Office Web Apps with SharePoint 2010 or SkyDrive Explained

What Are Office Web Apps

The concept of Office Web Apps is essentially your Microsoft Office in the cloud.   Enterprise customer can deploy Office Web Apps in a private cloud, while for Windows Live users Microsoft makes Office Web Apps available free in the Internet.The following is a screen capture of editing a presentation with PowerPoint Web App.

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Office Web Apps are online companions to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote giving you the freedom to work on Microsoft Office documents with browsers including Internet Explorer 7 or later for Windows, Safari 4 or later for Mac, and Firefox 3.5 or later for Windows, Mac, or Linux.Office Web Apps are entirely Web-based, and there's no additional software to download or install. Office documents can be created and stored in a server supporting Office Web Apps right from the browser session without the need of a locally installed Microsoft Office client.

Using Office Web Apps a user will be able to view Office documents seamlessly in the browser with great fidelity, create new Office documents and do basic editing using the Ribbon. There are however some differences between the features of Office Web Apps and the Office 2010 programs. When making changes requiring functions beyond what are available in an Office Web App, or as preferred, one can easily open and edit the document in Office locally installed on your computer, and later save it back to the server. The ability to open Office documents directly from Office Web Apps into the desktop application is available on computers running a supported browser and with Microsoft Office 2003 or a later version of Office (for Windows PCs). This functionality will also be available on computers running a supported browser along with the forthcoming Office for Mac 2011.

What Is SkyDrive

A free, password-protected online storage available with a Windows Live ID by Microsoft, SkyDrive is. With a Windows Live ID, a user can store up to 25 gigabytes (GB) of files as of July, 2010. The upload operation accepts a file up to 50 megabytes (MB) in size. A user can arrange files with folder and subfolders, and keep private files in the personal folder while placing those to be public in a shared folder.  To share a folder or individual file, a user can set permissions accordingly followed by inviting others with email. Shown below is one way to create Office documents in SkyDrive.

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Although SkyDrive provides a location for storing files online, it is nevertheless not an FTP site, nor does it function with an FTP client. Further Microsoft may limit the number of files that each user can upload to SkyDrive each month. Individual seeking support on SkyDrive can participate the conversations and look for answers in SkyDrive Forum.

Office Web Apps , SharePoint, and SkyDrive

For enterprise customers with on-premise SharePoint installation, Office Web Apps require SharePoint Foundation 2010 which is free from Microsoft. On the other hand, Office Web Apps does require volume licensing. Office Web Apps can present Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files on many devices. Supported mobile viewers for Office Web Apps on SharePoint include Internet Explorer on Windows Mobile 5/6/6.1/6.5; Safari 4 on iPhone 3G and 3GS; BlackBerry 4.x and later; Nokia S60; NetFront 3.4, 3.5, and later; Opera Mobile 8.65 and later; and Openwave 6.2, 7.0 and later. To roll out the services in an enterprise environment, TechNet has documented specifics including planning and deploying Office Web Apps.

For consumers, Office Web Apps are part of the Windows Live offerings. A user with a Windows Live ID can user Office Web Apps to create, upload Office documents which are stored in SkyDrive. Supported mobile viewers for Office Web Apps on Windows Live include Safari 4 on iPhone 3G and 3GS, and Internet Explorer 7 on the upcoming Windows Phone 7. Viewing Excel files via a mobile browser is currently only available with Office Web Apps on SharePoint 2010.

imageStart Using Office Web Apps with SkyDrive Today

A supported browser and a Windows Live ID are all you need to create, view, edit, and share your Office documents in the cloud. Your teammates can now work with you on projects regardless if they have a locally installed copy of Microsoft Office.

(A cross-posting from https://blogs.technet.com/yungchou/)