Comments on: Office Web Apps

By: Terryd

Terryd — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 16:59:00 +0000

I am unable to download the Office 2010 Beta from the MS site (maybe something to do with my ISP proxy). Is there another way to download it?

By: Ross

Ross — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 22:04:00 +0000

Hi,
I blogged "about" OWA just over a year ago(!), wow, Tushar is bang on, in his assessment!
There are a whole world of issues to consider about web office (woffice), the only one the average user needs to worry about is the performance, which in all the different forms I've seen is horrific. V1, V2, V3, V4, yes, agree. But I think the issue with woffice is not only about the app, it about the band with. I think the future might see "work" done on the local client, and the data slaved from the cloud - unless something stellar happen with band with in the nect few years - like a 500% speed increase, and caching or paging or something.

http://www.blog.methodsinexcel.co.uk/2008/11/13/why-woffice-web-office-is-such-a-disappointment-to-me/
and
http://www.blog.methodsinexcel.co.uk/2008/11/11/the-case-against-on-line-collaboration/
and
http://www.blog.methodsinexcel.co.uk/2008/03/12/on-line-rubbish/

By: Jim Cone

Jim Cone — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Tushar,

Your post got me interested in finding out a little more about Office Web Apps (OWA).
(thanks for the two links you posted)

And... you have to have Windows Server 2008 (decided to skip that one) or follow the nine step procedure here for home use...
http://www.microsoft.com/office/2010/en/office-web-apps/activating.aspx

Now if there was someone out there with Office 2010 installed and
a Windows Live ID that was interested in editing my list of Pet names then
maybe I would give it a go. [grin]

By: Tushar Mehta

Tushar Mehta — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 23:32:00 +0000

13 comments and not one about Office Web Apps. Guess it shows how enthusiastic people are about the product. {grin}

I won’t be trying out OWA. I invested enormous resources in OWC – Office Web Components (released with Office 2000 and 2002 – or was it 2002 and 2003?) only to have all my investment go to waste.

Maybe, OWA will be better than OWC but I will wait and see. As of now…

(1) OWA is an online companion to O2010. Office Web Apps Overview (http://www.microsoft.com/office/2010/en/office-web-apps/overview.aspx) states “You must install the Microsoft Office 2010 before using Office Web Apps. Install it today, and then get started using your Office Web Apps.” and

(2) Microsoft Office Web Apps (Beta) (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=27d81b1c-18ae-4983-8e1c-224bb747eb99&displaylang=en&lc=1033) states “Office Web Apps enable you to view, do light editing…” (emphasis added)

OK, so from a professional perspective, if I have to have O2010 on my machine and can do only light editing in OWA, why would I want to use the latter? Real-time collaboration of relatively simple documents? My clients don’t hire me for that! They hire me for high-end work — with a sprinkling of the impossible.

And,from a personal perspective, Google docs is more than adequate for sharing documents with family and friends. Don’t have to worry about which — if any — version of Office they have on their machine.

So, where OWA is concerned, yes, it’s possible I will be singing its praises some time in the future, but that time is definitely not now.

By: EdH

EdH — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:59:00 +0000

@bob – yeah, i have to be careful with sumifs() in files sent to 2003 users. Not sure your issue with months. I use month/period comparisons in nearly 100% of my sumifs. It is all financial and sales data.

By: Bob Phillips

Bob Phillips — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:57:00 +0000

@Idris - in -cell charting, come on they are a shambles http://blog.datadrivenconsulting.com/2009/11/excel-in-cell-bar-charts.html. Although they are improved in 2010, as the article states, how did they get it so wrong.

By: Bob Phillips

Bob Phillips — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:54:00 +0000

@EdH, SUMIFS are nigh-on useless IMO. Firstly, they are not backward compatible, but try comparing the Month of a range against a given month number with SUMIFS? Unfortunately, those SUMPRODUCT hacks as you call will continue to rule the roost.

By: EdH

EdH — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:45:00 +0000

Jon, sweet! hadn’t tried that. I will move Macros somwhre else because being on the View tab is just ridiculious.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:27:00 +0000

Thanks for blogging this, I immediately went and downloaded it.

My first impression is very positive. Finally I can double-click on chart axes again to change their properties! Excel 2010 seems to be much faster than 2007 (running on a Core 2 Duo T9300 with 4 GB RAM and dedicated graphics).

Furthermore I get the impression that my addin works faster, too -- nice!

I am a scientist and was very intrigued to see that they did worked on some formulas. Unfortunately, at this point the link in the help file does not work, so I don't know which formulas they improved and how.

By: Jon Peltier

Jon Peltier — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:16:00 +0000

EdH – The nice thing about the 2010 ribbon is that you’re not stuck with whatever some genius decided to put on each tab. They’ve built in the capability to customize your ribbon tabs.