This morning Microsoft unveiled Office Web application, a lightweight version of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote that can be access through a browser including Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari.
With these new online applications, users can create, edit, and collaborate on Office documents through a consistent user interface. During the demo on stage at the Professional Developer Conference (PDC) I liked the fact that documents were being continuously synchronized across the different platforms (desktop, web and mobile).
Online Office will be available free/ad-supported or through a subscription
Office Web application will be part of the next release of Office a.k.a. version 14 planned for next year. It will also be available to consumers through Office Live, Microsoft’s online service for free (ad-supported) or by subscription. Businesses will have access to a separate hosted subscription service.
The private “technical preview” of Office Web applications is expected later this year but knowing Microsoft, don’t expect anything stable before next year!
[...] world’s largest software company announced yesterday that it will launch sometimes next year a “cloud” version of its Office productivity [...]