The Internet as Your Office Extension

By Newt Barrett

The day is soon coming when those of us who want to be connected to the Internet full-time at high speed will have our wish. Relatively high-speed ISDN and Wireless connections are already available in Southwest Florida. The Internet will function more like an extension of our individual PCs or our office LANs than the relatively slow dial up source of news and information it is today. To make this a reality, a new breed of products is emerging that runs the gamut from basic contact manager/calendar to sophisticated virtual office with surprising functionality.

Last month we discussed information management tools that were in the process of migrating from PC-based software such as ACT, Goldmine and Franklin Planner to the Internet. We concluded that they have promise and will soon benefit regular Internet users who need access from various locations and who want to share information easily with others. The disappointment was that their online implementations are only "almost here" in terms of real benefit. But, because of the substantial user corps that successful PC-based information tools enjoy, they have an initial competitive edge over the web only tools we'll examine in this article. But, that said, some of the Internet-centric products show great promise.

Certain functionality is critical no matter what species of collaborative information manager you choose. Meaningful functionality requires components that provide bi-directional communication and information access to and from the web. This is true both for what we need for ourselves and what we want to share.

We looked at a plethora of online tools from the simple to the sophisticated. It's pretty clear that the likely winners will have a very rich mix of capabilities for both individuals and work groups No single product has every important attribute today. But here are the capabilities you'll want, if not today, then very soon:

* Access to your data from any PC anywhere

* Online contact management/calendaring functions

* Task management

* Integrated email tied to contact information

* Integration with PC-based information managers

* Integration with Internet-enabled handheld devices

* Online business resources customized to your needs

* Online document sharing

* Sharing of information with anyone anywhere

Magicaldesk.com

MagicalDesk has all the basics for email, contact management, a calendar, and task management. It has no message boards but it does enable sharing of documents and the storage of files online. There is currently no way to upload contacts to the site. However, they do permit you to receive email from the site via your Palm VII. It can also synchronize files with your hard disk. It is planning further synchronization with more Palm Devices and MS Outlook.

MD offers "magical boxes" that are essentially just gussied up hyperlinks to search engines and such that the user can select from a limited menu. Overall, it has an amateurish look and feel as if it's not designed for serious business use. The only apparent revenue model is to charge for an online file viewer and for more than 5MB of online storage. Unfortunately, the serious competitors of this product are offering more storage for free.

HyperOffice.com

HyperOffice, still in beta testing, is much more sophisticated than MagicalDesk. It includes all the key information management tools as well as a notes function, a reminder tool and front page news headlines. HO has a "Quick Add" tool to add whatever data you want from wherever you are on the site. It also offers both personal and group functionality. HO has a voting function, which could be very appealing when used by large groups. It has an instant messaging function that would function on one test PC but not another.

HyperOffice seems to be a product with lots of potential, but it was a bit flaky in our testing and would tend to bounce us out periodically for no apparent reason. It is not advertising supported, either, but obviously expects to charge for data storage above its free 20MB. This will be a strong contender once out of beta.

Hot Office.com

Hot Office is a veteran in this category, and it shows in its simple but sophisticated user interface. The first model user paid, but it now offers a free ad-supported version in addition to an adless version available for a monthly fee. It is both sophisticated and intuitive with basic contact/calendaring for both groups and individuals-enhanced with group bulletin boards and document sharing.

Hot Office allows integration of multiple email accounts within the site. It also features integration with MS NetMeeting for online conferences. You can view stored documents online without downloading them. Finally, you can use Intellisync for HotOffice to synchronize with Outlook and Palm computers. Best of all, everything works.

Intranets.com

This site may be the slickest of all, because it has every information management component you need from individual to group contacts, calendars, documents, discussion boards where documents can be linked and instant messaging. Documents can be viewed and edited in a browser window. It also incorporates news focused on your vertical industry. Served up by NewsEdge, this component works quite well. Also included are financials from Stockpoint, Web Search and Yellow Pages search have been integrated into the site very neatly. You can even add your logo to the home page with a direct link to your website.

Intranets.com is a terrific intranet for a defined set of affiliated users. But it does not appear to be designed as an online contact manager or connected calendaring tool because it doesn't synchronize with land-based products and cannot import batches of contact names.

Visto.com

Visto.com is also a first-rate product but with an emphasis on connected contact management. For starters, it makes the importing of your electronic addresses effortless. In addition, it can synchronize its calendar with MS Outlook or Palm Desktop software-and indirectly with your Palm. In addition, Visto can synchronize with a cell phone. It's also simple to create groups that can share messages, files and a calendar. Its email components enable you to retrieve email from office or ISP email accounts. Visto includes 15MB of secure online file storage. Visto also delivers syndicated news headlines

If online, anywhere contact management is what you need, Visto does a terrific job. It is well ahead of its competitors in connecting your PC, handheld or cell phone to your online data. Its group management capabilities are good, but not as strong as HotOffice or Intranets.com.

Conclusion

The best of the new online tools will prove formidable competitors to their bricks and mortar cousins in terms of functionality and usability. But, we'll need to watch how the already profitable software companies that have created ACT and Goldmine, for example, attack the market in the next 6 months. The new Internet players are buoyed by a unique investment climate that may soon punish them unless they can prove that an ad or storage-based revenue model actually works. But, since the price is right, I'd recommend test-driving the products that match your online information management needs.