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Microsoft Unveils Browser-Based Office Apps

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the what-took-you-so-long dept.

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."

11 of 126 comments (clear)

  1. MS Gets it right? by Trojan35 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    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.

    1. Re:MS Gets it right? by marcosdumay · · Score: 5, Informative

      It's an extension of Office in licensing. That means, it is a completely unrelated app, that is browser based (that means, it will also be broadband-dependent) that will only be licenced for your use if you brought a licence of Office.

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      Rethinking email
    2. Re:MS Gets it right? by Firehed · · Score: 5, Informative

      a) Google Gears. Get it. Now.
      b) It'd also take down your email and numerous other systems, and as a Slashdotter I assume you have a tech-oriented business that rather relies on internet connectivity so you'd be largely screwed regardless of how you manage your documents.

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      How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
  2. but by ionix5891 · · Score: 4, Funny

    will it have Clippy :p

    1. Re:but by blair1q · · Score: 5, Funny

      but he'll be in Ajax

      so he's cool now

    2. Re:but by Beardo+the+Bearded · · Score: 5, Funny

      It looks like you're trying to modify a post. Would you like help with that?

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      ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
  3. locally installed? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    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.

  4. Microsoft and Cloud by mebrahim · · Score: 5, Funny

    Microsoft is embracing the cloud. I'm worrying about the weather.

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    Persian Project Management Software as a Service
  5. Re:Runs on FF/Safair? by D4MO · · Score: 5, Informative

    It's silverlight based, so no. Also, it'll also run in Firefox on Linux via moonlight.

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    Rocket science is easy. Neurosurgery, now *that's* difficult.
  6. Re:Runs on FF/Safair? by nine-times · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Are we accepting Silverlight as a valid system requirement now?

    I don't mean that as an anti-Microsoft question, but I don't want to have to install every company's obscure little proprietary plugins to run my apps and access my data. Flash is bad enough, but I draw the line directly behind Flash and won't go any further. In fact, I'm still hoping to boot Flash to the other side of that line, especially since it crashes my browser on a regular basis, but I still seem to be stuck with it.

    But regardless of who's developing it, I'm loath to install another proprietary incompatible Flash clone.

  7. Ah, yes... more maneuvering toward subscriptions by macraig · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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.)