Intraweb document collaborative editing

Question

I am a big fan of Google Docs, but my workplace likes to keep internal documents internal. Is there a good real-time collaborative editing tool to work with .doc, .doc, .odt, or similar document formats that may be openable in Word (eventually) that we can deploy on our network? Preferably free, but we wouldn't mind a small fee. If there is a WYSIWYG (or close there to) LaTeX editor like WriteLaTeX that can be installed locally, that will get bonus points with me.

I like Etherpad, but it doesn't support more than text and html.

Answer 1

Yep, It's called Microsoft Word - if you are working in .docx you probably already have it so effectively free. MS Word can allow changes to a document by more than one user in a couple of ways - it is just:

a) the documentation sucks b) they keep moving where to find it c) they sometimes change the name

The 2 basic mechanisms are:

1. Push it out by email allowing others to add comments/ammendments - normally found in review or file/publish menus.
2. Save it to a location that everybody can see, usually a network drive, and set the document as shared.