I’m here at the Web 2.0 Expo keynote, where Stephen Elop, President of Microsoft Business Division, hinted that we may be seeing Microsoft Office make its way to the iPhone some time soon. After his interviewer Tim O’Reilly caught him on the comment, Elop backtracked a bit, stating “not yet, keep watching”. But it’s clear that an iPhone version of Office is on his mind.
Rumors of an Office client for the iPhone have been circling for over a year, as users clamor for a way to edit their Word and Excel files on the go (the iPhone allows them to view them, but doesn’t include any editing functionality).
Unofficial editing suites are also on the way. Today saw the annoucement of QuickOffice, a suite of applications that can edit office files (though it has yet to be released). Also worth checking out is this spreadsheet application.
In other Office-related news, Elop said that Microsoft plans to launch an ad-supported online version of Office for the web, though it won’t be out this year. He also notes that of the 500 million people who use Office, only 250 million actually pay for it. When asked what Microsoft’s biggest fear concerning Office was, Elop said that it was afraid of innovation slowing down, explaining “It’s not about having bolding or underlining in the browser… The real threat is if we’re not continuing to innovate”.
But does anyone ever use an office suite on their phone?
I agree with James.
And I think Google Docs allows you to update what little you might want to from a phone: someone mails you a Word doc, Open In Google Docs, edit, tire of the novelty, go home and finish
but as far as I’ve been able to tell, you can’t edit using google docs on the iphone.
I’ve found myself in meetings in coffee shos where the laptop we’re using runs out of battery and there aren’t any powerpoints.
this has got to be the stupidest idea i’ve heard in a while – even from microsoft, which has got everything wrong the past several years. what is wrong with those people?
“which has got everything wrong the past several years”
Are you trolling? i can understand MS did not do a great job on Vista but they pretty much been doing great products. To name a few, Office 2007(The ribbon is a great way to edit once you get use to it), Surface, Photosynth, SeaDragon, Windows Home Server, Media Center, and many more products.
Care to explain why? Or shall we guess?
Why is it bad? They have the Office program Word Excel and Powerpoint on the PocketPC phone already.
..and on the Apple Mac also!
I’m not sure about anyone else, but I have a hard enough time working my iPhone keyboard for a short email. Unless I was making a single change to a Word doc, I would just pull out my laptop.
Also, does the iPhone have the juice to power anything interesting? MSOffice has never been fabled for being a light application suite.
Do you actually think they will port the complete office environment or you just wanted to say something negative?. I mean it’s obvious that when an application is ported to a mobile environment it’s slim down. I think that the use of office on the iphone can be used for editing Minor details on the go not producing and creating engineering spreadsheets.
I can’t figure out whether this is an April fool or not
I agree with jonathan – i’m thinking april fools all way!
I don’t want to get a blue screen on my iPhone or have it crash:)
Leave no platform unbloated.
Maybe it won’t be a broken as Mac Office…
iWork is way better on the mac.
Why would they even consider wasting resources implementing a client for that iphone thing? I thought there was ‘No chance Apple iPhone is going to get any significant market share’. Bah. This must be one of those April fools jokes.
I’ve got Office on my HTC Touch Pro and never use it. It is good to know it is there in case I need to create a PowerPoint or something on the fly but haven’t had the occasion yet.
I wouldn’t trust MicroSoft to make a version of Office for the iPhone. Dataviz would probably do a much better job. Look at Palm OS versions of Documents to Go versus WinMo.
And yes, I would like a native office on the iPhone. I currently use a Treo 700P and PRAY Dataviz has the D2G ready when Pre launches.
Is it and April Fool?
Nah cant b an april fool, was only posted 10 hours ago…if it is there the fools
hope it isnt tho
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Office on the iPhone could look like this:
http://www.flic...unny/2362014136
Well, there’s already Mariner Calc for the iPhone, which can work with Excel files. And at $10, it’s certain to be less than whatever bloatware Redmond churns out.
Dunno about what’s out there for Word and PPT files, but non-MS apps can’t be far behind Calc.
MSOffice:Mac already cripples the performance of my Mac whenever I run it… don’t want it fscking my iPhone too. Thanks but no thanks, MS.
Keep dreaming microsoft!!
How is that all going to work out and can Apple really ban it.
I don’t know about all of you, but I want to be able to edit documents on the iPhone / iPod Touch.
I have been doing it on my Dell Axim X51v and I know that the keyboard on the iPhone is a lot easier to use than it.
One of the things that bug me is when I am reading a document and see a misspelled word. Now, I have to write the word down in a note, then go to the document on the Desktop computer and change it, then import the document back into the iPhone.
I would like to see this application. I would like to see Microsoft actually do it.
How about using the Citrix ICA client for the iPhone to access a real version of Office running on a remote Terminal Server? The client looks pretty good, and it behaves like a “real” iPhone app, complete with pinching to zoom, changing orientation based on the phone position, etc. And if Office is running on a remote server, you can access your home drive and pick up your session where you left off when you get into the office.
So sure, it’s not quite the same as an iPhone Office suite, but it’s pretty compelling and available now.
try
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i think microsoft can do it!!!
sure William “Bill” Gates is (……) but his ceo Steve Ballmer is great person and passionate man. he could do that!