Writely.com - Student answer to writing papers?

There are so many new web aps that I have on my list to try over the break, that I doubt I will get them all.

Today I am composing on a cool new web app called writely.com . This is an online word processor with all of the basics that a student would need. So many of my students struggle because they have Works or Word perfect and can't afford to purchase the $300 Office package (or know about the student discount they can get.)

The converters in Word don't work very well for Works and Word Perfect. This is a great solution for these students!

They can log onto writely.com and create an account. They can then create and edit documents. They can even collaborate with other students if it is a group project. The difference here between this and a wikipage is that writely is a word processor.

This program will import and export into Word format! Until the produce the final word document, they can edit from any computer where they can log onto writely.com. This is a great advantage for students and provides them with portability.

Another great feature is the ability to directly produce Adobe PDF files from writely -- something you cannot do with Word.

So much for lugging a laptop or even those bothersome floppy disks that always give out. Go to the library, do your research. Copy your source. Login to writely and add your changes and be done.

Very impressive! Let me know your favorite web apps. This has got to be killing the folks at Microsoft.

Recent Reviews:
John C. Dvorak
TechCrunch
USA Today - Great article that explains what all of this is about!

Other cool web aps to try:
NumSum - Online spreadsheet
gOffice - Online office suite
Zimbra - E-mail and Outlook replacement