Wednesday, March 29, 2017

Microsoft bolsters Office 365 with co-authoring for Excel

Microsoft has made its usual end of the month post concerning what’s new with Office 365, and the major fresh addition which has just happened for March is co-authoring support in Excel.

Yes, co-authoring support is now live for Excel on Windows desktop PCs, or at least it is for testers only at the moment (those on the fast ring of the Office Insiders program).

That means you can collaboratively work with others on the same spreadsheet and see their changes more or less in real-time, within seconds of them being made. Just the same as when collaborating on a Word document.

Microsoft’s getting feedback from testers at the moment, and it will roll the feature out more broadly soon enough.

Note that co-authoring is already available in the web version of Excel, and its mobile apps (Android, iOS, Windows Mobile), but this is new for desktop machines. As well as Windows, Microsoft notes it’s also working on co-authoring in Excel for the Mac.

Autosaving the day

So what else is new? Microsoft has also introduced autosaving to Word, Excel and PowerPoint on Windows desktops, where files stored in OneDrive or SharePoint Online are concerned.

In other words, you don’t have to worry about habitually hitting save, as it will automatically be done for you (and indeed the other users who may be collaboratively working on a file with you).

Microsoft also reminded us that the Teams messaging and collaboration app is now live for Office 365 business subscribers, and Office 365 Education users – and that in excess of 150 integrations with third-party apps and services are already available, or coming soon.

And Microsoft Bookings, the app which helps small businesses schedule and manage appointments with customers, is now rolling out worldwide for Office 365 Business Premium subscribers (previously it was US and Canada only).

Other minor tweaks have been made to Office 365 apps, such as inking updates for OneNote. For example, you can now jot down an equation in OneNote, select it, and have the app display a graph of it – and indeed it can teach you how to solve the equation.

For the full list of every little change and tweak, check out Microsoft’s blog post.



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Tuesday, March 28, 2017

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Oh snap: Facebook adds Snapchat-like filters and Stories

Facebook is going all in on a new suite of features for sharing your goings-on with friends without cluttering your News Feed with images only meant to be seen once.

Specifically, the social network is adding special filters and masks to its camera feature, as well as Stories for sharing single-view images, video, or replies atop your News Feed that disappear after 24 hours.

Facebook is also allowing its users to send Stories to just a select person or group of people with another feature called Direct, should you not want to share pics from your latest bar escapades with just anyone.

By this point, you've likely drawn a similarity or five between Facebook's newest update and a certain picture-sharing app. However, it comes as no surprise, as past tests have made it apparent that the Big Blue F was planning to emulate Snapchat's ephemeral image-posting style.

While this is first time we've seen these features on Facebook proper, the site's Messenger app has had its own take on 24-hour snippets for a while now. The Facebook-owned service Instagram has also been using a similar feature for nearly a year now.

Facebook's new snap-swapping features will roll out over the course of this week to both iOS and Android users of the app. 

For those who already use Snapchat, not every feature has been copied by Facebook just yet, such as...um...its featured Stories from magazines like Cosmopolitan and Esquire.



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