Online applications are ideal for collaboration, especially for
collaborating with users from multiple locations. These browser based
applications offer convenience, mobility among many other advantages.
But when you have to depend on a locally installed application, to open
a document for example, breaks the flow. Integrating document editing capability
within in the browser can offer seamless experience and can make users
productive as well as remove the hurdle to have an installed
application.
We have seen collaboration vendors like Box.net, Huddle, Knowledge Tree etc offer
seamless online document editing experience using Zoho editors. Today,
another online collaboration & project management vendor,
Glasscubes integrated Zoho Writer and Zoho Sheet into their application.
If you upload documents or spreadsheets into GlassCubes documents
section, you'll notice an additional option to edit the document.
Choosing the 'Edit Document' option opens the document (including 2007
formats) in the appropriate Zoho Editors. You can make changes to the
document and save it back to the Glasscubes application. Thanks to our
Remote APIs, Glasscubes users need not have a Zoho account to use this
functionality.
Rob Hallums explains this integration on their blog. We'd like to thank GlassCubes for integrating Zoho.
InfoLogic's MathMagic is a desktop based equation editor software. Its latest version 6.8 for Mac users has introduced a special menu item for Zoho Writer. MathMagic can now be used as a front-end equation editor by Zoho Writer users (Zoho Writer has allowed writing of LaTeX equations since May 2008). Whether or not you are fluent in LaTeX, you can now write mathematical equations and symbols using MathMagic
easily and fast, then simply copy-paste it into Zoho Writer's Equation
Editor window. LaTeX expressions from Zoho Writer's Equation Editor can also be copy-pasted into MathMagic window to edit the equation on a WYSIWYG interface.
InfoLogic says MathMagic's Windows version will also support "Copy as Zoho equation" in the near future. We believe this new menu will help both MathMagic & Zoho Writer users.
At Zoho, we provide APIs for a good many of our products and they have all been well received. A sample list of our API partners here. The latest one to join the list is Elementool.
Elementool provides web based project management tools for help desk, bug and defect tracking and time tracking tools. Elementool has implemented Zoho's API in their Docs module. All uploaded documents, spreadsheets and presentations to the Elementool's Docs module can now be viewed using Zoho. Not just viewing, you can edit the file too and when you save the file again, all changes get reflected in your uploaded file in the Elementool account.
Such a functionality is useful if you are uploading a lot of your project/work-related documents, spreadsheets & presentations online and want them viewed or edited then and there in the browser itself (instead of downloading each of them and editing them using a desktop application). Try Elementool out and see if it fits your needs.
We have a couple of other API collaborations happening too which we will blog about in the days to come. Stay tuned.
The chat bar you see at the bottom of applications like Zoho Mail, Zoho Business, Zoho Docs does a lot of useful things. Most of them has got to do with your presence status and the bar helps you in chatting live with your contacts who are online. But there's one other important feature - notifications. The little bell icon adds a number to itself whenever there is a new notification.
You get notified for a good many work instances.
1. When you are offline and someone sends you a chat message
2. When someone shares a Zoho document, spreadsheet or presentation.
3. When you upload a file to Zoho Docs
4. When you make a post in a Zoho Discussions forum and someone responds to it. You get notified when you watch someone or a forum too.
5. Users can send a direct notification message (instead of a chat message) to their Contacts / Groups from Zoho Chat
You can see the past notifications history by clicking on the Feeds link. 
So, watch the little Notification icon at the bottom-left when you login to Zoho the next time. It might have some important notifications for you :) The chat/presence bar itself will continue to evolve as we have planned for more useful features to be delivered through it.
KnowledgeTree, an ECM provider who focuses on document management
software is launching their SaaS offering today - KnowledgeTreeLive.
This is a hosted version of their open source online document
management system and it integrates Zoho for editing documents.
With this integration, KnowledgeTreeLive users will have options to create new documents and
view existing documents using the Zoho Editors. When a document is
created/edited with Zoho Apps, the documents are saved back to
KnowledgeTree servers as they maintain complete information about your
documents.
We have a unique set of APIs which let external
applications programatically open documents using Zoho Apps and save
them back to their own servers. Here, 'Saving back to their own servers' is an
important point as it enables some interesting integration scenarios as it fits into the workflow.
We think adding document editing capabilities to other document
management systems is a natural fit. But this need not be restricted to
document management systems alone. To be generic, any
system/application that has documents attached can add value by
integrating document editors for creating/viewing/editing. We have seen
some good integrations already from some of our partners and we
certainly hope to see more such integrations.
We'd like to thank KnowledgeTree for integrating Zoho and looking forward to a long-term relationship.
As you may know, we have been focusing a lot on integration between Zoho applications. For a end user, it is important that Zoho
applications fit well into his workflow and integrate well with third party applications/services as well. Apart from integrating Zoho
applications, we have also integrated Zoho with many third-party
applications. Infact, we have too many such integrations. So I'll split
this into multiple posts and expand on some of our integrations with non-zoho applications
Integration with Google/Yahoo
Let
us start with login. We don't mandate you create an account with Zoho
to try our apps. If you are reading this, you probably have a Yahoo
or a Google account, right? So we figured, we'll just let you login to Zoho with you existing accounts. This way, you don't have an
additional username/password pair to remember.
EchoSign Integration in Zoho Writer
If you are working on an agreement or any other document and you need to get it signed/approved, EchoSign is a great service to use for electronic signatures/approvals. To
make the process seamless, we integrated EchoSign into Zoho Writer. So you work on a document and with a click or two, you can send
the document for approval. You'll find EchoSign integrated as 'DigiSign' option under the 'Share' MenuTab in Zoho Writer.
Flickr & Picasa Integration in Zoho Show
When you try to insert an image in Zoho Show, apart from uploading the
photos, you'll notice two options - Flickr & Picasa. If you already
have your images uploaded in other sites, why re-upload them to Zoho.
So we integrated Flickr & Picasa into Zoho Show to let your embed
those images into your presentations.
Paypal, Google Checkout & Authorize.net integration with Zoho Invoice
Sending out invoices is just one part of the story. If you want to
receive payments, your invoicing system needs to have multiple options
for your customer to choose. Zoho Invoice integrated multiple payment
gateways to receive payments - Paypal, Google Checkout and
Authorize.Net.
Integration with multiple IM Networks in Zoho Chat
With Zoho Chat 2.0, we added multi-protocol chat support. This lets you
chat with users from other IM Networks including Yahoo!, Google, MSN,
AIM, ICQ or any network that supports the Jabber protocol. As Zoho Chat is integrated across mutliple Zoho Apps, you'll be able to chat with members from other IM Networks no matter which Zoho App you are in.
There are just a few examples of external services integrated into Zoho
Apps. I'll talk about other integrations in follow-up posts. Meanwhile,
if are there any third-party integrations you wish to see in Zoho,
please let us know.
Rabbit is a web-based operating system that connects people, processes and content, combining the power of social networking into an enterprise environment. A key component of Rabbit is its information sharing capabilities, which let users work on documents they’ve uploaded to Rabbit’s web workspace, and share this with other users. Rabbit has selected Zoho for this because of Zoho's proven ability to provide high levels of functionality and performance, and to provide a smooth transition for enterprise users from working locally on the desktop to working on the web.
All documents, spreadsheets and presentations uploaded and stored in Rabbit can be opened using Zoho. The documents and spreadsheets can be edited and saved back where as the presentations can be viewed. Below is a screenshot of files in Rabbit being opened using Zoho.
New documents and spreadsheets can be created too from inside Rabbit by invoking Zoho Writer and Sheet. This video by the Rabbit team explains the functionality in detail.
Zoho is primarily about working online. We have a great set of online
productivity apps which businesses find extremely useful for
collaboration. Microsoft SharePoint is ubiquitous in enterprises for
content management, but it lacks several advantages that cloud
applications like Zoho enjoy.
Today we are pleased to announce Zoho Office for Microsoft SharePoint that brings the advantages of Zoho online productivity applications to ubiquitous Microsoft SharePoint.
Zoho Office for Microsoft SharePoint extends the value of Microsoft
SharePoint by allowing users to create new documents using Zoho's
office suite and then save them directly to SharePoint in Microsoft
Office supported formats. Users can view or edit existing documents,
spreadsheets and presentations using Zoho Writer, Sheet & Show and
save them back to SharePoint.
This video gives a good overview of this add-on.
Installation video is available here. As Zoho applications are served
from the cloud, you don't need any installations on desktops to
create/view/edit documents. Once you install the add-on for SharePoint
server, you can be more productive with just your browser.
Zoho Collaboration on Microsoft SharePoint
Apart from providing editing capability for existing documents, the
add-on also provides collaborative editing functionality. Based on
sharing permissions already defined in SharePoint, multiple users can
collaboratively work on documents/spreadsheets/presentations in real-time.
This feature basically brings one of the key advantages of an online
office suite to SharePoint.
While collaboratively editing documents, you can also chat with other members using our integrated Zoho Chat.
Data Behind your Firewall
Along with small and medium businesses, we see a good percentage of
departments in larger organizations using our productivity apps for
collaboration. There are businesses which prefer keeping their
data behind the enterprise firewall. For such organizations, this new
add-on brings in the best of both worlds - Collaboration capabilities
of an online application while keeping the data behind your firewall.
If you have SharePoint installed in your intranet behind your corporate
firewall, you still will be able to view/edit documents using our
online applications. After changes, your documents are saved back to
your SharePoint server behind your corporate firewall leaving no data
on Zoho Servers.
When you open the document, a copy is transferred temporarily to Zoho
servers securely. When the document is closed, it is permanently
deleted from our servers immediately leaving no data on our side.
Pricing & Availability
Starting today, this add-on is available for Microsoft SharePoint 2007
and 2003 versions. You can try the 30 day evaluation version for
unlimited users. After the trial period, it costs $2/user/month on an
yearly subscription or $3/user/month for monthly subscription.
If you have already invested in Microsoft SharePoint, this add-on is a
great compliment that brings in the advantages of online productivity
applications to SharePoint. If you are able to access SharePoint,
you'll be able to view/edit documents without having to invest on
productivity suites for every desktop in your business.
Additional information is available @ http://www.zoho.com/sharepoint
Please do give it a try and let us know what you think.
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Microsoft, SharePoint are either registered trademarks
or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or
other countries. ZOHO Corp is not affiliated or endorsed by Microsoft
Corporation.
In
one of my previous posts, I talked about integration between different Zoho Apps expanding on the following integrations.
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