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Should Microsoft Put Office On the iPad?
theodp writes "Microsoft is working on a touch-friendly version of Office for Windows 8, writes GeekWire's Todd Bishop. But what about Microsoft Office on the iPad? 'The decision,' Bishop says, 'will say a lot about Microsoft's priorities in this new era. The company can give Windows 8 a boost if it makes Office exclusive to Windows-based tablets. But that's also a risk. The iPad's momentum not only in the home but in the workplace opens the door for Office alternatives to take hold on the Apple tablet, posing a challenge to Microsoft Office.' Over at Minimal Mac, Patrick Rhone feels Microsoft has bigger problems than the lack of Office apps for iOS and Android. 'Like the curtain finally falling from the Wizard of Oz to find just a small, frail, man pretending to be far more powerful and relevant than he really was,' writes Rhone, 'Microsoft's biggest miss was allowing the world to finally see the truth behind the big lie — they were not needed to get real work done. Or anything done, really. And that will be what ultimately kills them.' Perhaps, but BusinessInsider — which finds it just can't quit Excel — also makes a case for why Microsoft should put Office on every platform. Speaking of the future of Office, did you ever notice how people use MS-Word to convince people to use Google Docs?"
Keynote runs Powerpoint presentations.
(Also edits and exports them if it comes to that.)
$9.99
You seriously never encountered someone using Excel instead of a proper database? That seems to be the most common abuse and has caused untold damages to small businesses all over the world.
It's a media consumption/review device. Office readers would be great. Office is such a pig for resources otherwise, that compositional tools would be plainly insane to port to iOS.
The question itself if a fishing attempt to find feature interest. Office is coming to Windows 8 in one form or another, so do they bother to port it to iOS? Same chipset (ARM) same form factor (tablet) same profile of consumer (please, no sandals vs loafers arguments).
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
No one with an actual job is relying solely on post-pc devices to do their "real work".
Except of course the many that do.
Of course that doesn't mean that they don't also have a Mac or PC. Just that for at least part of their job, an iPad or an iPhone is the better tool.
Okay, I can understand wanting some kind of rudimentary spreadsheet viewing/editing application for tablet/mobile devices, but Excel is a particularly good example of a program that really needs a physical, full-size keyboard. There are numerous key combinations and shortcuts that are absolutely essential for efficient usage of Excel. If you're doing any kind of spreadsheet work, you need a keyboard with a numeric keypad, cursors, and Ctrl/Alt/Shift/F-number keys. Tapping an on-screen keyboard just isn't going to cut it, especially when that keyboard takes up valuable screen space that would otherwise be used to display more cells.
If you think shortcuts on an on-screen keyboard are the way UIs on touch devices are done, you haven't understood how they work. On touch devices, there are no shortcuts. The on-screen keyboard is used for text entry, nothing more. If you want to select a cell, you just tap on it, you don't press some kind of arrow button. If you want to make something bold, you tap the bold button right next to the text field. With a pure software UI, you can make any special-purpose input you want. For example, take a look at the Numbers number keyboard. You just have exactly the buttons you need, and they say exactly what they do. No need to remember any shortcuts or functional correspondences.