Goal: building a web application where a user can: Upload a document (doc, docx, pdf, additional office formats a +) View that document in a browser, preferably in html Download the document (in doc, pdf, additional open formats a +) Current solution: Ruby on Rails Application on Rackspace Users can upload doc and pdf files (AWS) Files can be downloaded in the format in which they were uploaded Thumbnail generation ([doc, pdf] - pdf - png) is done through AbiWord. Certain doc files do not convert well. Documents can be viewed in embedded Google docs viewer (https://docs.google.com/viewer). Certain doc files cannot be displayed. Little flexibility. Potential improvements: Document viewing in pdf through pdf.js Viewing in html (+ annotation) through Crocodoc I'd be glad to hear other users' experiences, and will add good recommendations to this list.