Anybody using this any have any thoughts to share? Just really started playing around with it this weekend.
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/groove/HA101672641033.aspx
Groove 2007
Anybody using this any have any thoughts to share? Just really started playing around with it this weekend.
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/groove/HA101672641033.aspx
Looks Like…
It looks like they are finally getting on-board with collaboration tools like oDesk and SourceForge, with a bit more focus on client-side functionality rather than server-based web forms. Also it seems to finally put a decent front-end on the colossal abortion of a product that is Microsoft SharePoint. It looks pretty slick. Want to set up a Groove workspace together to try it out?
If it could integrate Cakewalk Sonar files into the synchronization stuff, it could be a solution to a problem Justin and I have had sharing audio projects for years…
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Matthew P. Barnson
What happened?
Matt, thought you were going to reply to my invite?
Life
Life happened.
We had another death in the family. My mother asked me to buy her house and move in with her, so we’re packing and spending almost every evening there. My company apparently bought a site-license for MS Office 2000… and the corporate standard is OpenOffice. Groove is an Office 2007 product. I’m not allowed to install non-approved Microsoft software on my work laptop, and my home laptop is broken.
Lots of reasons 🙂 Sorry I didn’t communicate them effectively.
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Matthew P. Barnson
6 weeks later
It’s pretty slick. Without comparison or awareness of other similar client-side apps available for XP/Vista, Groove 2007 is a working solution to the problem of inconvenience.
Before, to keep files consistent between multiple workstations (in my case, home & office) I had to upload, backup and swap, all while keeping the master or most current file version straight in my head. Now, there is one place where the file resides and I don’t have to backup or upload anymore. I just pull up the folder on any computer and it’s there, the most recent version.
The only downer is that it takes a bit more time than I’d like to synchronize. Probably because it’s going through some MS server and they’re reading all my confidential info.
I wonder…
I wonder how this compares to Google Docs? I run Google Desktop on my computer, and it automatically syncs the latest version up to my personal repository. I bet sharing is built in there somewhere, too.
Sorry I couldn’t check out Groove with you. I just barely got my new personal notebook up and running, and my work computers wouldn’t allow me to run it due to licensing.
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Matthew P. Barnson
Google Docs Is The Crazy Bomb
Matt,
Just wanted to post here that since working with Groove I’ve also experimented heavily with Google Docs. Google Docs is the crazy bomb. It actually is more functional then Groove 2007 for one single reason — it is real-time, multi-client authorship and update. If you are working on a shared word processing document, spreadsheet, presentation, invite form, or survey I would highly recommend. Google Docs is basically the 20-25% of MS Office application features you actually use placed on the web, for free, to share amongst collaborators.
Let me give an example of this being used to the max. Several months ago Wife Unit and I got picked up by a limo service to go to the airport. Wow, aren’t we fancy people. Actually, the limo service cost the same as a taxi. We hop into an upscale, sleek SUV and I notice the driver is toting up front an open laptop with a flashing, changing spreadsheet on display. He explains that they run their dispatch over Google Docs, with all drivers connected to a spreadsheet (through wireless connectivity) updating real-time. It saves a ton of cost from traditional, resident mapping and dispatch systems.
We’ve been using it at work now with very cool results and productivity gains. The days of emailing versioned files back and forth (e.g., FinancialsNew1.2_v2.3.xls) are O-V-E-R. I am not advocating for Google so much as I am advocating for the premise and viability of shared productivity applications over the web.
Cool!
I’ve begun experimenting with Google Calendar. If Google Docs supported macros from Excel/OpenOffice, I would start using it for my budgeting. Heaven knows how many times I’ve been somewhere twiddling my thumbs waiting for something else and thought “hey, I could put the receipts from my wallet into my budget spreadsheet”… but I couldn’t because I didn’t have it there.
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Matthew P. Barnson