Microsoft Prepping Browser-based Word and Excel

JCWDenton writes "In a bid to spin its web-based version of Office into contention with rival internet behemoth Google, Microsoft has said it will begin accepting applications for beta testing its web apps later this year. There is one significant difference, however: unlike Google apps, Microsoft said users of its new service can only create or edit online documents if they have Office software already installed on their machines. Microsoft said features of its Office Live Workspace would include allowing users to upload more than 1,000 documents to free personal websites."

Comments

What's the point?

[k_187]

If you have to have office installed, why bother with the online version? I could see them requiring office to register for an account. But why bother?

Re:What's the point?

[Phantom of the Opera]

Hmm, automatic upgrades? That will be loads of fun when your file from years ago suddenly ceases to work.

It's something 'cool sounding' more to market.

Re:What's the point?

[PlatyPaul]

My guess is to allow you to use Office tools while not at your usual desktop machine. One serious downside, however, is that this makes piracy that much easier: one legal copy would be needed per office, with all other machines logged into the online version. No blank media and CD-key cracking required.

Re:What's the point?

[suv4x4]

If you have to have office installed, why bother with the online version? I could see them requiring office to register for an account. But why bother?

There is no point. You need to see Microsoft thinks in multiple steps, and this is just step 1.

Step 1 is about rolling out a beta of this software, and allow the public to test it, give feedback, and their devs to improve on that.

The fact they offer it only to existing customers means there's no chance that this may hurt their Office sales. And it also lets the world know that Microsoft is "aware" of competing web products, such as Google's.

Should things get rough (Step 2), Microsoft already will have a mature web product in their hands, it will have people familiar with working with this product, and have the option of changing how to offer it, including separately for an yearly fee, as Google does.

It's the benefit of having so much money, you can throw them in all directions and use what "sticks".

Re:What's the point?

[Killgore9998]

Because it makes the coding soooo much easier.

Re:What's the point?

[speaker of the truth]

The only real advantage is easy uploading of files onto an internet server.

Re:What's the point?

[omeomi]

My guess is to allow you to use Office tools while not at your usual desktop machine.

The summary states that you can only edit online documents when using a computer that has Office installed...so, even if it's not your usual desktop machine, it still needs to have Office installed (assuming the summary is correct)

Re:What's the point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe they will share the one feature that makes the Google apps really powerful (and are sometimes overlooked).

Multiple people can edit a Google document simultaneously, with the changes being continuously merged.

Plus, there is the more obious advantage that your docs are online, so you don't need to copy/sync them or use a usb drive when moving to another machine.

Still, having said that, what are they thinking?

Re:What's the point?

[ozmanjusri]

What's the point?

Google has an online office suite.

Microsoft wants to "fucking kill Google". That means leveraging their OS and office suite dominance to undermine any market Google ventures into.

Re:What's the point?

[PlatyPaul]

Hmm... according to TFA, you're right (aside from the ability to read files w/o Office installed). However, it does seem to make it easier to pirate - instead of installing the whole Office package and somehow cracking the CD-key issue, you could just do a quick copy-over of the applicable registry entries.

Re:What's the point?

[ednopantz]

Because they are playing a different game than online apps.

This is all about mating everything we like about desktop apps (rich ui, etc.) to collaboration tools found in online apps.

Basically, Sharepoint for the masses.

Whether or not this works is open to debate, but to say this is me-too is just slashbots wearing their ignorance with pride.

Re:What's the point?

[ThirdPrize]

Just read the articles and it doesn't bear much similarity to the summary Taco posted. There is a M$ press release that describes a off-site document hosting set up. As long as you have Office installed on a machine you can download/edit/review documents from the server anywhere in the world. Not really comparable to Googles offerings.

Re:What's the point?

[neoform]

Microsoft has been trying to switch to the service model forever. If they had an online version the could charge either a per use fee, or a monthly subscription. Right now they're 'stuck' with their one time sale that doesn't provide MS with the money they feel the deserve.

Re:What's the point?

[east coast]

If you have to have office installed, why bother with the online version? I could see them requiring office to register for an account. But why bother?

Because if you would have RTFA you'd have realized that the blurb is yet another example of MS bashing FUD.

The service isn't an online office application in the flavor of Google's online service but rather an online storage area where the documents can be viewed by anyone with permission. You'd still need MS Office to edit or create.

Basically it's a free online repository for Office documents. Had the blurb said that we could be left with our normal amount of MS bashing instead of having people run around and acting all insightful over something that simply isn't true and was never even hinted at.

Re:What's the point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod parent's post up. Microsoft is NOT creating a "browser-based" version of MS Office. The press release simply describes a collaboration service that allows you to store and share office documents online. Folks assuming otherwise haven't read the press release (big surprise) and are dolts.

Re:What's the point?

[Opportunist]

In other words, a CVS with limited application?

Umm... anyone could explain to my why I'd want that instead of some real CVS?

Re:What's the point?

[Anonymous Coward]

...

Step 3: Change software installed so that it is only a front-end for the online application - not a stand-alone functional app. Charge subscription service for online apps.

Step 4: Profit!

Re:What's the point?

[Rolgar]

The only point would be collaboration or having the documents automatically saved somewhere other than your own hard drive, for folks that don't want to go to the minimal effort of backing up their computers themselves.

Re:What's the point?

[Penguinisto]

Because they are playing a different game than online apps.

This is all about mating everything we like about desktop apps (rich ui, etc.) to collaboration tools found in online apps.

Basically, Sharepoint for the masses.

Sharepoint is a bastardized version of what the Web has enjoyed for years, if you knew where to look. I do agree about the motivations behind this little Office trick, though... I'm thinking OWA for Office, but this time you have to have the app anyway.

Then again, what exactly were they thinking? It's useless if you already have Office and a Web Browser - you go get the online doc, you work on the doc. All of these steps are pretty much the same no matter what route you take - the only real diff being where the binary translation from *.doc to UI is done.

Whether or not this works is open to debate, but to say this is me-too is just slashbots wearing their ignorance with pride.

I wouldn't exactly call it "me-too" - after all, Google Apps doesn't require you to blow $200-$400 on an app and install it locally, just to make their by-that-point-redundant service work.

That's the part that makes no business sense.

/P

Re:What's the point?

[MightyMartian]

Of course, the nice thing about Google Docs is all I need is a compliant browser on any suitable operating system, so what we're talking about here, once you strip away all the hype, is nothing more than remote storage of your documents. I mean, if you need Office installed, then it only eliminates the step where you copy the file from a remote site to the local machine, then edit and then upload it again.

Not that Google Docs is all that great; it's certainly no Office, and maybe it's simply not possible to build a comprehensive office app in Ajax, which is why Microsoft is going this route.

Re:What's the point?

[Locutus]

my thinking on this went like this, 'how can Microsoft leverage their existing monopolies on the Windows OS and office applications?'. Well, putting this out there for free to existing Microsoft Office users is one way to leverage the MS Office monopoly. After all, once Microsoft built this monopoly, they've been really consistent at making sure only MS Office vX users could exchange with MS Office vX users. If they don't tie this with MS Office 2007, they'll surely do so at a later date.

Step One of the forward looking steps which are ALWAYS part of Microsoft's project design principles is 'How can it be used to protect the monopoly?'.

Microsoft does not need any money from these web apps, just needs to make sure the gravy trains of MS Windows and MS Office continue. Google is looking for revenue and coming up with tools/ideas to attract customers. Microsoft is doing what it's done for close to 20 years, attacking new ideas and protecting what it has. IMO.

LoB

Re:What's the point?

[ednopantz]

That's the part that makes no business sense.
"
Uh huh, which is why Google is stupid. They "give away the milk." They go out of their way to get customers who want something for free instead of targeting those willing to pay. Then again, that company is run by kids, so what do you expect?

Re:What's the point?

[Locutus]

I can see step 3 being something like an ActiveX control wrapping winword.exe but step 4 is just wrong. Microsoft has failed at adding revenue to their three money makers(MS Windows,MS Office, MS WindowsServer) for the last 15 years. So "Profit" is a long shot and not really much of a concern for them. I'm sure they'd like to actually have something successful at not losing money but the main goal of any MS project is to protect the money makers they have. And do so at pretty much any cost. They make billions in profits from only 3 product lines and spending a few million to protect that is not a problem. Their problem is that they suck at coming up with or making anything profitable and it's probably because protecting existing profits is job #1. IMO.

LoB

Re:What's the point?

[Corporate Troll]

However, it does seem to make it easier to pirate - instead of installing the whole Office package and somehow cracking the CD-key issue, you could just do a quick copy-over of the applicable registry entries.

And you think that's going to be easy? Fuck, have you seen what Office dumps into your registry. If I didn't knew that it's an Office Suite, I'd think it's a Operating Service pack in the likes of XP SP2....

Re:What's the point?

[Locutus]

because constantly adding drive space to your MS Exchange email server is driving you nuts and it's driving MS Exchange performance down. If that is what the article is really about then maybe Microsoft is just trying to build a control channel which lessens the load of sending 3+MB of MS Word or MS Powerpoint files around the enterprise via email.

My guess is that they'll tie this into the email clients and servers so the user doesn't know about it.

FYI, the article on TheRegister.co.uk mentions both online apps AND web storage. I don't think it's one or the other. Given that, this being about MS Exchange load is less likely and it's more likely a shot at Google Apps. Making it free to existing MS Office users moves Microsoft into the enterprise web apps space in one leap. And they probably won't have to pay people to use it like they did to kill off Netscape's browser.

LoB

Re:What's the point?

[JimDaGeek]

There are more advantages to Google's offerings too. Such as being cross-browser, and for me, cross-platform. Oh, and their free too, unless you buy the corporate version.

90% of the MS Word docs I have seen at two fortune 500 companies are very simple documents that can be handled very easily in Google's web-based Google Docs. The vast majority of the spread sheets I see are simple enough to be handled by Google's spread sheet app as well. The only exceptions I see for spread sheets are ones coming from financial analysts.

A lot of companies would love to save all that cash by getting rid of MS office. Most workers just need a basic Document editor and spread sheet. However, most companies just get the whole office suite because they use MS Outlook with MS Exchange and are forced into purchasing the whole suite.

Re:What's the point?

[myxiplx]

roflmao! Google, stupid? Go look at their earnings, and the figures on the strength of their brand image and come say that again.

Re:What's the point?

[ConceptJunkie]

If I didn't knew that it's an Office Suite, I'd think it's a Operating Service pack in the likes of XP SP2...

But it's Office, it's more tightly integrated into the OS than a mere service pack.

Re:What's the point?

[Paradise Pete]

One serious downside, however, is that this makes piracy that much easier

That's an upside. Get a lot of people to use it and become dependent on it, then crack down on the non-payers.

Re:What's the point?

[QuestorTapes]

Additionally, you may be able to just view the documents without office. This might be useful in some cases; PowerPoint presentations, for instance, and some people make documentation available as Word documents, for some reason. Especially if they are in that minority of docs that OpenOffice doesn't render quite right.

Re:What's the point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pay per use? Maybe.
Disabling pirated copies more easily? Probably.
Lurk into users files and inform the FBI of anything suspicious? Maybe.

Any reason would be pure speculation at this time, but I'm pretty sure I will keep using OpenOffice or whatever free and trusted software will be around.

Re:What's the point?

[Anonymous Coward]

The only point would be collaboration... Which is a big, BIG point. Millions of people collaborate on Word documents daily, using Office's clumsy built-in tools (track changes, comments) and email/fax. Smoothing out the collaboration workflow has been on the wishlist of every editor, proofer, writer, and typesetter for the past 10 years (since MS became the standard in the publishing industry). Making all this easier could be a small but happy cash cow for MS.

Re:What's the point?

[bladesjester]

some people make documentation available as Word documents, for some reason

It could be because it's sort of the de-facto standard for business documents anymore (and has been for some time). I maintain 4 copies of some things (html, txt, pdf, and word) because, for a while, I was sending pdf's of documents, and kept getting mailed back by people wanting .doc

Now, I jump through hoops to provide all forms of documentation to all people. It can be a huge headache at times.

Also, whether or not you want to admit it, Word is a decent program. It's pretty easy to get things to look the way you want them to. I spend my time in Word actually writing what I need to write. Half of the time I spent in Open Office was taken up by trying to get things to look right.

So, you see, there are those of us who put things in the format that we do for business reasons.

Re:What's the point?

[east coast]

Umm... to share documents without the need to create a network? Maybe this isn't meant to target the same crowd as you're limiting it to?

Re:What's the point?

[Hucko]

YMMV... Mine did. Yes, it is a decent program. I'll even agree that it is technically superior to OO.o. I'd pay AUD$50 for it, if it could output a truly open document format. (Not an export function...) Of course, I don't have data locked problems.

Re:What's the point?

[skinfitz]

you could just do a quick copy-over of the applicable registry entries.

At a guess I expect that it will use the Office ActiveX controls, and of course the whole thing will probably only run in IE as a result. Admittedly this will be completely and utterly pointless to a level never before previously seen, but that's Microsoft for you.

Re:What's the point?

[jesterzog]

There is no point.

Well, there is the same point that has convinced me to use Google Docs for a few minor things, which is the convenience of being able to edit within a web browser and use a central storage location that's available ubiquitously.

I probably wouldn't store important and/or personal documents that I care about with Google or Microsoft, but I have used Google docs for jotting things down between work and home. I've also made use of the features for letting a couple of other people collaborate on the documents. (Realistically Google Docs is like a structured Wiki in many ways, but it's one that's already set up and ready to go.) For basic stuff, something like Google Docs is a lot more convenient at times when mounting a remote file system isn't an option.

I imagine that Microsoft plans to integrate this into its desktop MS Office, allowing people to store their documents online rather than their PCs, and then access them from anywhere. Microsoft has a history of leveraging their existing successful products to force their way into new markets, and using MS Office to "encourage" people to use "MS Office Online" doesn't seem too unlikely.

Re:What's the point?

[mpe]

In other words, a CVS with limited application?
Umm... anyone could explain to my why I'd want that instead of some real CVS?

Especially considering that it probably won't let you use arbitraty encryption on the files. Which you'd need to have any chance of security.

Re:What's the point?

[mpe]

The only point would be collaboration or having the documents automatically saved somewhere other than your own hard drive, for folks that don't want to go to the minimal effort of backing up their computers themselves.

Who also don't care who else might be reading their files.

Re:What's the point?

[QuietObserver]

You mean worse than AOL?

Re:What's the point?

[Corporate Troll]

I've never been exposed to AOL.

Re:What's the point?

[tehcyder]

Microsoft is doing what it's done for close to 20 years, attacking new ideas and protecting what it has.

If anything Microsoft are responding to Google's ideas, not attacking them.

And why wouldn't MS want to protect what they have? That's what commercial organisations do.

Re:What's the point?

[sco08y]

As long as you have Office installed on a machine you can download/edit/review documents from the server anywhere in the world. Not really comparable to Googles offerings.

Office has had the ability to be embedded in a web page as an ActiveX control for years now, and Word and Excel have had revision tracking for some time (maybe others, I'm not sure). And they have relatively mature HTML export functions. All MS really needs to do is add upload capabilities to the ActiveX control, which it may already have, and any computer running Office, meaning any work computer in corporate America, can run it.

Google's offerings are more accessible but have virtually no features. It's pretty comparable, from the user's POV.

Re:What's the point?

[Locutus]

"I'm Going To F*king Kill Google" sounds like "responding to Google"?

http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/050905-135244

And Microsoft's long long history of these kinds of attacks on competitors does not make them a friend of consumers or a friend of businesses. They surely have done very little to be a friend to me and far far more to the contrary. And convicted monopolies can not protect their monopolies. It is illegal.

LoB

Re:What's the point?

[QuietObserver]

AOL just dumps dozens of registry keys (and then leaves most of them when you try uninstalling); I know this not from experience, but from some testing someone reported on when I worked as a Microsoft Windows technician. My objective here was to make a joke about AOL, not to provide an actual, intellectual response. I guess it wasn't that funny, as I had to explain what I meant.

Re:What's the point?

[Corporate Troll]

Oh, I did get it... I pretty much guessed that AOL was sloppy. That's not it, I tried to be funny by insinuating that I've never been touched by the AOL appendage. Which is true. They never were very popular at my side of the pond.

Re:What's the point?

[QuietObserver]

While I have absolutely nothing against my country in general, that is one good reason NOT to be an American.

Anywhere..

[Travis Mansbridge]

Now you can use our software anywhere. As long as that software is already there.

Re:Anywhere..

[Anonymous Coward]

The damned thing works only on IE6 & above. Firefox is not supported. Why can't MS include this in their documentation ? Wasted 10 minutes registering at Windows Live website.

Maybe MS should concentrate on fixing bugs on the all popular Outlook and MS Exchange, instead of uploading the same crap on web. Shit is still shit whether you give it away for free, make it available online, or charge 100 bucks for it.

Re:Anywhere..

[Anonymous Coward]

Look mommy there is such things as a 'Linux sheep'

Re:Anywhere..

[Fayn]

There ARE still some benefits to this. Sad as it may sound, I actually respect Microsoft's applications for word processing, spreadsheets, etc. Since I already own a copy of MS Office, I can actually see myself using this. Though it would be fair to argue that one could just upload documents to an FTP.

Why the web?

[Shadow Wrought]

Because math errors on the desktop are so confining.

Re:Why the web?

[PlatyPaul]

Actually, since everything seems to be interacting desktop-to-web-and-back, my guess is that the errors could actually be caught at some point in the process (though it seems unlikely).

By the way, here is the actual Microsoft press release, indicating clearly which components will be involved (for business and personal levels).

Re:Why the web?

[Dachannien]

Too true, but seriously, you ask a good question: Why the web?

For tax preparation software, I can understand it. It changes considerably every year, you only need it for one or two days out of the year, and it facilitates electronic filing.

But where's the convenience in trying to cram a full-featured word processor or spreadsheet into a web browser? I can see this going one place only: micropayments. Clippy says, "It looks like you're trying to write a letter. Please deposit twenty-five cents."

Re:Why the web?

[FrankDrebin]

Poetic justice will be a Firefox extension that fixes the bad calculations. Or implements the "behave like unpatched Office 2007" feature.

Re:Why the web?

[Shadow Wrought]

Clippy says, "It looks like you're trying to write a letter. Please deposit twenty-five cents."

Reminds me of the recorded operator in the payphone days, "Please deposit twenty-five cents for the next 500 words please." ;-)

Re:Why the web?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a display error, not a math error. It's still pretty stupid.

Re:Why the web?

[mpe]

For tax preparation software, I can understand it. It changes considerably every year, you only need it for one or two days out of the year, and it facilitates electronic filing.

Also, if it's done correctly, the result is completly cross platform.

Already have Office installed

[christurkel]

And will work only Internet Explorer, let me guess. This is will be competition, how?

Re:Already have Office installed

[Anonymous Coward]

You seem to be forgetting that Windows owns the desktop like Sparta owns Persia.

Re:Already have Office installed

[PlatyPaul]

According to TFA, there will be read-only access for those who don't have Office installed, and (just my guess) that will likely extend to use with non-approved browsers.

Re:Already have Office installed

[Prof.Phreak]

And will work only Internet Explorer, let me guess. This is will be competition, how?

Indeed. One of the major points of google apps is that I can edit files from a Windows box at wr0k, and from a Linux box at home [or from anywhere, in fact] (not to mention have a reliable `backup' provided by google).

As much as I don't like MS, I think MS Word is a pretty good product (besides for the locked file format)---editing the files is pretty enjoyable; a bit better tuned than OpenOffice), and if it weren't for such arbitrary restrictions, I might've tried the web version. Oh, well...

Re:Already have Office installed

[Anonymous Coward]

Sparta didn't own Persia. The first "Greek" civilization to successfully invade Persia was the Macedonian empire lead by Alexander. Jesus fucking christ.

Re:Already have Office installed

[PlatyPaul]

From the Microsoft press release:

Collaborators who dont have a desktop version of Microsoft Office software can still view and comment on the document in a browser.

So, this would also allow cheap/low-budget businesses to buy a smaller number of licenses for editing, with all other collaborators creating a list of comments leading to each document update. That actually sounds like a good idea, in my mind, since it restricts the final editing to a single user (for style and accountability purposes) while clearly indicating which sections were updated as a result of each person's comments.

(yeah, I know it's bad form to reply to yourself - this just needed to be added)

Re:Already have Office installed

[mgblst]

Great point, I guess Microsoft is making the same mistake as they have made with their current Office Suite, and we all know how that backfired on them. When will they learn.

Mate, most people don't have a Linux machine at home. This is not to stop all the Linux people from using Googles Word, it is to stop the majority from moving to Googles word.

Re:Already have Office installed

[jesterzog]

It will be competition because Microsoft will direct its existing customers to the online service using its already established dominant Microsoft Office product. Only working in MSIE is irrelevant because everyone who uses Office has MSIE installed.

Typical Microsoft-think

[BJZQ8]

Microsoft said users of its new service can only create or edit online documents if they have Office software already installed on their machines

So close, yet so far away...

mod parent up

[Anonymous Coward]

nt

Pathological?

[Anonymous Coward]

The documentary 'The Corporation' likened the character of a corporation to that of a sociopath but Microsoft seem to be pathologically retarded. Lately, they have been an established idea, breaking it in a fundamental way and coming out with it far too late.

Are they ill?

What a great idea!

[HexaByte]

What a great idea! Smash the free competition with your version that requires users to fork out hundreds of dollars to get what they can have from the other guy for nothing.

I'm gonna use this model to build a pay per url web and make billions! I just know everyone will want to use MY web, because by paying for it, they'll know it has real value, unlike that free junk!

Re:What a great idea!

[mikael]

Or if you are a students, just for less than $60 (USA) or

USA/Canada version

UK version

Re:What a great idea!

[speaker of the truth]

I've got an ultimate steal right here for $0!

Knee Jerk, or Just Jerk

[OneSmartFellow]

Wow, are they getting lazy at M$ or what. I guess somebody got a raise, but I also guess he'll be getting fired in about 6 months when there is no uptake on their generous offer.

Billiam must be wondering how much longer his empire can survive with such stupidity.

Re:Knee Jerk, or Just Jerk

[archen]

Slightly worse than 'knee jerk' I would think. This appears to be very much a solution looking for a problem to solve. In other words it's going through the same motion as the other guy without having a clear objective or understanding what they are trying to do, nor actually solving the problem they address.

Pros and Cons

[thatskinnyguy]

Pros:

• Updated versions constantly
• Access from anywhere the tubes go.
• Ease of sharing documents.

Cons:

• DoS attack at Microsoft could mean loss of revenues for companies using this service
• I never have experienced any "outages" of Office installed on my desktop. Have you?
• Do you really own anything but your user name for this service? How expensive is a user name going to be?

Re:Pros and Cons

[faloi]

You forgot a "con." If your browser has any issues at all, you're locked out. I've run into a handful of people running Vista that get mysterious "stackhash" errors when running IE. Not such a big deal for web surfing, but a huge deal for services tied to the browser. Office doesn't work, time to reinstall the OS!

Re:Pros and Cons

[Anonymous Coward]

"I never have experienced any "outages" of Office installed on my desktop. Have you?"

Ladies and gents, this is the ./ counterpart of the scene in Die Hard when Bruce Willies shows up with a "I hate N..." sign in Harlem....

Be nice now!

Re:Pros and Cons

[PlatyPaul]

It would also make it easier to pirate, which could be either a pro or a con depending on your side of the situation. You could copy a legit user's applicable registry entries and then use the online service without ever installing Office on your machine (if the service really just checks for your installation, rather than launching it as part of its processing).

Re:Pros and Cons

[p0tat03]

"Ease of sharing documents" is the only one that's valid in that list. Honestly, I've *never* patched any version of Office I've owned, and never had a problem - even the current version, which I do patch only by virtue of the updater nagging me, poses no problems. So really, patched or not Office works fine. Also, I tend to work a lot during travel time - planes, trains, buses, what have you... A tube-based Office simply won't work, and I know a LOT of businessmen who do the same.

Not to mention that with a text-based (i.e. non-binary) file format for documents now, one can very easily use a code repository like SVN to share documents. That's what I did last time in a team project.

Re:Pros and Cons

[thatskinnyguy]

I didn't mean "updates" as in patches. I meant version updates.

Re:Pros and Cons

[Anonymous Coward]

The word you're looking for is "Nigger".

Re:Pros and Cons

[zlogic]

I never have experienced any "outages" of Office installed on my desktop. Have you? Software can be broken too. Like a registry key (or DLL) that gets deleted/broken when installing an Office extension/generic app/game/whatever. In fact network outages are mostly caused by software bugs and not hardware failures. However software usually works fast while web apps make you wait even for simple actions, especially if anything between you and the server (hundreds of kilometers away!) gets overloaded.

Re:Pros and Cons

[JasterBobaMereel]

Cons

* Updated versions constantly
* Lack of access unless you have IE(latest version)
* Impossible to share documents since no-one else will use it?
* DoS attack at Microsoft could mean loss of revenues for companies using this service
* I never have experienced any "outages" of Office installed on my desktop. Have you?
* Do you really own anything but your user name for this service? How expensive is a user name going to be?

Competition is good

[speaker of the truth]

Yet another fine example of how competition is good. Although personally I've moved away from the buggy implementation of Google Docs (the text editing is fairly clumsy) to OOo. I've lost access to the internet part however I rarely used it (simply stopped me from opening a second program and the load times were seeing this advantage dwindle). I might have been tempted to try out Microsoft's offering, but I'd rather not be tied to Windows right now (might change later next year when I give Office 2007 a whirl).

Why office should be installed in the machine?

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Are they trying to share DLLs between installed MS-Office software and the Web based spreadsheet and word tools? Given their track record this is typically the kind of thing they will do. They preload MS-Office DLLs during boot to create the impression of instant-on MS-Office compared to OpenOffice. (They don't have try this hard to beat OpenOffice in launch time, but that is a different issue). They might tunnel behind the browser and security and everything so that the web based tool can give you faster response time. They don't have to stream in code to execute in the browser and they don't have to send changes back to the server to rerender the page being edited.

I could easily imagine a development team pitching this idea to the pointy haired bosses. "We have this huge installed base of DLLs and megabytes of code already in the client's machine. We beat them in the download time! We execute complex code in their machine, we beat Google in refresh time! yay!! yay!!!" Of course, such a thing would violate all security protocols, and create thousands of security holes, but they won't care. It would not work in any platform other than Windows and they won't care. It might not work in FireFox and they would go, "yeah! that will kill FF"

Anyway this is all speculation, but I don't see why they would demand pre installed Ms-Office to allow a web based tool to work.

Re:Why office should be installed in the machine?

[Hanners1979]

I'm not sure it's quite a sinister as that - I would imagine that they simply don't want to offer this tool for free to people who haven't already shelled out hundreds of dollars on Microsoft Office already.

Re:Why office should be installed in the machine?

[Aladrin]

Actually, I think he was right on pretty much all accounts. Requiring the software to be installed negates the majority of the usefulness: Being able to use it from anywhere.

The only benefit it gives is easy uploads of documents to a central location... That could easily be done with webservices and the regular Office app. As far as MS is concerned, it would be -easier-.

If they do it this way, and then later decide not to have it installed, they'll have to push all the DLLs to the target computer (which wouldn't be allowed on computers the person doesn't own, like when they are travelling) or require a complete rewrite to make it more server-side than client-side.

Re:Why office should be installed in the machine?

[suv4x4]

After some research, the Slashdot title and summary are, as usual, completely wrong. The Office Live service will complement Office, and NOT offer online Word and Excel.

It'll offer complementing services, such as email, online synch and storage.

CmdrTaco, how would you feel to get fired from your own blog for incompetence?

Re:Why office should be installed in the machine?

[Angst Badger]

It's much more likely that Office will simply launch as a tab or iframe in IE, with no actual connection to the net besides the ability to store and retrieve documents from one of Microsoft's servers. What's being sold here, ultimately, is an MS-hosted fileserver with provisions for sharing files amongst one's coworkers.

In terms of actual document-editing capabilities, Google's office toys aren't serious competition for anyone. Their strength is in providing collaboration tools for small to medium-sized business. (Forget the enterprise.) OpenOffice actually is competition for MS Office in terms of capabilities, though it still lags way behind in collaboration tools. Until Google -- or someone else -- stops screwing around with second-rate DHTML clones of WordPad, and builds MS Office-equivalent (and interoperable) collaboration tools for OpenOffice, Microsoft has nothing to fear from Google in this area.

In the meantime, Microsoft is just fishing around for new revenue streams. The problem here isn't that Microsoft doesn't get it. They get it just fine. The problem is that neither their customer base nor their competition get it. You and I, dear reader, may be dismayed by their bullshit, but we aren't part of the target market in the first place.

Re:Why office should be installed in the machine?

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Until Google -- or someone else -- stops screwing around with second-rate DHTML clones of WordPad, and builds MS Office-equivalent (and interoperable) collaboration tools for OpenOffice, Microsoft has nothing to fear from Google in this area.

People are messing with "second-rate DHTML clones" as you call them because, they don't want to sink tons of money in Ms-Office replacement, only to see MS move the goal posts, change the file formats. Their code would become useless then. Till somehow MS gets nailed into making one inter-operable file format there will not be a straight competition for Ms-Office. The ODF document standard is one thing that could help. If Google web-tools gain a critical mass that forces a significant percentage of Ms-Office users to save to Office97 by default or odf by default, it would create a market for people willing to write tools as powerful as Ms-Office. As long as MSFT can play games with apis, gui, file formats and keep making interoperability impossible, you will not find anyone willing to invest what it takes to compete with Ms-Office.

Why Not?

[yakmans_dad]

Why, in the current climate where Big Brother has cowed telecoms into letting them eavesdrop on everything under the sun, would anyone adopt a program that makes you save your documents elsewhere? I can hear the tagline: "Don't kid yourself! Your documents aren't really private anyway!"

come now. tell me that this isnt a me-too -

[unity100]

- operation after what google did ?

Re:come now. tell me that this isnt a me-too -

[Anonymous Coward]

microsoft had a web based version of at least one office components (outlook) before google's even existed. how about you get your facts in line?

Re:come now. tell me that this isnt a me-too -

[unity100]

"one office component" is not comparable to translating office capabilities of word, excel to web.

Re:come now. tell me that this isnt a me-too -

[xgr3gx]

I agree, me-too's aren't always bad. They foster competition and innovation. But everything shouldn't be a me too. When a new technology shows up and M$ wants in, they quickly buy a startup that has already developed something similar, and rebrands it to M$. That's not even a me-too, that's just laziness. Who did they buyout for this online office thing? And putting Outlook online...that's called webmail. (I'll give them credit though...the calendar reminders look just like the desktop Outlook...that's cool)

Re:come now. tell me that this isnt a me-too -

[Anonymous Coward]

Google was a me-too operation, your point is?

Re:come now. tell me that this isnt a me-too -

[unity100]

it wasnt a 'me too' operation. it was a competitor's entry to market.

if, some company does everything after its major, declared rival, then its me-too.

Re:come now. tell me that this isnt a me-too -

[Anonymous Coward]

neither is what ms is doing. you don't have your facts straight. you're a moron and you've just proven it to me again.

capitalizing on past success

[s4m7]

Yes, almost 10 years on the heels of the "smashing success" that is OWA, they're going to move the rest of the office suite to a non-functional, browser incompatible format that costs way more that competing, functional products.

The folks at Microsoft are such innovators...

Other companies already do it better

[Alzheimers]

It's a sad state when other companies have remade MS Office better than Microsoft makes their own software. I like Google Documents and Sheets, but my favorite so far is ThinkFree.com. It's got the look and feel of Office, but all the collaborative features that the desktop software lacks, and it's completely accessable from anywhere in the world from just about any machine. And like Google it's completely free for the online version. The only downside is how long it takes to open a document, but it's a small inconvenience compared to downloading Openoffice on a friend's PC who got shafted with a demo version of MS Works.

Bill Gates quoted as saying

[Tejin]

"That's the stupidest fucking thing I've heard since I've been at Microsoft!"

Clippy

[Anonymous Coward]

Clippy ! On the Web? Where do I sign up?

Re:Clippy

[s4m7]

Clippy ! On the Web? Where do I sign up? "It looks like you're trying to strangle the web with application traffic. Would you like to..."

This makes sense...

[teknopurge]

In other news, Microsoft engineers finally determined JavaScript was sufficiently weak-typed enough to develop production applications in. When asked, lead Application Architect, Jing-Jong Wong Alturi stated "Our skills with the Visual Basic enterprise language will translate nicely to our new web platform. We were able to write Excel macros to take our VB code from our code respoitories, filter it through the advanced mathematic functions of Excel and translate it to JS semantics. Additionally, the memory leaks of most JS runtimes fit nicely into the 'develop' stage of the our development process."

Re:This makes sense...

[MagicBox]

hahaha....

Re:Why the web? Automated Sharing

[Nymz]

One stop automated sharing. Now I don't have to worry, that all my data isn't being shared with Google, Microsoft, any of their bussiness partners that would like to target me for advertising, the FBI, Homeland Security, etc...

Article description is WRONG!

[Anonymous Coward]

MS is not creating a "web-based" version of MS Office. The press release simply describes a collaboration service that allows you to store and share office documents online. Once again - THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO MENTION OF ONLINE EDITING OF OFFICE DOCUMENTS! So, in conclusion, this is not a press release for an ajaxified/dhtml/web 2.0 Office application and hence, it DOES make sense that you would have to have Office installed on your machine to edit your documents.

Re:Article description is WRONG!

[east coast]

What? A summary is wrong on Slashdot? The last bastion of journalistic integrity has fallen!

Re:Article description is WRONG!

[SavedLinuXgeeK]

Um, I'm not so sure, from the article:

There is one significant difference, however: unlike Google apps, Microsoft said users of its new service can only create or edit online documents if they have Office software already installed on their machines. I'm pretty sure I just read only create or edit online documents. Going with the article, I'd say your wrong.

Re:Article description is WRONG!

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, you have it wrong. You need to read the sentence in the context of the press release to understand what it means. The site for the "Office Live" service states, "Open and save files directly from Word, Excel, and PowerPoint" (http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/officelive/FX102394081033.aspx) which implies that the files are saved directly to the service via the Office software - hence, you would need Microsoft office in order to add (aka create) or edit files that are contained in your "workspace".

Why are you trying so hard to make this a Google vs. Microsoft thing?

Re:Article description is WRONG!

[SavedLinuXgeeK]

The "Office Live" site may state that, but I was referencing the article. If the article is flawed, fine, but according to the article, I stand by what I wrote. The article implies that you can edit documents online. I realize the article can be, and is probably wrong, but I was referencing the article when writing my response.

Re:Article description is WRONG!

[Nazlfrag]

Their press release talks about the 'rich, seamless experiences' that are 'personalized, integrated and available online anywhere'. Under the 'Office Live Workspace: New Web Functionality for Microsoft Office' they say 'Extend Microsoft Office. Users can easily connect to Microsoft Office Word, PowerPoint, Excel and Outlook on their PC via the Web.' It seems that it is their plan to rival google apps, they are just clueless.

Re:Article description is WRONG!

[Anonymous Coward]

"Edit documents online" doesn't imply that you are editing them via a front end constructed with HTML and JavaScript, nor does it imply the prerequisites for using such functionality. From the article it sounds like an online repository which can be accessed directly from within Office.

Re:Article description is WRONG!

[whitehatlurker]

The last bastion of journalistic integrity has fallen!

You can see that from here?

Google competes?

[Anonymous Coward]

Google is competing with MS Office? Don't you actually have to have a product on the market to be considered a competitor?

At this point, all the pies Google plans to have their thumbs in are nothing more than vaporware.

Re:Google competes?

[j-pimp]

Google is competing with MS Office? Don't you actually have to have a product on the market to be considered a competitor?

At this point, all the pies Google plans to have their thumbs in are nothing more than vaporware.

There are certain documents that I store in google docs and spreadsheets. I'd hardly call their apps vaporware.

Microsoft has a product. Google's online office tools perform a similar function. Its very possible people can say that Google's suite is "good enough" for some people not to buy Office. On top of that, if someone uses Google's office suite because its free and then decides they need more functionality, they would be more likely to consider Open Office if they already find free office suites as acceptable.

Look at the IE versus Netscape competition of the browser wars. Netscape and Microsoft were both giving away browsers for free. They both wanted their browser to dominate so they could sell their other products, that were delivered to the users through browsers.

Obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

First U.S.A. Communist Party FP !

Fuck Bush !

Me-too != Bad

[PlatyPaul]

Being the second (or third, or fourth...) company to roll out something doesn't have to be a bad thing. Yes, innovation is wonderful, but there is also a lot to say for "standing on the shoulders of giants" (with my apologies to Bernard of Chartres and Sir Isaac Newton). If Microsoft does things well, that improvement alone might be just as valuable to the future of the e-Office as Google's first step.

Whether or not Microsoft does things well, however, will have to be seen.

Antitrust Law

[Nymz]

If they gave it away for free, like their browser, then they would face an antitrust trial, like their browser.

munchausen syndrome

[OneSmartFellow]

Quick, sell your shares Bill !

is Microsoft serious?

[Antiocheian]

``a significant step forward by combining our deep client and server software experience with...,,

What experience? Is this a joke? They got the date right (at least in my own zone) but the month is October -- not April.

woosh

[fwarren]

Sparta didn't own Persia. The first "Greek" civilization to successfully invade Persia was the Macedonian empire lead by Alexander. Jesus fucking christ

woosh

I'm looking forward to...

[oahazmatt]

I'm looking forward to Microsoft's next big thing: The Browser-based Browser. "You can now use Internet Explorer through any other browser, just make sure you have Internet Explorer installed!"

Re:I'm looking forward to...

[Anonymous Coward]

FireFox addon IETabs sry but you'll have to get 1.21 gigawatt to get back to the present

Re:I'm looking forward to...

[rastos1]

Mozilla beats them there too: chrome://browser/content/browser.xul

PR speak

[cerberusss]

FTFA:

Microsoft business division president Jeff Raikes said: "We are taking a significant step forward by combining our deep client and server software experience with our strong commitment to delivering flexible services offerings for our wide variety of customers and their unique needs."

Such language makes me wonder whether English is these people's first language.

Re:PR speak

[m2943]

for our wide variety of customers and their unique needs.

Just remember: "our customer base, they're all individuals to us."

Online word processors are not up to par

[icepick72]

For the most part, the web browser is too generic to allow any product built on it to compete with an existing standalone counterpart (unless it natively make heavy use of the web), just like Google apps vs Microsoft Office standalone. Hell, even Open Office is having a hard time fighting MS with a standalone product of its own. I can imagine Open Office developers would laugh if approached with the great idea of "going online" to continue competing. You'll always have a select few who are happy with the web version but the stats are extremely small.

The only reason for Microsoft to go online is to provide an answer to Google apps and others like it. Sure it's a useless answer but at least it's an answer. MS office needs better web integration regardless.

Bringing OpenOffice.org to the Internet

[Anonymous Coward]

No thanks! I'll wait for the real online open source office. [PDF Alert]

Quite simple: stop people from defecting

[Laxator2]

The point is that people who are most likely to use the Google browser Office apps are those who are using MS Office already. And those are using it in two places, work and home. And they have MS Office installed in both places. The whole point of the move by MS is to protect its already installed user base form migrating to Google browser-based Office, not to recruit new users.

I expect that a lot of corporations will force their employees to use the MS web apps, they just had to wait for MS to release them.

FYP

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be a sad state when other companies have remade MS Office better than Microsoft makes their own software....but it hasn't happened.

This is partly about Office piracy

[Dr. Spork]

I know this isn't some sort of a revolutionary transformation of Office. It's just making webspace available for storing docs, in case you work on the same docs from more than one location. That much is a good idea. The reason why my gradebooks are in the Google spreadsheet is because I sometimes ammend them from any one of four locations.

But the piracy-fightning motivations of this should not be ignored: For the first time, Microsoft can say that a legit version of Office can actually do something useful that a pirated version can't do. It's very easy for them to make sure that pirated versions will not pass the authentication you need to sign up for the webspace they offer.

Another thing they hope for: Once users start building up big collection of files that are hosted on Microsoft servers, this becomes a significant new source of lockin. Competitors need to react now if they want to prevent this. There is a straightforward way to do this: Google could give out some online storage space and make it so that space is mountable like a networked drive from any computer. MS users could just load and save their documents on this drive, say Z:\, and they could be sure that local hardware failures won't wipe them and that any changes made from one location will show up when the file is opened later from another.

I know there are little hacks that allow this already, but they have severe limitations, plus they're hacks. But the existence of the clever hacks gives all the more reason for Google to do this officially.

Can you smell the lock in?

[BlueParrot]

The idea here seems to be to force universities and public institutions to use Microsoft as otherwise people will not be able to access their documents from Microsoft's servers. If this is not a good reason to move away from Microsoft's document formats I don't know what is. Sure, today you can just use your stand-alone version of Office, but will Office 2010 make a subscription mandatory? Will Office 2013 still allow you to store your documents locally ? Really, if you thought Google doing "software as a service" was scary, Imagine what happens when the Windows API suddenly starts to display a lot of "bugs" that cause software that is NOT software as a [Microsoft] service to fail... They will never do it? Just like windows update would "only notify you" about new patches. Just like WGA would "let users know they have a genuine copy" ? They have no qualms trying to corrupt the ISO, they have no qualms installing software on your machine without your consent. It is a BadIdea(TM) to trust them with anything of any level of importance.

ActiveX is not "web"

[linebackn]

It seems like they have been trying for something like this for quite a while. Obviously this would be implemented using Win32 ActiveX binaries so it would be IE and Windows only.

Congratulations, Microsoft, you just re-invented client/server architecture, just using web protocols as a transport.

Re:ActiveX is not "web"

[Tarlus]

Man, I wish I had some mod points to give ya to raise that post... That's really ultimately all this web-based MS Office software will be.

Competition

[t00le]

Maybe Microsoft is simply going to add support to save Office files directly to a "Gmail Drive Extension". :)

If all they are doing in phase one it would be simply a matter of copying someone else's great idea. I save all of my M$ Office files to my Gmail drive and I don't have to worry about even bothering with their beta next year. Office already supports this type of behavior (ActiveX component not written by M$), which is why they will want to re-brand something as their own to stay competitive.

Pointless! But maybe a good direction to go...

[erroneus]

I agree that it's definitely pointless to have an "Online Office" that requires MS Office to be installed locally. However, the model opens up some interesting possibilities.

Yes, there are document management solutions already in existence and all that. But here's what would be a really cool thing:

Set up office on the user's machine. The machine may be inside the office network or possibly outside of the office network. Next, there could be some sort of "MS Office Server" running that connects with the Office clients (internally or externally). This could then make the user and office common data available from anywhere without having to deal with much of the nonsense associated with document management systems. The MS Office Server would be that document management service.

Whether or not a user is allowed to save those documents locally or whatever else is a permissions and rights matter that could also be controlled through the server. (Is allowed to save locally, Is allowed to email as attachment, etc...)

How many laptop users have lost critical business data because of lapses in backups or some other such problem?

Now there should also be a Web-Interface version of MS Office that is served up from the server without Office installed locally. This would enable greater possibility to have Linux on the desktop! This can't happen soon enough for me... but what are the odds Microsoft will allow THAT to happen easily or will not try to prevent people from creating such "interoperability" [in violation of court orders]?

The original strategy

[Xenographic]

Well, here's the original strategy. The following is from the Comes v. Microsoft discovery, and in Bill Gates' own words:

One thing we have got to change is our strategy -- allowing Office documents to be rendered very well by other peoples browsers is one of the most destructive things we could do to the company.

We have to stop putting any effort into this and make sure that Office documents very well depends on PROPRIETARY IE capabilities.

Anything else is suicide for our platform. This is a case where Office has to avoid doing something to destroy Windows.

Groklaw has an archive with all this as well if you want to check up on me. I couldn't remember where this exact memo was, so I had to Google it and I found my copy here. It's pretty widely available on the Internet now, though.

Oops, they did it again...

[BritneySP2]

As if Outlook (the Web version) did not suck.

Oxymoronic notions

[penguinstorm]

The word's "Microsoft" and "browser based" in ANY sentence are inherently oxymoronic. They have no place together.

One exception MIGHT be "Microsoft is incapable of creating a browser based application" and its many derivatives and variations.

Stifling Competition Is Not Competition

[Jane Q. Public]

Microsoft does not know how to "compete" in a free market. Its knee-jerk reaction has always been to get involved in anything the others are doing, not to "compete", per se, but to throw their weight around in the market. That is not the same thing.

I know you're kidding, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's what Bill Gates *actually* said, per the Comes v. Microsoft documents:

One thing we have got to change is our strategy -- allowing Office documents to be rendered very well by other peoples browsers is one of the most destructive things we could do to the company.

We have to stop putting any effort into this and make sure that Office documents very well depends on PROPRIETARY IE capabilities.

Anything else is suicide for our platform. This is a case where Office has to avoid doing something to destroy Windows.

Thin edge of the wedge

[xigxag]

Microsoft is clearly hoping the whole web app idea will fail. To a large extent, Office IS Microsoft. It is their huge cash cow and must be protected at all costs.

But, they don't want to be caught totally unprepared for a paradigm shift, so placing web apps allows them to gauge the market penetration and use of these types of applications, as well as keeping users locked into the MS camp.

But they don't really want to see this succeed, not even a little bit. MS doesn't "get" the web, never has, and if they have to compete on Google's home turf, they will lose.

No outages on the desktop

[symbolset]

I never have experienced any "outages" of Office installed on my desktop...

Then you haven't tried visio.

So does this mean...

[SuluSulu]

...that all of the Office macro viruses will work in my web browser now too?

In other words, it's useless.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Office Live service will complement Office, and NOT offer online Word and Excel. ... services, such as email, online synch and storage.

So it's going to offer "services" that every competent company in the world already provides for it's employees. So, as a reward for buying a new office suit you get to get to trust M$ with your sensitive company data instead of putting it in the usual place. Next up, the usual sabotage for the "competing" services that force you into yet another "proffit center" like AV, browsing, and word processing before.

The sooner you get away from M$, the more you save.

Oh boy oh boy oh boy!

[XantheKnight]

Now Office can crash at the same time as iExplore, instead of separately.

and yet they are still being forced to change -

[insomnyuk]

their market share has been slowly, but consistently decreasing in several areas - especially in the web browser arena and to some extent in the computer arena, especially since Vista has been such a flop in the business world (tangent: Apple really needs to boost their OS soon - that was supposed to happen this year, right?).

As much as they may appear to be resisting change and attempting to maintain their position, every new innovation is affecting them and forcing Microsoft to adapt, if ever so slightly at times. They are losing key battles over document formats - ISO just rejected Microsoft's OOXML proposal, for example. Sort of like Planck's theory of observation affecting what is observed, Microsoft, by virtue of being in a market where it has to interact with customers and businesses with changing preferences and plans, is changing.

There is no point

[mcrbids]

You got that right - there is no point, but not for the reasons you specify.

If you RTFTA you'd see that this is nothing more than a glorified WebDAV directory. The functionality they're talking about is something we've been using for freaking ever with Apache/Mod_SSL/WebDAV. We routinely read, write, and save documents to and from anywhere in the world collaboratively with other people in the office, with the server being an old P3 Desktop too old and slow to work as a desktop anymore running CentOS for free with the above configuration hosted on the company Internet Connection.

Works a champ. I don't have any idea why they think this is in any way relevant.

Re:Desktop Outage.

[Macthorpe]

I don't think there is anyone who's used Windoze for more than five years who's not had a desktop fail so badly that it won't boot and everyone knows someone that's happend to. I know someone who has had an install of Linux fail so badly that it wouldn't even bring up a console.

I know someone who has had an install of Linux screw up an entire hard disk full of data.

Oh, wait, both of those people were me.

eh well,

[unity100]

at least i have a name - moron. you, amazingly, are still an anonymous coward. better be a moron than a turd without balls.

It's a real pity

[codingmasters]

When will Microsoft learn? This is not going to do them any favours at all. If they ever want to compete with Google, they're going to need to grow a brain for starters