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Microsoft Office for Mac gets Touch Bar support
Owners of the Macbook Pro with Touch Bar will be pleased to hear that Microsoft Office now works with the LCD strip Apple introduced with its latest laptop. Support for Touch Bar was announced alongside the new MacBook Pro at an Apple event last October, but Office support is now available to all users. The Touch Bar has special layouts ready for Word, Excel and PowerPoint, with Outlook and Skype additions coming soon. It's the latest high-profile app to get Touch Bar support and joins other massive apps like Adobe's Photoshop and Apple's own Final Cut Pro.
PowerPoint brings real-time collaboration to your slides
It's not much fun to plug away at a presentation, but Microsoft might have found a way to make the experience more bearable for Office 365 subscribers. It's updating the Windows version of PowerPoint with real-time collaboration that helps you share the workload. You can see who's editing specific slides, and see typing as it happens. You'll need to be part of the Office Insider program to use this right away, but don't be surprised if it's available more broadly in the near future.
Microsoft puts AI to work in Office 365
Microsoft isn't just trying out artificial intelligence through bots and voice assistants -- it's going all-in. The crew in Redmond has revealed that Office 365 is wielding cloud-based AI to automate many tasks. Tap for Word and Outlook surface relevant content from your company to help finish a project, for instance. PowerPoint and Sway will have a QuickStarter feature that gives you curated outlines for given topics, saving you the trouble of creating the foundation of a presentation from scratch. Excel, meanwhile, will have a way to turn raw geographic data into Bing-based maps.
Microsoft Office iPhone users can doodle with their fingers
If you want to sketch or perhaps add your signature to a Word, Excel or PowerPoint document on iOS, the only option has been to use the iPad Pro's Pencil. Now, with the latest version of Office for the iPhone, you can draw directly on a document with no need for the stylus. Once you launch the app, you can "use your finger to write, draw and highlight with the tools in the new Draw tab," Microsoft says.
PowerPoint spruces up your presentation using image recognition
If you've ever slapped together a PowerPoint presentation at the last minute, Microsoft has an Office 2016 feature called Designer that may save your bacon. It worked with graphics pros to build about 12,000 "blueprint" design templates in total. All you have to do is select an image, and it will use the cloud "to analyze and identify the most compelling portion of your images," and build an appropriate design. For instance, it can zoom in on the tomatoes or peas (above) to build a theme, or avoid busy overlay images altogether if you have lots of charts. Once you've picked an appropriate blueprint, you just need to fill it in with your content.
Skype video and voice chats come to Office and Outlook on the web
You can already have Skype text chats while you're collaborating on Office Online docs or checking mail at Outlook.com. But wouldn't you rather talk to your colleagues and keep your hands free for, you know, work? You're about to get just that: Microsoft says it will bring Skype's video and voice chats to everyone using Office Online and Outlook.com, starting in November. On top of this, it's trotting out a Chrome extension that lets you quickly work with Office and Sway content in the browser, whether it's stored on your PC or in the cloud. All told, you don't have to worry quite so much about leaving Office's native apps behind.
Outlook plays nicely with Office for iOS, PayPal and Uber
Outlook is now a more powerful tool if you get a lot of work done on your phone... or just need a quick ride to the airport. To begin with, the iOS versions of Excel, PowerPoint and Word have received tight integration with Outlook. You can send a document you're working on as an Outlook email attachment, or edit someone else's attachment and return directly to Outlook with a new message ready and waiting. Also, some big, promised third-party Outlook web add-ons have gone live. You can set Uber ride notifications in your calendar, or put Evernote clippings into email. Boomerang will schedule both meetings and messages, while PayPal lets you pay a friend for last night's meal. Tie-ins with IFTTT, Wunderlist and Yelp are still "coming soon," but there's already plenty here to keep you busy.
Microsoft's document sharing service, Docs, is available to everyone
Sure, you can technically use OneDrive and other cloud services to share your Office files, but wouldn't it be nice if there were a dedicated site for that? Apparently, Microsoft agrees -- it quietly launched the public beta for Docs, a dedicated website (this was previously a Facebook-only service) that simplifies sharing your Office files, PDFs and Sway presentations. Think of it as a parallel to offerings like SlideShare or Scribd, where the focus is more on preserving the formatting of your work than anything else. You can comment on and download documents, but you'll have to turn to other tools to collaborate on that upcoming report. You only need a Microsoft account to give Docs a spin, so it won't hurt to sign up.
Microsoft Office 2016 Public Preview is now available
Office 2016 may still be getting the finish touches in Redmond, but Microsoft is opening up its productivity suite for public preview. If you'll recall, some apps were included in previous releases of the Windows 10 Technical Preview and made available for both IT folks and devs. As of today, though, regular folks can get an early look and offer feedback on all the new stuff -- including those redesigned universal apps. This means that you'll gain access to OneDrive attachments in Outlook, real-time co-authoring and retooled applications that learn how you work to lend a hand. Specifically in Excel, there are updated charts and graphs alongside one-click forecasting and more data analyzing tools. Looking to take it for a spin before the official release this fall? Even if you're not an Office 365 subscriber, you can nab a trial version right here.
Office for iOS can store your files in iCloud
Until you, if you'd wanted to use Microsoft Office on iOS, you'd have been stuck using Dropbox, OneDrive or SharePoint to store your files online. For some reason, Apple's home-grown storage service was a notable absentee, but thankfully one that has been now remedied. In the most recent update, Microsoft has enabled users to save their documents, spreadsheets and presentations to iCloud, so long as they're running iOS 8. Unfortunately, it's not as simple as with the other platforms, since you have to dig into the "More" section before you can select the option. Still, better than nothing, eh?
Universal Office apps for Windows 10 are now available for preview
Remember those universal Office apps Microsoft spent some time demoing a couple weeks back? Well, as of today, a trio of them are available as part of the Windows 10 Technical Preview. The three workhorses -- Word, Excel, and PowerPoint -- can be accessed on desktops, laptops and tablets running the preview version of Redmond's upcoming operating system, and in the weeks to come, phones will be able to join in. If you'll recall, the so-called universal apps are designed to wrangle touch gestures and properly equip mobile devices, insuring a consistent experience across your Windows-driven gadget arsenal. If you're itchin' to give 'em a go, you can request access right here.
Microsoft's Office preview for Android tablets is now available to everyone
If you've wanted to try the preview of Office for Android tablets during its brief history, you've had to request to join a Google+ group. That's not the hardest thing to do, but do you really want to participate in a special club (and in some cases, sign up for Google+) just to try some productivity apps a little early? As of now, you don't have to. Microsoft has posted the previews of Excel, PowerPoint and Word on Google Play, so you can download them like you would any other app. The only major requirements are that your slate runs at least Android 4.4 KitKat and that you're comfortable with less-than-polished software. You may not want to finish an important report with these releases, then, but it's now easy to experiment with the new Office suite before it's completely ready.
You can now chat on Skype inside Office Online apps
Want to get advice while you're plugging away at that big report in Office Online? You won't have to fire up a separate app (or website) any longer. As hinted at by recent leaks, Skype chat is now built into the web productivity suite's versions of PowerPoint and Word. If you want to share ideas with a colleague, you can keep the conversation running alongside your docs without having to juggle windows or browser tabs. Yes, Google Drive has had a similar option for a while, but this collaboration upgrade is definitely handy if you frequently work in Microsoft's world.
Dropbox makes it easy for workmates to edit Office files
In November, Dropbox users gained the ability to edit Office files from within inside the app, thanks to a partnership with Microsoft. Now, the company has launched its first set of Project Harmony tools so that groups of workmates can take advantage of that feature -- but only if they're Business users part of Dropbox's early access program. These features, which were first previewed when the company started letting users link their business and personal accounts, can make team projects, well, more bearable than usual.
The new Office for iPhone is everything it should have been on day one
I remember when Microsoft first came out with Office for iPhone. It was actually kind of exciting. Here was this thing that for years had only existed in the form of rumors and leaked documents. And there it was, at last: the killer iPhone app, ready to download. Or so I thought. Maybe I was expecting too much, but I came away feeling underwhelmed. That first version of Office Mobile was a watered-down gimp of a program, with pitifully few editing tools and an occasionally confusing layout (imagine having no way of knowing what size font you were using). Compared to some apps, like Google Drive, it wasn't that bad, but it still wasn't as feature-rich as Apple's own iWork suite. Worst of all, the software has received few feature updates in the 17 months since it debuted. Is this what we waited so long for? At last, however, Microsoft seems to have come to its senses. The company is getting rid of Office Mobile and replacing it with three standalone iPhone apps for Word, Excel and PowerPoint, just like on the iPad. In fact, because these apps share code with the iPad version, they arrive with the same robust feature set, along with a couple tricks designed specifically for the iPhone. In short, then, the new apps are everything the original Office for iPhone should have been.
Office for iPad update brings a slew of top-requested features
When Office finally launched on the iPad four months ago it was a blessing for iOS converts with loyalties to Microsoft. Still, like every launch title, the app suite wasn't perfect. Today Microsoft has released an update that they hope will help fill in some of Office for iPad's biggest deficiencies. Up first is the addition of Presenter view for PowerPoint. Now when giving a presentation in PowerPoint on another screen your iPad will show your notes, what slide is coming up next, and other presentation details. In addition users can now embed videos and sound recordings directly from PowerPoint for iPad, or insert video from their Camera Roll. Microsoft has also added a new eraser and pen function to allow for on the go annotations while making presentations. Excel has been enhanced with PivotTables, easier grid navigation, and keyboard short cuts. Thanks to the new update users can now sort, filter, expand or collapse, refresh, and show details of PivotTable data contacted within a workbook. These new PivotTable features also include customization options for visual style and layout. Grid navigation has been simplified with a new flick feature that allows you to grab a selection handle and then flick up or downwards. Your flick will select everything from your selection until the next blank cell, making it easier to manipulate large chunks of data between books quickly. Finally Excel is getting keyboard support complete with Excel's existing keyboard shortcuts. They've even added a new one, CTRL+2, to allow users to quickly switch between modes. There are also additions that have been made across the suite. Export to PDF has now been added to the sharing menu of all Office apps, and is available for everyone to use; even if you don't have a 365 subscription. Image editing within Office apps has also been improved. Now when you tap on an image you are presented with Crop and Reset options, allowing you to quickly scale images or undo your scaling with ease. Finally Office now supports third party fonts, including AnyFont. Simply install the font of your dreams to your iPad and get to writing. You can find Microsoft Office for iPad right now in the App Store.
Office for iPad now lets you print documents
Microsoft vowed that Office for iPad users wouldn't always have to track down a PC just to print their files, and it's making good on that promise with a slew of app updates. The tablet-sized versions of Excel, PowerPoint and Word now let you make hard copies of documents so long as you have an AirPrint-friendly printer on hand. The move tackles one of the biggest gripes we had with Office when it launched last month; it's at last possible to skip the computer entirely when producing that class report or family budget.
Office comes to the Chrome Web Store along with a slew of upgrades
Microsoft isn't done with Office updates just because it released Office for iPad and made Office Mobile completely free -- it has a bunch of improvements in store for Office Online, too. To start with, Office has reached the Chrome Web Store. You can now launch most of the productivity suite's web apps (Excel is due soon) in the Chrome browser or Chrome OS just by clicking a shortcut. Clearly, the crew from Redmond is no longer averse to supporting your Chromebook.
Here's what a touch-native Office for Windows looks like in action
You didn't think Microsoft was going to launch Office for iPad without a Windows counterpart waiting in the wings, did you? Sure enough, Microsoft has just shown off its long-expected touch-native Office for Windows in beta form. The software shares a few interface elements in common with the iPad release, but not much -- this is clearly built for Windows tablets, with a more traditional layout that expands objects to make them finger-friendly. There will be plenty of gesture support, though. You can circle an item with your finger to highlight it, and you can pinch and swipe to get around much of the productivity suite. Unfortunately, the folks in Redmond aren't saying when this touch-ready Office will ship. The demo is just a preview of what to expect, so it could be a while before you're using the software yourself.
Future Office for iPad update will let you print your documents
Although the Office for iPad suite is relatively full-featured, it won't print hard copies. That's a glaring omission even in this increasingly paperless era, we'd say. Not to worry, though: Microsoft tells PCWorld that printing support is coming as part of future app updates. The company hasn't said just when those upgrades are due, but Office general manager Julia White promises to "iterate very fast" on the fledgling productivity software. In the meantime, don't toss out your conventional PC -- you may need it to print out that next contract or term paper.
