Microsoft has detailed some new updates to its Office Web Applications for Office.com and SkyDrive as part of its major Office 2013 revamp that appear to bring it more in line with the ever-popular Google Docs (now part of Drive) with “far richer editing”, new sharing features, and a brand new UI to reflect the merger of Ribbon and Metro that Office 2013 has.
The Word Web App will be getting “page layout” as opposed to full screen, meaning that you can write and know the spacing for a particular page, and better formatting capabilities. Excel and Powerpoint have had minor changes to support graphing, transitions and animations. Excel also has an “Interactive View” where data on the web can be used to populate a spreadsheet.
But the biggest feature is the collaboration and sharing features. Now you can co-author with people on the four web apps – Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote – and you can comment and share files right from SkyDrive or Office 365.
As well, the new update will see the Web Apps available in more platforms and devices – especially with mobile. They have been updated to suit both the new touch-friendly controls on Internet Explorer and work with modern smartphone browsers.
The features are to be rolled out in a couple of days.
via Microsoft Office