Google Docs has been one of the most
powerful editing and collaboration tools for years. And it’s free! The built-in
ability to create documents, invite editor and collaborate in real time is
awesome. The rest can be achieved through helpful addons that are available all
over the web.
Sadly, there are not nearly as many
of these extensions as there are for their flagship browser, Chrome, or as many
apps as there are for the Android platform. But you are slowly seeing more
being released, and the ones already out there are really helpful.
For those who are writers or editors,
these are the ones you should definitely be trying out.
Don’t waste a lot of time trying to
create a bibliography from scratch. EasyBib allows you to add in citations from
the doc itself. It has a book, website or journal option, with a search bar. It
will search out the citation you request, and let you slip it in where needed.
From there, a bibliography will be generated at the end of the doc, with
interactive sources cited through the doc itself. It makes it easy for you, and
for those who are reading it.
A lot of scientifically minded sites
have been using this tool to create documents that they then share on their
blogs, to make it easier to refer to studies and journals. The best part is
that it auto formats to the chosen style you select (AMA, Chicago, or MLA
citation requirements). This is a college student’s dream come true.
As an owner of and contributor
to a number of sites, I have to deal with collaborating with multiple writers
and editors. For some of those blogs, I have to discuss and confirm edits a lot.
Wordkflow makes it a lot easier for
several reasons.
- First, we already use Google Docs on most of those sites for maintaining an editorial calendar.
- Second, I can use Workflow to authorize changes, and see further ones made before they are submitted officially for publication. It is so much faster that way, and eliminates a lot of confusion and stress.
You have probably heard of MindMeister
before. It is a fantastic tool that lets you mind map out content, from an idea
for a novel, to the details of a presentation. You basically take bulletpoints,
and create a more visual map for you to work around. That is then applied
directly into the doc for anyone to see, or you to edit as you need to in order
to add additional information.
It is a great way to take the
powerful mind mapping tool we all know and love, and combine it with a cloud
service that lets us access those maps anywhere. Very convenient, and very
helpful, no matter what you use it for.
Sometimes you need to write a really
long, through document. Or you want to use Google Docs for something like a
book. It is one of my go-to tools for just that, when I ghost write books for
clients who want to be a part of the process the whole way through, But it
comes with its challenges, such as navigation.
A TOC through this addon gets you
around that. You can create a TOC right in the sidebar, which connects to
certain pages in the doc and allows you or anyone else to go right where they
want to, quickly. The only downside is that it doesn’t put in actual page
numbers, which can be a bit of a hindrance. Other than that, it works very
well.
Do you need help finding the perfect
words? Forget Google (which we all know is used to check
spelling/definition/find synonyms all the time), and use this addon that puts a
thesaurus right there in the doc. There isn’t a lot to say about it.
The program works well, it has
multi-language support, and it is quick and simple to use. In fact, it is so
good that Google should really just make it a regular part of their feature,
automatically built in. It works much more consistently – and thoroughly – than
their built in language assistance.
Great productivity tool for
translators and journalists who use international sources.
It runs quickly and smoothly giving
you the translated version. Google Translate has a Doc attachment you can fall
back on.
Are you a fan of Google Docs? Have
an addon that we should know about? Let us know in the comments!
Hello, my name is Jack Sparrow. I'm a 50 year old self-employed Pirate from the Caribbean.
No comments:
Post a Comment