Screaming Penguin - Source Does Matter

or (Rocky and Bullwinkle alternate title style) . . .

We recommend what makes us the most cash. (The stuff you need eighteen people on staff for 2 years to "integrate.")

Gotta handle the due diligence for the enterprise across the verticals, right? Ars has an overview of a recent Burton Group report that recommends against Google Apps.

Yeah, once again the consultants just come right out and prove how useless they are. They pander to the businesses that they get paid to support in said "reports." Google Apps is not even *trying* to replace Word or Excel. Macros and VB? How much of that does the "enterprise" really use? I have worked for many Fortune 100 companies over the decades and I can recall on one hand how many spreadsheets some division was using that had macros all over the place (and the support nightmares that ensued). Maybe it's unfair to compare actual experience. Maybe smaller companies get more out of the fancy Microsoft Office features because the big boys buy or build a specialized product to handle the task, whereas they use a spreadsheet? Possibly, but the report says the opposite. It says gApps might work in a limited sense for smaller companies but that big ones need the advanced stuff--my ass. 99.9999999% of all Ms Office use at every company I have ever seen was very basic. All things that gApps can handle--with the notable exception of headers/footers/index/contents on docs, those are basics gApps needs (and a presentation app).

The point with gApps is being generally missed by that discussion though. Suitable for big or small? Irrelevant, the answer is yes--both. The online collaboration and offsite setup/support/backup/etc is what matters (even more so than the cost). People have pontificated the rise of the online app for years. At some point it *will* happen. gApps may not be it, but it sure is impressive and is a great start. And, Microsoft products offer some of that too (online collaboration anyway, which should tell you how far the "be afraid, be very afraid, code red!" security bluster in the "report" should be carried, arguably the same or MORE [based on track record] vulnerability exists with MS Office).

All in all gApps is a smart choice. I actually use it at the "enterprise," even when I have Office on my desktop. The things it can do, the 99%, it does well. When you need to collaborate, it clobbers the other choices. If you need some of the things it cannot do, there are other local choices too, such as OpenOffice. And, the backup and access anywhere nature is frankly, *cough*, better than any similare feature Office provides. Even though at my company we have had the consultancy syndrome for decades and have all the fancy products that said consultants say are better, and are paid to install and maintain, gApps and other dissed apps (everything open source that Gartner has bashed over the years) are still used.

The "contacts" app Cooper mentioned would be a force. That is sorely needed. Now if contacts could be combined with gApps and gMail, look out.

While there are some shortcomings to the nascent Google Apps approach, they certainly are not what the Burton group seemed to focus on. 'Switching to Google Apps could be a "career-limiting move.' Sure, but exactly whose career are we talking about?