Google is offering, since April 28th, an “official” Android application for its services of on-line office automation. Soberly baptized Docs, the program allows you to visualize or to edit your documents stored in Google Docs.
Once installed, the application – only available in English at the moment – downloads at once the list of all the files in which you have access in Docs. The interface, pleasant, offers a fast access to documents “follow-ups” and to the list of those which belong to you, what excludes files shared with you by other people.
Character recognition
The opening of a document is not very fast on the other hand. Once the file is loaded , we discover a variation of the Web interface of Google Docs on the mobile. For the moment editing is very very limited, moreover it is impossible to download files on the phone, for example to consult and print.
The application distinguishes itself besides by an original, but regrettably imperfect, function of character recognition ( OCR): it indeed allows you to take a photo with your mobile and to send it on Docs. The photographed text will be analyzed by Google and retranscribes in the document. Other weakness: the OCR is not totally reliable and it will often be necessary to you to correct yourself the errors of the machine.
This innovation thus offers new perspectives in terms of mobility particularly for the professionals, the convergence between mobile and laptops is increasingly tangible even if it is not just around the corner. However it illustrates the war which rages between Google and Windows.