Microsoft Office 2010 to Gain Free Web-Based Components

[MacRumors]

Microsoft yesterday announced at its Worldwide Partner Conference 2009 that its forthcoming Office 2010 suite will gain a web-based component offering free, ad-supported access to browser-based versions of Word, PowerPoint, Excel and OneNote to anyone with a free Windows Live account. Notably, the online versions will be compatible with Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari.

Wired provides an overview of what users should expect from the web-based version of Office 2010 when it launches alongside the paid desktop version early next year. In short, Wired cautions users that the web-based Office applications will serve in practice more as an enhancement to the desktop version than as an everyday document editing suite.

We won't get our hands on Office Web Apps for another month, but what we do know is that they will be lightweight, dumbed-down versions of their desktop counterparts. They will remain closely tied to, and largely dependent on, the Windows desktop. This is understandable, since Office for the PC desktop has proven to be Microsft's most valuable cash cow behind its Windows desktop and server products.

So while its competitors are gaining steam with full-blown productivity applications that run completely in the browser -- namely Google Docs and start-up Zoho with its office suite -- Microsoft is still firmly entrenched in the "software plus services" camp.

The Office Web Apps will reportedly provide "lightweight" editing capabilities and viewing that offers proper formatting of documents. Real-time collaboration will be supported for Excel, allowing users to see each others changes as they are made. Collaboration support for Word and PowerPoint will not be included in the initial release.

The paid desktop version of Office 2010 will initially only be available on Windows platforms, as the Mac Office suite follows a different development cycle and is not expected to be revised until late 2010 or more likely 2011. Consequently, while Mac users will be able to take some advantage of the web-based tools deployed in Office 2010 on a standalone basis, they will not be able to utilize the integrated Office experience until the next version of Office for Mac is released.

Article Link: Microsoft Office 2010 to Gain Free Web-Based Components

[Sky Blue]

Nice, iWork for editing, online Office for compatibility check

[thegoldenmackid]

And it still is going to crash, now it shall just crash Safari.

[talkingfuture]

If they can match the features of Google's apps at the same quality and polish as the desktop version of office it will be a winner for me.

[LagunaSol]

"Notably, the online versions will be compatible with Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari."

Who wants to bet it will only work solidly on IE (Windows-only)?

I'd be happy to take your money...

[RobertCraigWils]

You guys are all insane! haha - Microsoft can never catch a break, even when trying to move in the right direction. I'm off of Microsoft since switching to Mac a few years back and I love the OS / software that Apple makes, but let's not pretend that Microsoft can do nothing right. Day late, dollar short still gets to the party! It's so funny to me that people can just go wildly insane against anything good that Microsoft tries to do. If you wanna deal with bad programming, check out RPG!

[kas23]

This takes a stab at Apple's online, fee-based iWork. Regardless on how it works, I will pick the free-version over a fee-based version. Sorry, MS wins with this one. As for people who state it won't run well or it will crash, we really don't know yet.

[HLdan]

Originally Posted by LagunaSol

"Notably, the online versions will be compatible with Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari."

Who wants to bet it will only work solidly on IE (Windows-only)?

I'd be happy to take your money...

Yep, what else. Slimy Microsoft wouldn't dream of thinking about the "customer". They just want to make sure that nobody but Windows users can access their crap. Now, if it works perfectly with the browser I choose (Safari) and on the platform I choose (Mac OS X Snow Leopard) then I MAY even pay for their services.

[CmdrLaForge]

If there are editing capabilities it is at least better then iWork.com right now.

[happydude]

Originally Posted by kas23

This takes a stab at Apple's online, fee-based iWork. Regardless on how it works, I will pick the free-version over a fee-based version. Sorry, MS wins with this one. As for people who state it won't run well or it will crash, we really don't know yet.

yeah, unfortunately, i'd do the same. online version of iwork should be free for those who buy iwork. it's just the way the industry is moving. apple will be forced to do so, maybe with iwork 2010 now. competition is a good thing.

now, where's iwork for the iphone?!

[MorphingDragon]

Now here's the key questions...

Is it FREE free?, (No strings attached free)
Google free?, (Usage used for advertising)
Microsoft free?, (To create a proprietary lock-in)
or
Adobe free? (Its a standard but totally sucks)

[TheCheapGeek]

The exciting part is that the apps are ajax javascript apps, so in theory these should be accessible on the iphone.

[Sky Blue]

Originally Posted by RobertCraigWils

You guys are all insane! haha - Microsoft can never catch a break, even when trying to move in the right direction. I'm off of Microsoft since switching to Mac a few years back and I love the OS / software that Apple makes, but let's not pretend that Microsoft can do nothing right. Day late, dollar short still gets to the party! It's so funny to me that people can just go wildly insane against anything good that Microsoft tries to do. If you wanna deal with bad programming, check out RPG!

I agree. People really over react on MS stuff. I'll try it out, if it works well in Safari, I'll use it.

[pdjudd]

In another related thread to this announcement, I mentioned my fears of this:

We won't get our hands on Office Web Apps for another month, but what we do know is that they will be lightweight, dumbed-down versions of their desktop counterparts. They will remain closely tied to, and largely dependent on, the Windows desktop.

Looks like my fears were somewhat justified despite the fact that people were saying that it would work on Macs because this was compatible with Firefox and Safari.

While it very well may work on the mac platoform to some degree, I believe that we will be even more limited to the capabilities of the what the Mac office suite does (and the online portion will be limited itself even on the windows side) essentially not changing the long held notion that Mac users are treated by Microsoft as second class citizens. There is no doubt that MS would compromise its biggest cash cow.

[Sky Blue]

Originally Posted by MorphingDragon

Now here's the key questions...

Is it FREE free?, (No strings attached free)
Google free?, (Usage used for advertising)
Microsoft free?, (To create a proprietary lock-in)
or
Adobe free? (Its a standard but totally sucks)

If you read the first post, you'd know.

[MorphingDragon]

Originally Posted by Sky Blue

If you read the first post, you'd know.

The first post doesn't answer those questions as it hasn't been released yet.

[baretree]

Originally Posted by Sky Blue

I agree. People really over react on MS stuff. I'll try it out, if it works well in Safari, I'll use it.

I know we all love apple software but fact is to most that the iWork suite has never tie MS Office functionality not even the Mac version. I love my Macs but I have a job and obviously I have to use MS Office to everything: PowerPoint, Excel, Word, even my company's email is through Exchange-Outlook so, we know we have to use it and we know that it works pretty good. The Mac's "iWork" is just nice but nothing compared to Office. So just wait for it to be released and give it a try. If it doesn't work that well on Safari I think it wouldn't be MS' fault at all. It's a pain in there to try to make things work in Safari, I mean, so different behaviours than IE and Firefox. At least in here developers are always going insane trying to secure a web app in the Safari environment, call it Windows or OS X. That's why I guess, most banking apps doesn't supports it.

[morespce54]

Wow, I thought I'd never say that about MS, but... That sounds like a good idea!

[MikhailT]

I wonder if MS would ever seriously offer an awesome Office Suite for the Mac, Office 2008 is just sad and don't forget 2004.

They could make serious money selling Office Suite for both Macs and Windows. I don't know honestly how much of their revenue is from Office but it is far more than 20% last time I remember. I wonder how much of that is from the Mac suites.

Anybody here wish the Office Suite for Mac would be as awesome as the Window versions? iWork has nothing on Office 2007 or 2010.

[ravenvii]

If it opens .doc files preserving the formatting and look of the document, this will be awesome for me. Just about the only thing I really use Office for is to print .doc files I get via email or whatever with the intended formatting intact (i.e. forms, syllabuses, etc - in other words, stuff that should be PDFs, but are not for some reason).

If this works in that manner, I might even skip buying the next Office.

[Colrath]

Originally Posted by MikhailT

I wonder if MS would ever seriously offer an awesome Office Suite for the Mac, Office 2008 is just sad and don't forget 2004.

They could make serious money selling Office Suite for both Macs and Windows. I don't know honestly how much of their revenue is from Office but it is far more than 20% last time I remember. I wonder how much of that is from the Mac suites.

Anybody here wish the Office Suite for Mac would be as awesome as the Window versions? iWork has nothing on Office 2007 or 2010.

Have you used Microsoft Office 2008 for the Mac?

[MikhailT]

Originally Posted by ravenvii

If it opens .doc files preserving the formatting and look of the document, this will be awesome for me. Just about the only thing I really use Office for is to print .doc files I get via email or whatever with the intended formatting intact (i.e. forms, syllabuses, etc - in other words, stuff that should be PDFs, but are not for some reason).

If this works in that manner, I might even skip buying the next Office!

That's precisely why MS won't make it easy for the Web verison to be edited or be used to create new docs. They make a lot of money from the Office suites.

It could be locked to the Office desktop, meaning people have to own the Office suite in order to use the web for free.

[corinhorn]

I hope this online office from Microsoft works well. Since Office 2008 won't install on SL without rosetta, I won't be installing it on SL.

[MikhailT]

Originally Posted by Colrath

Have you used Microsoft Office 2008 for the Mac?

Yes, of course. I still prefer Office 2007 on Windows. While Office 2008 is the best Office suite so far on the Mac, I still think it can be a lot better and definitely could benefit from having OneNote included (Word's Notebook is crap). More performance and optimizations could be gained, VB Macros support (cross-platform is important for many of my clients) and many more.

When you use Office 2007 on Windows and switching to Office 2008, it does feel like a lot of things are missing. Not to mention it does not really feel like a Mac application for me. If MS gives the Mac team the ability to create a true Intel OS X Mac application and not just meshed up Windows|Mac look, it would seriously take over as the true must have Office suite on the Mac.

Now that's just my opinion, majority of people is probably just happy with Office 2008.

[pimentoLoaf]

Since online security has come to the point of being nearly godlike in its perfection, with reports of hacking to be urban legends at best, I will, of course, only use MS Office in online format when the service is released.