Here’s more screenshots & a nice video of how to use Open IT Online to view documents online with Zoho. Install the Open IT Online Firefox add-on to view/edit files directly online without downloading them.

• When you are adding or editing slides, the visitors to your blog/website will be seeing live the unfinished changes that you are making
• When you want to have the original version linked to on the site while wanting to have the revised version private or shared only to a group

There is the Automatically re-publish when document is modified checkbox which does the trick. Leave it checked and you will always see the latest version in your blog/website. Uncheck it and you can do your edits safely without the external world knowing it.

Having the Automatically re-publish when document is modified option ticked makes the latest version available to the public always

Leaving the option unchecked, you can see that the last published version is 1.4 while the latest version is 1.6

The above is not just limited to embedding your presentation as it applies in general to making a presentation public! Hope you found the tip useful. Try this out in Zoho Show and do leave your comments on how you are using Zoho (Show).

Does Zoho offer a backup function which will let me download all my data?

We have various options depending on each Zoho service.

Zoho Writer : Offers a variety of different formats that you can export a document to - doc, docx, pdf, odf (odt), latex, sxw, html, rtf & txt. Click on Export to see the options.

Also integrates with Google Gears. Offers upto 50 documents to be downloaded to your desktop. You can access these documents from http://writer.zoho.com/offline. Click on Go Offline to download Google Gears and your Zoho Writer documents

Zoho Sheet : Click on Export. Again offers a wide variety of options from xls to pdf to ods to xml. There is also a batch export option available from the sidebar.

Zoho Show : Open a presentation. Click on Export and you will see the options available (ppt, pdf, pps and odp)

Zoho Projects : Export all your tasks as an xls or csv file. Under Tasks and Milestones, click on Export button

Zoho Creator : Export all your data as xls, pdf. Also as RSS, JSON feeds etc.

Zoho Wiki : You can download all the pages of your Wiki as a zip file. Available under Settings -> Click to download the backup

Zoho CRM : Choose the module (Leads, Contacts etc) and click on Export. You can also export all your CRM data in one go also. We charge a nominal fee of $10.

Zoho DB & Reports : Export your reports as csv, pdf or an image file

Zoho Invoice : Export each invoice, estimate as pdf. Export customer’s info as VCard (vcf).

Zoho Notebook : Has an Export as mht option. The exported page can be viewed in Internet Explorer.

We will be coming up with more export options in upcoming updates.

I have a document/spreadsheet/presentation that is to be emailed every time to a ‘prospect/client’ or to my ‘boss/peers/co-students/teacher for review’. In the former instance, “I don’t want the doc to stay in my prospect/client’s inbox (as documents soon become obsolete)”. And in the latter instance, “I and my boss/peers/co-students/teacher end up having multiple versions of the file, adding to my/their email clutter”. How can Zoho help me here?

Well, this is one of the fundamental problems solved by Zoho. Let’s say you have a .doc or .odt file. You have a few options in Zoho that would make things easier for you.

• Import your document into Zoho Writer
  • Share it by giving the email addresses of your prospect/client, boss,peers, co-students or teacher. They will receive an email with a HTML link (URL) which they can click on to view the document. They can edit the document too, directly inside Zoho Writer if you have given them proper permission
  • Make the document public (if it doesn’t contain anything confidential) and give the URL to anyone who would like to view it.
• Upload your document to Zoho Viewer. You get a URL which you email to everyone concerned & they can view it. Use the Zoho Viewer option judiciously - there’s an option where you can choose the URL to expire after a certain time period

Here’s a short screencast (our first attempt. bear with the video/audio quality please!) explaining the above options. For better clarity, view the video in Full Screen mode.

There are other advantages too.

• No compatibility issues that come with using different types and versions of desktop software
• You can keep updating your document and the latest version’s available for your prospect, client or whoever you want it to be viewed
• Live collaboration is possible - you and your collaborators can work on a document or spreadsheet in real-time
• And, you can chat too (using the embedded Zoho Chat)

Use Zoho. Say NO to email attachments.

Once you login, the Zoho tab shows the recent 5 documents from each Zoho app. You’ll be able to view your personal and shared documents under the respective application tabs.

We are looking forward to your feedback on this new redesign.

You can view your public presentations here after you login or @ http://show.zoho.com/public/<zohousername>

If you want to make your presentation public but don’t want to list it in this section, you can do so under the ‘Publish’ Menu with the ‘Remove from Public List’ option.

For every public presentation you have an option to comment, email or embed the presentation. You can also view related presentations or other presentations from the same author.

• In your Zoho Show account, open the presentation that you need to present to your remote participants
• Click on the Remote button
• Give the ‘Email addresses of presentation attendees (Remote Users)’ in the pop-up dialog
• You can set your own custom message for the email that is to be sent to the intended participants
• Click Send button. The participants will receive your email with a link in it to click on
• When you are ready to give the remote presentation, choose Start Remote from the Remote menu drop-down
• The remote presentation gets started & your participants join in by clicking on the URL that got sent in your invite mail

You can chat with the participants in the chat window to the right. There are other options like Show Notes & Share this Desktop (other than the Zoho Show presentation, your whole desktop can be shared, which is done using Zoho Meeting, the web conferencing tool).

Try the Remote Sharing feature of Zoho Show & we will be glad hearing about it in the comments section below.

UPDATE : As always, Zoho fans are more thorough in explaining things than ourselves!

1. Amit Agarwal @ Digital Inspiration points to the advantages of Zoho Show’s remote feature - there’s no limit to the number of participants, you the presenter is always in full-control of the presentation & the participants need not have a Zoho account.

2. Richard Byrne notes that Zoho Show’s Remote feature “doesn’t require any software to be downloaded by you or your presentation attendees”.

With this partnership, Baihui hosts Zoho Applications in China for distribution in China (ofcourse, in Chinese language). These applications will be distributed under Baihui brand. To start with, Baihui will offer the following Zoho applications…

• Zoho Writer - Baihui Xiexie
• Zoho Sheet - Baihui Gege
• Zoho Show - Baihui Xiuxiu
• Zoho CRM - Baihui CRM

This list will expand going forward. All these applications are currently available @ www.baihui.com.

As with Zoho, Baihui plans to offer these applications free of charge for individuals. Zoho CRM does carry a price tag (99RMB/User/Month) beyond three free users.

While I don’t understand any of the stuff in the above screenshot, we are certainly excited to see our apps up there. Almost 50% of our existing users are outside US which is a good sign. We think partnerships like these will extend our reach further.

There are more exciting stuff coming from Zoho. We’ll keep you posted.

Zoho Show is a straightforward to use thanks to its pre-built themes, clipart and shapes, coupled with handy features like drag-and-drop. In fact, anyone familiar with using the web should be able to put together a decent-looking presentation in just a few minutes. And, of course, you can access your presentation from any computer, so long as it’s connected to the internet.

Version 2.0 of Zoho Show has a number of enhancements — most noticeably the new user interface, which has been completely redesigned. The UI is now less cluttered and more intuitive to navigate, and the floating toolbars are a real boon. Support for themes has been improved too, and the application now has over 50 default themes to get you started.

Zoho Show 2.0 integrates much better with Zoho Meeting, an online desktop sharing tool from the same stable. The major benefit here is that you can now quickly and easily switch between applications to share your desktop with the participants viewing your presentation. And Zoho Chat allows you to chat with your audience during remote presentations.

Chris gave 7.5 out of 10 for Zoho Show 2.0. Zoho Invoice which we released a couple of weeks ago has got a very good welcome from small & medium businesses. Peter Piazza writes about the release at CIO.com in an article titled, ‘Zoho Challenges Business App Industry Heavyweights‘ :

Web 2.0 company Zoho has announced the launch of the latest product in its suite of online freeware and payware applications. Zoho Invoice gives users the ability to create everything from estimates to invoices in multiple currencies.

Zoho Invoice is integrated with PayPal, so invoices can be generated and sent to customers, who can then make payments directly through PayPal. The company plans on adding more payment gateways. The application is free for sending up to five invoices per month; four monthly subscription versions range from $5 to $35 and allow from 25 to 1,500 invoices to be sent each month.

Mozilla’s Firefox 3.0 release is being anticipated much by all. And it was our pleasure seeing the Release Notes for Firefox 3 Beta 5 mention Zoho in it!

[Improved in Beta 5!]  Speed: improvements to our JavaScript engine as well as profile guided optimizations have resulted in continued improvements in performance. Compared to Firefox 2, web applications like Google Mail and Zoho Office run twice as fast in Firefox 3 Beta 5, and the popular SunSpider test from Apple shows improvements over previous releases.