Google Docs Adds More Fonts, Templates
May 03, 2012
By Michelle Amodio, TMCnet Contributor
For those who scrapped using Microsoft (News - Alert) Office with the inception of Google docs, gone are the days of being limited by a small choice of fonts and templates from which to choose. The team behind Google (News - Alert) docs just made it more attractive for anyone to use by adding over 400 new fonts and a bevy of new templates.
Google made the announcement in a blog post, highlighting all the nifty new features that make some rather impressive documents.
Aside from making things look pretty, users can insert images from the LIFE Photo archive, or take a snapshot with a webcam and throw it directly into the project. There is also support for minor gridlines in charts when using spreadsheets, as well as the option to customize the formats of axis labels.
"To use these new fonts, click on the font menu and select ‘Add fonts’ at the very bottom, which will take you to a menu of all the Google Web Fonts available,” explained the post on Google Docs official blog. “Once you've selected new fonts, you'll be able to select them from the font menu."
With templates, there are 60+ to choose from, including resumes, invoices, press releases and lab reports.
This move puts Google in line to compete with the capabilities of its main productivity suite competitor, Microsoft Office. Template options are divided into different sections, Work, School, Home and Fun. The update to Google Docs also supports the importing of images from Google Drive and increased support for screenreaders.
The new update also bumps the size limit for files from 2MB to 50MB.
The search behemoth made headlines as well with its Google Drive cloud storage service, as it now offers support for Linux distributions.
According to a comment by Google Docs community manager Teresa Wu in a Google+ thread, official support for Linux is being worked on, but no further details are known. Meanwhile, several community efforts have risen, with the aim of bringing a native Google Drive client to Linux.
Edited by Braden Becker