Date: Monday, August 13, 2007
ThinkFree: the future of the online office?
ThinkFree is an online version of Microsoft Office which enables users to enjoy the facilities of the programme for free, but is it as good as it seems?
The opportunity to view, edit and share files online without having to go through another program first or have to pay for an expensive software programme does seem an attractive offer, but it appears the web browser is not as efficient as it may seem. Although you can compose texts as you would using Microsoft Word, and make spreadsheets in the same way as Excel, the appearance and viewing capability of files saved on the web browser, are not as good as the genuine Microsoft Office version. ThinkFree is useful for people who do not use Microsoft Office on a regular basis, or who need to view files that will not load on their regular Word application; however, it does not seem that the programme has many day-to-day benefits for frequent programme users.
When using ThinkFree users are able to view or edit articles, and may do the latter using one of two options. Quick Edit is fast to load and uses Ajax coding running inside the web browser but is not that powerful, whereas Power Edit, which is code written in Sun's Java, is more powerful and downloads on to your hard drive. It therefore takes longer to load than Quick Edit, but afterwards runs like any other program on your computer. Documents can then be saved as RTF, Word documents, PDF, XML and docx, the new format from Office 2007. However problems have been reported about reloading files on docx, but the program is useful for viewing files that are proving difficult to load on the regular application. The jury is still out as to whether ThinkFree has any real purpose or benefit, but for occasional use it does seem to be a nifty little tool.
Source: Guardian
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