Thing 18

I've used both Open Office  and Google Docs before and liked each of them.  I found that Open Office had a few issues with it, but mostly only when opening a Microsoft document in Open Office, or vice versa.  Otherwise, it was simple to use, once I got the hang of it.  It's set-up is a little different than Microsoft, which is the program I am used to, but I was still able to use Open Office without seeking help.  In fact, I used to only use Open Office because I didn't want to pay for Microsoft.  I found that I was not able to do some of my class assignments as easily in Open Office, especially when the demonstrations were in Microsoft.  I do still use it sometimes; my sister has it on her Mac and it's the only program I can use that is compatible with both her Mac and my Dell.

 Google Docs are wonderful!  I actually just posted my niece and nephew's school calendar to Google Docs, so my family could all access it.  Google Docs has tons of templates to choose from including ones for a budget, resume, calendar, to do list, etc.  It has them narrowed into categories for easier searchability (yes I just made up that word), too.  One category is "Students and Teachers" which included surveys, worksheets, homeroom forms, speech outlines, graphs, and more.  I use it mostly for family things, like posting Christmas lists or planning things.  I used it for collaboration with my sister on an assignment before, too! (Well, not exactly collaboration.  I posted my paper for her to read and offer editing suggestions.)  My father likes to use it to share pictures.  He posts them there for us to save into our own files.  Google Docs even has its own blog to give you advice and ideas on how to use it more effectively.  Oh!  And they're recently added new features such as real-time collaboration, more fonts, and an advanced revision history tool.  I haven't had a chance to use any of the features yet, but I can see their potential - especially the real-time collaboration!  How great would it be to use this feature when working on a group project?  Plus, it has a chat feature in it!  Not only would fellow collaborators see what you're changing when you're changing it, but you could chat online about editing and creating, too!  If you couldn't tell, I really like it using Google Docs.  It did take me a bit to get used to it - my sister is the one who got the family hooked.