Tim Howell’s Weblog

Google is about to release spreadsheet application a web-based spreadsheeting application that allows users to work on, and collaborate within, online spreadsheet data. Importantly, it’s also supposed to allow both importing and exporting of XLS and CSV files.

As with the Google’s acquisition of Writely, an AJAX-based word processor, there will inevitably be commentary about the likelihood of Google competing with Microsoft and its Office suite. For many users, the capabilities offered by these applications will address many of their basic needs, particularly home users and SME users who only have rudimentary requirements.

The enterprise market is a different challenge, and these kinds of applications are unlikely to – immediately, at least – gain traction, as the capabilities of these tools will be limited when compared to the full Office suite, and users simply don’t have the time to reformat and tinker with documents to ensure they work with both types of product. Nor do these applications work effectively with each other as yet.

That said, Google doesn’t need to target this market just yet – using this product, combined with Writely (or whatever it will be called) and Gmail/Calendar create a suite suiting many users, the Google advertising model will drive further revenue, and the FUD it sends at an embattled Microsoft are all inevitable outcomes.

It will also be interesting to see how these applications evolve, with the online capabilities leading to potential collaboration and inter-product integration opportunities (e.g. embedding spreadsheet data within word processing documents and integrating these products with other Google platforms such as Gtalk).

UPDATED: Having received an invite, I’ve been able to try out Google Spreadsheets. Overall the application works reasonably well. There are a number of limitations, such as no filtering, no print capability (although you can export to HTML and print from there) and no graphing functions, but these may come as it is still an early and limited beta. There are still a few niggles, and the importing and exporting of data isn’t perfect, but for occasional users who need something for basic list management and calculations, it may do the job.