5 ms·

Microsoft to launch Office 365 on June 28

30 points by Garbage 15y ago

melling 15y ago
Google really needs to turn up the heat with Docs. The spreadsheet, etc need to get a lot better if they want to steal market share from Microsoft. Office is hard to beat.
- Raphael_Amiard 15y ago
  I think the developement on docs is going at a pretty fascinating pace. They just don't necessarily have the focus on things you'd expect them to work out first. But they have a pretty rock solid collab feature that is currently unmatched in any other office suite. Once you get the habit of working like that on certain projects, it's hard to go back to the old way of collaborating by sharing files. Spreadsheet is the least polished app of all, but i think this is no coincidence. SpreadSheet is the app in which the functionality gap is the biggest, and also where user expectations are the most tainted by excel's idiosyncrasies. I wouldn't be surprised if the spreadsheet app doesn't get much love for a long time.
- ams6110 15y ago
  Not sure I agree. A small number of sophisticated users really use Excel in something close to its potential, but most people I know use spreadsheets for simple lists and maybe adding up a column of numbers. If Google start chasing Excel on features, they could find themselves on the losing side of a "fire and motion"[1] strategy. [1] http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000339.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000339.html
  - kprobst 15y ago
    It might be the perception thing. OWA looks more 'professional' than GMail for example, although the latter probably has more capabilities and obviously isn't tied to Exchange. I'm guessing this version of Office will be extremely flashy, and Google Docs will look like a 90s edition of WordPerfect by comparison.
  - Lewisham 15y ago
    Yeah, I use the Spreadsheet app the most. It's quicker to download all the Javascript required to run it than it is to boot Excel off my hard drive, and I just use it for groceries and things.
  - jaredmck 15y ago
    This makes a lot of sense strategically- as an excel power user it's hard to imagine google docs really ever catching up with excel, but that's not how most people use office. Excel really is a fantastic product, and when used with the excellent analytics plug-in is so awesome for analyzing web analytics & SEO data that it actually makes me glad to be running windows (and I'm not sure I could ever move entirely to Mac/Linux because of how developed these specific niche products are on windows). Although google clearly could build something of this quality for web analytics data mining, they seem to be moving in the opposite direction, and making the GA interface less powerful (for reasons which are understandable albeit not really admirable)
pinhead 15y ago
My biggest complaint with Google Docs is related to consistent formatting. I am anxious to see how MS handles this. I do agree that for pure collaboration, Google Docs is currently unmatched.
xpaulbettsx 15y ago
(Disclaimer: I work on Office at Microsoft) If you want a preview of the Word/Excel/PowerPoint/OneNote pieces of Office 365, you can use them for free at http://office.live.com http://office.live.com - if you're using OneNote locally, they'll also host your OneNote notebooks so you can access them anywhere (as well as still use them via the desktop app)
- tansey 15y ago
  I just tried the Excel version. Is there some reason that the line graphs are so ugly? The graphs in Excel 2007/2010 are beautiful, but the 365 graphs are filled with jaggies. See: http://i.imgur.com/KOHSI.png http://i.imgur.com/KOHSI.png
  - xpaulbettsx 15y ago
    Not sure, but totally agree - I'll try to file a bug.
- mikemaccana 15y ago
  Last time I tried this, after reading something microsoft wrote that specifically mentioned tablets, I wasted an hour trying to hack office web apps to run, then finally got a message asking me to install silverlight on an ipad. So pardon me if this seems rude, but do you have an actual web office suite, or is this more bullshit? Thanks. MS office has a great ui, and i'm looking forward to try a web version of it if such a thing ever exists.
  - xpaulbettsx 15y ago
    It doesn't work on an iPad yet. It's our first web Office release, it's still a little rough, but it's definitely something we're putting a lot of engineering work behind to improve. However, you don't actually need Silverlight to use it (I'm not sure what they're using it for), I've used it on Chrome in Ubuntu and it worked just as well. Any new'ish browser should work.
m0nastic 15y ago
I've been using the beta for a while now, and look forward to it being launched. I must be in the small minority of people who prefer hosted Exchange to Gmail (but oh do I), but I've been pretty impressed so far with the functionality.
chrisjsmith 15y ago
The name sounds like we will have to pay a little bit for it for 365 days a year...
- ronnier 15y ago
  I dislike names with 365, 360, X, Live and so forth. Microsoft violates all of them :-/

30 points by Garbage 15y ago

Google really needs to turn up the heat with Docs. The spreadsheet, etc need to get a lot better if they want to steal market share from Microsoft. Office is hard to beat.

Raphael_Amiard 15y ago
I think the developement on docs is going at a pretty fascinating pace. They just don't necessarily have the focus on things you'd expect them to work out first. But they have a pretty rock solid collab feature that is currently unmatched in any other office suite. Once you get the habit of working like that on certain projects, it's hard to go back to the old way of collaborating by sharing files. Spreadsheet is the least polished app of all, but i think this is no coincidence. SpreadSheet is the app in which the functionality gap is the biggest, and also where user expectations are the most tainted by excel's idiosyncrasies. I wouldn't be surprised if the spreadsheet app doesn't get much love for a long time.
ams6110 15y ago
Not sure I agree. A small number of sophisticated users really use Excel in something close to its potential, but most people I know use spreadsheets for simple lists and maybe adding up a column of numbers. If Google start chasing Excel on features, they could find themselves on the losing side of a "fire and motion"[1] strategy. [1] http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000339.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000339.html
- kprobst 15y ago
  It might be the perception thing. OWA looks more 'professional' than GMail for example, although the latter probably has more capabilities and obviously isn't tied to Exchange. I'm guessing this version of Office will be extremely flashy, and Google Docs will look like a 90s edition of WordPerfect by comparison.
- Lewisham 15y ago
  Yeah, I use the Spreadsheet app the most. It's quicker to download all the Javascript required to run it than it is to boot Excel off my hard drive, and I just use it for groceries and things.
- jaredmck 15y ago
  This makes a lot of sense strategically- as an excel power user it's hard to imagine google docs really ever catching up with excel, but that's not how most people use office. Excel really is a fantastic product, and when used with the excellent analytics plug-in is so awesome for analyzing web analytics & SEO data that it actually makes me glad to be running windows (and I'm not sure I could ever move entirely to Mac/Linux because of how developed these specific niche products are on windows). Although google clearly could build something of this quality for web analytics data mining, they seem to be moving in the opposite direction, and making the GA interface less powerful (for reasons which are understandable albeit not really admirable)

pinhead 15y ago

My biggest complaint with Google Docs is related to consistent formatting. I am anxious to see how MS handles this. I do agree that for pure collaboration, Google Docs is currently unmatched.

xpaulbettsx 15y ago

(Disclaimer: I work on Office at Microsoft) If you want a preview of the Word/Excel/PowerPoint/OneNote pieces of Office 365, you can use them for free at http://office.live.com http://office.live.com - if you're using OneNote locally, they'll also host your OneNote notebooks so you can access them anywhere (as well as still use them via the desktop app)

tansey 15y ago
I just tried the Excel version. Is there some reason that the line graphs are so ugly? The graphs in Excel 2007/2010 are beautiful, but the 365 graphs are filled with jaggies. See: http://i.imgur.com/KOHSI.png http://i.imgur.com/KOHSI.png
- xpaulbettsx 15y ago
  Not sure, but totally agree - I'll try to file a bug.
mikemaccana 15y ago
Last time I tried this, after reading something microsoft wrote that specifically mentioned tablets, I wasted an hour trying to hack office web apps to run, then finally got a message asking me to install silverlight on an ipad. So pardon me if this seems rude, but do you have an actual web office suite, or is this more bullshit? Thanks. MS office has a great ui, and i'm looking forward to try a web version of it if such a thing ever exists.
- xpaulbettsx 15y ago
  It doesn't work on an iPad yet. It's our first web Office release, it's still a little rough, but it's definitely something we're putting a lot of engineering work behind to improve. However, you don't actually need Silverlight to use it (I'm not sure what they're using it for), I've used it on Chrome in Ubuntu and it worked just as well. Any new'ish browser should work.

m0nastic 15y ago

I've been using the beta for a while now, and look forward to it being launched. I must be in the small minority of people who prefer hosted Exchange to Gmail (but oh do I), but I've been pretty impressed so far with the functionality.

chrisjsmith 15y ago

The name sounds like we will have to pay a little bit for it for 365 days a year...

ronnier 15y ago
I dislike names with 365, 360, X, Live and so forth. Microsoft violates all of them :-/