Satya Nadella is planning to host his first press event as Microsoft CEO next week. The software maker has been inviting members of the media to a special cloud- and mobile-focused event in San Francisco on March 27th. Nadella is expected to discuss Microsoft’s “mobile first, cloud first” strategy, and there will be some major news ahead of the company’s Build conference in early April. Sources familiar with Microsoft’s plans tell The Verge that the event will mark the introduction of Office for iPad.
Meanwhile, Office for Metro is nowhere in sight.
is next.
What does it say about Metro/Android when even Google and Microsoft are releasing stuff first to iOS before their own platforms.
Google has always been chaos and always will be chaos. Google does release items on Android first quite a bit.
Google reason for release some of the time iOS first is the simple fact their developers release when ready. Most of the time the latter android version has extra features over the iOS version. So you could say its google power to tweak android is slowing them up a bit.
Microsoft metro version of MS office was meant to be under way when windows 8 was released. iOS version is only a recent thing. So really where is it you have been able to release Android and iOS version yet you still have not showing up with a metro version. Ok are you going to kill metro???
I think what is says is that iOS is the dominant device OS in the corporate space and as Microsoft moves reluctantly to supporting all platforms rather than just trying to use it’s productivity apps to leverage Windows it faces the most urgent pressure in ceasing to be irrelevant in the mobile corporate space.
> Good Metro apps are nowhere in sight.
FTFY
It is mind-boggling.
I am still waiting for an MUA that will let me send stuff from SkyDrive without having to DL it first then send it with the email. Gmail lets me email stuff from Google Drive. Easily.
Other than maybe MetroSkype and MetroIE, it’s evident that no one at MS uses Metro apps.
XBox One just got a nice Twitch client. Where’s the Windows 8 version? Couldn’t MS have built them in parallel?
It is fooking mind-boggling.
i agree this is a problem with microsoft as a whole, it’s a group of competing departments that hate each other.
If microsoft was to fully integrate their products together then they would be a real threat, like you say google docs, gmail, hangouts, g+ they all work together really well, are easy to use and just work. Microsoft have the pieces but cannot seem to slot them together.
Sorry I just don’t see it. Will any professional create an Excel sheet or Word doc on a tablet? I could see the occasional Powerpoint (more drag and drop than typing) but why would anyone use a tablet?
I have Office on my Windows Phone, I never used it except One Note…
We are surrounded by computers, do we really need to edit docs on the worst form factor?
Edited 2014-03-17 23:41 UTC
I know a lot of people who use a tablet as their primary on-the-go computer. This is the use case that’s most likely: you’re on the road and someone sends you a Word or Excel file and they want your comments and corrections. Most of the apps that will allow you to edit or preview an Office document lack the editing functionality that would enable this user to perform meaningful work. But even though it might be awkward to try to do full-blown desktop publishing on a tablet, if the Office app is well-designed, it would be great for reading through and making edits and notes on an existing document, or adding a few paragraphs or rows.
Let’s set aside the fact that in that use case a cloud-based collaboration platform might be better suited. In today’s workplace, that kind of collaboration is usually done by exchanging office docs.
Valid points, maybe I am not that type of user.
Only thing I can say is that I would buy a small, light laptop if I had to process a lot of docs on the go but I can understand many people these days do use tablets as their main computing unit.
Yeah, so would I. That’s why I carry a Macbook Air around and I don’t even own a tablet. I do a lot of stuff on my phone, but if it’s too awkward to do on a phone screen, I usually need a full blown laptop. But strangely enough, I think that’s starting to make me an outlier.
As a translator who gets (virtually) all his work in Office formats, having proper Office on a tablet, with a touch-friendly interface, would be a life-saver. I’ve tried the non-Microsoft ones, but they all have terrible Office compatibility – something I cannot accept in my line of work.
I’m pretty sure this applies to many professions.
I am sure it does. But I am waiting for the fun.
OSi, Android, OSX and Windows versions. Anyone see a source of disaster? OSX and Windows version of MS Office was bad enough to create files with odd ball bugs. 4 OS + Microsoft this could get bad.
In my company, our team has moved to Quip for collaboration on various project documents. We take turns being the “translator” and copy/pasting from the browser interface into the word documents that eventually go onto Sharepoint never to be read by anyone again. It sounds onerous, but it’s the only way to have proper collaboration tools that don’t require us to all sit on a conference bridge staring at someone’s screen share.
You don’t even need different OSs – different versions of Office under the same OS will also give you headaches in complicated documents. It’s a nightmare in my (old) job with a mixture of 2003, 2007 and 2010 installed. Tables and formatting in general seem to suffer greatly once they get a bit more complicated… I can only imagin what it’ll be like with so many different versions everywhere!
What CAT do you use?
When I was using my iPad, I carried it to several Linux and Python conferences as well as to a year-long weekly class, and took page after page of notes using Notability.
Granted, using the on-screen keyboard wasn’t as comfortable as my current Chromebook, but it was more than adequate – enough that I didn’t bother with buying a physical keyboard. Not a workstation replacement, of course, but certainly fine when portability matters.
The Metro versions of Skype and Lync are pretty bad. I’ve installed the desktop versions and got rid of their Metro counterparts. The iOS versions, running on tablets and phones, are even better than the ones running on a full blown desktop computer.
Is there any reason to assume Microsoft Office will be great or even good (enough) in Metro style? Again I suspect the iOS version will be better than the Metro one (if it finally arrives).
Meanwhile OneNote has arrived, for free, on OS X.
Ccompletely free, even if you don’t have MS Office?
AYE.
I’d love to love Evernote, but Iike OneNote more. Now there’s an OS X version the circle is complete.
> Meanwhile, Office for Metro is nowhere in sight.
If you’re talking about Office on tablet: you already have Office for Windows RT bundled with Windows RT-based tablets, and you can already have Office 365 or Office 2013 on Windows 8-based tablets.
So having Office in “Metro”-style would be just another Office for Windows (8 or RT) with another UI?
He’s talking Metro. On Windows RT when you use Office it launches a Windows 8 desktop just so Office can run.
Yes, but I think the goal is to have Office running on a device, so whether it is designed with “Metro”-style or running on “desktop” is just a matter of UI issue.
Perhaps some think that “Metro”-style can make the application easier to use and more suitable for touch-based input.