In last week’s blog, I talked about how Google was taking aim at Microsoft by announcing that it was developing its own computer operating system Google Chrome OS. Google claims that the Chrome OS will be entirely focused on the Web. Microsoft responded by surprising Google and the industry with the announcement that Office 2010 will include, among many new features, an online web version of Office 2010 apps that will be free.
Microsoft made the announcement at its World Wide Partner Conference in New Orleans. This move and the timing of this announcement were clearly intended to grab the attention away from Google’s recent announcement.
Office 2010 web apps will be offering a browser version of Excel, PowerPoint, Word and OneNote. The Web versions of Office 2010 won’t be as feature rich as the full software versions, but they will still have the basic, necessary items for editing.
“I expect one of the biggest pluses of Office Web apps is its integration with SharePoint 2010, giving the apps a full backend data store to organize and access documents, and an integrated experience via a SharePoint portal. Office Web apps gives SharePoint an extra leg up on the competition, by embedding a much richer set of apps into the portal software, vs. the standard web page editing form nearly all other portal and wiki technologies rely upon as stated by Mitchell Ashley, of Network World.
“Microsoft's strategy here is to offer the best of all worlds; rich installed apps and web versions, standalone office apps and Office integrated into SharePoint, and a pubic Windows Live version offering, Microsoft hosted offering or customer internally hosted option. Google's only giving users one option; Google Web apps are only hosted on Google's servers, and there's nothing near an equivalent to SharePoint 2010 and Workspace 2010 (formerly Groove) from Google. Other than being the "anti-Microsoft" option, Google looks pretty limited in comparison. Microsoft Office Web apps may also eat into the uses of open source Open Office software, since Microsoft's Web apps will work under Firefox and Safari, in addition to IE. (Notice not Google Chrome support.)”
Only techies invited by Microsoft will get an up-close look at a “Technical Preview” of Office 2010. A beta or test version open to the public is expected later this year. Microsoft is promising many new enhancements and features.
“Office 2010 is the premier productivity solution across PCs, mobile phones* and browsers,” said Chris Capossela, senior vice president of the Microsoft Business Division at Microsoft. “From broadcast and video editing in PowerPoint, new data visualization capabilities in Excel, and co-authoring in Word, we are delivering technology to help people work smarter and faster from virtually any location using any device.”
“Office 2010 and related products will deliver innovative capabilities and provide new levels of flexibility and choice that will help people:
Work anywhere with Office Web applications — the lightweight Web browser versions of Word, PowerPoint, Excel and OneNote — that provide access to documents from virtually anywhere and preserve the look and feel of a document regardless of device.
Collaborate better with co-authoring in Microsoft Word 2010, Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 and Microsoft OneNote 2010, and advanced e-mail management and calendaring capabilities in Microsoft Outlook 2010, including the option for users to ”ignore” unwanted threads.
Bring ideas to life with video and picture editing, broadcast capability in Microsoft PowerPoint 2010, easy document preparation through the new Microsoft Office Backstage view, and new Spark lines in Microsoft Excel 2010 to visualize data and spot trends more quickly.“
Will Office 2010 bring innovation to the marketplace? As Google and Microsoft battle for Web dominance will new innovation be introduced? Share with us thoughts about Office 2010. How will these enhancements affect your office? We you be more apt to use the free online version? Is this a good strategy that Microsoft is employing?
