Box.net And Zoho Integration
Box.net has joined Omnidrive in integrating Zoho's online document editing with their file storage service:
[from Box.net Blog]There is no need to download the file you want to view or modify - just select “Edit Document” in the right-click option menu for your .doc file and Zoho will launch a new tab or window with your file! Then, make any edits you want and click “Save” in the upper left hand corner of the Zoho window. This will automatically save your updated file back to your Box.
So, the best of breed model for Office 2.0 is coming together, as various competitors in the complementary categories begin to exploit APIs for our benefit. Now users can try out various file sharing options independently of various online doc editing capabilities.
Note that this makes the approach that I outlined in a recent post even more interesting (In The Time Of "Me-First": Stikkit). I explain how I am trying to use Stikkit as a personal/interpersonal organizer, and how Box.net plays a role, there:
One issue has come up, which may be a blessing in the long run: Stikkit does not support file uploading or attachments to notes. Basecamp does have a workable (but flawed) file sharing model. So, to acheive the same in Stikkit, I have created a Box.net account just to support file storage, and then I am manually creating links in Stikket notes. I can put password protection on individual files in Box.net, and share that password with others that I want to have access to Box.net files. This, once again, pushes the security onto the object, not onto some shared space defined by group membership. This fine grained control is often what I really want, and what I have to approximate in a group-oriented system. For example, I might want to create a spreadsheet to share with a single member of a project team. In Basecamp, I would have to define a new project to get that sort of control, or perhaps I would simply email it to him. In Stikkit, I can share it with that person, we can comment on the spreadsheet, and then, at some later point, after incorporating his thoughts, I could simply add the names of others that I wanted to share the spreadsheet with.
And now, I can use Zoho to edit those docs online. I will have to dig in to see how the distributed collaboration works out. Consider the possible complexities: I have to share a Stikkit note with my partner, Greg. I add a link to a Box.net file, a spreadsheet, and have to give Greg access to the doc, there. If he opens that with Zoho, is there another layer of access control? I hope not.
What would be much simpler would be for Stikkit's team to do what Zoho did, and provide an integration for file attachments that would rely on the Box.net API, and free me from the manual mess involved.
But I am still happy that it works at all, and I can cobble together a workable solution, relying on different services that focus on doing one thing right.
[pointer from Raju Vegesna]
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