Friday, May 30, 2008 10:59 PM
Well, this is definitely what I'm talking about when I talk about programming losing some of its mystique and non-techies being able to whip up their own applications. In this case, it's for web apps. We have so many sites making widgets to embed that someone with zero coding experience and minimal, if any, HTML experience can make a very cool web site. One thing that gets in my way at times, though, is the overhead for crafting a simple form for a site. I don't want to create a database table, forms, validation, and data access code for a simple, often throwaway, list entry.
There are a few sites out that offer DIY lists (like http://www.formdiy.com), but I tend to shy away from them. Even a very cool site with a very cool product doesn't cause me to jump right away since I've been burned too many times by flash-in-the-pan sites. I don't want a site to disappear all of a sudden when I'm relying on it for some functionality. Especially a free site where they really don't have an obligation to keep serving me or even to notify me.
Google Docs now supports embedding forms to insert data into a spreadsheet. On the surface, what an easy concept. Similar to features of Excel Services, but available for free to anyone. Unlike other free sites, I'm not too worried about Google disappearing tomorrow (though anything can happen...). Of course Google could abandon just the feature at some point, but at least I'm more confident that it won't be going anywhere soon.
Having an API would be great for developers to create better user interfaces (including getting rid of the "Powered by Google Docs" and the silly confirmation message (I don't want people to know the data is in a spreadsheet now!). On the other hand, having an API would defeat the purpose here. If I'm going to code, I'll probably do it myself. Having a spreadsheet back-end is no substitute for a custom SharePoint list or database. This is for quick-and-dirty data capture for me, or for a non-technical person to create a data-capture form that they never thought was possible before.
As more of these types of products/features/widgets appear, the landscape will change and change until at some point programmers are creating only the most esoteric, system-level stuff (and of course the embeddable widgets themselves), and most users don't even think twice about creating a new composite application from what's out there. What a new face we'll have on software!
More info: http://documents.google.com/support/spreadsheets/bin/answer.py?answer=87809