Adventures with Google docs

Last week I had a presentation to do on my proposal for my major project. My initial plan was to use the facilities in the IOCT to create a simple presentation. Due to using Linux, I don't have PowerPoint and I didn't want the hassle of making something using OpenOffice or KPresenter and either having it not work in PowerPoint, or having to bring my laptop to the IOCT. Unfortunately, the IOCT was busy for the whole day, so I made for the library. On the way there, I came up with the idea that of trying out Google Docs, as this would solve any future problems I might have along these lines.

I created a simple presentation and while it doesn't have any kind of fancy animations or effects, it does everything I want. You can find it on my major project development blog.

After this good experience, I decided to use Google docs once more. This time I used it for my research essay on moderation systems in online communities. I worked on it at home and then I was able to simply go into the IOCT and download my document. I then cleaned it up a bit in Word (double-line spacing, page numbers, etc) and printed it off.

The final problem that Google docs has allowed me to solve is that I wanted to put my essay I did for my Digital Cultures module on here. I didn't want to simply post it as a blog post, as that would be obscenely long. I also couldn't attach it as a file as Blogger doesn't offer that service. That left me with only the option of having it hosted somewhere else. Thanks to Google docs, I'm able to simply publish it to the web and provide a link.

While I don't plan to use Google docs for everything I do in the future, it's still a very useful tool and will hopefully only get better.