Google Docs has gone mobile.
Google announced today that it is expanding the capabilities of the Google Docs viewer to accommodate iPhone, iPad, and Android platforms by enabling users to open a wide variety of documents via their mobile device with the Google Docs Viewer.
Since the start of 2010, Google has allowed users to store a wide variety of file types (up to 1Gb of data) online. But, until now, the cloud-based data was only accessible on non-mobile devices.
Mickey Kataria, a Google Docs software engineer, announced on the Docs Blog that the upgrade will “help you view PDFs, .ppt, .doc and .docx files you’ve uploaded to your documents list, without needing to download the file.”
Additionally, you can now “switch quickly between pages and pan/zoom within a page.”
A relatively quiet arrival given the headlines and noise generated from Apple and AT&T’s lingering iPhone 4 supply shortage, the debut of Google Docs for mobile devices will, at last, eradicate from the digital world one of the biggest complaints of many smartphone users – the inability to view PDFs, Microsoft Word, and Microsoft PowerPoint files.
The laudable mobile endeavor on the part of Google is expected to lend favorably to the company’s not-so-subtle effort to present Google Docs as a more modern, and cooler alternative to Microsoft Office.
