COLLABORATIVE AUTHORING
WITH WORD AND GOOGLEDOCS
Introduction
This document gives some instruction on sharing documents with others using
Googledocs. Rather than the confusion of emailing multiple versions of the same
document around a group, all contributors can see and work on one, online.
Prerequisites
You should have a working knowledge of Word, including the use of styles
Contents
1.
Copy a document to use in Googledocs
2
2.
Sign up with Google
2
3.
Create a new Google document
3
4.
Sharing your document
5
5.
Editing a shared document
7
6.
Export to Word
9
7.
Other useful functions
10
8.
Using styles
13
About this Document
Words in bold
Will need to be typed or chosen from a menu
or window
Small capitals – e.g. ALT
Indicate keys that you press
Press KEY1 + KEY2
Press both keys together
Press KEY1, KEY2
Press each key consecutively
•
Are guidelines on how to perform a task
Bulleted lists
Choose Insert - Picture
Show menu commands – in this case, choose the option
Picture from the Insert menu at the top of the screen
This document is available from ITS reception, room 151 Malet Street or from the College
intranet at www.bbk.ac.uk/its/docs/. Large print copies are available on request
Collaborative Authoring
1. Copy a document to use in Googledocs
Objectives
Use an existing Word document as the basis of a new document
Method
Open a Word document
1.1
Use a word document
•
•
In a web browser, go to the URL http://www.bbk.ac.uk/its/help/resources/
Save and open the file fisheries.doc in Word
This is a fairly ordinary Word document, with no special formatting other than
headings.
2. Sign up with Google
Objectives
Sign up for an account with Google
Method
Use the Sign in link at the top right of Google’s home page
Comments If you already have a Gmail account you should use that unless you want
another username and password to remember
2.1
Set up an account or use an existing one
•
•
•
2
Browse to the google home page in a web browser – note that for speed
you can just type google into the address bar and then press CTRL +
ENTER together; www. and .com will be added automatically
Click on Sign in at the top right of the page
If you have a google account, enter your username and password;
otherwise click on Create an account now
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2.2
Login to Googledocs
Once you have created and/or logged into your Google account, you can browse
to the Documents application.
•
•
At the top left of the Google screen, click on more
Choose Documents from the list, as shown below
Note: If you have
recently used
Google
documents, it is
likely to appear
within the main list
of applications, and
you may not need
to click on more
3. Create a new Google document
Objectives
Create a document we can share
Method
Create a new document and paste in the contents of a Word document
Comments There are several upload options, but copying and pasting works well
3.1
Browse upload options
We will create a document by copying and pasting a Word document into a new
Google Document, but it is worth looking at the import options.
•
On the Google documents toolbar, click on Upload
•
Note the options, as shown in the screenshot below
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You may
1. Import a file from your computer
2. Import a file from the web
3. Email a document directly to the email address shown on your screen,
either by putting it in the body of the email or sending it as an attachment
3.2
Create a new document
•
•
Click on the New button, as shown in the
screenshot
Choose Document
Google will load its word processor with a blank screen.
Many of the icons should be familiar – bold, italics, copy
and paste and so on.
•
•
•
•
•
•
Switch back to Word
Select all of the fisheries.doc document (CTRL + A is the shortcut)
Copy the selected text (CTRL + C)
Switch back to Google Docs
Click into the body of the new document
Paste in the copied text (CTRL + V)
Google Docs will automatically convert the pasted text into HTML.
•
4
Click on Edit HTML to see the HTML code
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You will not normally use the HTML view, but sometimes it is useful in spotting
why a document looks a particular way.
•
Click on the link <<Back to editing the document to return to that view
Potential problems
1. Tables and text boxes will be converted, but results may be mixed,
depending on the complexity of the original Word document
2. Text in headers and footers is omitted
3. Googledocs will happily accept formatting imported into it in this way, but
the options within Google itself are more limited – in general, the less
formatting there is within a document, the better the results. Font
support, in particular, is limited within Google – you may import text in a
particular font, but will not be able to format new text in that font unless
you amend the HTML code
4. Sharing your document
Objectives
Share the document with other people on the course
Method
Use the Share tab to add other authors
Comments Anyone with whom you share the document will need to sign up with
Google – it may be a good idea to let them know in a separate email, sent
from your usual email address
4.1
Share tab
It is worth noting at this point that collaboration may not be totally unrestricted –
worth considering if you plan to share a document with a large mailing list, or are
allowing collaborators to invite other people to contribute. From Googledocs
online help
“Limits for documents and presentations: 200 combined viewers and
collaborators. 10 people may edit and/or view at any given time.”
Whilst you have a document open on screen, you may share it with other people
by using the Share tab at the top right.
•
Click on Share
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•
•
Enter an email address to share the document with another person on the
course
Click on Invite collaborators
Note that you use this same screen to invite people who can only view the
document, but you should do that as a separate operation (i.e. click on “as
viewers”, enter their email addresses, and then click the Invite viewers button)
4.2
Other actions command
You may still share a document even if you are looking at your list of Googledocs.
Note that although you may select more than one document here, you may only
invite people to collaborate on one document – if you select more than one, the
only option available from the more actions menu is
“Save as HTML”.
•
•
Tick the box next to a document in the list
Click on More actions
Note the list, as shown on the right – clicking Share
will open the sharing options in a new window (or
tab)
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5. Editing a shared document
Objectives
Try editing a document which you have been invited to view
Method
Use Googledocs to edit the document online
Comments As you are signed in to Googledocs already, you should be able to open the
document by following the link within the email you are sent
5.1
Opening a shared document
A shared document is added to your list of available Googledocs once you click
on the link within the email. You may have to sign into google, depending on
whether you are usually logged in or not – for now, you should find that clicking
the link opens the document.
•
Click on an invitation to collaborate in your email
It may take a while for Google to open the document – where two people have
the same document open, it is making sure that both editors are aware they are
editing in tandem.
Ownership
Google docs can only determine who has access to a document from the email
address you entered when sharing it. Therefore, if Y sends a shared document to
X at one email address, but X signs into Googledocs with a different address, they
will either see the list of collaborators as “X, Y, X’s full name” – i.e., the owner,
the invited sharer and this other email account. If you have switched off the
“collaborators may invite others” option, X will in this case not be able to access
the document – they would have to sign up for a new google account with the
email address you used (or, more likely, will complain). It is therefore
recommended that you check which email address to use in advance.
5.2
Editing tools
The editing process itself is straightforward – use the toolbar to change the
formatting of selected text
Most of the functions here are self-explanatory, but note the cut-down typeface
and point size menus, as shown below;
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Two other functions are unusual
Quote: takes the current selection and indents it on both sides
Remove formatting: applies default formatting to the current selection
5.3
Revision history
Google keeps a list of amendments made to a document under the Revisions tab;
The Compare checked button (
) allows you to select a number
of revisions and have the differences marked (a little like the track changes feature
in Word).
•
Compare a couple of revisions of your document
Once you have compared versions, the revision history window may not show
the whole list – click again on the Revisions tab
full list.
8
at the top to see the
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5.4
Contemporaneous editing
When two or more (up to a maximum of 10) people are editing the same
document, Google will list those working on a document at the bottom of the
screen.
The “refresh” link allows you to reload the document and see any changes made
– though you may find the revision history more useful, as it details what has
changed.
6. Export to Word
Objectives
Save a Google document to a file that can be opened in Word
Method
Use the more actions menu to export the file
Comments Different export options may give different results
6.1
Export options
You may export a file either from its individual window or from the list of files
stored in Google Docs.
•
•
With a document open, click on the File menu at the top left
Click on Export as Word…
You should then be asked whether you want to open the document or save it (it
may just open automatically in Word, in which case you should make sure you
save it somewhere you can find it again – F12 is the shortcut for Save as).
•
Try the Export as pdf option
If you are at the list of files, put a tick next to the file to be exported and choose
the relevant export option from the More actions menu.
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7. Other useful functions
Objectives
Briefly explore a few other useful functions
Method
Use the File, Style and Change menus
Comments Even though they are not listed, shortcut keys will typically work as in other
applications
7.1
File menu
We have already looked at the export functions
available from this menu. Standard file operations
are listed – New, Save, Print and Rename (Save
As).
At the bottom of the menu are
•
•
•
Word count
Find and replace (note that the usual
shortcut, CTRL + H, will also work)
Document settings, allowing you to set line
spacing and a default font
The command Save copy as presentation depends
on you having used styles (see next section) – a
new slide will be created wherever the document
contains text formatted as Heading 1, with that
text as the heading – this is how Word’s outline
view works.
7.2
Text formatting
Along with the usual text formatting commands,
Google docs has some support for styles, allowing you
to structure your document – particularly useful if, for
instance, the final version is to be imported back into
Word and have a table of contents added.
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7.3
Change menu
The contents of the change menu depend on what is selected within the edit
window. The restore or remove extra blank lines command is designed to tidy up
your document from problems that may have occurred when it was imported
into Googledocs.
Change menu with ordinary text selected
Change menu when image is selected
Change menu when cursor rests in a table
The change table command allows you to set a width for a table – either a set
number of pixels, a percentage of the page size or to fit its contents
There are other possible appearances for this menu; if for instance you select an
image which is itself within a table.
7.4
Change Image
It is worth looking at the change image options. From here you may resize an
image, set whether or not text is wrapped around it and decide on its alignment.
Note even if an option is selected, it may not actually be applying to that image.
For instance, the screenshot below shows left-aligned as the position of the image,
but Google will have tried to position the image as it appeared in the original
document. If you now click on Change Image, it will jump to the left of the page.
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It is also possible to resize an image by clicking on it to select it and then dragging
the boxes at any corner, as in Word.
7.5
Insert menu
Most useful here for collaborative authoring is the comment command – adding
a comment to your document allows for explanation of edits made, which appear
indented from the main text.
The insert bookmark command allows you to mark parts of the document,
which can then be linked to from a table of contents – you may find that Word,
which can automatically add a table of contents based on the heading styles, is
easier and quicker for this, but for very long documents it might prove useful.
Special character is similar to Word’s Insert-Symbol, allowing accented
characters to be added – the selection is limited, but you may click on Advanced
to add any character for which you can find the Unicode value – for a full list, see
http://unicode.org/charts/
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8. Using styles
Objectives
Export a file as a presentation
Method
The file used in this exercise has been created using Word’s inbuilt styles
Comments Use Heading 1 formatting to structure your document – each heading will
become new slide. Word and PowerPoint can be used in a similar way,
with Word in Outline view.
8.1
Import a file
•
•
•
•
•
Leave Googledocs open and open a new web browser (File-New Window
in Internet Explorer)
Go to the URL http://www.bbk.ac.uk/its/help/resources/
Save and open the file presentation outline.doc in Word
Select all the text in that document
Copy the text
•
•
•
Return to Googledocs
Start a new document
Paste the copied text in
The document is an outline of a presentation. You can check what style any line is
in by clicking into that line (you do not need to select text) and clicking on the
Style button
•
•
Click into the top line of the document
Click on the Style button – that line is a top level
heading, as shown in the screenshot
•
•
Click into the line “Allowing all visitors…”
Click on the Style button again – this line is a second-level heading
We will convert the document as it is into a presentation.
•
Choose File-Save copy as
presentation
A new window will appear with the presentation
within it. Note that Googledocs has automatically
saved the word processor document – use a
different web browser window have a look at the
list of files within Googledocs to check what it has
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been called. It may take a little while before a new document appears in the list –
click one of the links on the left to refresh the display.
Google picks the first line of your document as the title – note that you can have
files with the same name, so you should use File-Rename to save the file if you do
not want that name, or if you have already saved it and want to change the file
name.
Google has created a new slide at every top-level heading. The conversion is not
perfect – the bullet points have not translated. You may tidy them up (by
selecting the text and clicking the bulleted list icon) in the original Google word
processor document, but it is just as easy to do so in the final presentation.
•
•
•
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Click on Start
Presentation to see
the presentation in a
new window, almost full screen
Click the mouse to move through the slides
Use the up or left arrow keys to move back a slide
Document 5.154
Version
1 December
2007
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