Google Spreadsheets Now on Preview

Is this the beginning of the end for desktop-based Office/productivity applications? Web-based email had been popular since commercial and free e-mail services were introduced. Web-based word processors have been around for quite some time now, and one such application is Writely, which Google has actually acquired. However, an online set of office applications wouldn’t be complete without a spreadsheet, and this is where the desktop-based solutions still dominate.

Until now, that is.

Google has just announced a public preview of Google Spreadsheets. While for now, the service is not open to just anyone, Google account holders (Gmail will do) can sign up to be part of the beta test.

The good

• Interface. Google’s spreadsheet interface feels just like any desktop-based spreadsheet app (like MS Excel, for instance). It’s all done in AJAX, so the interface is dynamic–you don’t need to refresh the browser page when saving or updating information.
• Collaboration. You can share google spreadsheets with your contacts and correspondents with Google accounts. You can choose whether to have your contacts just view the spreadsheet or make editions themselves. There’s even a useful chat application that appears when two or more people are editing or viewing the spreadsheet at a time!
• Import and Export. If you have existing MS Excel or .CSV files you would like to share or edit on Google Spreadsheets, import and export are a snap. The application allows you to upload files for importing, and you can save any existing spreadsheet into Excel or .CSV (comma-separated text) format

The bad

• Speed. One disadvantage of Web-based applications would be the speed. Most broadband users won’t notice much lag in the loading of spreadsheets, but dial-up users would probably have to wait a while before the application is pre-loaded.

We just got our approval for the Google Spreadsheets public test. We’ll be taking this shiny new Web app for a spin and share what we think.