Office Web Apps get rebranded as Office Online, now easier to find

Shawn Knight

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Microsoft has rebranded its online Office Web Apps to Office Online in an effort to make the product less confusing to consumers. The Redmond-based company has also made it easier for newcomers to discover Office Online as many people aren’t aware that online versions of Microsoft’s Office products even exist.

In a blog post on the matter, Office Online product marketing manager Amanda Lefebvre said they’ve heard from customers that the inclusion of Apps in the name was confusing. Some wondered if they had to install something or if they needed to go to an app store to retrieve them - both are valid questions for someone not in the know.

microsoft office web apps office online office

With the new name, consumer confusion should be a thing of the past.

Additionally, Microsoft has made Office Online easier to access. Previously, users had to log into their OneDrive (formerly SkyDrive) account to get started. Now, simply head over to the new dedicated Office Online landing page and hop right in to Word, Excel, PowerPoint or OneNote. Users can also quickly access Outlook.com e-mail and OneDrive via the included app switcher without having to navigate in and out of various services.

The new location should help consumers figure out exactly where to find Office Online.

Microsoft has also added in hundreds of templates for Word, PowerPoint and Excel that can help you go from nothing to something with just a click. These include budgets, resumes, calendars and more, all free of charge.

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Wow, such logic. Much improve. Now if they will just bend to reason and separate Metro into its own Windows version called "Windows Touch".
 
And so it begins....the shift from your computer being a powerful workstation to a dumb terminal where the user has control over nothing.
 
Is this what they previously called Office 365? If so, why not bloody say so in the article? I'm still damn confused, and I'm not that stupid.
 
Is this what they previously called Office 365? If so, why not bloody say so in the article? I'm still damn confused, and I'm not that stupid.
confused? not anymore click here for comparison...
 
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Good! Free online office sounds like something.

Just tried it out, it's not like a full fledged copy of office but for being free it's great for home usage. Not an office app, not something for students unless it's for text processing and doing simple presentations.

Still it's great and I was also able to open it from a browser in my android phone but wasn't able to edit the file... looking into it.

EDIT: Petty much like google docs work.
 
Good! Free online office sounds like something.

Just tried it out, it's not like a full fledged copy of office but for being free it's great for home usage. Not an office app, not something for students unless it's for text processing and doing simple presentations.

Still it's great and I was also able to open it from a browser in my android phone but wasn't able to edit the file... looking into it.

EDIT: Petty much like google docs work.

Wow, its truly free, as in no forced advertising? God, I love Microsoft. I wonder if they will gift to me a new car also.
 
Wow, its truly free, as in no forced advertising? God, I love Microsoft. I wonder if they will gift to me a new car also.

I had no problems just have to log in with a live account and you are ready to do some work, not sure if there was any ads I dont recall seing them, good luck on the car
 
I had no problems just have to log in with a live account and you are ready to do some work, not sure if there was any ads I dont recall seing them, good luck on the car

I was being somewhat sarcastic. I doubt Microsoft really does anything for "free". I can't remember any prior operating systems that were free or any other software they have created for that matter. Well, other than small utilities. But Office has been a big part of their bread and butter for several years. I read somewhere that they don't have many choices in the decisions they are making lately because of market forces. So, maybe this is one of those forced decisions.
 
Probably, considering google docs is a good alternative that is able to read the up to somewhat "old new" file systems when they switched from doc to docx.
 
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