- iWork
- QuickOffice Connect Mobile Suite
- Documents to Go
- Office2 HD
- Honorable Mentions
- Final Thoughts
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Documents to Go
Documents to Go (http://www.dataviz.com/products/documentstogo/iphone/) by Dataviz has been around for a number of years on various platforms (including the old Palm OS and BlackBerry). The app ships in a basic $9.99 version and a $16.99 premium version. The primary differences between them being that the premium version can sync files with a range of cloud services and offers the ability to create/edit presentation files (which can be viewed but not modified in the less-expensive version).
Like QuickOffice HD, Documents to Go offers access to a full range of formatting features in documents and a full range of Excel functions in spreadsheets. In fact, from an overall feature perspective, the two apps are very similar.
One area in which Documents to Go has an advantage, however, is that formatting and view options for documents are always available through a toolbar at the bottom of each opened document. The Document to Go toolbars provide many of the same formatting options, but options beyond the basics somewhat more visible.
Documents to Go also seems to be a bit better at properly rendering complex formatting than any of its competition and it will alert you when it encounters formatting that it can't process.
On the flip side, the current release of Documents to Go's overall interface, particularly for navigating file structures (both on the iPad and cloud services) seems more like a smartphone app, while QuickOffice has a more desktop-like feel and better organizes multiple cloud service accounts.
A final, albeit temporary, disadvantage when compared with QuickOffice is that, at the time of this writing, neither version of Documents to Go has support for Apple's AirPrint. This is a somewhat surprising shortcoming, though one that will likely be rectified in the future.
- Price: $9.99/$16.99
- Local file storage/transfer: iTunes, desktop app (Windows, Mac OS X)
- Cloud services supported: Google Docs, Mobile Me's iDisk, Dropbox, Box.net, SugarSync
- Document types supported: Microsoft Office 97[nd]2003, Microsoft Office 2007+, iWork (view only)
- Pros: Clean interface, handles formatting very well, support for all Office file formats, broad cloud support
- Cons: Lack of AirPrint support, file and account handling could be made more tablet-optimized or desktop-like, lack of VGA output support for presentations (even with appropriate adapter)
- Overall: Documents to Go is a great solution if you need to create, edit, or view common office-type files. If you need to work with heavily formatted files and will use it and your iPad as only an adjunct solution for your computer (limited presentation and no printing), it is probably your best option. My advice is to pay the extra $6.00 for the premium version, if only for the cloud services support.