Harry McCracken over at Technologizer.com has penned an excellent and very detailed article about what consumers and businesses can expect from the upcoming version of Microsoft Office. He asks twelve of the most popular questions and answers them.
Before we get to that, here’s a promo video from Microsoft with a sneak peak at what customers can expect.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zf0dqzTUPk
Here are three of the questions Harry asks and answers (find the rest in his article):
Why isn’t Microsoft introducing a full-on Metro edition of Office?
I assume that there will be Metro editions of all of Office’s major programs someday. And I hope that someday doesn’t have to wait for the next sweeping upgrade to the whole Office system in 2015, 2016 or thereabouts. Maybe Microsoft is working on them right now.
How much will the consumer version of Office 365 cost?
Businesses pay $20 a month per user for the version that includes the full Windows suite. Office 365 Home Premium is going to include Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Publisher and Access and let you use them on up to five computers and other devices, plus 20GB of additional SkyDrive storage and an hour of Skype calling time. It’s a lot of stuff, but if Microsoft truly wants it to largely replace the boxed version of Office, it’s going to have to make the price really tempting to huge numbers of price-conscious folks.
How does Office for the Mac fit in?
If you subscribe to Office 365, you’ll have the right to download Office’s Mac version as well as the Windows apps. Right now, Office for the Mac is substantially different from the Windows one–with a different interface and fewer features and apps. (I also find parts of it outlandishly slow.) Opinions may vary, but I’d be happy if the next version of Mac Office, whenever it shows up, is a closer counterpart to the Windows one.
