This is the second article in the series Online Blogging Platforms series.
I’m not a Microsoft fan whatsoever, but when I opened this series up to user entries, one of our readers mentioned he did his writing in OneDrive. Since I couldn’t say no, I made a Microsoft account and jumped headfirst into OneDrive. I’ll say this: it wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Keep reading to check out some pros and cons from my time with OneDrive.
But before I jump in, a quick shoutout to our reader Robert Daniels who recommended this platform to me. Thanks for the suggestion, and I hope your t-shirt found you well!
More Pros Than Expected
- Clean Style- Ever since Microsoft did their refresh when they entered the mobile market, I’ve had half an eye peeking at their new ecosystem with a bit of awe. Their refresh is very minimal and super clean, two qualities I love about modern design. It kind of felt like a guilty pleasure loading up OneDrive and admiring the look of it on my screen. The hideous icons of the Word I’m used to are no more, replaced with more modern, flat icons that looked perfect. The page is mainly white with a few other shades for contrast, and a colorful header at the top. Calibri is the default font, and it looks super crisp with the standard setup. Little things such as the cursor changing color when you select a different font color really made the experience all the more fluid and stylish. Microsoft doesn’t Scroogle you on the style front (sorry, I had to!).
- Fully Featured- A huge plus of this OneDrive web app is that it had a ton of standard options that come in the desktop version of Word. It seemed like all the buttons I use most are present, and the contextual clues (like the formatting box that appears when you select text) is laid out much better than previous versions.
- Free- As far as I have encountered, the OneDrive app is free to use. I mention this in response to Tim Adams’ article on churches violating Copyright like it’s their job, when really the opposite is true. Churches do not need to break the law in order to get work done! OneDrive is just another free tool that churches can use to get the day to day office stuff done without compromising themselves legally. If you want to hear more on that subject, check out the Level Up Podcast that Jeremy and I did with Tim on precisely that topic.
Two Glaring Cons
- Portability- I imagine this wouldn’t be an issue on Windows Phones and Tablets, but on my Nexus 7 the OneDrive app isn’t as useful as I thought it would be. When I opened it up and signed in, I expected an experience similar to Google’s Drive app where one can view and edit documents all in-app. When I clicked on my document, a blank document opened up in QuickOffice. I can’t tell you why, but it did. QuickOffice is a great offline text editor on Android, but I have no idea why Microsoft would Scroogle their Android users out of using their own app (see! I did it again!). I was so thoroughly confused, I closed the app and went back to my computer. Some things are better left on the desktop I guess.
- Where did my work go??- When I began writing my article, I came to a point at which I had to stop and pick up my work at a different time. OneDrive told me that all progress was saved as I typed, and that I was good. Not the case for me. When I opened up OneDrive again, my work was not there. The crisp blank page stared at me, taunting me to either throw my computer out the window or rewrite my article. I have no explanation as to why this happened, but I intend to submit a support ticket. For now, I am finishing the article in Writer, which I reviewed last week.
All in All
Ever since Microsoft’s below-the-belt “Scroogled” ad campaign, I haven’t given their products a second glance. But for the average Joe, I’d recommend to give the platform a shot if you’re in the market. I’d especially recommend it to church staffs using pirated software. Yes, I mean you. I’ll also throw in that OneDrive does more than just Word documents, and functions similarly to Google Drive if you’re familiar with what.
Provided that your work doesn’t randomly disappear (always backup!), you should find a nice looking, fully featured online text editor in OneDrive.
How about you? What are your thoughts about Microsoft products? What do you like about their new OneDrive service? Have you ever ran into any trouble with it like I have?
Robert Daniels says
Thanks, Jesse, for the write up. I *think* you need to install the free Office Mobile app to edit docs on the go. That’s what I use on my Moto X. I don’t have an Android tablet to test if it is available for tablets. I know the iPad version requires a subscription. You can also use OneNote through OneDrive, which is what I use a lot when working on different projects.
Haven’t gotten the shirt yet but I am looking forward to wearing it proudly.
Jesse Gruber says
Yeah, that was a weird glitch! I just assumed it would open up right in the OneDrive app like Google Drive’s app does, but it kicked me out. Maybe that had something to do with my lost work? Not sure. Hoping it was a freak thing though. I’m sure it was or else no one would use it haha!
Joe Benson says
Am I the only who is wondering whether you were using OneDrive or OneNote. It looks kind of like you were looking for the features of OneNote while using OneDrive or vice-versa. One is for cloud storage, the other is for note taking.
Jesse Gruber says
That’s my fault Joe. I was using the OneDrive web client and created a Word document using that and that’s what I was reviewing. I hadn’t touched OneNote (yet) as I currently am shifting towards Evernote as my life manager.
Jesse Gruber says
Thanks for the clarifications @steinersupport:disqus and it’s my fault for not clarifying all of this in my review. The process I was using for OneDrive was one that I thought someone who wanted to write an article in it would use. So I went to the website on my browser, created an account, and created an “online” Word Doc. Totally my fault for not stating that up front, as that probably would have cleared up a ton of confusion!
I appreciate your thoughts on the Microsoft/Google debate, as I’ve never really heard any positive discussion from Microsoft’s point of view, and I do think that in that case it is a shame that Google would leave you guys hanging. I always thought that it was Microsoft who was closing their ecosystem off! We should start a company called “Why Can’t We All Get Along Inc” haha.
Steve Steiner says
I really wish they could just get along, it isn’t all on Google, as scroogled clearly demonstrated (though you can “install” Microsoft apps for Google Chrome), and it makes sense that you wouldn’t be familiar with MS’s side since you aren’t an MS user.
Regarding Word online, it has been a few years since I used that, but since in my job, out of necessity I usually have more of an MS products focus anyway I’ll look into that. If I discover anything helpful I’ll report back. It does help for the sake of clarity to have this on the tail end of your article anyway, since Word online and OneDrive are separate products as well and it can clear up some confusion. I do believe you have to do an initial save with it but I could be wrong. I’ll also look into it saving automatically, do to my lack of use didn’t know it did that. Could you specify if you did an initial save so I can keep that in mind as I start troubleshooting this?
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