Office 365 Newswire: Details leaked on Microsoft SharePoint Online 2013 – 3.16.2012

I’ve spent some time this week with my nephew. He’s three and he is dangerous with an iPad. If he sees one, he immediately wants to play with it. Normally, I wouldn’t trust a 3 year old with an expensive computer but in his case, it is entirely entertaining to watch him work it. I’ve been obsessed with Haikus lately and here is one I wrote about him just now:

He knows what to touch
Swiping is easy, changing
screens is a breeze, dude

I’ve been amazed with the iOS user interface since its initial release because people know how to use it without any training whatsoever. Luddites like my wife and mother-in-law are very proficient with their iPhones.

A 99 year old grandmother purchases one and writes a poem with it the first day she has it.
A baby girl is exposed to one and then wonders why a nearby print magazine doesn’t “work”

I think this is how all software should be. I know it is difficult to achieve. It isn’t easy to make the user interface easy-to-use. It isn’t inexpensive either… but it is worth it. Just ask AAPL.

Anyways, these are thoughts that have been taking up residence in my head, slightly unorganized.

Then I ran across this interview: >Buttons were an inspired UI hack, but now we’ve got better options. I read it and it helped me understand why I’ve been so amazed by iOS. I love that he calls buttons both a hack and a middleman. The interview is good (est. reading time 5 mins).

I think we are in for some exciting changes with the upcoming “Wave 15” releases from Microsoft. The way we interact with software will look drastically different in just a few years. Heck, looking back 5 years ago, who was predicting what we are seeing now? This stuff is fun.

Office 365 news & editorials

• New lower prices for Office 365 :: Office 365 continues to add more and more customers. From the looks of it, the growth has resulted in cost efficiencies for Microsoft. Microsoft is a benevolent capitalistic company so they are passing the savings to their customers. If you want to see a breakdown of the saving by each plan visit this article from The Register. (est. reading time: 1 min)
• Details begin to leak on Microsoft SharePoint Online 2013 :: MJF (Mary Jo Foley) has some information regarding the next version of SharePoint Online. This is the version that will be released with Office 15. I think almost everyone believes the next version of Office and SharePoint will be Office 2013 and SharePoint 2013 respectively. So it is no shocker that one leaked juicy detail is that the next version of SharePoint Online will be called SharePoint Online 2013. There is more but… like anything with an anonymous source… take it with a grain of salt. The fact is, until MSFT starts releasing official details, we just don’t know. (est. reading time: 3 mins)
• Beauty product company selects Office 365 over Google Docs :: I like to include stories about real companies using Office 365. I only wish I could find solid case studies from independent sources. But I am not holding my breath. Microsoft is the best source given they have a vested interest. I say best source because they are the best place to find such stories. I didn’t say they are an objective source. Anyways, this company took a dramatic step forward with their technology simply by opening and using an Office 365 account.(est. reading time: 2 mins) 

Office 365 tips, tricks & tools

• Create a SharePoint Document Library in Office 365 :: This article starts out as if it is meant for the IT Admin readers. It mentions cmdlets and that there are not any that work with SharePoint Online for this purpose. But do not be afraid. The article continues as a nice tutorial for creating a document library using SharePoint Online’s web interface. (est. reading time: 5 minutes)
• How secure is your current iOS SharePoint client with Office 365? :: This is an important question. If you are connecting to SharePoint Online with any of the iOS apps that work with it, then you need to be careful. This post details a flaw in the system that affects several iOS apps. (est. reading time: 3 mins)
• Get InfoPath forms and SharePoint Online with Office 365 :: If you make significant use of InfoPath forms in your on-premise instance of SharePoint, you will be glad to know you can use InfoPath with SharePoint Online. In fact, you can do it without buying InfoPath. Read this article to find out which Office 365 plan includes InfoPath. (est. reading time: 2 mins)

Office 365 developer & IT admin items of interest

• Migrating content between SharePoint Online Site collections :: Have you ever created a folder in Windows and placed a ton of files in it only to decide later that you want to create a different folder in a different location entirely and move the files now residing in the original folder into the new folder? Did you know the previous sentence contains 47 words and is not run-on sentence? Well, this article shows how to complete this “content migration” task within SharePoint Online. (est. reading time: 3 mins)
• Displaying an Office 365 SharePoint page in iFrame in CRM :: SharePoint & CRM integration isn’t all that is great out of the box. Still, if you all you want to do is something basic like display a SharePoint Online page in your CRM instance, then this article shows you how to do it. (est. reading time: 2 mins)

Cutting Room Floor

• Is there a Plan B if Windows 8’s Metro fails?
• How to live without the start button in Windows 8