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Microsoft Unveils Browser-Based Office Apps
snydeq writes "Microsoft followed up its Windows Azure unveiling by announcing that it will deliver lightweight versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote through the browser, a la Google Apps. Surprisingly, Office Web applications will run in Firefox and Safari, not just Internet Explorer. Far less shocking: You won't get Office Web apps free and clear as you do Google apps. The apps are meant to be an extension to locally installed instances of the next version of Microsoft Office, the same way Outlook Web Access provides access to mail without the fat Outlook client."
Do the FF/Safari versions lack all but the bare bones features like OWA for FF/Safari?
Positioning it as an extension of office is much more appealing to me than google's broadband-dependent offering. For all the times MS looks completely befuddled by consumer needs, the office team seems to know what it's doing.
WinCE had those apps in a lightweight version too. Deja vu all over again?
will it have Clippy :p
The apps are meant to be an extension to locally installed instances of the next version of Microsoft Office, the same way Outlook Web Access provides access to mail without the fat Outlook client.
Except in order to use Outlook Web Access, I don't need to have a "locally installed instance" of Outlook. I understand where they're going with this, but the example that the author used doesn't seem very apt.
I'm curious whether they are using a common GUI toolkit for their local and web-based versions of these apps.
I'm beginning to like the idea of being able to write a locally-running app and also make it web-based in one swoop.
I guess MS wouldn't be the only ones going this way. Things like GWT and Google Gears and XULrunner make this quite possible. I'm just wondering if MS is uses similar in-house technology.
Microsoft is embracing the cloud. I'm worrying about the weather.
Persian Project Management Software as a Service
Sure, it can run under Firefox and Safari, but what about the most important question: Will it run on Linux?
this sort of uninspired muddled everything in the browser thinking smacks to me of the same sort of cookie cutter approach that brought us to national financial ruin.
This is my sig.
it is part of the Exchange email server, it's not part of the Outlook/Office.
Since you have to have Office installed locally I suspect that it involves an ActiveX control with whatever plugins are necessary to wedge it into Safari and Firefox on Windows.
Sure, it may look pretty, but what's the EULA going to be on this hit of the Microsoft crack pipe? The gradual tightening of their EULA's is another reason the company I work for won't entertain budget spent for new Microsoft licenses.
Have you read the silverlight EULA? Since it's job-related I did, and let me tell you it's not pretty.
We're a small business that has purchased Microsoft site licenses over the years. I gotta wonder how long Microsoft can alienate customers like us before it starts affecting their top and bottom lines.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
Google Apps work without a broadband connection too.
Now all we need is a standard compliant browser to run this on! *cough*
Yes, just last night you were using one of your sockpuppet accounts to tell everyone about it. Didn't go well, that.
The hilarity here is that you were very probably one of the people who used the argument that those apps were broken as another bullet point in the "M$ sux" advocacy crusade, but now it's a veritable tragedy that Microsoft is replacing them with an installer. Actually, someone mentioned as much in response to the flamebait you posted.
If there's no way you can even justify making this point, since it's obviously not true, why even bother?
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
World points and laughs.
But Outlook Web Access isn't an extension to the locally installed fat Outlook client -- you can use Web Access without it... maybe I just misunderstood submitter's wording. I don't have time to RTFA because I'm running out the door but I expect Microsoft's cross-browser office plan will require office products to be installed locally. Likely the glue will be Silverlight and/or .NET -based. I highly doubt a pure web version of the read-write products will exist because it's a stupid level to put everything on. Although I have to admin I get a lot of use from Google's free documents suite but it's fodder for desktop products.
...before they are renting software instead of selling it, and the consumer is devoid of any rights thereto?
Quiz: True or False -- On a scale of 1 to 10, what is your middle name?
Windows got lambasted as windoze
NT; Not There
Azure: sounds like "A Sewer"....
Anybody care to add to the list?
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
the whole idea was implemented years ago, and is still available in both free and paid versions, by ThinkFree Office.
(no, i have no affiliation with the company, aside form using their product from time to time)
why doesn't microsoft just buy thinkfree? (i'd hate that to happen, but it makes more sense then starting from scratch, as we all know what happens when microsoft actually tries to write code)
1 - you are tied to a subscription service forever
2 - ISP's are once again limiting bandwidth ( and thus limits access to your apps and data )
3 - did i mention you are tied to a subscription service?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
You can do full web-based previews and rudimentary editing without Office installed locally.
Gee, I don't have a Microsoft Magic Password on my Mac, so I can't thrill myself with the rudimentary editing!
Guess I'll just have to put up with Office X.
So, basically the same idea we had at Sun years ago (about 10!) with StarPortal?!
Plus ca change.
D.
I have been using OO.org in conjunction with the ZOHO/Google Apps plugin to make Google Apps and ZOHO Office an extension to OO.org. ...and even cooler, the ZOHO developer API allows me to use ZOHO as an extension of my other web apps. So, what are the advantages of using this with MS Office?
In my quest for cross-platform capabilities, I have been using apps that generally work this way. Most of my word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, PDF (Zoho reader), documents are accessible to me in quite a few ways.
1. OO.org
2. ZOHO Office
3. Google Apps
4. The eyeOS desktop installed on my own web server.
What I would like to see now is the ability to sync them all without OO.org and use one OpenID with all of the services.
Make America grate again!
both political parties pushed a housing boom because everyone wants to see everyone own a home. I'm Republican and I think Bush and McCain failed not because of the financial crisis per se but because of their failure to accept the credit that goes with this simple point. Bush could have accepted the beating, like, what difference would it make on his ratings, and say, but he didn't. Rolling the dice to benefit the American people is at least something people would be empathetic to.
Washington was well intended, rolled the dice, and took a beating. I would be willing to bet that, if you look at the people that did get put into homes, that, overall the deal will be even worth the trillion dollar price tag. I mean, if we can accept blowing a trillion dollars as a cost overrun on a war, then, why not explain another trillion on putting people in homes. I think that effort far more noble.
This is my sig.
2. The patch was released before the exploit was available -- that's a win for MS.
Bzzt! Wrong!:
We discovered this vulnerability as part of our research into a limited series of targeted malware attacks against Windows XP systems that we discovered about two weeks ago through our ongoing monitoring.
Microsoft developed the patch in response to targeted attacks. Therefore exploit code was in the wild before the patch. You are right about it dating back to XP, and all prior versions of Windows. Someone, somewhere, has been exploiting this remotely exploitable security hole in highly targeted attacks for an indeterminate number of years. Who knows what valuable proprietary data they've got so far? What corporate secrets were leaked? Every time this happens we get some idiot on here blathering about how things are better now. Well that wasn't true before, was it? It wasn't true last time, was it? Note the 10 XP vulnerability blurb footing the story. What convincing evidence do you offer that this time they really, really mean it?
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Here we go again: another attempt to maneuver people toward software subscriptions and changing the perception of software as a tool to an image of software as content... for which people are already accustomed - habituated, in traditional Pavlovian fashion - to forking over cash every month without really analyzing the big picture. (This is one tactic used by manipulative people to concentrate massive amounts of material wealth... toward themselves and away from everyone else. It's totally Darwinian but not very ethical.)
I am thinking, google's office runs in any web browser and device, this thing needs silverlight and apparently even MSOffice, it is basically BS...
Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
ahem.
Let's just agree we don't see eye to eye. Time will tell.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Oh twitter, the lulz just don't stop with you. Did you notice someone posted a link to a picture of your wife in there? ha, ha.
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
mother of god...
Look, you were doing a fine job for your boss right up until you started to annoy me. I don't crawl the dark corners of the Internet any more so I don't have time to hunt up a nice exploit for you. I do however have a good reputation here. So here's my first slashdot comment with this account, a reply to the story "Yet Another Windows Worm". There have been 1600 of 'em since then and I've been right far more often than I've been wrong. I've posted so much insightful, forward looking, informative information (and some funny stuff) here that it is worthwhile to subscribe just to read it. This, for example is my fifth comment, my first read on the SCO debacle:
So the idea is that if you pay millions for commercial software, some company you didn't even know you were doing business with can shut you down. But if you use the free software that works better, is more compatible and looks the same, you're good to go. And this is a problem. OK, thought I had it. Somebody explain this again.
2003 was such a pivotal year. My contribution here is appreciated a lot more than yours. How many astroturf campaign ribbons do you have, anyway? I've never had that many highly moderated rebuttals, and I've posted when I shouldn't have. Maybe your arguments are unpersuasive. Or maybe you're not "with us"? Looking over your back posts I don't see anything to convince me you're an unbiased party. You probably don't want me to dig in there for material to post in response to your reply of this post.
Back to the subject at hand:
Maybe, if Vista ever gets 20% real share there will be enough exploits to waste a few on some bots that find Microsoft's honey pots. I could probably give some useful guidance here, but I won't because I have no interest in furthering your mission. The 20% share thing looks like outside odds anyway.
It is my firm belief that there exists within a default install of Microsoft Vista and Microsoft Server 2008 a vulnerability which allows an anonymous attacker to achieve total control of such a system without user interaction. I further believe that such vulnerabilities are currently being exploited in targeted attacks against "high value" targets. I also believe that as time goes on these exploits will become more bold and be revealed. These are the trivial vulnerabilities that are absurd in that nobody uses the product this way. I also believe that with user interaction a Windows Vista system with a full suite of Microsoft applications or a common Windows 2008 server usefully configured with normal services contains sufficient vulnerabilities to make its use for normal business matters unwise and its use for confidential business matters or critical operations involving life and safety deliberately stupid . Further, I believe that as each vulnerability becomes common, is revealed, patched and repatched, others like yourself will continue appear to say "That was before! There are no more!" I offer no evidence and I have none. I do not assert that these things are true - I only state that I believe them. I really do believe this and there's nothing you could say or do to dissuade me from these beliefs. Perhaps it's foolish to believe things without evidence. I certainly won't encourage others to do so. But this I'm willing to take on faith and experience. I believed this on release of Windows NT (all versions) Windows 98 and SE, Windows 2000, Windows ME, Server 2003 through too many "security updates" to enumerate here. People who read here who value my oft-validated opinions will take note, now that you've drawn this statement out of me. I haven't been wrong yet. Time will tell whether I'm right now. Since Windows 7 relies so much on Windows Vista's legacy code (such a legacy!), it seems unlikely this will
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Well reasoned and reasonable, rational and consistent. I look forward to your future stuff.
Maybe you can help bring the level of fervor on slashdot back to a more reasonable level. I wish you luck.
Help stamp out iliturcy.