Comments on: Google Gears

By: Google Reader at Productivity501

Google Reader at Productivity501 — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 10:37:00 +0000

[...] copy for times when I didn’t have an internet connection. However, with the addition of Google Gears, I decided to give Google Reader a try again. While I miss some of the advanced features of [...]

By: Mark Shead

Mark Shead — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 13:18:53 +0000

@Gaz – I’d actually be surprised if they make a Safari implementation of Gears. Firefox seems to be setup well for handling this type of thing and Safari just doesn’t seem to have the plugin capabilities.

@Filip – I’ve been kind of surprized that Reader doesn’t have a search function–especially since it is from Google!

By: Filip

Filip — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 12:41:30 +0000

This is great news. I’ve already left Vienna for Google Reader so this great news for me. The only thing missing in Google Reader is a search function?!

By: Gaz

Gaz — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 09:35:45 +0000

Hi Mark,

I’ve been a Google Reader fan ever since I followed enough RSS feeds to warrant using an aggregator.

From the tide of reaction sweeping through the blogosphere alone, it’s obvious that Gears is going to be huge. I think the impact that Gears will make when it hits GMail is going to the killer feature everyone is waiting for. Along with the FireGPG plugin, I’ll be first in line to try it out!

Here’s hoping the Safari implementation of Gears isn’t too far off…

By: Mark Shead

Mark Shead — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 22:42:35 +0000

There are two differences with OpenOffice that I can see. First OpenOffice doesn’t have the marketing power the Google has. People use Google’s Calendar because they tried Gmail, etc. Second OpenOffice doesn’t give you the ability to sit down at any internet connected computer and bring up your files.

Another thing that might be in Google’s favor is the fact the Microsoft is looking at offering hosted versions of MS Office. If Microsoft releases a web based version of Word, I think people will be more likely to embrace Google’s applications. Especially if Google’s are free.

Personally, I was surprised how many people were using Google Reader. I tried it a few times previously, but stuck with my NewsFire on my Mac. However, once they released a version I could use off line, I made the switch. The biggest benefit hasn’t been the offline access. It has been the ability to read my news feeds whenever I have a few minutes available regardless of what computer (or phone) is handy and have it keep track of my changes across all devices.

I think that once people experience the ability to get access from any computer, they will start seeking out other applications that give them this capability. Microsoft Office is has a huge market penetration, so it might be a long time before large businesses start switching over.

Regardless of what happens, it sure is interesting to see how far we’ve come from simple web pages thrown together in notepad.

By: Jason

Jason — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 22:24:09 +0000

I think you are correct to prognosticate that Google Gears will expand to other Google Apps like Docs & Spreadsheets, allowing for more traditional offline document creation/editing synched with the connected power of Google.

I must (sadly) disagree that any of this will be a serious threat to M$ Office, even once the software reaches a mature and stable state. Due to the long-standing mindset that applications should be run locally and the market penetration of M$ products, I cannot be too optimistic about Google overthrowing Microsoft. Example: OpenOffice.

By: Sapphire

Sapphire — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 15:05:39 +0000

This has the potential to be huge. Right now, I’m too reliant on my PDA to get stuck with anything I can’t easily sync to it anytime, anyplace. Going online isn’t always possible.