Omnidrive and Netvibes?
Anyone else think an Omnidrive thingy would be nifty in Netvibes?
I already have a box.net one in Netvibes, but it only seems to work when viewed in a windows/firefox browser. All others seem borked… But heck, I’m using Omnidrive more lately, so…
The Zoho / Omnidrive Deal
Last August, I had a bee in my bonnet and mentioned, several times, how nifty it would be if the online office guys were working with the online storage guys. [1] [2] [3] You know, why put all our eggs (aka documents) in one basket? Why not get some cooperation going.
Apparently I wasn’t totally out in left field. Zoho and Omnidrive announced today that they have integrated their respective services. [Zoho] [Omnidrive] Store your documents in Omnidrive, open them in Zoho — and save them back to Omnidrive.
This is very cool stuff! I feel strangely validated that maybe not all my ideas are totally goofy…
I wonder if it will extend in more directions? Will Zoho and Box.Net partner up too? Will Omnidrive do some dealing with ThinkFree or Ajax13? Will Google do whatever it is Google does off in their own little playground? Inquiring minds are, err, inquiring.
I reckon I’ll have another run at Omnidrive soon. I tried recently and had some windows client issues. Was too swamped with the real world and just iced it instead of digging into it. Oh, but I did manage to get my wife using Zoho Writer this week. 
[update: I should clarify and mention that the web interface for Omnidrive works just fine for me -- and is rather slick itself.]
Omnidrive – Still Interesting
Last wrote about Omnidrive a week or two ago. Since then not a whole lot has changed. The web interface is definitely improved and quite “friendly”. Except I have yet to figure out what the hell I’m doing when I click on “Create a New Live Folder.” Sounds interesting and there’s probably a help file somewhere that I haven’t found yet.
In a comment to my previous article, Nic mentioned some new client updates should be out. Unfortunately, I’ve not found ‘em yet. I’ve ran my Omnidrive Updater a few times and even re-downloaded the install package. Guess they didn’t make it out for beta?
I did notice something a bit odd while poking around though. In my Omnidrive install directory is a folder with my user account name. Not overly surprising. An omnidrive.xml folder that details my folders and files stored in my omnidrive account. Again, not overly surprising… I think. Makes sense from a local client and/or integration perspective I reckon. But what was surprising is that I also found local copies of those directories and all the files in ‘em! I reckon this explains why working with files in the “omnidrive” system folder is so zippy. Just don’t move stuff to Omnidrive in hopes of saving space.
I have mixed feelings about that last piece, yet I wonder if I’ve missed the point of the client programs for this? Just seems odd to upload something to an online storage app and find an extra copy of it locally.
Omnidrive – This Could be Cool
I briefly mentioned the other day that I’m in the Omnidrive beta. I’ve wanted this for soooo long and I’m quite thankful that Nik happened to agree with something I wrote recently and took pity upon me. Everytime Techcrunch would gush about Omnidrive I’d just squirm…
I was hoping to write a full review tonight, but I’m afraid I’ll have to stall that off a bit. Been having some technical challenges and I’m not entirely sure if they’re on my side or their side. I volunteered to try anything in an email this morning. I promised that I’m reasonably bright (I fancy myself quite handy with these computer thingies) and basically said I’d be a guinea pig. Because I gotta tell you, the little taste I’ve had of how things could be it pretty exciting.
The web interface is ok. Nothing overly surprising there. But the desktop integration is awesome. For a windows machine, you end up with what basically looks like an Omnidrive “System Folder”. Treat it like a hard drive and do the usual drag’n'drop or cut and paste stuff. Things get really cool when you have the software installed on multiple machines. Like, I have it on a machine at home and a machine at the office. It’s nice to toss stuff onto this drive for storage, but it gets really slick for shuttling files around — and of course, any machine with a decent web browser can play too.
Hopefully I can work out a few kinks soon and play with this a bit more. I honestly think the Omnidrive folks are onto something incredible here.
Google Base API and More Online App Storage Musing
The Google Code Blog has a post up announcing the new Google Base data API. When I first saw this, I didn’t give much beyond a “ho hum” response, but after pondering it a bit this morning, I suddenly realize this may make sense when looked at along with some of my recent posts about online offices and online storage.
From the API Page:
Google Base allows client applications to view and update stored data in the form of Google data API (“GData”) feeds. Your client application can use the Google Base data API to create new data, edit or delete existing data, and query for data items that match particular criteria.
Wouldn’t it be great if Writely was using this API for “databased” document storage? Sure, putting documents in a db may be a bit… kludgey, but if Google yanks the plug on Writely some day, at least all my documents would still be around.
It gets more interesting (ok, and realistic) when you look at other online applications. For instance, all the apps in the “Task Management, to-do list and Note keepers” space: they should be jumping all over this. If my favorite task manager tanks, at least my data and notes are still out there where I can reach ‘em.
Let’s extend the fantasy and pretend they all use a common schema too. Then switching from one service to another becomes trivial. And highly unlikely… but it’s fun to fantasize from time to time.
Speaking of interesting storage options, I got an invite into the Omnidrive beta last week. Still experimenting with it, but initial reaction is WOW. Stay tuned.
[via Web 2.0 Explorer]
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