Entries tagged with office - Channel 10

Microsoft Office Web Applications: Your Burning Questions Answered

sarahintampa — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 03:15:00 GMT

Since the announcement of the upcoming Microsoft Office Web Applications at this year’s PDC, there has been a lot of excitement about this new service which will allow for creating, editing, collaborating, and sharing documents using the web. However, as I’ve followed the blog posts about this topic, I’ve also come across quite a bit of misinformation about the web apps, too. In an attempt to dispel some of the rumors out there, I’ve created this special Q&A which will hopefully answer some of your burning questions about the new web applications.

Q&A

Q: Do the Office Web Applications require Internet Explorer?

A: No! Office Web applications will work across multiple platforms and browsers including Safari and Firefox, too.

Q: Will the Office Web Applications work on the iPhone?

A: Yes, in the Safari web browser.

Q : Is Silverlight required in order to use the Office Web Applications?

A: No! Silverlight is not required. Using Silverlight will enhance the user experience, resulting in sharper images and improved rendering. Also, the Office Live Workspace has integrated Silverlight technology into the multi-file upload function for a better experience there, too.

Q: Will the Microsoft Office Web Applications work on Linux?

A: Yes! It does not matter which operating system is used as long as you're running a supported web browser.

Q: Are the Web Applications replacing Microsoft Office software?

A: No. This does not change the way customers buy Office nor will it slowdown the future innovations coming to the desktop software.

Q: Will the Microsoft Office Web Applications be free?

A: We don't know for sure yet, but Microsoft will deliver Office Web applications to consumers through Office Live, which is a consumer service with both ad-funded and subscription offerings. That seems to imply a free (ad-supported) and paid (subscription) offering will be available.

Q: Will the Microsoft Office Web Applications be made available to business users, too?

A: Yes. For business customers, Microsoft will offer Office Web applications as a hosted subscription service and through existing volume licensing agreements. Pricing has not been released yet on this.

Q: Will educational institutions get the apps for free?

A: Yes. Students will get Office Web applications through Office Live Workspace and universities will get it through the free Live@edu service.

Q: When will Microsoft Office Web Applications be available?

A: A private technology preview of the Office Web applications will debut later this year. For more information about this and other details about the Office Web applications, people can sign up for Office Live Workspace at workspace.officelive.com.

Q: How does the collaboration feature work?

A: Collaboration will be done using Office Live Workspace. There are two scenarios here, one experience is similar to SharePoint, where a user makes a change to a document and then uploads or saves to the SharePoint site. Whoever opens the doc first has control of that document.

The second scenario is using Microsoft SharedView, which is integrated with Office Live Workspace and enables real-time collaboration. With Microsoft SharedView, you can share your desktop and edit documents with others in real time. While sharing your desktop, Microsoft SharedView, enables you to control who edits, makes comments, etc. and then save that document back to your Office Live Workspace.

Filter Pack For Windows Search

sarahintampa — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 22:28:00 GMT

I had been using the latest and greatest search tool for my XP PC, Windows Search 4.0, but somehow I had missed this: the Filter Pack for searching in Office documents. With the the Microsoft Filter Pack installed, Windows Search 4.0 is able to search within Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and other Office 2007 documents based on the text they contain. It also works for Vista too, adding new search capabilities which can be accessed right from Vista’s search bar. Now when you do a search, the Windows indexing service doesn’t just search for file names but also knows what’s in the files themselves, and that makes finding the right file so much easier.

IT admins will want to read further instructions found on the download page about how the new Filter pack can be installed into Exchange, SharePoint, SQL Server, and other Server products. The Filter Pack also works on Windows Server 2003, Vista, and XP. You can download it from here.

Gespräch mit Stephan Fasshauer - Office Tipps & Highlights

lorigros — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 09:18:00 GMT

Neulich habe ich mit Stephan Fasshauer (Marketing Manager bei Microsoft Deutschland) über Office, Office Live und Office Online gesprochen. Er hat mir die Unterschiede zwischen die verschiedenen Produkte erklärt und mir ein paar Tipps zu den Office Produkte gegeben. Stephan hat mir auch sein Lieblingsfeature (SmartArt) und ein Schnellstartleiste Add-in für Office 2007 gezeigt. Dieses Add-in erweitert die Multifunktionsleiste (Ribbon) mit einem neuen Menüpunkt, das ermöglicht man schnell auf wichtige Hilfe und Anleitungen, Tipps & Tricks Ressourcen zuzugreifen und macht den Einstieg in Office 2007 einfacher. Auch interessant für Leute, die auf Office 2007 umgestiegen sind, ist ein Tool, um Funktionen in Office 2003 und 2007 zu vergleichen. Es ist ein interaktives Referenzhandbuch, um Funktionen in der neuen Menüführung zu finden.

Weitere Tipps und Information zu Office Produkte findet man auf Stephans Blog:

http://stephan-at-work.spaces.live.com/

oder auf diesen weiteren Webseiten:

Office Online

http://office.microsoft.com/de-de/default.aspx

Die Office Produkte in der Übersicht

http://office.microsoft.com/de-de/products/FX100487411031.aspx?pid=CL100571081031

Vergleichstabelle der Office Suiten

http://office.microsoft.com/de-de/products/FX101635841031.aspx

Office Live Workspace

http://workspace.officelive.com/

Office Live Small Business

http://smallbusiness.officelive.com/

Schnellstartleiste für Office 2007

http://stephan-at-work.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!102220505F300E88!213.entry

Funktionen vergleichen in Office 2003 und 2007

http://stephan-at-work.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!102220505F300E88!151.entry

Crowdsource Your Office: Introducing Task Market

sarahintampa — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 18:17:00 GMT

Have you heard the term “crowdsourcing?” It means taking a task that was traditionally performed by an employee or contractor and farming it out to an undefined, large group of people – a group which is often found online. Microsoft has turned this trend into Task Market, a place where a business can crowdsource their projects to a group of freelancers who are skilled Microsoft Office gurus. What kind of tasks can be posted here? Pretty much anything that involves Office like design work, writing, presentations, spreadsheets, and more. Similar to the “hire a VA” concept that Timothy Ferriss promoted in his “4-Hour Workweek” book, outsourcing these important but time-consuming tasks can help you free up your time to focus on the things only you know how to do – that is, running your business. Posting a task is free, so give it a shot. And if you’re a freelancer looking for some work, you can sign up, create a profile, and get email alerts when to be notified of new work is available.

Looken' Lets You Search Outlook

sarahintampa — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 14:21:00 GMT

Recently, Xobni has been in the news for their “inbox as a social network” Outlook plugin (see our review here), which can help you better manage your email. But apparently, they were just the start of a new trend of plugins that help you deal with information overload. Now, there’s a new application called Lookeen, which can also help you get control of the inbox by allowing you to easily search for and find emails and other related files. Lookeen searches through your inbox, public folders, archives on Exchange, Notes, and your Calendar. For advanced users, it also allows for the use of specific query syntaxes like “AND” or “OR” or + / – and a lot more. The real question is, do you want a more social inbox (Xobni) or a more searchable one (Lookeen)? For those that said the latter, Lookeem may be worht a look. (via VentureBeat)

Bill Gates Demos TouchWall - Like Surface for the Office

sarahintampa — Wed, 14 May 2008 16:22:00 GMT

The 12th annual Microsoft CEO Summit was held May 13-15th. At this forum, business leaders meet up to discuss the most pressing issues affecting global business today. This year's topics included decoding financial markets, establishing cultures of execution, and exploring how the Internet will evolve over the next five years. The keynote speech was by Bill Gates. One of the highlights of the speech was when he demoed a brand-new piece of technology called the TouchWall.

He described the TouchWall as an "intelligent whiteboard." The screen that had been behind him showing a static image was actually the TouchWall itself, ready to be used. After discussing natural computer interfaces like touchscreen tablet PCs, Surface, and Microsoft RoundTable, he then walked up the TouchWall and touched it to begin the demo. Like Surface, the TouchWall uses scanning cameras, but here they are located at the bottom of the device.

Using finger gestures, like swooshes across the screen and other now common movements to expand and shrink items, he began zooming in and out on what was a big, multimedia laden document, of which the static image that had been there before was only a small part.

Gates then showed how you could zoom in on a Word document and flip through the pages, zoom out then back in on a Powerpoint presentation, then out again and back in to watch a video. It was a very similar looking experience as to what Silverlight's Deep Zoom functionality provides.

In addition to just moving the document on the screen and zooming in and out, you could also use a pen-like feature that lets you draw on the TouchWall with only your finger, something you could use to circle items for emphasis, for example.

Gates also said that the whiteboard was a "natural extension for Office," and that the hardware "wouldn't be that expensive." He hinted that not only was the Office group working on it.

This definitely has potential. I know at one of my previous jobs, we had a semi-intelligent whiteboard that would let you take pictures of what you had put up there, but thanks to a crappy driver and confusing software, no one ever really used it for anything but a traditional whiteboard. Instead, everyone just plugged in laptops to a projector and launched a PowerPoint. The TouchWall was so much more interactive and visually stimulating, but even better, it looked darn easy. You just touch it.

You can watch the video for yourself here. The TouchWall is at about 34:50.

Office Labs is Live

sarahintampa — Fri, 09 May 2008 16:58:00 GMT

A new web site called Office Labs has just gone live. Here, you will find all sorts of projects, prototypes, proof-of-concepts, downloads, and more, all of which are centered around productivity. The site features tools for the Microsoft Office system and SharePoint, too. To get the launch started with a bang, Office Labs is already offering a bunch of cool projects you'll want to check out, including the following:

Community Clips - Community Clips is a place where you can find "how to" videos made by other users like yourself; you can also easily create your own.
Search Commands - This is quite possibly the hottest of the current Office Labs offerings, considering how strong user demand was for just this sort of tool. Search Commands is an experiment designed to see if search is an effective way for you to find commands in complex software applications. You can download the Search Commands add-in into your Microsoft Office 2007 installation and begin using it today to help you find the command you need.
InkSeine - A tool for Tablet PC users, InkSeine offers an innovative new interface for pen input
Task Market - This is an online marketplace that can help you find freelancers skilled in graphic design, writing, editing, translation, and more.
SharePointPedia - SharePointPedia is social community application that can help you find useful info about SharePoint technologies, tools, tips and tricks.

To stay up-to-date on all the latest news from Office Labs, you can follow the new Office Labs blog, available here.

Customizing Your Outlook Today

sarahintampa — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 16:46:00 GMT

I just saw this tip on Lifehacker which points to a Tech-Recipes post on how you can customize your Outlook Today with just a bit of HTML code. Their post offers up some HTML templates for the various Outlook elements like Inbox, Calendar, Tasks, Contacts, and Notes.

But I also have to point to this TechRepublic post which gives some more details on this process, including the how-tos on how to extract the HTML page and the graphics in order to tweak them.

Pretty cool stuff. I did this once when I was bored at work and gave my Outlook Today page a pretty pale pink and purple swirly background. It rocked, of course. Have you ever customized your Outlook Today?

Microsoft Word Productivity Tips

sarahintampa — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:46:00 GMT

I love little productivity tips that help me do things faster and more efficiently, so I really enjoyed this blog post over at Web Worker Daily. Samuel gathered some of his favorite keyboard shortcuts for Microsoft Word, like Ctrl+Shift+C to copy and Ctrl+Shift+V to paste formatting and Ctrl + Shift to select all text between the current location of your cursor and the end of the current paragraph.

His list was short and sweet, but it was no match for the super massive list of all shortcuts for Word 2002, Word 2003, and Word 2007 found here. Wow, you really don't even need a mouse, do you?

New Microsoft Office Facebook Apps

sarahintampa — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 14:21:00 GMT

Two new Microsoft Office powered Facebook apps have just appeared: Framed Again and Office Poke! The Office Poke app is an alternative to SuperPoke, letting you send funny work-related pokes to your friends, like "Throw a Stapler," "Send Underpants through Inter-office Mail," and "Steal Lunch." The Framed Again app lets you re-create your friends on Facebook by inserting their photo into a headshot, onto a business card, or onto a poster. You can customize the size, rotation, brightness, and other elements of the photo and then share it with your friends.

Amy Sedaris on Microsoft Office

Larry — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 18:05:00 GMT

The videos for Microsoft products are getting better every day. This morning I saw an email in my inbox from Barbora Zychova, who found this Office commercial with Amy Sedaris from Strangers with Candy, who is always hilarious.

Microsoft Issues New Product Principles: The Ozzie Effect

Jesse — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 13:28:00 GMT

Microsoft this morning announced four guiding principles for it's major products, including Vista, Office, and SQL Server. Ensuring open connections, data portability, enhanced support for industry standards, and open engagement with the industry have all been listed as prioritied for current and future versions of the company's products.

As what a few of us here at C10 view as the first major impact of Ray Ozzie taking the helm, we will begin to see increased industry and community engagement from Microsoft; more APIs and documentation will be made available without licensing fees. There is also an Open Source Interoperability Initiative created as part of today's announcement, which is designed to further the conversations between Microsoft and the open source community.

(...to Expand Interoperability - MS PressPass)

Business Contact Manager Offered Solo

sarahintampa — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 08:15:00 GMT

Do you already have Microsoft Office installed, but wished you could have all the functionality of Outlook with Business Manager? Until recently, you would have had to get another version of Office, but now you can get Microsoft Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager by itself. This application will integrate with Office Accounting 2008, sharing that software's customer database, so changes to customer information in one database will be reflected in the other. Now you can centralize financial data and bill your customers straight from Outlook. Small businesses will like this too, especially at the price it's being offered: $149.99.

An introduction to Office Live Workspace

Nic — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 04:28:00 GMT

A message from the Office Live Workspace team: Stop emailing yourself files! :)

Office Live Workspace is a free service - currently in private beta - for document access, storage and sharing "in the cloud". The service will be open to anyone with a Windows Live ID and (currently) gives you 500MB of space for Office documents, images, PDF files, custom lists and more.

I was interested to see how Office Live Workspace differed to Windows Live SkyDrive so we sat down with Eric from the Office Live team at CES 2008 for a demo.

Make sure you check out the OLW website for more information or to register for the private beta: http://workspace.officelive.com/

Microsoft Office for Mac 2008

Tina — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 14:50:00 GMT

In celebration of Steve Job's announcement of MacBook Air...Microsoft just released Microsoft Office for Mac 2008 yesterday. We're spreading the MAC love. The Home and Student Edition includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Entourage 2008. Open XML file compatibility allows Macs and Windows-based computers to enjoy compatible Office-to-Office communications. Here is a quick hit of some of the features.

New Elements Gallery user interface offers easy access to the most commonly used tools and templates
Powerful OfficeArt graphics engine puts stunning visual and graphic effects at your fingertips; SmartArt graphics enable you to transform text and bulleted lists into professional diagrams with one click
Go to Entourage 2008's Project Center to manage project details, such as e-mail messages, documents, schedules and contacts, in one area
Use Word 2008's new design tools to create professional-looking cover pages and bibliographies in a snap; Dynamic Guides keep words and graphics straight and true
PowerPoint 2008's new Object Palette makes it more simple than ever to see and choose all your shapes, art, symbols and pictures; designer themes and custom designs make your presentations look sensational
Excel 2008 now supports more than 16,000 columns and more than one million rows to compile enormous amounts of data into meaningful reports and thought-provoking graphs
Also includes Messenger for Mac for communicating instantly with family, friends and colleagues

Saving files as PDF

brianjo — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 15:23:00 GMT

I caught a great article from Codswallop on PDF writers via Digg today. PDF can be useful for sharing documents with users who don't have Office installed, for archiving, or for when you want to print out something and you suddenly realize that your printer is out of ink.

I don't save files to PDF that often, but when I need to, I've got a couple of specific tools that I use that makes the process really simple.

Microsoft Save as PDF or XPS

This utility lets you save files as PDF from within Office applications. This Office 2007 add-in lets you optimize your saved files for print or online use.

CutePDF

CutePDF comes in both freeware and a commercial versions. The freeware version is free for both personal and commercial use. The commercial version offers a list of great features and is currently priced at around $50.00 US.

If you use PDF a lot, you should also check out Sarah's post: Outlook 2007 Tip: Preview PDFs Automatically.

Did you know: Office 2007 features OCR?

Nic — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 06:48:00 GMT

Whoa whoa,.. first thing's first; what's OCR?

OCR is an acronym for Optical Character Recognition; a term used to describe software that can extract usable text from images (usually scans, faxes or photographs).

Up until this morning I was not aware that Microsoft Office included a tool called Microsoft Office Document Imaging (MODI) which contains OCR features that allow you extract text from TIFF or MDI files.

MODI has been a part of the Office suite since Office XP was released in 2001. If you are using Office XP, 2003 or 2007 you may already have MODI installed. Check in the "tools" sub folder of the "Microsoft Office" directory in your start menu. (see pic)

If MODI is not installed grab your Office installation disc and select the "add/remove features" tab when it loads. MODI is listed under "tools" and needs to be set to "run from my computer". It should only take a few minutes to install.

For more information on Microsoft Office Document Imaging and how to use the OCR features check out the following resources:
- About Microsoft Office Document Imaging
- About indexing text in TIFF and MDI files
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Office_Document_Imaging

Microsoft's Home Office Makeover - You just might win

Tina — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 17:06:00 GMT

...if you sent in your submission in time of course. Microsoft Office recently got a makeover, so the Office team is offering an a chance to win a $25,000 home office makeover. HGTV's Vern Yip will lead the makeover, which includes hardware, software, paint and furniture. Check out Makovermyoffice.com for more information. But take a break from surfing the web and watch this piece instead. :)

Office 12 docx files are zips in disguise

Jesse — Fri, 22 Jun 2007 20:46:00 GMT

Take any document created in an Office 12 app, rename said document with a .zip extension, and browse that file’s contents from Windows Explorer. Welcome to the magic of Office’s XML implementation, where every document is simply a bundle of XML data. This little hack will provide you hours of needless content-editing fun for those who have Office 12 installed, as well as a sneaky way to replace the images in your coworker’s trip report with photos of our favorite popular music star.

OneNote for Office 2007

Laura — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 01:04:00 GMT

Gather your information in one place, find what you need fast, and share your notes and information. Get started with the new OneNote. Download it now, test it out in your browser, or buy it right now. But first, of course, watch this piece and find out what's new in 2007!

Office 2007 - Microsoft Word

Tina — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 01:02:00 GMT

Microsoft Word 2007 rules! It seems like we've used Word our whole lives but this is - by far - the greatest improvement in features and interface. High School and College kids around the globe will love the new Microsoft Word 2007. It's got a comprehensive set of new tools integrated with the incredible new ribbon interface.

PowerPoint for Office 2007 ::Create dynamic and high-impact presentations faster than ever

Laura — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 01:01:00 GMT

Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007 enables users to quickly create high-impact, dynamic presentations, while integrating workflow and ways to easily share information. From the redesigned user interface to the new graphics and formatting capabilities, Office PowerPoint 2007 puts the control in your hands to create great-looking presentations. Watch this video RIGHT NOW and see what you might be missing :)

Office 2007 - Excel

Tina — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 00:59:00 GMT

Mor Hezi, the senior product manager for Microsoft Excel stops by to sum it all up for us. Ha, ha, okay that was so bad. But seriously people the new Excel is so much easier to use. With the Microsoft Office Excel 2007 Home Tab on the new user interface, you can immediately view the most important cell-editing, formatting, and navigation tools. You no longer have to hunt for the menu to quickly format the appearance of a cell or filter your data. Watch this video and then go get your pivot table on.

The Vista and Office launch on the Microsoft campus

Jesse — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 21:09:00 GMT

We're here in Cafe 34 on the main Redmond campus to welcome Vista and Office to the world. The room is filled with microsofties, lunches and laptops, and hundreds of balloons netted suspiciously to the ceiling. In a few minutes Windows godfather Jim Allchin will grace the stage as master of campus ceremonies for the launch. While we won't be liveblogging the event, the C9 Coffeehouse thread will be extremely busy over the next hour. We'll also be updating this post later in the afternoon with some aftermath reporting.

2:01pm - Watch the Vista and Office launch webcast with Bill Gates and co.

Vista launch tonight: Parking lot parties with NFL pros

Jesse — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 17:39:00 GMT

Around the world tonight, Windows Vista and Office 2007 go on sale. Here in the States Microsoft is throwing parties in just about every city with a pro football team, and everyone's invited. The Vista Team Blog posted a VIP invitation for all comers. Print out your own golden ticket and go out for a Monday night of excitement. It's not often there's this much geeky furvor to be had!