Productivity Software Suites

Business Case: Alternatives to Microsoft Office 2007!

As leader in computer applications training, SYS-ED has been evaluating a variety of web-based software and software as a service alternative to the capabilities of workstation resident Microsoft Office 2007 software and downloadable software.

Application Software	Functionality
37Signals Writeboard	Non-WYSIWYG word processor with simple tools for creating, sharing, and editing documents.
Adobe Buzzword	Provides WYSIWYG document creation and editing in single or collaborate mode.
Adobe Photoshop Express	Storage of digital photographs online for access via the Internet.
Google Docs	Consists of document, spreadsheet, and presentation applications.
Scratch	Programming language with simple tools to create interactive stories, animations, and art.
TechSmith Jing	Program which provides the capability to capture images on a computer workstation screen as a digital image inclusive of text annotations, frames, arrows, and highlights.
VoiceThread	Create and share online multimedia slideshows containing images, documents, videos, and comments.
Zoho Writer	WYSIWYG word processor which provides the capability to to open and edit MS Word files, share documents online, and collaborate in real time.

These applications will replace or augment the Microsoft Office Suite and are part of the emerging movement information technology to open source software and the cloud computing. Most of the applications are available at minimal or no cost. For an organization which has purchased 15+ Microsoft Office licenses, the savings could be $10,000+ over a standard 5 year usage and upgrade cycle.

Integration of Networking and Search
Google has started including Sun Microsystems’ StarOffice suite for free as part of its Google Pack download. StarOffice is Sun's commercial version of the OpenOffice suite; it has been reportedly downloaded about 100 million times. StarOffice typically costs $70 to download. It has more features than OpenOffice and typically includes technical support from Sun; the free Google version won't. Google’s Firefox web browser is also included in the package. Internet search capabilities have been added to all StarOffice products.  A user will be able to highlight terms in a word processing document and search immediately for those terms through Google.

Case in Point: Google Apps
Google’s Apps has been developed as a software-as-a-service model.  Access and utilization of the product will be through an Internet connection. There will be no downloads, backups, or new hardware to deal with.  If collaboration is important to an organization, there can be real advantages with Google Apps.  However, there will be shortcomings in areas such as complex financial modeling in spreadsheets and producing highly customized and polished presentation graphics.  SYS-ED’s consultancy derived computer application courses and client site educational training sessions provide factual, clear and most importantly unbiased demonstrations which teach and explain.

Learning Google Apps
The functions are laid out differently from the MS Office commands or are in a different place.

Web Design

The base platform for stability in terms of hardware and processor technology is in place. The processing and content generators can recognize and intercommunicate with one another: Intel-and non-Intel workstations, mid range systems, and mainframe.  TCP/IP is firmly entrenched as the conduit for internetworking.  The component software for the next generation of web design is stable and available. There is a base standardization in web browsers for HTML and the XML browsers are on the way. The line up of operating systems is well established with Microsoft Windows and UNIX variants, with Linux, Fedora, and Sun Microsystems settling in as the main players serving as the platform for a heterogeneous combination of open source and proprietary web servers and scalable enterprise databases which primarily utilize WebSphere MQ middleware to access and manage data on IBM iSeries and mainframe systems. Equally as important, many of the operational challenges of web design have been resolved. The web design tools, interfaces, scripting and programmatic implementation have been refined and the featureset is becoming more uniform in hybrid computing environments. Industry experts agree that effective web design will require a fundamental understanding of the evolving state-of-the-market in order to produce a flexible and efficient long-term strategy for managing and programmatically developing web content.