ThinkFree Viewer

ThinkFree, one of the online office companies fighting for the alt-MS turf (and something we posted about nearly a year ago), has released a WordPress plugin for its free MS Office file viewer. I’ve installed the plugin here at Slaw, which is produced by WordPress, and I’ve created some sample links below in this post to demonstrate how it works. On the creation side, you need only make a link to the file and the plugin does the rest.

The links that follow are to Microsoft Office files (.doc, .ppt, and .xls formats) available on a web server. Beside each hyperlink there’s a small “button” that will launch the ThinkFree viewer for that file on top of the window in which you’re reading this file, much as the Lightbox plugin I’ve used from time to time with graphics superimposes itself on the current window.

This file is simply a spreadsheet of publicly available info about various graduate theses done at Osgoode over the years. I’ve not yet experimented with this in order to see about formatting the way the Viewer presents the data. In this example it’s presented very plainly: theses.

Next is a Word file, in which I’ve put an image, a table, and some formatted text, the actual content being irrelevant. Note that the hyperlink in the document to an internal bookmark doesn’t function in the Viewer: nonsense.

Third is a PowerPoint presentation. Note here that on the fourth slide the media file I inserted as a test doesn’t function: jabberwocky

It seems to me that even with the obvious limitations, such as loading time and inability to make use of some links etc., this might open up some interesting possibilities here at Slaw and on other WordPress blogs for presenting more highly formatted material for viewing online, or for delivering online instruction, or…