Office 2013 gets in touch with new ways of working

IF YOU'RE an office worker, you're probably an Office worker too, since more than 1-billion people are estimated to use Microsoft's productivity suite. The new features of Office 2013 unveiled this week show Microsoft is targeting a wider audience of cloud dwellers in danger of floating off to rivals just as Apple and Android.

The way with its Pages

Apple has already led the way with its Pages, Numbers and Keynote iWork applications converted for the iPad, during Google's Gmail, Calendar and Docs have persuaded many consumers to work in a web browser and store their information in the cloud.

I have been trying Office 2013 - the first version of Office to be optimised for touchscreens and tablets - on a Samsung slate running a preview version of Windows 8. During the new operating system goes on sale on October 26 as a $40 upgrade, there is no date or pricing as but for the launch of the new version of Office. Confusingly, Microsoft is as well pointing consumers towards a browser-based subscription version called Office 365 in the interim.

Just like Windows 8, Office 2013 switches between computing concepts. It is a regular PC program, though it looks like a series of apps on the home screen of my tablet - 12 squares on the tiled interface, representing each element of the suite.

Tapping on one opens it up in the familiar Windows desktop that lies beneath the surface of the tiled home screen. Nevertheless - back to the tablet app concept again - the program looks much cleaner and clearer than previous versions, and in a larger format in other words suited to touching options to select them. The familiar swiping and pinch-to-zoom gestures of touchscreens are there as then.

Windows 7 tablet - that

This is far different from my previous attempts at trying Office 2010 on a Windows 7 tablet - that was telescoped badly into the smaller screen and trying to use touch to make selections was fiddly and unsatisfying.

- Word Reading Mode allows you to swipe through and read documents more willingly in an e-book fashion, during Live Layout makes it easy to use fingers to resize and reposition photos and other items, much like Apple's Pages for the iPad.

Meanwhile, more as a rule, logging into a Windows Live account allows all documents to be saved automatically to your Skydrive account in the cloud, making them accessible from any device. If you are working in a team, new social and collaborative tools have been added for easy sharing and Microsoft's Skype acquisition has been integrated for video conferencing.

Although my test version had a few bugs that need to be ironed out previously the launch, the new Office promises to become a key differentiator for Microsoft on tablets. Its slick suite of essential applications could be the main reason why businesses and consumers in general might choose a Windows-based tablet in other words than the iPad or Android versions.

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