Glide OS, a Young Online Operating System With a Few Quirks

By Andrew Min

I suppose it’s fitting that my first review here at dawningvalley.com is
about Glide OS, since the first article I wrote in my life was about the same product. Back then, it was just called Glide Digital, required a credit card, and was not really an online operating system but a site that hosted your files with a few online applications. Two years later, Glide has evolved into a WebOS in the style of YouOS and eyeOS. But is it ready for general use?

What is Glide OS?

Unlike a traditional operating system like Windows, Mac OS X, or Linux, a web operating system is basically an AJAX or Flash suite of apps that live in your browser and look like an operating system. For example, YouOS (one of the pioneers of WebOSes) is a combination of a bunch of apps created by WebShaka and an interface that looks a lot like a Gnome-based Linux distribution. Glide OS is no exception: while it does not resemble any specific operating system, it certainly has a desktop “feel” (icons on the main desktop, a file system, etc).

Installation

You really do not need to “install” anything for Glide to work. All you need to do is register at http://www.glideos.com/. You will also need Flash Player 9 or higher, since Glide OS is written in Flash. Finally, you can also get an optional Desktop Application that sync and down your documents, pictures, videos, music, and PIM contacts/calendars from Outlook, iCal, and Sunbird on the local machine and on Glide OS. I was a little worried it would only support Windows (as all too many apps seem to do these days), but I was pleasantly surprised and found that it also supported OS X, Linux (using Qt), and Solaris.

Glide OS: Good, with (plenty of) room for improvement

Unfortunately, Glide’s workers seem to have focused more on features than usability. Almost all the applications pop up in new browser windows rather than using an embedded window-in-window like most other online operating systems. Why they did not boggles my mind. It is not like they do not have the technology already, since the Meeting app will open in an embedded window. Also, the file system is confusing, to say the least. There is no file browser, only something called Glide HD. At first, I thought it was a higher-definition version of Glide. I now think that it stands for hard drive, but I am still not exactly sure how it works. All I know is that it lets you access your files, but forces you into an area totally separate from the rest of your desktop. This section is full of folders. The problem is, you cannot put things in the folders, since they are automatically categorized. At first, this sounded like a great idea to me. However, I soon realized it was not. Some of the files I uploaded were not sorted correctly (one Flash video I uploaded wasn’t in anything). I definitely suggest that the folks at Glide try to work on usability a little bit.

Glide comes with a large number of apps, most of them fairly basic at press time. The photo editor does not really work right now (remember, this is mostly beta), though it does look like it could potentially turn into a really powerful image editor. The music player is similar to the classic Windows Media Player; in other words, about as bare bones as you can get. On the flip side, the video player is a lot more powerful, but will not always play the files you give it (it didn’t like my .flv, even though it is supposed to support it). So far, I am fairly unimpressed.

There was one bright spot: the powerful office suite, which boasted a word processor, presentation app, and spreadsheet app. Unfortunately, even this had a major flaw: it did not support common formats such as .doc (it had to convert it to HTML before it could edit it). Hopefully, this will be fixed soon. But even with this flaw, the office suite is very impressive. The entire suite is integrated very similarly to Apple’s iLife suite. You can email documents using the webmail client, add the document to a group, create a meeting about the document, or add pictures and videos right into the document, all using handy buttons on the left. I really wish more office suites would integrate with each other better (OpenOffice.org doesn’t integrate at all, and Microsoft Office integrates an Outlook email function and a few Excel features). The last feature I really enjoyed is the tool to edit the source code (in HTML) of a document. If you were one of the few loyalists who liked WordPerfect better than Word, you will find this feature very useful.

There is also a very nice PIM (email, calendaring, and groupware) suite included with Glide. The email client is very robust, sporting IMAP and POP3 support as well as the glidefree.com email addresses that all users get. The calendar is the nicest looking app out of all of them, but it can’t (yet) subscribe to remote calendars, a must for me. There is also a great Meeting tool, which lets you host really powerful meetings fairly easily. These meetings can be attended by both Glide and non-Glide users and include features such as media embedding (you can demo videos, pictures, and any other file Glide supports right in center of the meeting), microphone and webcam support, a whiteboard, and much more. Finally, there is a Groups app, which allows you to share files very simply.

The Verdict

Glide OS has really matured since I last looked at it two years ago. However, I still cannot see myself using it every day. The lack of .doc functionality kills its usefulness since no one except me uses .html files for documents. Additionally, the fact that not all my files work 100% of the time (like the weak video player) is a real downside. I have hopes for improvement, however. Right now, Glide OS is a youngster with a lot of potential that is not fully realized yet. This is one product I will be following for quite a while.

Rating: 3.5/5

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