Full Circle Associates

Monday, September 26, 2005

Writely - The Web Word Processor

I love wikis, but many of the people I work with look at me when I show them a wiki and simple say, "no way." They want wiziwig. They are not first -wave adopters. They don't have time nor the inclination to "figure it out." Unlike some of us, they don't think that's fun!

So I was glad to try the beta of Writely - The Web Word Processor. I think I sort of got in by the back door as I was invited to give some input to a planning document. But I had the need for some shared editing space for another Katrina response project so I am giving it a spin.

So far, I like a lot. I also have some tweaky sort of feedback. Here are the pros and suggestions to date:

like the wisiwyg - works really easily, fast and intuitively
like the speed... feels like it will work well on dialup and need to try that
like some of the "insert" functions but it took me a while to notice them
there are some beta features still not implemented -- which naturally makes me curious!
It is easy to start new pages, bring in collaborators, etc. I wish you could add a new collaborator and email just that person rather than having to email the whole group. I don't always find everyone "comes in" at the same time
I have not tried the publishing features, including the ability to publish to a blogger blog, but see that as a great thing and look forward to playing with it
I wish the history could track who did what change. Like when someone deleted a question of mine without an answer. That was frustrating because I could then email that person to ask without making a fuss.
Love it that you can save it as a word file. No, wait... it says you can, but that feature doesn't work yet! Tricked ya! (you have to love beta testing)
Love that you can get an RSS feed but dang, it sure wasn't obvious. I was looking for some sort of change alert and finally found it tonight. I have yet to see how the feed looks and what kind of information it gives you. I'd love to see a RSS button on each document. One click. Remember, I'm looking for tools that I can use with my NON geeky friends and fellow proto-geeks
Instructions still can use a bit of tweaking. I guess that's why they ask for feedback! (voila!)
I wonder about the ability to include visuals
I wonder about future multilingual interfaces (I work globally so I always have to ask)
Free now, but as always, I wonder about the pricing

writely, techreport

4 Comments:

Sam said...: Hi,

Thansk for the nice review, and really thanks for all the feedback. A couple of comments...

We know about the Word file issue. We have a third party vendor doing these conversions, and they have some issues we're working out. If you have a file that's not confidential, send it to me and I'll forward it to them to look at.

For history - we do track which user made which change - it's in the upper right corner of the history page. We're working on making this easier to understand, and on new ways to present the information.

A lot of the other issues you mention will either be fixed in this iteration (later this week) or the next (two weeks or so).

Last one - visuals. You can import images into the files. And...they're versioned, too, so if the visual changes over time, the version history will reflect that.

Glad you like us, thanks for taking the time to write this up. Keep it coming!; 7:26 AM
Claudia said...: Nancy-

Thank you so much for the feedback, as it's the folks who speak to me that I listen to! ;)

"I wish you could add a new collaborator and email just that person rather than having to email the whole group."
- You can already e-mail just the new collaborators you add to a document. In a few weeks, you'll also be able to pick and choose exactly who you want to e-mail.

"I wish the history could track who did what change. Like when someone deleted a question of mine without an answer. That was frustrating because I could then email that person to ask without making a fuss."
- Can you tell me more about this? Is it an RSS feed thing or something you'd see in History?

"Love it that you can save it as a word file. No, wait... it says you can, but that feature doesn't work yet!"
- You should definitely be able to save as Word -- please tell me exactly what happens when you try (and what your system is).

"Instructions still can use a bit of tweaking."
- Which ones? What wasn't clear to you?

"I wonder about the ability to include visuals"
- You can already insert standard web graphics -- are there any others you'd want?

"I wonder about future multilingual interfaces"
- At least 60% of our beta testers are abroad. We will offer multilingual interfaces at some stage, but will start with only local spell-checking dictionaries.

"Free now, but as always, I wonder about the pricing"
- Our intention is to keep the product (as you now see it) free. But, we will be adding features that will cost something (nothing exorbitant) once they're out of beta-test. Those features will be clearly marked as soon-to-be-subscription. Many educational institutions will also qualify for a discount.

I hope these answer some of your questions, and really appreciate your taking the time to note them. Anything I haven't addressed directly I have made a note of and am mulling over.

Thanks again!
-Claudia; 8:43 AM
Nancy White said...: Lovely response from two of the three Writely founders. WOW, y'all are on top of it.

OK, clarifications....

* Word file. I tried to save a Writely created piece as word. The one I'm working on is not public, but when I get a chance to do another test, I'll alert ya if it happens again.

* history - It only shows the last editor, or am I missing something (which is a real possibility)OH OH OH, I just figured it out. See, I am slow. You have to click on previous in the upper left. So I guess I'd think the revision and the scrolling feature to previous would be closer to each other. Did that make ANY sense?

* I will play with visuals next

* Emailing just new collaborators. OK, here is what I tried to do. I clicked on "Collaborate" and then "email collaborators" -- it auto fills the to to the full group. Again, am I doing this wrong? (I am a great beta tester. I miss obvious cues really well!)

* RSS - what I get is not full feeds, just the first few lines so it is not very helpful. Plus as far as I can see, it doesn't say who modded. But let me watch that for a while and see how it unfolds.

* instructions... oh dear, I should have taken notes when I first went through. Now I can't recall as I figured most things out. I think the RSS feature is really hidden from view. And as you can see above, I was slow to really understand the full functionality of the history tool.

* I forgot to note that you include tagging, which will be really cool for public docs.

Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions! Onward!; 8:07 PM
Vivian Evans said...: Hi Nancy and the Writely team members.. I have only just started using Writely and am enjoying the outcomes so far!!

see http://www.writely.com/View.aspx?docid=atktxhr6crp for a product that I uploaded and then edited online using Writely

I found the editing and help steps very clear. I did try to add to my Blog and it sent it slightly heywire... text went all red after one point when I had one line of red text see http://vivianevans.blogspot.com/ Writely did say they are working on this feature so I sent them feedback immediately.

still more testing to be done.. especially the collaboration features - cheers Vivian Evans; 7:21 PM