back to article Office for Android, iOS pushed back to late 2014?

Post-PC professionals who are hoping for a version of Microsoft Office for their Android or iOS fondleslabs may have to wait another year or more, if new information purportedly leaked from Redmond proves to be correct. ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley reports that a confidential source has shown her what looks to be an authentic roadmap …

COMMENTS

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  1. mrmond

    Who cares anyway ?...

    When we already have Polaris, Kingsoft, QuickOffice, Documents to Go etc, etc,etc...

    I remember owning a Windows phone and the "support" for office meant being able to view basic docs.

    3rd party apps already fill the gap.

    1. Don Jefe
      Meh

      Re: Who cares anyway ?...

      Third party apps come nowhere close to filling the gap if you do a lot of heavy or deep work in a MS shop.

      I think their decision is really stupid though. The only Surface tab we have in our entire organization was given to us by a partner for eval & nobody wants the thing. Everyone else in our firm (and on the planet it looks like) have Android or iOS devices. This actually seems like a serious case of hubris on part of MS. Unless they've got some 'great' new low priced full function Surface in the works.

      1. Wibble
        Holmes

        Re: Who cares anyway ?...

        Trouble is that a tablet makes a really rubbish client for "work". Fine for lightweight editing, but horrible for anything more substantial. For that you need a keyboard and mouse...

        I've had Pages for years on this iPad and would never use it to create 'real' documents of substance. The thought of using Word is just as repugnant.

        It'll be nice to open a word document for review, but it'll never pass muster.

        1. Don Jefe

          Re: Who cares anyway ?...

          Agreed. They aren't good for document creation but it would be nice to be able to make minor edits and maintain all the previous users markups without having to switch devices.

          1. Babbit55

            Re: Who cares anyway ?...

            I don't know, I find it easy enough using my Nexus 7 and the case I have with a built in keyboard and the touch screen to be just as good as using my lappy.

    2. This post has been deleted by its author

    3. Green Nigel 42
      Happy

      Re: Who cares anyway ?...

      If find Kingsoft & co are great for minor editing, but still suffer from incompatibilities with Office docs. These mainly being format, tables & macro on the more heavyweight items. I do suspect it is more to do with MS twisting the doc standards.

      However I have recently been able to load CloudOn on to my Android device. Problems gone so far as it appears to be MS Office for free! Only hassle is the online need, but no different to Office 365 & s whole wad of cash cheaper.

    4. Captain Scarlet Silver badge
      Terminator

      Re: Who cares anyway ?...

      MS need people to buy Office to keep the money rolling in, if "Polaris, Kingsoft, QuickOffice, Documents to Go" decide to bring out desktop apps and they get a foot hold it can cost MS dearly.

  2. Wibble
    FAIL

    What's the next stunning innovation?

    What radical innovations are they going to come up with in the next version of office? A different colour scheme? Change the ribbon to something even more useless? More shit to add to the shit nobody uses?

    14 versions of a word processor and they still haven't got it right. Jeez.

    1. Wibble
      WTF?

      Re: What's the next stunning innovation?

      I do hope those Redmond idiots haven't discovered skeuomorphism. That's just the sort of useless crap they'd foist on the world whilst falsely claiming its utility.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: What's the next stunning innovation?

        It's worse, they've discovered skeuomorphism-hate. As such everything is flat, undifferentiated and difficult to use.

        Honestly people, do you want a situation where the graphical representation for 'file save' is some squares and an arrow, rather than a floppy disk, because some arty designer got on the antiskeuomorphism bandwagon?

        1. big_D Silver badge
          Thumb Down

          Re: What's the next stunning innovation? @AC 00:51

          On the other hand, most people coming into IT over the last 10 years have no idea what a floppy disk is... I can't remember the last time I saved to a floppy disk, 1994, maybe... And with 99% of what I save going onto a server or directly into the cloud, a floppy disk is inappropriate.

          I don't have an answer to what should replace the floppy disk, but the FD is no longer a suitable icon, especially for users who never used a computer before the mid 90s.

          As for the skeuomorphism-hate, I have to say, I like it. The iOS apps and the changes in OS X were horrible! I much prefer the flat, clean look of Windows 8.

  3. McBeese
    FAIL

    Cancel it and fire the team.

    Who is going to wait TWO YEARS for a 1.0 version of Office on iOS and Android? That's TWO MORE YEARS that people will have invested in non-Microsoft solutions before a bloated port of Office shows up on iOS and Android.

    Cancel the project and fire the team. Send them back to the 90s.

    Leave it to companies that understand mobile, or consider acquiring a company and team that is kicking ass and brand whatever they have as 'Mobile Office'. Just like when Microsoft acquired Powerpoint.

    1. Roland6 Silver badge

      Re: Cancel it and fire the team.

      >Who is going to wait TWO YEARS for a 1.0 version of Office on iOS and Android?

      I suspect a lot of people and they will even put up with the limitations whilst MS develops 2.0, particularly if MS were to make this vapourware offering official!

      I'm basing this on what MS did in the 90's in the embedded OS market with WinCE and in the Enterprise messaging market with Exchange. In both cases the vapourware products were heavily marketed and trailed for several years before finally being released, resulting in many enterprises adopting a technology led wait-and-see policy, instead of delivering solutions that addressed real business need. Naturally having waited and been wined-and-dined by MS, it would of been a lot of egg-on-face if they didn't then deploy the MS solution, even though in the case of Exchange it did not provide anything like the functionality Notes had years previously.

  4. Stephen Channell
    Unhappy

    What takes so long

    So it’s going to take the largest software company in the world longer to do a “skin” for iOS & Android than it took them to write the whole (first version) of MacWord & Excel, & with 100 times the resources. Given that they’ll both be based on Office 365.. how difficult can it be to write an app to host a web browser?

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    LibreOffice announced Android & iOS versions 18 months ago

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/10/17/libreoffice_porting_ios_android_cloud/

    Nearly there...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2vNTkTQi60

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: LibreOffice announced Android & iOS versions 18 months ago

      Sigh! Not this shit again.

      Unless you're some kind of supreme being, announcing something does not make it spontaneously spring into existence —hence the reason us mere mortals coined the term "vapourware".

      Microsoft could delay the release of Office for iOS/Android til 3014 and they'd still beat those "Couldn't spot an opportunity if it jumped up and bit them" fuckwitts at Open/Neo/Libre Office to market.

      1. Dan 55 Silver badge

        Re: LibreOffice announced Android & iOS versions 18 months ago

        It doesn't really matter if they're taking a little longer, if they get LibreOffice out the door within the next year MS will be mortally wounded.

  6. Stephen Clifford

    I'm still amazed that people still don't get that Microsoft isn't really going for the pure 'Tablet' market anyway. They're going for the (for want of a better description) the 'Convertible' market. They want businesses to have a Windows 8 device that plugs into a docking station and provides a full windows experience but that you can also undock and use as a tablet when needed.

    Office on a tablet using the virtual keyboard doesn't work. iPads and tablets in the office are still more to do with status in the company rather than productivity.

    1. P. Lee

      Not sure why you were down-voted.

      MS' problem is that ARM is far less capable so they can't price at full-fat x86, but neither do they want to cannibalise Office and Windows x86 revenue by making ARM Office cheap.

      My guess is that Office/x86 will eventually come with an 365 license bundled so that non-x86 Office can be priced to be recoup the lack of revenue without offending too many customers. i.e. Android/linux offers no price advantage so you may as well buy desktop windows. Non-Windows versions will also be feature-incomplete, as Mac Office is now.

      Its a difficult line to walk. MS don't want to be caught out missing the boat as they did with the internet and mobile, but being too good at cross platform will destroy their own ecosystem. They need to be good enough to prevent people from jumping ship, but rubbish enough to steer people back to full fat windows. Full-fat windows currently means x86, but there isn't a reason why they shouldn't do ARM too, when that's fast enough. What they don't want is to provide full fat Windows/Office RT on ARM at a cheap price and then find that someone is selling an RT device with a pluggable (server/desktop) CPU, keyboard, mouse, external screen and a couple of gigabit ethernet ports. Windows RT licensing on a pumped-up Calxeda anyone?

      The two-year wait is just fine with MS. A bit of uncertainty and doubt but close enough to be included in strategic plans. Stall a bit until the RT tech sorts itself out and they see if server ARM begets desktop ARM.

      1. big_D Silver badge

        @P.Lee

        Yes, it was announced last week, that Office 365 will be changing. As well as the 5 PC / Mac licences, you will get 5 "device" licences for tablets and smartphones.

        That makes the most sense. It also stops them having to pay Apple their pound of flesh.

  7. mIRCat
    Linux

    As you were Gentlemen

    Continue to code yourselves into irrelevancy.

    Tux cause you're always free to change.

  8. mark l 2 Silver badge

    My guess is they probably have office running on iOS and Android already but they are holding off releasing to try and leverage the advantage of having Office on the Surface to try and make some traction on sale.

    I don't see office being a huge seller on Android and iOS though as these are mainly consumer devices where a lightweight office suite for < £10 would be more than enough for most users and there is no way Microsoft would put out an office version for that sort of price.

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