There are some good and practical changes coming to the main web portal for Microsoft Office users, Office.com plus some features already available you might not realize. These changes are either happening now or in the coming months. As usual, there’s a gradual rollout to Microsoft server farms across the
Microsoft has added 77 more images to their Office 365 Stock Images collection, just in time for Halloween. Just a few days ago, searching for ‘Halloween’ at Insert | Pictures | Stock Images showed just four pictures in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook. Stock images or premium content now in
A recent attack on Microsoft 365 organizations has highlighted the danger of ‘password spray’ attacks that try to get into your account and perhaps get a foothold into an organization. There’s a simple fix that can protect you and your organization. Regular Office Watch readers will know what we’re going
All about Windows 11 software and accessory compatibility, promises of better and fewer updates and our view on whether Windows 11 is worth switching. See all the Office-Watch.com coverage of Windows 11 Software and accessory compatibility Underneath the changed desktop lies much the same core technology that’s in Windows 10.
The September 2021 release preview has a lot more than usual new and updated features in Office 365 for Windows. Almost as if Microsoft has been saving them up for a bumper surprise! It’s all in the ‘Current Channel (Preview)’ release v2109 build 14430.20088 that’s out now. This is the
The new Widgets pane in Windows 11 has three widgets for Outlook and Microsoft 365 users. Calendar, To Do and one only for Enterprise users. Widgets are a pop-up window of configurable small panes. The selection of widgets is quite limited, at least for now; Weather, Traffic, Stocks, Sports, Entertainment
Chromebooks are low cost alternatives to regular laptops with great battery life. They can run Microsoft Office in different ways – two and a half by our count. There were two more, but Microsoft dropped support for them in September 2021. Quick Chromebook buying tips Web apps Chromebooks come with
Importing genetic codes into Excel is still a problem despite widespread reports of the problem. And still Microsoft is blamed, despite the real solution is with the lazy scientists who need to learn how to use Excel. A new report in the journal Nature shows that Autocorrect errors in Excel
Modern Excel has a danger zone that hackers increasingly use to get into your computer. It’s been there for well over twenty years but is being abused a lot more in 2021. Here’s how to disable it. The problem is in a very old method of Excel automation called Excel
Word’s Advanced Find has many special codes to help locate or replace hidden or unusual things in a Word document. Here’s a complete and searchable list of all the ^ codes and what they are for Under Find | Advanced Find | More | Special there’s a list of special
Qantas, the Australian airline, as released some nice background images for virtual meetings, calls and beyond. Though some of the picture choices are strange. There are photos in the cabin, outside and cockpit (especially nice because public access is barred these days). The preview doesn’t do the images full justice,
Microsoft has now revealed all the details of their Windows 365 cloud based PC service. Here’s what it will cost, some pricing traps and some hidden ‘features’ to consider. Windows 365 is a ‘PC in the cloud’ service that lets you run a Windows 10/11 machine from any Internet connected
Chromebook users are getting unexplained messages when they use some Office apps, leading to rumors about Microsoft Office support of Chromebooks. Microsoft isn’t helping by their silence but the signs are not good for paying Office customers with Chromebooks. It all started when Chromebook users reported getting pop-up messages and
PowerPoint can show slides on a screen as a high-tech signboard, using a self-running presentation known as Kiosk display. Here’s how to do it plus all the settings and tricks available. We’ve all seen screens displaying information on a series of slides – maybe in a shop or conference. Maybe
Microsoft has announced their plans for later this year with additions to Teams, Whiteboard and an expansion of their Fluid components concept. None of these things are available now. It’s all future promises, nothing substantial customers can use today. Let’s strip away all the hype about ‘hybrid’ workplaces that are
We have a new COVID-19 statistics workbook with a new automatically updating Excel spreadsheet that shows the latest cases and vaccination rates by country and region. All our Office Watch readers can get the entire workbook today. We’ve made this workbook as a practical and timely example of some important
Microsoft is expanding the reach of their Teams service with more personal and family related features available at no charge. Teams for Home is a repurposing existing Teams business features so they can bring together families and friends. All these features are free (there are some call limits). There are
Sometimes Excel 365’s Linked Data Types are great (Stock and Currencies) and other times they’ll drive you crazy or lead you to use wrong statistics. Here’s some problems we found trying out the, supposedly, simple City data type compared to the similar Geography and Location data types. Just getting the
Here’s a first peek at Office LTSC for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Access, Publisher and OneNote which is now out in public preview showing off some of the new features. Office LTSC in it’s current preview is underwhelming, to put it mildly. But that’s what Microsoft is aiming for. Office LTSC
Suggested Replies are coming to Outlook 365 for Windows. As usual, there are details that Microsoft has ‘forgotten’ to mention but we at Office Watch aren’t so forgetful! In the Outlook reading / preview pane, possible replies can be displayed. Or Microsoft’s cloud systems have scanned the message and offered
In late 2018, Excel 365 got an important new feature, Dynamic Arrays . Here’s a simple way to use the feature to make your workbooks sort better and automatically. It also fixes a long-standing problem in Excel. We’re going to focus on a very simple and useful part of dynamic
Yes, there are bunnies and other secular Easter graphics waiting for you in Microsoft 365 and Office 2019. Icons and Illustrations (both types of SVG) have some Easter or at least bunny related graphics. Stock Images also have some choices. Religious choices are missing but there are Christian or Latin
A more efficient way to mark index entries in Microsoft Word is with a concordance or AutoMark file. It’s a separate document with a table of words to be found in the document coupled with their index entries. See Simple Indexing in Microsoft Word for an intro to Word’s indexing
Another bad week for Microsoft’s customers who rely on the Microsoft 365 hosting and other cloud technologies. There were global outages for more than half a day in Teams, Azure, Xbox Live and many other Microsoft Cloud services. All should be restored by the time you read this but there
