Google Drive and Microsoft Office Stuff #busedu #office

So, over break, I finally got into my OneDrive (formerly SkyDrive) from Microsoft to edit a document. And, I couldn't save it! Apparently I was (oops) 25 GB over my allowed storage space. I guess that means at some point they changed the allowed amount and I just never realized. Either way, I couldn't work on the document in the cloud and had to download it and then upload it to my Google Drive. It was a test and for whatever reason, those image and numbered/lettered lists never convert well to a Google Doc when I try. **SIGH**

But, I found someone who shared info about a Google Drive plug-in that adds a ribbon in Office AND allows you to open straight from Google Drive (in Word!) and edit the DOCX file and save it right back to Google Drive, exactly like my OneDrive did. Yay! https://tools.google.com/dlpage/driveforoffice

It worked great on my laptop. Then, I returned to school.

Fail.

Not sure why. I tried it on two computers but I got an "exception" error for the Google Drive plugin. And, I can't use it at all at school. Probably a firewall restriction. I have no idea. But, I still needed to finish that test! And I was determined not to download it OR convert it to Google Drive Docs either.

So, I tried the whole "Open With" thing on my Google Drive to investigate options and ran into something called OnlyOffice. I was pretty impressed, too.

Features

ONLYOFFICE allows you to edit Office documents in browser.

• Compatible with .docx, .xlsx, .pptx formats.
• Works right in your Google Drive account.
• Connects to Dropbox, Box, OneDrive and Google Drive.
• Provides co-editing and commenting. 

Anyway, here's a snapshot:

Let me be clear about a few things. First, I like Google Docs and it's come a long way. And if I am starting from scratch, sometimes that works perfectly fine. But, I still use MS Office and not having cloud storage for it is the PITS. So, this is a great alternative for something I've already authored in Word to be able to finish and not have to convert.

Just thought I'd share. Check it out!  Have a super day!