Google Apps, WiX Designer Beta 2, Add-in Express for IE and other news
During the last few months, I have patiently kept silence, though torn with the desire to share quite interesting news with you. But one thing stopped me – we were tied with the NDA signed between Add-in Express and Google. Finally, all of the formalities are completed and everything is launched very cautiously and without great pomp, so now I am ready to tell you a new story…
A new Office development era might start in 2014
I will understand the sarcasm of anyone regarding this heading. Agree, this does look like advertising. Moreover, some of you definitely remember that I have already voiced a similar thought, but it was back in 2012 and on a totally different occasion. That occasion end up with my complete disappointment, which Ty very nicely described here.
It’s a different time now. Another architecture is shown. Another vendor has come to this niche. And the name of this vendor is Google. So…
Google Apps may be a new platform for your Office solutions
In November 2013, after receiving an invitation from Google, I realized that finally we had an opportunity to adequately port all of our Office add-ins to cloud apps. And we have already done some of this, learning the platform itself along the way, with all its pros and cons. As a result, I am willing to say that I open a new direction in my business, in the scope of which we are going to develop add-ons for Google Docs and Sheets.
Here’s a list of what I found attractive for my business:
- Add-ons for Google Docs and Sheets – the opportunity to expand the market for our Excel and Word add-ins
- Access to all Google apps including Drive, Gmail and Calendar – the opportunity to create feature-rich add-ons
- Well-designed solution architecture – it’s true, we have tried this out…
- Server-side code and client-side code – yep, and in addition – an intelligible object model
- Free cloud-based IDE – plus, JavaScript with the full stack of open-source technologies
- Our source code is protected automatically – it is what repels in MS Office apps
- A normal store to-be – MS Office Store looks repulsive so far
- Finally, it is all about clouds…
We will talk about cons later. I think we will publish a series of posts in the near future about how to develop for Google Apps, what to develop and how to start selling this. Besides that, we will draw a detailed comparison between Google Apps and modern MS Office apps, as two cloud platforms for around-Office business. In the meantime, here’s the entry point for those who get interested: https://developers.google.com/apps-script/
This is the end of today’s story. Now briefly about Add-in Express … :)
WiX Designer Beta 2
We have just published Beta 2 of our WiX Designer. I’ll remind you, this is a new product that will provide a VDProj-way for your WiX setup projects. I have to admit, we carefully approach to its development, so it may seem that the product is entering the market slowly. But my position is this – quality matters more than speed :)
Beta 2 already includes almost all features of vdproj for WiX and is still publicly available. Here’s is a download link:
www.add-in-express.com/downloads/wix-designer.php
Scold us for our bugs on our support forums or directly in the comments here :)
Updated on 8-May-2014. The beta testing period is over, the release version is published – Designer for WiX toolset home page.
Add-in Express for IE – version 9.0
We released the next major version of ADX for IE in January:
- Support for Visual Studio 2013
- Support for Internet Explorer 11
- Support for InstallShield 2013
- ADX IE Broker App
As usually, we immediately sent out new license keys to all the customers with active subscriptions. So, if you did not receive the key (the main reason is spam filters), please let me know.
All others can get this new version by simply renewing your subscription for 50% of the full license price.
Your feedback: we need it!
This is all the news I have for now. As usually, I am keen to know your feedback! If you have any questions, suggestions or ideas, simply leave me a comment :)