For now co-authoring is enabled/available for:
- Word
- Excel
- OneNote

More info from Microsoft on this topic can be found at:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff718249.aspx (Co authoring overview in SharePoint 2010)
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/microsoft_office_word/archive/2009/09/09/co-authoring-in-word-2010.aspx  (Co-authoring ie simultaneous editing) in Word 2010

Recently I had the proper use case to actually use this feature for its proper duty!  Together with a few colleagues I was responsible for answering a large RfP under ‘some’ time pressure….. Everyone in college or in business who has had to work together on a document knows the caveats….. how to keep up with versions, how to merge the different additions, how to share the latest version….
Have you ended up with a merged document containing changes from more than 2 authors? Was it fun judging all those changes in that rainbow of colors? Bet it was…..

I’ll leave the general description of the co-authoring feature to the Microsoft dev team and instead will focus on the practical use of this nice feature. Some prerequisites:
- SharePoint 2010
- Word 2010 client
(this applies to the Word co-authoring of course… Excel is a bit different and I’ll hope to get to that later when I have to make a joint business-case . Also, checkin/checkout should be disabled.

So, where do we start? Well, in a SP workspace with a document in it….

And how? U could click on the document name, and then in the view choose edit in word (co-authoring in web app version not supported I believe…. Note to self: test that too…) or just call function menu and choose edit in word.

Ok, so then you are busy with multiple people in a document… the catch is that you might be editing the same document,but not the same section ! Word locks the area in which an editor is working for other users until the editor saves the changes to the server, thus releasing the sections and sharing the updated results with the other authors.

But, it is possible to comment in the section someone else is editing… not the same I agree, but perhaps usefull. However, the other user would have to save (and u too) to synch the changes and make them visible. Until then Andy wont see the comment…

Its easy to see where the other user(s) are editing. A bracket appears indicating the locked section. Commenting as said is still possible, editing isnt (see notification in bottom left corner) My section locking bracket appears differently, as seen below:

If you have a small document, or you have a writer going through it like a berserker touching every paragraph you might get something like this:

All sections locked until Andy saves the document, synching the changes and releasing them to me, the other author…
From the backstage view it is possible to see who is editing the document, and send them a message. A quick image:
 

An overview of users (and the ability to send them an IM via integrated OCS) is also available at the bottom of the screen…

When both users try to save at the same time the second one is blocked…. Wait a few seconds and try again… Oh yeah, the indicator on save button indicates available updates…

Thats all for now folks ! Enjoy your co-authoring and remember to save often ! No sectionsquatters !!!

Ciao,

Martijn

ps: Thnx to www.twitter.com/@awdhaan for testing this feature together with me….

There is, unfortunately, a catch. It will only work with receiving and sending Outlook 2007 clients. I don’t believe Microsoft will open this feature for use in other mail clients, except for their own Hotmail / Live mail.

Nevertheless I like the – little naive – way they think: slow down email behaviour so a spammer will have to expand computer power. Like they won’t use botnets or hack some else’s computer to send on be-halve…?!

The better part is that it is all “under the hood” functionality. Great! As a consumer I do not wish to be burdened with this stuff. My ISP (or IT dept.) should take counter measures.

I will put my money on the mail server initiatives like DKIM, SMTP authentication, EmailXT instead of client/point solutions.

- Paul 

Office supplies mixed with IT. I like this innovative gadget!

- Paul

Click here for the download

For those who are not familiar with OMPM; it is short for Office Migration Planning Manager and is similar to what ACT (Application Compatibility Toolkit) does for Vista, only OMPM ‘does it’ for Office. It provides you with a set of tools that enables you to to scan the pc’s and file shares for document conversion issues. The purpose of this free tool is to simplify the migration to Office 2007.

Information that you can retrieve from this tool is which documents have which type of conversion issues. After examing this data, you can decide which documents you want to convert automatically (a conversion tool is provided with the OMPM) and which files you do not want to touch. In addition, it tells when documents have last been modified and that information can be used to archive those ‘ever lasting’ documents.

I’ve been playing around with this version of the OMPM this morning and I have to admit that is has some improvements over the Preview version Microsoft has released a few months ago. Improvements I’ve noticed are:
* Access databases can now also be analyzed.
* More conversion issue types are included (see picture) and more information on those issues is provided

* The VET (Version Extraction Tool) works. In earlier versions of Word a user was able to save multiple versions of a document in one document. This feature was barely used and is now removed from the Office 2007 feature list. But this means that if you open such a doc with Office 2007 (even in compatibility mode!) you’ll loose those different versions. The VET can extract those different versions automatically and store them in a folder called “[FileName] Versions”

So with this handy tool in place, we are ready to migrate those Office suites!

Regards,
Stefan Stranger
http://weblog.stranger.nl

Read more at source.

Regards,
Stefan Stranger
http://weblog.stranger.nl

Its comes is two flavors, the Standard and of course the Enterprise edition. The standard can host up to 5000 clients. While the Enterpise can have more clients connected and can use Hardware Load balancing and much more enterprise like stuff.

In one word LCS 2007 is great, finally we now get the live meeting solution to our own LAN. Microsoft calls it as On-Premis Web Conferencing. I think this is a great thing for world wide spread organisations. The combination of Outlook 2007 with the Live meeting plug-in, Exchange 2007, LCS 2007 and the new 2007 Communictaor give you al the flexibility you need as an Information Worker. With great presence information (MS calls it Rich presence). you can now pin point youre status information. So not everbody needs to know what you are up to but only youre boss and wife let’s say.

There is support for PSTN phone lines within the 2007 edition. So pretty cool. Just have to figure out a way to use UM from Exchange 2007 with LCS 2007 and the 2007 Communicator.

 To bad there is no mobile 2007 communicator (yet). Would be nice.

If you install the 2007 communicator you will need a LCS 2007 backend. LCS 2005 is not supported as back-end.

I will some up some features:

NEW FEATURES:
§         On-Premise Web Conferencing

§         Rich Presence

§         Federation Enhancements

§         Deployment and Administration Improvements

Multimedia Capabilities:

§         IM Conferencing Server. Provides server-managed group IM.

§         Web Conferencing Server. Enables multiparty data collaboration.

§         A/V Conferencing Server. Enables audio and video conferencing.

§         Telephony Conferencing Server. Enables audio conference integration with ACP (audio conferencing providers).§         Access Edge Server. Validates and forwards IM traffic between internal and external users. The Live Communications Server 2005 Access Proxy with a new name.

§         Web Conferencing Edge Server. Enables data collaboration with external users.
§         A/V Conferencing Edge Server. Enables audio and video conferencing with external users.§         Group IM

§         Data Collaboration
§         Audio/Video
§         PSTN Connectivity

Data Collaboration:

§         PowerPoint support. Uploading and sharing Microsoft PowerPoint® presentation graphics program slide decks, including animations and other rich features.
§         Application sharing. Sharing applications among multiple participants. Can be disabled using WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation).
§         Microsoft Office Document Imaging (MODI) Support. Uploading and sharing of any document format that supports the MODI print driver, such as the full suite of Office documents.
§         Web page. Sharing Web pages that can be viewed and navigated by all meeting participants.
§         Multimedia. Viewing media files (such as Flash or Windows media files) synchronously by all meeting participants.
§         Handouts. Sharing files in their native formats among meeting participants.
§         Snapshot. Taking and viewing a static Desktop snapshot.
§         White boarding. Free-form drawing and writing in a common, shared space.
§         Text. Writing and sharing text on a virtual whiteboard (separate from richer white boarding features).
§         Annotation. Annotating any type of slides.
§         Polling. Polling meeting participants based on lists of questions and possible answers and recording and compiling their responses.
§         Q & A. Asking and answering questions during a meeting.
§         Chat. IM within the context of a meeting.
§         Shared notes. Ability to share meeting notes with other participants.
 

So this is a lot that we can do with LCS 2007. I’m excited can’t wait for the release updates.

See ya,

Jeroen J. Jansen

Source: MS

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

  

This download is available for anyone that is using an Office 2007 installation with a valid key, as it uses validation prior to download.

This download allows you to export and save to the PDF and XPS formats in eight 2007 Microsoft Office programs. It also allows you to send as e-mail attachment in the PDF and XPS formats in a subset of these programs. Specific features vary by program.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=4d951911-3e7e-4ae6-b059-a2e79ed87041&displaylang=en

 http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/beta/overview.mspx

The requirements to run Office 2007 beta2 are :

Operating system 
Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack (SP) 2 or later or Microsoft Windows Server 2003 (or higher) required
Computer and processor 
500 megahertz (MHz) processor or higher; 256 megabyte (MB) RAM or higher; DVD drive; 1 gigahertz (GHz) and 512 MB of RAM or higher is required to run Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager
Hard disk 
2 gigabyte (GB) necessary for install; a portion of this disk space will be freed after installation if the original download package is removed from the hard drive
Monitor resolution
Minimum 800×600; 1024×768 or higher recommended
Internet connection 
Broadband connection, 128 kilobits per second (Kbps) or greater, for download and activation of products
Additional components
Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 with service packs, Microsoft Exchange Server 2000 or later required for Outlook 2007 users. To install Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager, you will need to first install Outlook 2007
 

Read all requirements (also for Office server) on http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/beta/sysreq.mspx

Everyone that has written some documents knows Microsoft Text editor number 1 and that’s Word.

Why is it that most people that are posting on weblogs (like www.buit.org ) use a web based editor and/or notepad?
The answer is simple, Word doesn’t allow you to post to weblogs until now… From Word 2007 b2 it will be possible to blog using Word like you use to writing documents. And it’s not only text that you can use, pictures are also supported.

Howto:
There are 2 ways of posting to a weblog from Word 2007:
1.       Select File -> New -> “New Blog Post.”
2.       Start a post from an existing document | Select File -> Publish -> Blog
Supported Blogs:
Word 2007 b2 will support services based on the metaweblog API or the ATOM API. Not all services will work in b2 because almost every API is implemented differently, but the basic functions should work in b2.