How to Collaborate on Documents Over the Internet

Microsoft’s Office Online recently gained real-time coauthoring features, so it may also be worth a look.

Like most Google services, it’s a free program you access in your web internet tool.

Files you create in Google Docs are saved to Google Drive and associated with your Google account.

Google controls the document and can give other people access to it.

To use Google Docs for collaboration, head to theGoogle Drive websiteand sign in with your Google account.

With the document open, go for the Share button.

you might hover over this button to see who has access to this document.

Enter the email addresses of the people who you want to collaborate on the document with.

The “Can view” permission is useful if you just want to show a document to people.

By default, people will receive an email when you share the document with them.

The email contains a link to the document so they can edit it along with you.

When multiple people are working on a document, you’ll see multiple text entry cursors.

There’s even a chat feature you’re free to use to talk to your coauthors.

Office Online

Microsoft’s Office Online was formerly known as Office Web Apps.

It’s a completely free, web-based version of Microsoft Office you access in your net surf tool.

Because it’s a web app, it’s not the full Microsoft Office and is more limited.

For example, only one person can work on the same paragraph at a time when collaborating inOffice 2013.

Office Online is available atOffice.com.

With a document open, hit the Share button at the top of the page.

Enter the email addresses you want to share with and choose the permissions you want to grant.

The people you share the document with will receive email invites with a link to your document.

Google Docs and Office Online both make this simple and include capable office apps to work with.