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Skype for Business for Mac is a long, long way off.

So will they just leave users using Lync for Mac connecting to Skype for Business Server?

Any ideas if Skype for Business will have a web client? At least we could get around it by telling users to use that. At the moment you can only run meetings through the web version.
 
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Skype for Business for Mac is a long, long way off.

Is it?

I wonder how much Microsoft will improve Office for Mac.

I am currently using Word 2013 to write an article. I was using Word 2011 but I just gave up, as it, on top of being buggy and cumbersome, was not recognizing the Portuguese dictionary.
 
Public beta will be out later in the first half of 2015, probably Q2.

Thanks for the information.

Very disappointing, though. We will have to wait a few more months to put our hands in the beta version of software that should have been released over a year ago.
 
Thanks for the information.



Very disappointing, though. We will have to wait a few more months to put our hands in the beta version of software that should have been released over a year ago.


It only should have been released over a year ago to you. We don't know if Microsoft intended to release it then or if this year was always the plan. In my books, software should be released when it's ready. Not when some self entitled forum members say it should be...
 
Well i use the outlook web app which has skydrive and everything but would like to see a refresh soon.
 
It only should have been released over a year ago to you. We don't know if Microsoft intended to release it then or if this year was always the plan. In my books, software should be released when it's ready. Not when some self entitled forum members say it should be...

Its definitely behind schedule, an Exec from Microsoft in Germany said at the start of last year that it would be due by the end of that year.
 
It only should have been released over a year ago to you. We don't know if Microsoft intended to release it then or if this year was always the plan. In my books, software should be released when it's ready. Not when some self entitled forum members say it should be...

They did mention that it was going to roll out in 2014. I'm not sure what happened, but it got delayed.

I wonder if its going through a complete rewrite or just slapping some lipstick on the pig so to speak
 
They did mention that it was going to roll out in 2014. I'm not sure what happened, but it got delayed.

I wonder if its going through a complete rewrite or just slapping some lipstick on the pig so to speak

They focused on the mobile apps first.
 
Mellel and Nisus Writer Pro are good word processors, but fall short of Microsoft Word.
I wonder what you need in Word, for the tasks you described, that Nisus and Mellel can't do. I know several people who have written dissertations (myself included) with one of the two, and who regularly submit academic works to publishers with those wordprocessors.

You are not the only one who absolutely wants Word, or don't feel at home when writing. It's really a mistery why you don't simply use it.
 
Office 2016 for the PC will be released this year according to the Verge.

So it will be Office 2016 and Office: Mac 2011...
 
No. It will be Windows Office 2016 and Mac Office 2016 at the same time, so it seems.

Yes, but I think the Mac version will be on par with Office 2013. I cannot imagine that Microsoft will make both versions the same. Windows is their preferred platform and they have no reason to change that.
 
Yes, but I think the Mac version will be on par with Office 2013. I cannot imagine that Microsoft will make both versions the same. Windows is their preferred platform and they have no reason to change that.
Actually they DO have reason to change that... Office 365. Without cross-platform parity, the benefits of O365 are greatly reduced.

And as we've seen with iOS and Android, the touch-optimized version of Office is available for those mobile OSes but not for Microsoft's own.
 
Yes, but I think the Mac version will be on par with Office 2013. I cannot imagine that Microsoft will make both versions the same. Windows is their preferred platform and they have no reason to change that.

With the new CEO things seem to be very different. He seems to embrace universal apps, even on platforms that are not his own. Look at Office for iOS

It would make me very happy if we finally get a true equal Office for both platforms.
 
Actually they DO have reason to change that... Office 365. Without cross-platform parity, the benefits of O365 are greatly reduced.

And as we've seen with iOS and Android, the touch-optimized version of Office is available for those mobile OSes but not for Microsoft's own.

This is the reasoning I'm hoping for. Their new approach seems to be a consistent experience for Office everywhere. That means they have no benefit to intentionally gimping the OS X variant.
 
I wonder what you need in Word, for the tasks you described, that Nisus and Mellel can't do. I know several people who have written dissertations (myself included) with one of the two, and who regularly submit academic works to publishers with those wordprocessors.

You are not the only one who absolutely wants Word, or don't feel at home when writing. It's really a mistery why you don't simply use it.

Mellel and Nisus Writer Pro are both good word processors and they are able to do everything I need, or nearly everything.

Still, Word 2013 for Windows is more convenient. Word has a better interface and is more intuitive. Word has grammar checker in Portuguese, and both Mellel and Nisus lack that, and it is useful for me. Word has a thesaurus in Portuguese, which is very handy to use.

Word can split a page in two so I can work on both parts of a document at the same time. Word has a draft view that allows me to work with footnotes, and neither Mellel nor Nisus have that.

I can of course send files to publishers with Mellel and Nisus. But I have to convert them first, and make sure that the files are still readable under Word. If there are issues, I must correct them before sending. Plus, when I receive a file back, I must open it with Word first. If I receive a manuscript from a publisher, it's OK to use Mellel or Nisus.

However, if I receive a document from a client, I must keep the formatting in order, and therefore I must use Word.

Want it or not, Word 2013 is still the best and most fully-featured word processor available. Nisus Writer Pro and Mellel save the Mac, as Apple does not care about it. But still, Microsoft has a multi-million (or billion) dollar budget to develop Word and polish it to perfection. Nisus and Redlers are both small companies and have limited resources to develop their software. While Nisus Writer Pro and Mellel are good, or even great, you cannot simply compare them to the crushing power of Word.
 
Office 2016 for the PC will be released this year according to the Verge.

So it will be Office 2016 and Office: Mac 2011...

MS is working on rolling out updates for the office 365 folks and also touch office, which I think will be a different version.

Since office for the Mac comes from a different group within MS, I'm hoping that we'll still see an updated version this year, but then I more or less said this last year :(
 
MS is working on rolling out updates for the office 365 folks and also touch office, which I think will be a different version.



Since office for the Mac comes from a different group within MS, I'm hoping that we'll still see an updated version this year, but then I more or less said this last year :(


Well, Microsoft officially said Office for Mac will come out during the second half of 2015. So I guess it is how it is going to be.
 
They released a new update to Outlook 15 a couple of days ago (now on 15.6) which seems to have resolved most of the crashes I was experiencing. Other than the lack of feature parity with Windows its quite a good email client now.

Full screen mode is the last thing I am waiting for, not holding out much hope as the Microsoft support members on their forums don't even know what it is. They think its just maximising the window.
 
They released a new update to Outlook 15 a couple of days ago (now on 15.6) which seems to have resolved most of the crashes I was experiencing. Other than the lack of feature parity with Windows its quite a good email client now.

Full screen mode is the last thing I am waiting for, not holding out much hope as the Microsoft support members on their forums don't even know what it is. They think its just maximising the window.

Do you use Outlook with an Exchange account? For private use or business?

I am thinking on using my Office 365 account (that I have privately), but the iCloud integration is really nice and I have doubts..On the other side I prefer using Exchange for Mail. I don't like that I cannot create subfolders under the Inbox on my iCloud mailbox. I also don't like that I can have only client side rules in Mail.app. If I want to have server based rules I need to go to icloud.com and configure them there. With Outlook I can edit my server side rules directly on the client.
If only Microsoft had even more integration with OS X. Or if Apple's software worked better with Exchange...
 
If only Microsoft had even more integration with OS X. Or if Apple's software worked better with Exchange...

Yes, indeed.

I miss having the ability to sync Outlook calendars across devices, computers and platforms since moving to the Apple system from MS Windows.

I'm a home user so it's difficult to justify signing up with a commerical provider for an exchange account. So, at present I'm sticking with Thunderbird and its ability to sync calendars with Google's calendar service across Mac Mini and Macbook Air and across my iOS devices.
 
I've noticed now they tend to do new product launches (inc Beta releases) on a Wednesday, so you never know - could be tomorrow.

Only problem I have at the moment is the ADFS setup at work doesn't seem to let me activate any of newer the software. The new OneDrive for Business sync client works fine and Office 2011 activates, but OneDrive iOS, Outlook and OneNote all throw errors after logging in.
 
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