ReadWriteWeb

Project Barcelona, a new project in the works from Microsoft, will give enterprises Web crawler-like tools for searching and storing information. The crawlers will search Microsoft products such as SQL Server, Excel and SharePoint and extra metadata. Barcelona Index Server will then serve-up the metadata, making it easier to find and access business information across the enterprise. There will also be Barcelona tools designed specifically for database administrators.

According to the project's FAQ: "Project Barcelona however is not a centrally controlled metadata repository in the traditional sense in that the overall design embraces the decentralized and web-like nature of the modern enterprise."

As Microsoft moves into the cloud with Web-based versions of its Office suite of applications, Google has been beefing up Google Docs to stay one step ahead. The Big G has just made it much easier to share documents online through the service's online document editor, Google Docs. Previously, users who wished to share documents with others had to send a formal invitation through email, but now sharing can be as easy as sharing a link. These changes come on the heels of enhanced collaboration features which were recently added to Docs to give it more of a Google Wave feel.

On this day 30 years ago, Dan Bricklin's VisiCalc spreadsheet program changed the way people thought about computers and how they applied to business.

Bricklin remains a leader in the field and on this anniversary date is seeing his SocialCalc technology come out of beta and become a fully developed product from Socialtext, the company he has collaborated with since 2006.

Ever wish you had the ear of the employees who work on Microsoft Office? For all those whose work lives and breathes Office, here's your chance to make yourself heard. Two enterprising Microsoft employees have created MakeOfficeBetter.com, an unofficial outlet for ideas that will improve the world's most popular office suite.

Like the White House project that started up in March, the site is basically a clone of Digg's functionality, even if it isn't using that exact software. By logging in with your OpenID or signing up, you can submit new ideas and vote up favorites.

Come July, ThinkFree, the web office provider which first added mobile access in 2008, will unveil the only complete Office suite for the Android OS.

To date, the official Android Market has had slim pickings when it comes to document editing, with the majority of apps being simple notepads. For enterprise users, so many of whom still rely heavily on Microsoft Office, a notepad simply won't cut it.

Like a lot of people, I had my problems with Google Apps this week. Sure, Google "feels my pain" but they also lost my confidence. And confidence is a delicate thing. What crashed for me was Spreadsheet. That has always been the weakest component for Google and the strongest for Microsoft. Excel rocks, its just a tad behind the times on collaboration.

But in this post we explain how Google could still win the spreadsheet game by buying eXpress Corp.