Documents To Go: Bill Gates is Worried!
Written: Aug 09 '02
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Easy Document Loading, Carry Word/Excel, Font editing, free with PDA purchase
Cons: Hard to Read, limited features compared to real thing
The Bottom Line: Now serious Palm user should be without
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| roosthui's Full Review: DataViz Documents To Go For Palm Organizers 2.0 Fu... |
HOT PRESS: Bill gates has a crisis on his hands. No longer is the public forced into buying an expensive laptop to do their business on the go. Documents To Go 4 is a must for all Palm OS users
How I got it
Last Christmas I recieved a Palm m500 and low-and-behold it came with several bonus software titles. On the install CD there was a few games, ebook reader, etc, and a neat tool that apparently lets you edit all you Microsoft Word, and Microsoft Excel documents right on your Palm instead of typing out all you notes on the memopad.
Along with the software I happened to buy a keyboard from a friend of mine. After trying that I would definitely recommend that anyone interesting in really using this software get one. The Keyboard is wallet sized folded up and goes for around $100, or less. All the software is fully compatible.
Installing the Software
Installation was very easy. First you have to install the software that loads and runs on your desktop. During that installation it asks what you would like to install to your handheld, or this can easily be done later from the menu. It took me only a few minutes and I was ready to go. Registration is optional; I'm still getting a reminder every 2 weeks, but even that can be cancelled.
On your handheld you have to install the Documents To Go program, plus the viewers for Word and Excel. The whole thing without any documents is about 500kb. Size shouldn't really be a problem, furthermore the actual documents are a tenth the size they are on your desktop.
Transferring Files
This is the easy part. The software is extremely to use and very straightforward. You just have to confirm which account to sync to (if you have more than one), then click on the huge button that says "Add Item". You can choose to open however many documents at once you want. So if you have a lot (as I did) of Documents time will not be any issue.
Once you have selected them and hit "open" all the files your have selected to be synced will be listed below. If you later decide that you don't want to transfer the updated file you can easily change the status of all the files.
From this point all you have to do is perform a normal HotSync with you Palm Os device and during the sync Docs To Go will pop up and load into the device. All the files will automatically be sent to the appropriate place and listed on the Palm for viewing. On the desktop or Palm your documents can be sorted into specific folders depending on their nature. I have some for work, and others for hobbies, and still others just for information.
Editing on the Palm
Editing the documents on the Palm couldn't be more straight forward. You just open the document, tap where you want to do/change something and go nuts. For typing it's just like a regular word document, but many features aren't available. For example their are only 3 font sizes, bold, italic, and underline.
Also excluded from the program is the ability to show pictures. I've tried this and found the if you try to click on the picture it freezes and you end up resetting the Palm. It may be possible that it trys to show it to you but gets overwhelmed. Either way this software isn't meant to be a media presentation.
As for excel files it looks like a normal workbook: you can see all the grids and your numbers. The scrolling for Excel especially needs to looked at; rather weak. The unfortunate thing is that with limited use of the excel part I have yet to find a way to make formulas on the Palm.
Just like the real version of Word when you go to exit the document it gives you a choice to save the document, save it in a new name, not to save, or cancell and go back to the document.
Minor Quirks
Their are a few minor details in which this product could be improved.
1. Improved scrolling or viewsize for Word and especially Excel documents
2. Making formulas in Excel
3. Picture viewing in Word
4. Have the ability to create new documents instead of just editing. *Hint create a blank document called blank.
5. When trying to load a lot (and I mean a lot) of documents the Palm HotSync process occasionally freezes.
Summary
Absolutely no Palm user should be without Documents To Go, especially regular users or just if you want the best performance out of your palm.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
roosthui
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Location: Aurora, Ontario, Canada
Reviews written: 48
Trusted by: 6 members
About Me:
Hey, my dream is to go to medical school, and I appreciate everyone's help.
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