Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

Allen Filush — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:41:44 GMT

@nick: Check out this video with a guy using SharePoint 2010 (which is included with Office 365) and his iPad.

"Using SharePoint 2010 with iPad" http://vimeo.com/10690956

Also there is this app. www.slideshare.net/.../share-pluss-ipad-client-for-sharepoint

Thanks for the comment.

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

nick — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:40:18 GMT

This is exciting. We are looking to deploying iPad for managing partners working outside the office, but all of our documents are in MS Word on our internal Windows file server. How would the iPad access the files behind the office firewall? Has anyone tried doing this at their office?

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

Get IT News — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:39:59 GMT

Really a nice facility by Microsoft but still waiting for my account for http://www.getitnews.co.cc

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

gmj — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:39:37 GMT

A belated response to your 10/20/2010 response (sorry):

Size/industry: Educational institution with about 3,000 full-time and a roughly equal number of part-time staff. We looked into both live@edu and BPOS, but at the time the offerings couldn't meet security requirements for sensitive communications and/or were deemed by our IT department as too difficult to manage ... I assume that has changed since you bid/won the contract for California State employees and New York City employees, and you bid/won (pending the challenge by Google) the US Government/DOI contract. I've also seen references in the media about MS working with clients to build dedicated clouds for large organizations (e.g., such as Statewide deployments, etc.) where that was appropriate and cost-effective.

A licensing question: Assuming that one opts for a tiered service (i.e., Office 365 for most everything combined with on-site deployments of Exchange, SharePoint, Lynx, etc., for unique requirements and/or extremely sensitive information/communications), does one need to purchase both an Office 365 seat and CALs for each users of the on-site servers? It would seem that if MS is truly suggesting that sites go to the "cloud" and, if necessary, deploy a hybrid of "cloud" and on-premises service, that licensing needs to be simple and not require multiple seats/CALs per person.

Again, I encourage you to make the beta more widely available and not just limited to those who could access your site within the first few minutes of its posting.

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

Allen Filush — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:38:45 GMT

@ Bob Fahey: Thanks Bob, we have seen enthusiasm all over the spectrum, from partners to businesses of all sizes. Can't wait hear your feedback once you actually have the product in hand!

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

Bob Fahey, Senior Business Dev Exec — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:37:58 GMT

I attended the launch event last week in San Francisco, CA. Since then I’ve spoken to 5 different customers who were all aware of Office365 and looking for more additional information. It's exciting and encouraging to see such high interest in the platform!

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

Allen Filush — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:37:09 GMT

@onorton We did! Lync is the rebranded, next wave of Communicator with a completely redesigned interface and way more features. I use it daily for all parts of my job, and I would have loved to have this way back when I was in school! Although I could see how there could be a definite negative effect for students to be able to IM during class :).

Thanks for the question!

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

onorton — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:36:20 GMT

Are there any plans to add Communicator to the bundle? The reason: I have an education company that could then use the whole thing to create and teach classes.

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

Allen Filush — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:35:07 GMT

Hey all thanks for the comments! Catching up after a long day of launch. The questions are great, but instead of just answering all of them here I will be posting a Q&A, so everyone can see the answer. If I don't address you below, check back by end of day or tomorrow for more!

Bob, Oscar, Sunny + Tommy: Thanks for the comments and enthusiasm.

Steve: Try it now, I just tested in IE9 and not having issues. Let me know if it still is, I can follow up with you personally.

Charles: Yes, go ahead and join the beta!

E W: Wikis and Forums will go live for those in the Beta when it begins, you will have access at that point if you are one of the lucky ones :).

gmj: Sorry about your issues, as long as you have your confirmation email that means you have chance of getting into the beta as it expands.

As for waiting, we have a great cloud productivity service for you right now, BPOS! microsoft.com/online. The best of what we have right now, and we will migrate you to Office 365 after it becomes available. What type of company are you in? Size and industry?

Thanks and keep them coming!

re: Welcome to the Office 365 Blog!

Fred Jorgonson — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:34:19 GMT

What a great service <if I do say so myself.> Gives new meaning to the words "cloud computing" and 'in the cloud.'