All about Microsoft Office Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook, Microsoft 365, Office 2021 and earlier versions.
Overdue changes to Windows 10 available now
The upcoming update to Windows 10 represents a major shift by Microsoft. While the company won’t admit it, the October 2018 update was a disaster. So many bugs in the update, including some that destroyed customers files. Somewhat chastened, the Win10 May 2019 update is being deployed in a much more cautious way. The May […]
Microsoft accounts hacked. Who to believe and why it matters.
Microsoft has admitted a security breach which allowed hackers to access the accounts and data of customers. The admission from Microsoft isn’t complete and the hackers say it’s worse than the company is saying. Who is affected? Some people with a free Microsoft accounts like Outlook.com, Msn.com Hotmail.com etc. Microsoft says that a ‘limited’ number […]
Google’s G Suite gets direct Word, Excel and PowerPoint doc support
Google has announced that their G Suite customers will be able to edit and collaborate with Microsoft Office documents. It will be available to all G Suite users by the end of May 2019. Source: Google. Until now, a clumsy Office compatibility app for Chrome allowed Microsoft Office documents to be edited in Google Docs, […]
Slack gets better Office 365 and OneDrive support
Slack, the popular collaboration service, has added better integration with Office 365 hosting and OneDrive. Office 365 tools were inevitable because Microsoft now has Teams, its own rival to Slack. There are two new tools, Outlook email and calendar plus nice previews of Microsoft Office documents. Office document preview Now included in Slack is better […]
Excel scams for tax time
It’s income tax time in the USA and that means a new round of email scams and infected Excel documents to watch out for. IBM Security Intelligence reports on a series of scam emails courtesy of the Trickbot hackers. All the emails look like legitimate messages from big companies like Paychex, a payroll provider and […]
Updates for Japanese Era support in Excel
Microsoft continues to struggle with their support for Japanese Era date format in Excel. The new Imperial Era, ‘Reiwa’ is known but the necessary changes for Excel aren’t released yet. New Japanese Imperial Era changes in Excel and Office explains how to add the new Reiwa era without waiting for Microsoft’s patch. Meantime, yet more […]
Office support for SVGZ, the smaller version of SVG icons
The lesser known version of SVG icons is the smaller, compressed, SVGZ format. Here’s how to use SVGZ in Office 365/2019 despite no direct support for the format. Most SVG icons arrived uncompressed in plain XML text using the .SVG extension. We’ve shown before how SVG’s can be edited in any text editor to make […]
Microsoft gives out less information about Office bug fixes and patches
Microsoft has never been great about documenting patches and bug fixes but this month they have sunk to a new low. Maybe it’s a delayed April Fool’s prank with Microsoft ‘taking the Mickey‘ or treating Office customers with contempt? Sustained Engineering isn’t sustained Maintaining Office software is the thankless job of the Office Sustained Engineering […]
How we made the Office 366 satire
We hope you enjoy our little 1st April satire, Office 366. Office 366 was fun and, along the way, reminded people of some important points about Office 365 plans. ‘Office 366’ is the, not impossible, idea that Microsoft would make Office 365 customers pay for leap day in 2020. https://office366extra.com/ the Office 366 announcement including […]
Google Drive plug for Office ending soon
The current Google Drive plug-in for Microsoft Office will stop working near the end of June. There’s an improved update already available for some customers and an alternative for the rest. If you’re using the Google Drive plug-in, you’ll start seeing a warning about the plugins death on 26 June 2019. Source: Google There are […]
New Japanese Imperial Era changes in Excel and Office
An update for Excel users on the upcoming new Imperial Era in Japan and how to type the Reiwa era name in Office documents The Japanese government has now announced the new Era name that will coincide with new Emperor. From 1 May 2019 we’ll be in the 令和or Reiwa era. This might not seem […]
What Office 366 demonstrates about Office 365’s downside
Some people might be surprised about Office 366 and the loss of services for a day, but they shouldn’t be. It’s a demonstration of the much tighter control Microsoft has over Office 365 customers. Office 366 is a price slug for Office 365 customers Office 366 exclusive interview The switch to an annual payment, so-called […]
Office 366 exclusive interview
Office Watch met with Office 365 spokesman, Morrocos Fieffit, for a few drinks and this exclusive interview about the changes and fees with Office 366. Quickly, what’s Office 366? “Office 366 is an enhancement to Office 365 to deal with the extra day in the 2020 leap year. Office 365 is a 365 day per […]
Office 366 – the price slug for Office 365 customers
Office 366 is the latest ‘innovation’ and price gouge for Office 365 customers. It’s an important change to Office 365 with costs for everyone and dread consequences if you don’t pay. It’s horrible news to start a new week. Office 365 users are waking up to this as Monday 1st starts across the globe. Without […]
Warning: Office 365 plus Amazon gift card price ripoff ?
Today we’re seeing plenty of mentions of a ‘great deal’ that isn’t ‘Office 365 Home plus Amazon Gift Card for $100’ is NOT correct and NOT a good deal at all. For starters, the price is $149 not $100. Sample headline and text from just one prominent tech web site. Click through to Amazon and […]
Word’s Melissa virus is 20 years old – what’s changed?
One of the first major Word viruses, the Melissa virus, is 20 years old. It’s amazing to see how much and how little has changed over two decades. Office viruses today follow much the same pattern as they did back in the 20th Century. Melissa was a Word macro virus which infected computers then spread […]
