI love zoho's suite of free tools. When I first got started in web development business 10+ years ago, I used their invoicing tool, and thought it was perfect for a freelancer like I was at the time.
- coffeefamine 5y agoAs a small business owner, I found refrens.com extremely useful for invoicing.
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agoDoes Zoho have a self-hosted version? If not, is there any reason to trade one vendor lock for another?
- heipei 5y agoI consider neither Zoho nor Google Docs to be vendor lock-in since you can always download the documents as docx and continue working on them locally. I'm gonna give Zoho Writer a spin since Google Docs is missing some vital features for me, most notably the option to have custom page designs (font/colors/footers) that you can centrally update and apply to a bunch of documents. If anyone has another Google Docs alternative, I'm all ears.
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agoVendor lock-in is an inability to use another vendor without substantial switching costs. [1] Changing Google Docs for .docx has significant costs, because their compatibility with MS Office is far from ideal. That said, using .docx is yet another vendor lock-in. As you might know, OOXML is not a true open standard: it was recognized as such by ISO only due to Microsoft's shenanigans. That's why it is not fully supported by any other software and trying to use alternative applications results in numerous compatibility issues. So your best option is to use LibreOffice, because it is libre software, capable, available from several vendors, and is based on true open standard, OpenDocument. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vendor_lock-in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vendor_lock-in
- vishnumohandas 5y agoAre there plans to launch an end-to-end encrypted version of Writer?
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agoWe develop app that does have end-to-end encryption. From my experience, people who demand it rarely understand what it means and how many inconveniences true e2ee introduces to a product. Anyway, if you are seriously worrying about the privacy of your documents, just use a localy deployed libreoffice and send encrypted files to your contacts.
- sambroner 5y agoWhat app are you developing?
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y agohttps://github.com/redsolution/xabber/ https://github.com/redsolution/xabber/ this one. Page is rather dated, though.
- WA 5y agoHow do you deal with the fact that fonts render differently on different platforms and it might look off on one of them, because the user isn’t used to the Canvas font rendering? Or is this not an issue?
- sambroner 5y agoIs Zoho investing in WASM to do other canvases? I'd love to learn more about that solution.
- JaggedJax 5y agoI do like seeing the new Writer interface consistent across multiple applications, and it's very intuitive to use. I do find this interface is slow to load of even semi-large documents, especially when large tables are involved. That and a few formatting/editing quirks are the only real complaints I have. Otherwise I find Writer a great alternative.
- miohtama 5y agoWhat are the pain points when switching to canvas based editing, or what does DOM based editing still do better?