Webware

PDFVue, the online PDF viewing and editing tool, has a new name, a new look, and a handful of new features.

We originally checked out the service late last year and came away impressed with its handy Firefox add-on that let you read any PDF link in its viewer, and tools for filling out forms and annotating pages. Now called DocQ, those things are mostly unchanged. What's new, however, is that you can now store, organize, and share PDFs.

To help keep a handle on all your files you can add tags as well as organize them into "smart folders." These are named folders you can drag and drop your PDFs into. You can then filter the ones you want to see, just by clicking on the folder name from the top menu. I couldn't get the search to work, which is the only way to make use of these folders and any tags you've assigned.

DocQ's interface remains largely unchanged since its PDFVue days. You can still view PDFs and make quick edits and annotations.

(Credit: CNET)

Another new feature is that you can digitally sign documents. In DocQ's integrated editor you can place multiple signatures within a document, then send it off to one or more recipients. Then, whenever the person (or people) on the other end signs, they can send it back to your DocQ in-box. The folks on the other end don't need to sign up for the service to use it, since a special log-in is created from the invitation. For now, the signature feature can only work with one user, meaning each person you send it to is seeing only their signature. However, coming in two weeks will be a way to have multiple people sign off on the same document.

For now, you can upload up to 10 PDFs at a time. Storage and file size are unlimited, although that will eventually change when it becomes a paid service. There will then be caps on how many files you're uploading, and how big they are. DocQ's owner, Docudesk, also plans to deeply integrate it into the rest of its PDF-editing software to let people upload and share PDFs they've created.

I wouldn't recommend relying on DocQ for business just yet. I ran into a handful of slowdowns where I couldn't get back to my list of files. And without the search or tag sorting working, it would have been problematic if I had more files, and wanted to access one in short order. Still, two of the really great parts about this service--editing and annotations--continued to work very, very well.