How can you buy Office 365?

Now that we know what Office 365 is, it is important to find out how we can buy the service from Microsoft. While we're at it, we can find out how much does Office 365 cost to subscribe to.

Simply put, here are the current Office 365 offerings, all of which can be found on the Office 365 website here:

• Office 365 Home Premium (US$ 99.99 per user per year)
  Designed for home use, and includes:
• Microsoft Office 2013 to be installed on up to 5 PCs or Macs (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Publisher, and Access)
• Office On-Demand and Office WebApps
• +20 GB online storage with SkyDrive
• 60 Skype world minutes per month (available in select countries)
• Office 365 Small Business Premium (US$ 150 per user per year)
  Designed for small companies with up to 10 users, and includes:
• Exchange Online with 25GB mailbox
• SharePoint Online with a public website and internal team sites
• Lync Online with web conferencing and instant messaging
• Microsoft Office 2013 to be installed on up to 5 PCs or Macs (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Publisher, Lync, and Access)
• Office On-Demand and Office WebApps
• Simple IT Controls
• Office 365 Midsize (US$ 180 per user per year)
  Designed for midsize businesses with between 11 and 250 users, and includes:
• Exchange Online with 25GB mailbox
• SharePoint Online with a public website and internal team sites
• Lync Online with web conferencing and instant messaging
• Microsoft Office 2013 to be installed on up to 5 PCs or Macs (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Publisher, Lync, InfoPath, and Access)
• Office On-Demand and Office WebApps
• Enhanced IT Controls
• Office 365 E1 Plan (US$ 8 per user per month)
  Designed for enterprises with over 250 users, and includes:
• Exchange Online with 25GB mailbox
• SharePoint Online with a public website and internal team sites
• Lync Online with web conferencing and instant messaging
• Office On-Demand and Office WebApps
• File storage and sharing with SkyDrive Pro
• Advanced IT Controls
• Office 365 E3 Plan (US$ 20 per user per month)
  Designed for enterprises with over 250 users, and includes:
• Exchange Online with 25GB mailbox
• SharePoint Online with a public website and internal team sites
• Lync Online with web conferencing and instant messaging
• Microsoft Office 2013 to be installed on up to 5 PCs or Macs (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Publisher, Lync, InfoPath, and Access)
• Office On-Demand and Office WebApps
• File storage and sharing with SkyDrive Pro
• Advanced IT Controls

Of course, you can buy individual products:

• Exchange Online: US$ 4 (or US$ 8 for added features) per user per month
• SharePoint Online: US$ 3 (or US$ 7 for added features) per user per month
• Lync Online: US$ 2 (or US$ 5.50 for added features) per user per month
• Project Online: US$ 33 per user per month (paid annually in advance)

Alternatively, you can contact your favorite IT service provider and ask them to get you Office 365.

In conclusion, it is important to say that Office 365 is not a 'one-size-fits-all' type of product. Companies should decide based on their requirements with consideration for future expansion.

What is Office 365?

With all the hype surrounding Office 365, I've noticed that most people still don't know what it is. First impressions, probably because of the name, tend to go towards it being the next version of Office, the popular desktop suite. This is partially true, as Office is part of Office 365, but not the entire story.

Office 365 comprises of 4 main products, 3 or which are Cloud-based, as follows:

• Exchange Online: this is Microsoft's enterprise level email, calendar and contacts platform, hosted and managed by Microsoft. Under Exchange Online, users get email (25GB mailbox per user) as well as calendar and contact management, including the most current antivirus and anti-span solutions to help protect your organization.
• SharePoint Online: this is Microsoft's collaboration suite, hosted and managed by Microsoft. Under SharePoint Online, businesses can create sites to share documents and insights with colleagues, partners and customers.
• Lync Online: this is Microsoft's unified communications offering, hosted and managed by Microsoft. Under Lync Online, users can meet online with PC-audio, video (including HD) conferencing and screen sharing capabilities. Lync Online can also be used for instant messaging and presence (available, busy, do not disturb, etc.) sharing.
• Office Professional Plus: this is Microsoft's popular productivity suite which can be downloaded (only downloads no other media available) and installed on up to 5 devices, Windows and/or Macs, per user.

It is important to note that, Office Professional Plus includes other features such as on-demand download; this basically means you can download Office applications (not the entire thing) on any number of Windows & Mac devices work on your documents and then when you're done, Office will remove itself automatically. You can even work on Office documents directly from the browser.

There are other products available from Microsoft as part of the Office 365 suite, however, the main four pillars are those mentioned above. Other products include:

• Project Online, and soon (unofficially speaking),
• Visio Online

Here is glance at what each of the core Office 365 products entails:

Links:

• Exchange Online: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/microsoft-exchange-online-email-for-business-FX103739072.aspx
• SharePoint Online: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/online-collaboration-software-sharepoint-online-FX103789366.aspx
• Lync Online: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/lync/webinar-software-lync-online-features-FX103789571.aspx
• Project Online: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/project/online-project-management-software-project-online-FX103802026.aspx

 

Microsoft Cloud: Office 365, Windows Intune & Windows Azure

Getting to know Office 365 closer I have learned a few things about Microsoft's cloud offerings here and there, including Windows Intune and Windows Azure as well as Office 365. Starting today I'm gonna start writing blog entries about what I learn on a daily basis, share the knowledge sort of thing.

I'm gonna start presenting on these technologies as well, so, if you need me to come present sometime, please email, or call me and I'll be there. All I ask of you is to bring people and an internet connection.

I'll probably concentrate on Office 365 for the next few blog posts, but then I'll start mixing and matching as we go along.

To start with let me first guide you to where you can get more details on each product:

1. Office 365 www.office365.com
2. Windows Intune www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windowsintune
3. Windows Azure www.windowsazure.com

If you don't know much about any of these, don't worry, we'll cover each with detail.

Yes, I still Bing as my main search engine, I use Windows 8, I have a Windows Phone 8 mobile, the lovely Nokia Lumia 920 and my sons love their Surface RT!!

Windows 8 Available for Download, NOW!!

All MSDN & TechNet subscribers should now be able to the RTM release!!!

Windows Phone Camp - 25th May 2012

Broadcasting live on MAY 25th from Istanbul, Turkey (in English) is the Middle East & Africa Windows Phone Camp!

A Windows Phone camp is a free event where you can learn everything you need to know to develop and publish a Windows Phone application. This event will be both an in person and online event broadcasted across the region. Day 1 will include a VIP keynote and technical sessions covering Windows Phone development. Day 2 will be “hands-on” with the opportunity to roll up your sleeves and code – put your learning to work and build that app you’ve been dreaming about! Please note that only Day 1 will be broadcasted online.

Whether you’re a student just starting out or a seasoned developer for Windows Phone, Android, Symbian, Web OS or iOS, we’ll share tips and tricks and all-around Windows Phone development know-how throughout the two days. There will be sessions for start-up companies as well.

To read more about the event, go here.

To watch, go to the event site, or stay tuned on May 25th for another post with the live player.

Join the conversation with the event organizers and attendees #windowsphonecamp

 

Why my son is searching through Bing rather than Google?

My eldest, Basheer, is 9 years old. And, as with all 9 year olds he has a inquisitive mind. Along with his 2 younger siblings I get bombarded with all sorts of questions on a minute-by-minute basis. Sometimes it gets annoying especially when I really don’t know the answer to some of the questions. Last week after “how do they catch lions for the zoo?”, “what is the latest mobile brand” and “how big are whales and what do they eat?” I decided I should steer him towards the Internet and let him get his own answers.

Being a Microsoft fan (that’s an understatement!), I immediately thought of Bing as the default search engine (seeing as it is already the default engine on his iPod), but then I thought realistically at what arguments there are for Bing against Google, and that is why I decided to write this post.

To cut to the chase, the main reason I chose Bing over Google for my son is (drumroll!) parental control.

Yes, parental control. Let me explain. When searching the Internet, one (especially kids) usually searches for images on the said subject. Needless to say, the images (and a lot of the written material) returned are not always exactly ‘children material’. For example, take the simple term ‘miniskirt’, when searching using Bing, I get the results shown in the image below, which to me, a parent, are perfect. Now, try this same search using Google, and the results are a lot higher up on the PG rating, to say the least.

The reason Bing is blocking these images is because we live in Kuwait, a Muslim country and under Kuwaiti law, such images are prohibited. Therefore, Bing automatically switches ‘SafeSearch’ on, and you cannot switch it off, believe me, I’ve tried. While this may be frustrating and considered a hampering of freedom for some adults, it is absolutely wonderful for concerned parents.

Google on the other hand does not switch ‘SafeSearch’ on automatically, and if it does, you can easily switch it off with relative ease (yes, even Basheer can do it).

So you see, this is why I guided Basheer to Bing rather than Google when searching on the Internet.

What do you think?

Windows Marketplace and Microsoft Marketing

I was sitting with a dear friend, and we were talking about the new Windows Phone 7,  and the how it compares with the competition (iPhone, Android and Blackberry; notice no mention of Nokia here), and the Apple App Marketplace was mentioned, then my friend suddenly asks: why doesn’t Microsoft have a Windows Marketplace, that would be a great idea?

My immediate reaction was; what the … ?! Microsoft does have a Windows Marketplace and has had one for quite a while now. When I told my friend this he asked, well, why doesn’t Microsoft market this place? Why did I never hear of it before?

To tell you the truth, his was a good question, and it took me some time to realize this; Microsoft really doesn’t market a lot of its work well, doesn’t it? I mean, I grew up hearing the words “Microsoft is nothing but a great big marketing machine” and “the marketing people at Microsoft created this image” and stuff like that, to the point where I started to believe it was true.

But it really isn’t true, not to this point anyway. Microsoft does have a big advertising budget, but IMHO that is only targeted to products it can sell, products like Windows, Office, SharePoint and Windows Phone 7. A lot of other products go unnoticed, simply because nobody knew they even existed. I mean, up until I told everybody, nobody knew Microsoft had their own free antivirus product you can install i.e. Microsoft Security Essentials; operative word is free here.

Other things Microsoft does that go unnoticed are success stories, did you know that MySpace uses SQL Server? As a matter of fact, 440 SQL instances, yes, four-hundred-and-forty instances. Not only that, the total data managed by SQL Server is a whopping 1 petabyte (1 petabyte = 1024 Terrabytes = 1,048,576 Gigabytes), with 130 million users, 300,000 new users every day and 4.4 million concurrent users at peak time. Try that on for scalability and stability!!

Back to the Microsoft Marketplace, not only does Microsoft have a marketplace for Windows, it has one for Office, Mobile and Xbox. Yes, that is correct, four! And here they are:

• Windows Marketplace
• Windows Phone Marketplace
• Microsoft Office Marketplace
• Xbox Marketplace

So you see, Microsoft really is a changed company, and not all for the worse either. What do you think?

Links:

• http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/
• http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Case_Study_Detail.aspx?CaseStudyID=4000004532
• http://www.windowsmarketplace.com/
• http://marketplace.windowsphone.com/Default.aspx
• http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/marketplace/
• http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/

Do you ‘bing’?

I know it sounds cheesy, that’s because it probably is. Not because it’s particularly wrong to try to ‘verbify’ it, but because it’s trying too hard to be like Google. The fact is, I do ‘bing’. Yes, you heard right, I use Microsoft’s bing as my primary search engine, and I have done so since the very first day. Actually, I started with ‘Live’, even before the birth of bing.

Having said, I have to say, I have never had to revert back to Google, ever. I have almost always found what I was looking for; except in those extreme cases when I could not, a quick refinement of my search keywords would remedy that immediately. That doesn’t say that I never use Google, I do, but only when the default search engine is set to Google (someone else’s machine); I’m not going to switch to bing just for the sake of switching.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying there’s something particularly wrong with Google, it’s just that I prefer bing. And I would ask everybody to try to use bing for some time, let’s say, a week, just force yourself for a week, and you’ll see for yourself that it is at least as good as Google. In fact, other than the interface, there isn’t much to differentiate between both search engines. That’s primarily because they keep competing for the same features, when one adds one the other does as well.

As for ‘verbifying’ the name, I’m afraid I will continue to use ‘google it’ instead of ‘bing it’ just the same way I say, pass the ‘Kleenex’ or ‘Xerox’ this for me or I ‘Hoovered’ the carpet.

What do you think?

Microsoft Maren

Almost every Arabic speaking person I know does this; they write Arabic words using English letters. When chatting, SMSing or even blogging.

That’s somewhat normal, since they’ve memorized the English keyboard by heart. The problem is, some of the letters in the Arabic alphabet are missing in English, and therefore people have replaced these with numbers and combinations of numbers and letters.

For example, the Arabic letter ‘ع’ is replaced with the number ‘3’. And the letter ‘ء’ with ‘2’. Which makes the name ‘علاء’ in Arabic translate to ‘3ala2’ in English literals.

If anything, this makes reading very difficult.

Introducing Maren, Microsoft Egypt’s solution to the problem! Watch the video on the site and you’ll understand…

Download it here.

Links:
http://www.getmaren.com

Xbox 360: Project Natal

I’ve heard about this a great number of times but never thought it was this good! If you thought (like I did) the Wii was good… take a look at this!!

Like my friend Shijaz said: no words, just watch and see.

Farewell Windows XP, Hello Windows 7

I just formatted my laptop. It is something I have not done ever since I bought my laptop almost 2 years ago, which came with Windows XP preinstalled.

I formatted it to install Windows 7 which, as an MSDN subscriber, I had first hand access to. I did everything right, I backed up my previous C: drive (I keep all my files on the D: drive) and made emergency bootable media just in case.

I inserted my Windows 7 DVD and restarted. A few clicks later, the installation was on its way. Thus far, I have to say, things were looking pretty good. Less than 30 minutes later the installation was complete and I was running Windows 7 for the first time ever.

I have to admit I was hyper-excited. I’d only had 4 hours of sleep the night before and was falling half asleep between clicks, but, it was all worth it. The ‘adrenaline was pumping fast’ as they say on reality TV shows.

Just to clear things up; my laptop’s a 1.6GHz Gateway with 3GB memory and 160GB HDD, and a VGA capable of running Aero. Towards the end of the Windows XP days, it was running pretty darn slow, because of all the software I’d install for testing and/or development purposes. And I was looking forward to the alleged ‘crisp’ speed of Windows 7.

To tell you the truth I was shocked to see how Vista-like it was, and when applications started to freeze for no apparent reason, I said to myself, oh boy, here we go again. If the recession didn’t ‘break’ Microsoft, this surely will, another Vista fiasco.

I tried to run Windows Media Player for the first time and it froze. I ran IE8, and a few tabs in, it froze. I couldn’t understand the ‘new taskbar’ and how it was supposed to operate and even that froze.

I was devastated. Now I have to switch back to Windows XP! And then I remembered an article I’d read earlier about how Windows 7 would run on netbooks and I thought, year right, super netbooks maybe.

I mean, on my machine, running almost entirely with no other applications installed, Windows 7 required almost 800 MBs of memory. That’s almost 4 times as much as Windows XP had required. Most netbooks have around 1GB memory in total, which leaves around 200MB for all other applications. How is that going to work, I don’t know.

The next day, I’d had some sleep and decided to give it another shot. I setup my email accounts, downloaded all the available updates, which were mostly for Office and then gave it a number of restarts.

A couple of hours had passed by, and for some reason (perhaps it’d finished indexing) Windows 7 started to work surprising well. No freezing, no delays, fast responses; IE8 was exceptionally responsive, even faster than Google’s Chrome on my XP machine!

Every other application I ran was working perfectly. I was getting the hang of it, and that new taskbar is amazing!! Windows 7 has so much out-of-the-box now I fear another round of anti-trust cases. In fact, the only problem I had was the fact that it was using way too much memory for my liking.

The way things are going if I never use Windows XP again, it’ll be too soon. For now though, call me Mr. Windows 7!!

Links:
Read my article on Bright Hub: http://www.brighthub.com/computing/windows-platform/articles/34988.aspx

Can you say 'Xobni'?

Neither could I. Xobni (pronounced zob-nee) is 'Inbox' spelt backwards, and has been hailed by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates as the 'next generation of social networking'.

At first glance Xobni looks like yet-another-desktop-search-engine, much like Google Desktop and Windows Desktop Search. A second glance would prove all the difference.

Officially, Xobni is an Outlook plug-in 'that helps you organize your flooded inbox' (which doesn't say much).

While indexing your email Xobni will group contacts you email together much like the way Facebook and LinkedIn do. It will provide you with information on who this contact 'networks' with (based on the people he Cc's when emailing you), how many emails you have exchanged with each contact (in and out) and will even rank your contacts based on the number of emails you send.

Xobni will even let you know how many 'conversations' you have had with a particular contact and what files you exchanged with him/her.

Xobni will even attempt to associate telephone numbers with contacts based on 'signatures' and other algorithms and will allow you to call them using Skype. Whenever you click on an email (to read or preview it) Xobni will immediately provide you with the most relevant information for the person who has sent you the email.

Microsoft seems to have been interested in Xobni, but were turned down, price issues (rings-a-bell?). Xobni are planning versions for different email applications / services, but right now, its only for Outlook. Remember, its still in beta.

Enjoy!

Links:

• http://www.xobni.com/

Long Live VB!!! or not?

Ok, first a disclaimer: I'm a Microsoft MVP with a competency in Visual Basic.

Normally I would not give this much thought, I've always favored VB (I started using it back when it was in version 3) over all other languages and thought very little of the debates that went on online comparing it to other languages.

Even when I read columns like this one, I felt nothing of it. 'VB will prevail' I used to tell myself, after all, no sane company in its right mind would alienate its 'largest group of developers'. I still think so.

However, when I am asked to 'consider' switching over to C# by my company, and specifically my boss and friend, who he himself is a former VB MVP, a few different thought-storms are brewing in my mind.

But probably the most important question is: how did this happen?

That is when I decided to write this blog. The fact of the matter is, there are many reasons for this to happen. The migration of developers from other platforms, J2EE for example, find a more familiar face in C#. VB6ers NOT migrating to the .Net world is another factor. And perhaps, the mere fact that VB is dubbed the hobbyists language of choice (after all, it is the most downloaded setup of Microsoft's 'express' editions) is yet another reason why 'professionals' are migrating.

But perhaps most importantly is universities worldwide offering C# as the development language of choice (or any semicolon language for that matter).

All the rest, is merely the chain reaction set in motion. C# books becoming more popular and better selling. C# developers becoming more desirable and thus paid better. Resources for C# are becoming much more available than for VB. And now Microsoft, the company that popularized the language, are treating it as a second-class citizen.

I don't mind becoming 'multilingual', but I've grown to love and respect VB throughout the years, and I won't go down without a fight! In my opinion, VB is and will remain the 'easiest' most efficient language to develop applications in; plus I don't think it is fair. Bill Gates: help!!

Anyway I'll take C#, with a grain of salt.

What do you think?

Links:

• http://visualstudiomagazine.com/columns/article.aspx?editorialsid=2540

Search Command Ribbon for Office 2007

Don't know about you, but personally I love Office 2007. Despite what I hear and read about it, it is much easier than its predecessor (which ultimately means it is more efficient).

Having said that, the number one problem users new to Office 2007 face is the 'ribbon'. To them, everything's NOT where they used to have it and that actually reduces efficiency.

Therefore, the guys at OfficeLabs (online at http://www.officelabs.com/, BTW powered by SharePoint) have come up with what they think would be the solution to some of their troubles; the search command ribbon.

What this does, is allow you to search for whatever command you're looking for and the search result will actually be displayed in the ribbon itself.

A picture is worth a thousand words:

Remember, if you decide to download and install this, you should bear in mind that Microsoft will be gathering information with regards to your usage, and you can NOT disable this which can be turned off from the 'Privacy' menu (thank you 'Anonymous' whoever you are).

IMHO we 'developers' should be doing more with regards to integrating solutions into Office using the new 'VSTO' (Visual Studio Tools for Office). Right?

Microsoft Live Mesh

Ok. I just read about this on some blog. Microsoft's "Live Mesh is an ambitious initiative — a combination of a platform and a service" or "a Software + Services platform for synchronization and collaboration" or simply "I think it’s being able to interact with your data anywhere you go across a number of devices"

'Nuff said. Click on the links to find more!

Unfortunately, there's a waiting list to try it out. I'll try and see if I can pull some MVP muscle to get it.

Awesome!

Links:

• http://content.zdnet.com/2346-12558_22-198563-1.html
• http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1355&tag=nl.e539
• http://blogs.zdnet.com/Stewart/?p=821&tag=nl.e539
• https://www.mesh.com/

Rumor: Microsoft Will Launch Own Retail Stores

It may not seem like something the general public has been crying out for, but Microsoft has apparently decided to begin opening its own retail stores.

Citing “our sources close to Microsoft”, Fudzilla claims the Yahoo chaser desperately wants to establish a retail market presence to build interest and desirability around its products, much in the same way Apple has done so successfully.

A full catalogue of Microsoft only products will allegedly be stocked in these stores ranging from PC peripherals such as mice and webcams to its Zune MP3 player line, Xbox 360 games console, Windows Mobile based handsets and core software offerings.

Microsoft's Zune: Round 2

Ok for all of you out there who take their music seriously; Zune 2 is out. Yes, and it comes in new sizes, colors, capacities and of course, prices.

Here are a few of the update details for Zune 2 (source: ZuneScene):

1. Glass: The plastic screen has been replaced with actual glass. On a hardness scale of 1-10 where 10 is a diamond and 1 is an iPod, glass is 5.5. This is a major improvement over the Zune 30.
2. Video Out: The new Zune 80 will have a video out resolution of 720x576 maximum. This is for TV output and easily beats the original Zune's 320x240 output. The LCD itself is the same 320x240 however. Warning to Zune 4/8 shoppers, there is not video output to TV on those flash memory units.
3. Smaller: Yes the Zune 2 is much smaller in size this generation. It actually weighs less than the latest 80gb iPod. This weight difference could be and advantage for Tour de France competitors and people who don't like to weigh down the school backpack with hefty devices.
4. WiFi: Would you like to be the first on the block to sync your player from the car in the driveway? Very 007-ish, Q would be proud.
5. FM: Most players require an expensive ($49) add on accessory that sticks out the bottom of the player. Built in FM is just smart.
6. Squircle: The Zune Pad offers both tactile d-pad type control and also touch sensitivity. Have your cake and eat it too.

I'm actually considering one!

Links:
http://www.zune.net/en-US/meetzune/
http://www.zunescene.com/
http://www.news.com/2300-1041_3-6211316.html?tag=ne.gall.rbcs

MSDN Roadshow: Gaining Insight Tour 2007

I've just received an email (actually I received the email yesterday but this sounds better) about Microsoft's upcoming MSDN and Technet Roadshow. This is Microsoft's technology promoting tour of the Gulf region. If you've never attended one, this is your chance to do so.

This time their sideline is 'Gaining Insight Tour'. Insight into what? Here's the list:

• Windows Server 2008
• SQL Server 2008
• Visual Studio 2008
• Silverlight

Plus, there are sessions on:

• Unified Communications
• Virtualization, and
• IIS7

Coming to a theatre near you! Check it out!

Links:
https://profile.microsoft.com/RegSysProfileCenter/wizard.aspx?wizid=e1dcb941-a365-4d4b-8e0f-1c3a8946ecb1&lcid=1033

Visual Basic Power Packs 2.0

Line and Shape controls, PrintForm component, and Printer Compatibility Library Microsoft Visual Basic 2005 Power Packs 2.0 includes a new set of Line and Shape controls and updated versions of the two previously released Visual Basic 2005 Power Packs, the PrintForm Component and the Printer Compatibility Library. All three are now included in a single assembly making them even easier to use and redistribute with your application.

Links:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vbasic/bb735936.aspx

Partnership: Microsoft & Facebook

Hey, all you Facebook fans out there, Microsoft and Facebook have launched a partnership and Microsoft has released a 'Facebook Developer Toolkit' which allows you to create applications for Facebook using Microsoft Popfly and Visual Studio Express.

You can even create a Windows Forms application that connects to Facebook using Facebook's API!! Now that I like!

Enjoy!!

Links:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/express/bb510381.aspx