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Microsoft's new Office app for mobile combines Word, Excel and Powerpoint
Microsoft's having a busy Monday morning, and for anyone that uses Office on the go, its new app might be the major gamechanger.
Microsoft brings Dark Mode to Outlook mobile apps and Office.com
Microsoft's Dark Mode support in Office was just really just the start of a much larger (and darker) trend. The software giant has started rolling out Dark Mode to its Outlook mobile apps on Android and iOS, not to mention Office.com. There's not much mystery to how it works -- surprise, it's darker -- but it should go a long way toward reducing eye strain when you're checking email on the bus home or finishing a project late at night. It should extend battery life on devices with OLED displays, too.
Microsoft drops the 'Online' name from its Office web apps
The next time you fire up any of the web versions of Microsoft's Office applications, you might notice something slightly different about them. Starting "relatively soon," Microsoft is dropping the "Online" branding of its Office Online suite and will refer to the web apps as simply Office. The decision means that the company's products like "Word Online" and "PowerPoint Online" will now simply be "Word" and "PowerPoint." The same goes for the rest of Microsoft's line of Office apps.
Microsoft Excel can provide real-time stock data
You might use Excel to track your budget, but your investments? That's less likely when stock prices change from moment to moment. Now, though, you don't have to think much about it. Microsoft has teamed with Nasdaq and market info provider Refinitiv to bring real-time stock data to Excel spreadsheets in Office 365. Type in a stock symbol, click Stocks and you can fill cells with real-time data like the price, last trade times and 52-week highs or lows. They can be used in formulas, too.
Livescribe is giving the smartpen another shot
We haven't heard much from Livescribe in the past couple years, but today, the company announced it's back with a next-gen smartpen, improved apps and an Office plug-in. Like past models, the streamlined Aegir smartpen lets you digitize handwritten notes. But this model is sleeker -- about the size of a traditional ballpoint pen -- and powered by new Livescribe+ apps for mobile and desktop. There's also a Microsoft Office plug-in that lets users to print any document with the Livescribe dot pattern. Notes made with an Aegir pen will be synced to the master document when the smartpen is connected to the computer.
Microsoft Word uses AI to improve your writing
Microsoft is about to challenge Grammarly (not to mention Google) on its home turf. The company is developing an Ideas feature for Word's online version that uses AI to suggest grammar changes, among other assists. In addition to catching basic errors, it can recommend rewriting phrases to improve concision, clarity and inclusiveness. Your report might be more to-the-point without requiring quite so much proofreading.
Microsoft's Build developer conference starts May 6th
Early May is going to be particularly busy in the tech world. Microsoft has announced that the 2019 edition of its Build developer conference will take place in Seattle between May 6th and May 8th. In other words, it starts just one day before Google I/O -- you're going to get a lot of news in a very short space of time.
Microsoft Office app for Windows 10 provides a hub for all your work
Microsoft's revamped Office.com portal has apparently been a hit with the productivity crowd (over 40 percent of Office 365 users start there), and now it wants to turn that experience into a native app. It's launching a simply-titled Office app for Windows 10 that serves as a hub for every modern version of Office, whether it's a 365 subscription, the free Office Online suite or offline tools like Office 2016 and Office 2019. Consider it a starting point for the day's work, especially if you regularly use more than one productivity app.
Office 365 for Mac now supports Dark Mode
As promised, Office 365 is ready to wring more out of macOS Mojave. Microsoft has updated the Mac version of its subscription productivity suite with several helpful features, two of which are tied to Apple's latest software. The obvious one is Dark Mode support -- you won't strain your eyes quite so badly if you're writing a school essay at night. And if you need to quickly add a photo to your presentation, PowerPoint now supports Mojave's Continuity Camera feature to let you directly import pictures from your iPhone or iPad.
Microsoft gives Outlook for iOS a full UI makeover
Microsoft has gradually been unveiling changes to Office's interface since the summer, when it announced plans for a major makeover. Since then, we've seen updated icons and a revised web experience, and now Outlook iOS is getting the treatment.
Microsoft's redesigned Office icons reflect its move to the cloud
Microsoft's Office icons on Windows and the web have been conservative, to put it mildly. They've been functional things you click while you scramble to finish a business spreadsheet or school report. The company would like you to sit up and take notice this time around, though. It just unveiled redesigned Office icons that will reach apps and the web in the "coming months," and they're decidedly more interesting. To Microsoft, they're a reflection of how much Office has changed in the five years since the icons last received a makeover.
Microsoft adds dictation to Office web apps to help with dyslexia
Microsoft has made voice dictation available for desktop Office users for months. Now, though, it's making the feature available to web users in the name of aiding those with dyslexia. The browser versions of both Word and OneNote will enable dictation sometime in the "coming weeks" so that dyslexic students can write more effectively than they would by typing. This should also help for dysgraphia (a condition that makes it difficult to write coherently) and people with mobility issues, Microsoft added.
Microsoft releases Office 2019 for Mac and Windows
Just because Microsoft is bent on moving everyone to cloud-based subscriptions doesn't mean it has forgotten about those who want a one-and-done purchase. The company is rolling out Office 2019 for Mac and Windows, giving you a "subset" of the upgrades that have come to Office 365 ProPlus in the past three years. They're not revolutionary, but they could be helpful if you've stuck to Office 2016 or earlier releases.
Microsoft merges search across Windows 10, Office, Edge and Bing
Amid hardware updates and other announcements at Ignite 2018 Monday, Microsoft said it's releasing a string of new features to boost productivity, including one major change that will affect how you find what you're looking for. The company is unifying search across Windows 10, Office, Edge and Bing in Microsoft Search. The search box will live in a "consistent, prominent place" across the apps, the company said.
Google Drive 'Priority' AI monitors your team to surface the right files
Google's 'G Suite' of apps and services has been applying machine learning everywhere over the last couple of years, and the latest update it's testing for Google Drive goes a bit further. Two years ago it launched the machine learning-enhanced Quick Access feature to put files it thinks users need right in front of them before they even start searching. Google said users have reported that feature saves about 50 percent of their time.
Microsoft's Office UI update includes a simpler, cleaner ribbon
Microsoft has given its infamous Office ribbon a much simpler, much less cluttered look as part of its interface redesign for Office.com and Office 365 applications. The tech giant updated the element to only show the most basic options -- if you need any of the commands the redesign hides, though, you can always expand it to go back to its more familiar 3-line predecessor and make sure you can quickly accomplish your tasks.
Microsoft adds file protection and email encryption to Office 365
Protecting yourself (and your documents) from cyberattack is only getting more important, so Microsoft is introducing new security features for the Home and Personal versions of its Office 365 suite. These aim to protect customers from the usual customers -- viruses and phishing scams -- as well as the increasing threat of ransomware. There's even a few convenient file-sharing and email features in the mix.
Google opens an office in China's Silicon Valley
Google's often fractious relationship with China may be softening on the news that the search giant is opening a new office in the country. The company already has two facilities in China, located in Beijing and Shanghai, but will now rent space in a building in Shenzhen, the Chinese equivalent to Silicon Valley. The province, which borders Hong Kong, is the home of Huawei, Tencent, ZTE, OnePlus -- not to mention the massive Foxconn plant that is also situated there.
Microsoft adds more AI smarts to Office 365
Microsoft has been adding cloud-based artificial intelligence to its popular Office suite for years now. In addition to new AI-focused upgrades to Cortana and Bing, the company also announced several new tools for Word, Excel and Outlook to help you make the most of your data, organizational content and more.
Microsoft adds AI-powered LinkedIn resume assistant to Word
We're starting to see more results from Microsoft acquiring LinkedIn last year, like the new employment information features brought over to Outlook.com members. Now the company that build Office is bringing AI to your job search with a new LinkedIn-powered feature in Word called Resume Assistant.
