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Microsoft Brings Office To Android Smartphones For Free
Mark Wilson writes: After a few weeks in preview, Microsoft Office is now available for Android smartphones. Despite Microsoft's mobile-first, cloud-first philosophy, it has actually taken some time to bring the world's most popular office suite to Android phones — it joins the tablet version of the suite that was released last year. Just like the tablet editions, the phone versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint won't cost you a penny, allowing for the viewing and editing of a range of files when on the move. There is a cloud focus with support for not only OneDrive, but also Google Drive, Dropbox, and Box, and Microsoft says it has made changes based on the feedback received during the preview period.
104Mb download just for Word on its own.
Wow. Seems like all those years of bloated coding are coming back to bite them.
Install office with very limited use on a mobile, and you lose half a Gig of internal storage on your smartphone and still might have to pay for an Office 365 subscription.
"Advanced features" like being able to write in a blank document, or change a character in an existing one.
Basically it's view-only unless you pay.
That's not so bad for smartphone, but absolutely no different to the tablet versions at all (which are effectively useless beyond being a free document viewer, which you can get thousands of).
Or you could just use Google Docs in your browser. Unsurprisingly also supports Google Drive.
So MS makes a pointless app, and makes it free!
I've installed it to edit my CV. Most features are there, and I could open and edit a new blank doc. You need a Microsoft account to sign on, but an Office 365 subscription isn't needed. Who going to be worried about tracked changes whilst using a tablet?
Not correct. From the only authoritative source -- Microsoft themselves:
"Sign in with a free Microsoft account to create, edit and save documents for home use. A qualifying Office 365 subscription is required to create, edit and save documents for business use."
And... "1. INSTALLATION AND USE RIGHTS.
a. Consumer Use. You may install and use one copy of the software on Android Phone devices you own or control in order to view existing documents. As allowed by the software, you may also create, edit or save documents for non-commercial use purposes.
b. Commercial Use. You may install and use one copy of the software on Android Phone devices you own or control in order to view existing documents. As allowed by the software, you may also create, edit or save documents for commercial use purposes IF you are a commercial Microsoft Office 365 subscriber with mobile device rights subject to the following terms:
Refer to your existing license terms for Microsoft Office 365 with mobile device rights (the “service”) to identify the entity licensing the software to you and for support information. The terms and conditions for the service apply to your use of the software. However, the software’s privacy statement applies to your use of the software in addition to the privacy statement for the service. You may find the privacy statement within the software, and as applicable, on the app store from which you obtained the software. You may use and install copies of the software on Android Phone devices you own or control subject to the service terms and conditions so long as you have a valid subscription license to the service that includes mobile device rights. If there is a conflict between the service terms and conditions and the above, the terms in this Section 1.b apply."
And finally... "Premium features on your Android tablet and phone with Office 365
Core editing is available for free on Android devices with screen sizes of 10.1 inches or less. The extra features below are available on Android tablets and phones with a qualifying Office 365 subscription. For information about the extra security and control features that are available for customers with an Office 365 for business plan, visit the mobile apps for business page.
Word
Track and review changes
Change page orientation
Insert page and section breaks
Highlight table cells with custom color shading
Enable columns in page layout
Customize headers and footers for different pages
PowerPoint
Save ink annotations from slide shows
Highlight table cells with custom color shading
A qualifying Office 365 subscription is required to use the premium features"
That's not free, it's payware with a non-commercial use, feature-crippled, time-unlimited trial that has basic features removed which even home users would want such as page orientation, breaks, table colors and headers / footers.
That's odd. I can use Google Drive, create documents and spreadsheets on all the above platforms, download them in multiple formats and edit them on other platforms.
Why would I pay Microsoft money for that which I can already do?
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Considering how poorly files move between different versions of Office for the same platform (and some times even between the same version for the same platform!)
I've seen this troll many times but never once in practice. Can you give me a concrete example that is easily reproducible or would affect a majority of users?