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Sindi wrote:

I checked out the list of these at Wikipedia.  Many require Windows or 
Java or are no longer free and online.

Google Docs says it requires javascript and works with IE 6+, Firefox 2 or 
3, or Safari.  I tried with Opera and it complained about cookies (with 
Opera set to accept all cookies).  With Firefox 2 (Bon Echo from DSL 
linux) it did not work (loaded the writer but you only got a blinking 
vertical line cursor and could not type).  Worked with Seamonkey 1.17 
GTK1.  VERY VERY slowly via dialup.  I could not find italic, bold, or 
underline in the menus (maybe they are in graphic form) but super and 
subscript under Format worked, however I could not get back to plain.
You can use it if you have a gmail account.

Imports and exports doc, rtf, html, text, openoffice, exports these and 
PDF (print from your browser if it is set up that way).
They also have a spreadsheet and powerpoint equivalent, and templates for 
budgets and resumes.


http://writer.zoho.com (also spreadsheet etc.) requires that you sign up 
with a 6-char+ login and you are supposed to reply to an email but it 
works anyway (for a while at least).  Menu of keyboard shortcuts lists 
italic, bold, underline, but you need to click on a picture for sub and 
subscript.  These all work fine with Seamonkey (did not try Firefox 2) but 
Opera uses Ctrl-U etc. as its own keyboard shortcuts.  Opera works much 
better on my 250MHz laptop - Seamonkey runs the CPU at max most of the 
time.  Imports/exports doc docx odf odt sxw rtf html text pdf latex. You 
can SAVE and then EXPORT (via a button labelled only with some icon) to 
/tmp (via the browser dialog box) or SHARE/MAIL (use them directly as 
webmail) or PUBLISH (free webspace?) or POST TO BLOG.  Or GO OFFLINE and 
work on the document.  You can SWITCH to their MAIL MEETING PLANNER WIKI 
CHAT REPORTS (did not try any of these - Google has a Calendar)

In Seamonkey you need to tell it to stop a non-responding script and then 
it works.

I was far more impressed by Zoho than Google Docs. If you NEED to read a 
file created with Office or Openoffice (and edit it, or provide a doc 
file) this is one way.  (There are also free online convertors but you 
need to wait for an email). Abiword cannot handle much formatting from 
WORD.  I did not test how these handle DOC files.  Both are nearly useless 
via dialup (at least over a wet phone line).