How can you tell which type of Office 2013 installation you have? Office 2013 comes with two quite different installation methods. Ideally there should be no difference between the two but the latest patch bug only affects some users with one type of installation called ‘Click to Run’. Since there’s
What does the new Amazon phone have for Office users? The new Amazon Fire Phone is interesting though it remains to be seen whether features like ‘Dynamic Perspective’ are useful or gimmicky. For us, the main question is Microsoft Office compatibility both for users of the Fire Phone and anyone
What’s in the latest Office 2011 for Max update? In late May, Microsoft quietly released an update for Office 2011 for Mac taking it to version 14.4.2. If this was Office for Windows, it would be called a ‘Service Pack’ but somehow, not Office for Mac. Update Secrecy One thing
The competition among cloud storage providers continues with Box improving their Android app. The competition among cloud storage providers continues with Box improving their Android app. The new Android app for Box includes ‘lightning fast’ document viewing including for Word, Excel and PowerPoint as well as PDF and images. Specifically
Microsoft Word does badly against the National Spelling Bee joint champions. The Scripps US National Spelling Bee is over for another year with unprecedented joint winners Sriram Hathwar and Ansun Sujoe. Congratulations to both winners who were commendably gracious while sharing the trophy. Like last year, we were interested in
A simple solution to uninstall problems with Office 2013/Office 365. If you’re trying to uninstall Office 2013 you might get some unhelpful error messages like: Couldn’t uninstall OfficeWe’re sorry, Office couldn’t be uninstalled. Please try uninstalling Office again. ‘Try later’ isn’t a very useful suggestion. How much later? A minute,
Does this Microsoft document give a peek at the touch screen version of Office aka Office Gemini? A document from Microsoft Research has got some people excited because it might reveal how Office software as a touch/Metro/Modern app (aka Office Gemini) will look. As part of a discussion about ‘Great
Behind the latest attempt to make Surface popular. Microsoft has announced Surface Pro 3, the latest incarnation of their tablet device. This time the focus is on replacing traditional laptops with something that has the power of a laptop but also portability of a tablet. There’s a larger 12-inch screen
How to change Word so it’s more to the Game of Thrones author’s liking. George R. R. Martin, author of the Game of Thrones series among other wonderful books* has revealed that he uses an old DOS program (WordStar 4) on a standalone computer to write. That’s great for him
A new way to publish PowerPoint presentations with videos, web pages and quizzes. Office Mix is a way to turn a Powerpoint slide deck into what Microsoft calls an ‘interactive online lesson’. It’s squarely aimed at the educational market. The idea is to expand a PowerPoint presentation into a full
Or survey gives results that suit those paying for the survey. It’s an old PR trick, put together some report or survey that will get lots of free publicity for the company that’s footing the bill. It’s easy copy for overworked journos so you can’t blame them for using them.
Microsoft likes us noticing changes – so why not tell us first? Jenny N. writes: ” I totally agree with you about Microsoft’s habit of making changes and fixing bug without telling customers. But it’s more ironic than you realize. Look at a comment from an Office for iPad product
Everyone can print from Office for iPad. An important new feature in Office for iPad is printing, at least to AirPrint enabled printers. The assumption is that printing is only available to Office 365 subscribers who get the full product enabled with editing. Printing is available to ALL Office for
One of the non-AirPrint options for iPad printing. Office for iPad now has printing but only Airprint which leaves a lot of printers not available to iPad user, especially if they have a Windows computer. One alternative is “Printer Pro”. Printer Pro for iPad supports printing to network linked printers
Group calling returns to the Skype ‘free’ list. Good news for Skype lovers, group calling has returned to the list of free features. You can now add group calling to our list of Skype hidden extras Group calling is having three or more people on the same video/audio call. Microsoft
Court confirms that any US controlled cloud server is vulnerable to US government access. Here’s a story that got little coverage but deserves a lot more. A US district court has confirmed what has been known for the last decade, that US companies have to supply data to the US
OneDrive for Business customers get a 4,000% increase. Microsoft continues to push their cloud services with a big jump in available storage in OneDrive for Business from a default of 25GB to 1 Terabyte. It’s a whopping increase intended to put pressure on Google, Dropbox, Box etc to compete or
Some nice new tricks and a lot of secrets in the first update of Office for iPad. Right at the end of April 2014, we have the first update to the Office for iPad apps to version 1.0.1. The main change is AirPrint support that we’ve covered separately and our
Office for iPad apps get an update including printing … of a sort anyway. Right at the end of April 2014, we have the first update to the Office for iPad apps. The main change is printing support … well Airprint support anyway. Airprint is Apple’s proprietary printing system which
We asked Microsoft eight simple questions and got one response. To accompany our story about OneDrive for Business changing documents and files without notice or trace we asked Microsoft for answers to some questions. Alas the reply came too late for the Office Watch newsletter but here it is, in
Without a clear reason, Microsoft has started blocking paid OneDrive accounts. MyCE.com is reporting a disturbing new trend from Microsoft … locking customers out of their OneDrive accounts without notice or clear reason. According to the report, customers may get a message like this when they login to OneDrive Your
Discounts available for buying Office 2013 We’ve said it for years, when it comes to buying Microsoft Office never, ever, pay retail. There’s always discounts available for the same software and license. Sadly and probably deliberately there’s few discounts available for buying Office 2013, as opposed to renting or ‘subscribing’
As promised, there’s now a cheaper Office 365 option. Microsoft has now released Office 365 Personal, a lower cost rental option for Office software. The ‘Personal’ subscription/rental option costs US$6.99 per month (US$69.99 a year) plus any state taxes. For that you get: Use of the current Office software for
How to change the date format in Excel Online The default date format in Excel has always been a mystery to newcomers and its stranger in Excel Online (the new name for Excel Web Apps). To change the default date format for display and date entry for Excel Online, go
