ReadWriteWeb

Google just announced it's extending the drag-and-drop functionality in its online office suite, Google Docs. A few weeks ago, it introduced an image uploader for docs that worked the same way as the new feature does - you simply drag a file from your computer's and it will immediately upload to "the cloud," (the cloud, in this case being the Google Docs online service). Today's upgrade now brings drag-and-drop to the file upload page, where it serves as an easier way to move your off your PC's hard drive and into Google Docs.

Dropbox, the file storage, sharing and sync service, is now available for the iPad. With an early morning update to the company's iPhone application, the free Dropbox app is now a "universal" app, a term that describes single apps that resize and reformat themselves to function properly on the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad.

With the updated version of Dropbox installed, iPad users can access all their stored files and folders without having to sync files via iTunes first, as is necessary with Apple's own iWork suite of office applications. Those files can then be viewed in Dropbox itself or opened using third-party software programs .

Uh-oh, Google Doc's offline mode is going...well...offline. Starting May 3rd, offline access for Google Docs, the Internet search giant's web office suite, home to an online document editor, spreadsheet editor and slideshow creator, will be disabled. Previously, users had been able to take advantage of the offline functionality provided by Google Gears, an open source browser extension which allowed for both the viewing and editing of files when an Internet connection was not present. Soon, the Gears-enabled feature will be no more. But have no fear - this setback is only temporary..at least that's what a company blog post says.

In the plugin's place, there will be a "new and improved" HTML5-based offline option which will replace the former solution, but its exact launch date is still unknown.

OffiSync is launching an all-new version of its Microsoft Office to Google Docs synchronization tool, a plugin that's a "must-have" for anyone still straddling the two worlds of office suites: that is, the desktop-based world of Microsoft software and the web-based world of Google Docs. In the updated version of OffiSync, set to arrive minutes from now, you'll be able to co-author documents in real-time between Microsoft Office and Google Docs, no matter what version of the Office software you use. There are a few other new features too, including improvements to search, added Google Sites support and the ability to store any file type, but it's the co-authoring feature that's today's biggest reveal.

Recently I was the keynote speaker at the Unlimited Potential W2W (Wellington to the World) event in Wellington, New Zealand. The topic of my presentation was running a virtual company.

In the presentation, written by our Marketing Manager Elyssa Pallai, I spoke about the unique nature of ReadWriteWeb's virtual business model and culture. Watch the video of my entire presentation below, for details of how our company is run and the Internet tools we use.

Adobe's online office suite, Acrobat.com, is getting its first major upgrade since the service left beta back in June of this year. The new release, launching tomorrow, is an entirely unified experience thanks to the addition of a much-requested file organization tool, explains the service's Director of Project Management Rick Treitman.

Also new are 35 user-requested features, including file searching capabilities and integrations with web services like Flickr and Google Image Search. However, one of the most exciting pieces to the upgraded service is the newly launched mobile component. With Acrobat.com's smartphone application, users won't just have access to their files on the go - they can also scan in new documents with their phone's camera.

Office Web Applications, the browser-based versions of Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote, are now being made available to more users according to a post on the Windows Live Team blog. The online office suite, which began its initial alpha testing (in Microsoft terms, it's called a "Technical Preview") in mid-September, was originally made available to only a limited number of users. Today, the Technical Preview is opening up, allowing more people to try the Web Apps, Microsoft's first attempt at porting their desktop Office software to the cloud.

This morning, Microsoft announced the technical preview to Office 2010 to much fanfare. The most prominently touted aspect has been the Web access to the suite, which has been seen as Microsoft's answer to the way Google, Zoho and others have dominated the SaaS market for office suites thus far.

But what they didn't tell you is that the browser-based version of Office 2010 will not be part of this technical preview, which will have its own release for which no date has been set.

Today at its Wordwide Partner Conference in New Orleans, Microsoft announced that the Microsoft Office suite has reached the 'technical preview' milestone, and that starting today the company will open up the Office beta program to a larger number of users. While a new version of Office is obviously big news for a lot of users, the really interesting part of the announcement is that Microsoft is also releasing more details about the Office Web applications - which are lightweight, browser-based versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote (Microsoft's note-taking tool). Beta testers can expect invites for the Office Web applications to go out in August.

Today, Adobe announced that their online office suite at Acrobat.com is moving out of beta and they will begin offering both free and paid subscriptions to the web-based suite of applications. For consumers, the change won't have that much of an impact since the core services at Acrobat.com will remain free: Buzzword (the word processor), Presentations (slideshows, still in beta), and Tables (spreadsheets, new today). However, business users will now face a dilemma as Adobe begins to charge for PDF conversion as well as their web meetings product, Adobe ConnectNow.