.FLYINGHEAD PRODUCT REVIEW
.TITLE Edit Office files on the go with Documents To Go
.AUTHOR Heather Wardell
.SUMMARY As a writer, Heather Wardell tries to have access to her works-in-progress at all times so she can revise a sticky section or just re-visit a part she particularly liked. Of course, her files are all on her laptop, but she doesn’t take her laptop everywhere. Her Palm, though, is an ever-present companion, and DataViz’s Documents To Go allows her to work anywhere she chooses. Should you add Documents To Go to your kit bag? Read Heather’s review and find out.
.OTHER
As a writer, I try to have access to my works-in-progress at all times so I can revise a sticky section or just re-visit a part I particularly like. Of course, my files are all on my laptop, but I don’t take my laptop everywhere with me. My Palm, though, is an ever-present companion, and DataViz’s Documents To Go allows me to work anywhere I choose.
Now, we’ve talked about Documents To Go before, which makes sense, since the product’s been around and updated year after year for years. This time, I’ll be talking about Documents To Go 10, and it’s been substantially updated.
.H1 The product
Documents To Go consists of two visible parts and several invisible ones. The visible pieces are the Palm software (also available for Windows Mobile and Blackberry) and a desktop companion used to manage the files on the handheld. The Palm software invokes the invisible pieces, which handle editing and viewing for Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files, and viewing of PDF files. Changes you make to an editable file are integrated into your computer’s version of the file when you synchronize your handheld.
Figure A shows the desktop component.
.FIGPAIR A The desktop component of Documents To Go allows you to add files quickly and easily to your handheld.
As the right side of the graphic shows, Documents To Go is able to access your files from their original directories. Other document managers I’ve tried required all the files to be in a directory managed by the program, which made it impossible to keep the files organized in my usual way. Documents To Go’s method is far more intuitive and functional.
When you add a new file or edit an existing one on the desktop, Documents To Go marks the file as ‘Needs Sync’ or ‘Modified’ respectively, so that you can tell at a glance which files are not up to date.
.H1 On the handheld
Most of the action of Documents To Go happens on the handheld, where you edit or review existing files or create new ones. The most current version allows you to edit and create Office 2007 files, but as I’m still using Office 2003 I’m unable to test this integration. With my files, though, Documents To Go does a truly outstanding job of maintaining formatting between my Palm and my computer.
My novel’s working files have headers and footers, and some parts have styles set up as well. While Documents To Go does not allow me to edit those elements, I have never once lost any part of them when I’ve made changes on my Palm, and the files look exactly as they always did on my laptop.
Figure B shows a test file I created, using tables and a different font for each cell, on both the Palm and the laptop. Viewing the file on the Palm requires me to scroll sideways, as the table doesn’t fit the screen, but the scrolling does work well and is the only solution I can see for a table wider than the screen. The fonts do not appear on the Palm, but when I click on a particular cell and select Font, the Palm does know what font was used, so fonts are preserved during synchronizations.
.FIGPAIR B The same Word file on my laptop and the Palm looks different but is equally functional.
I used to use a lot of tables in my documents, especially novel outlines and schedules, but as I’ve come to rely heavily on Documents To Go for my day-to-day work I’ve backed away from tables. While the program does the best job it can given the screen size restrictions, I do find the constant scrolling aggravating. Similarly, I don’t use fonts to emphasize different details; bolding, underlining, and italics do carry over and do just as good a job. Even colored highlighting carries over.
Files do not open instantaneously. In my testing, it didn’t seem to matter how large the file was; both the file for this article (46 Kb in size) and my most recent novel (842 Kb) took approximately nine seconds to be ready for use. It’s not a huge delay, but it can feel like a long time if you’re just wanting a quick look at a file, or if someone is standing beside you waiting for the file to open. Once a file is open, though, you can switch between programs on your handheld and the file will still be open when you return to Documents To Go, which is nice.
Excel files are handled just as well as Word files, and I was surprised to find that PowerPoint files actually display with their colored backgrounds on the Palm screen. I rarely have to do presentations any more, but the next time I do, I will certainly use my Palm for rehearsal purposes. Figure C shows the same PowerPoint file on my laptop and on the Palm.
.FIGPAIR C Documents To Go is able to carry over even the colored formatting of a PowerPoint file.
I find the vast majority of PDF files I try have something strange in their formatting when viewed on the Palm, either lines breaking in odd places or double letters where a single letter was supposed to be in bold (bbold instead of bold). In addition, there is a notable delay when moving from one screen to the next, on the order of six or seven seconds. However, Documents To Go’s handling of PDFs is such an improvement over the only other PDF reader I’ve tried, Adobe’s Palm version, that I can’t complain too much. Still, this would be the main area I think needs improvement, as it’s very disrupting while reading.
.H1 Sync
For a program like this, the most crucial feature is consistently accurate synchronization. You have to be able to trust absolutely that the changes you make on one platform will appear on the other, and that if you inadvertently make changes to both platforms you will be alerted. The thought of spending several hours editing a novel, only to accidentally wipe out the changes in a mistaken change on the opposite platform, does not exactly appeal.
I have been using Documents To Go in various versions for several years, and I have never once had it fail to synchronize my documents correctly. I do my best to only make changes to one platform, of course, but there are times when I slip up. I deliberately slipped up for this article, on the Word file I used for Figure B, and was given the following message upon synchronization:
.BEGIN_CODE
Documents To Go Message(s)
Table Test
Content was modified on both the desktop and the handheld.
Both versions of this record were copied to the Desktop and the handheld.
Delete the unwanted record and perform a HotSync operation again.
Table Test
There is a record on the desktop that has exactly the same title.
The title of this item was changed to the following: “Table Test_1”
.END_CODE
On the Palm, the original file looks the way it did after my change and Table Test_1 contains the change I made on the laptop. On my laptop, Table Test contains the laptop’s original version and Table Test_1 contains the modification from the Palm. Essentially, each platform retains its original and has a copy of the modification. While I have occasionally found this confusing (especially when my modifications were more subtle than the "changed on the Palm" line I used this time), I do like that Documents To Go does not permit me to lose anything I’ve done.
This is especially useful if both sets of modifications need to be kept. If, for example, I’ve changed a different paragraph on the Palm than I have on the laptop, having both copies easily accessible allows me to merge them and have no fear of losing anything.
Documents To Go is an outstanding program, clearly designed from the ground up for stability and security, and I would not want to be a writer without it. While I run nightly backups of my data as well, I use Documents To Go to keep my most crucial files with me at all times, so I never fear losing work. Highly recommended for anyone who ever needs to edit or look at Office files or PDF files while away from the computer, Documents To Go rates a solid 4.
.RATING 4
.BEGIN_SIDEBAR
.H1 Product availability and resources
Learn more about [[http://www.dataviz.com/products/documentstogo/index.html|Documents To Go]].
.END_SIDEBAR
.BIO
