Along with Microsoft's announcement Tuesday about the availability of a preview version of its next-generation mail server, Exchange 2010, the company gave out a couple of details about that most widely used software of all – Microsoft Office.
After not mentioning the suite for nearly six months, the company has come out with a general timeframe for the productivity software's release and tipped its hand as to the naming of the suite—which will apparently get the "2010" moniker like today's Exchange product. The company had previously been referring to the product as "Office 14."
On the heels of this snippet of information, tech sites have dug up the information that there will be both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the desktop software. Up to now, the software has only been available in the 32-bit flavor. But with nearly all new Windows PCs shipping with the 64-bit edition of the operating system, the 64-bit version of Office is a natural. Microsoft staff confirmed that there will be both 32- and 64-bit versions, in a statement sent to PCMag.com.
The pertinent paragraph in Microsoft's statement is this, which decisively uses the new names:
"Microsoft Office 2010, Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010, Microsoft Visio 2010 and Microsoft Project 2010 are scheduled to enter technical preview in the third quarter of 2009 and become available in the first half of 2010."
The main advantage of moving to 64 bits is the ability to take advantage of more RAM than the 4-Gbyte limit with 32-bit OSes – theoretically up to a whopping 16.8 million terabytes, though other system limitations make that much unfeasible at present. But those with huge databases and spreadsheets, as well as those who run lots of programs simultaneously would benefit. Because of the memory advantage, most Microsoft server products already have moved to 64 bits, such as Windows Server 2008.
Possibly more significant for the next version of Office will be the addition of a Web-based version of the software. The company announced this at its Professional Developer Conference in Los Angeles last September. One intriguing element of that announcement was that there would be an ad-supported version of the Web version, which might mean a free version for consumers. A Web based version also means that it will be possible to run office on Linux and on the Apple iPhone.
In other Office news, Microsoft said that Mac users can try a 30-day trial version of Office 2008, for free. The trial version is completely full-featured, but just time-constrained. Users can register for a trial key, then buy the full version from Microsoft's Mactopia site, or pick up a retail copy from an Apple authorized reseller. The Home and Student Edition of Office 2008 for Mac is priced at $150, the Standard Edition at $400, and the Special Media Edition is priced at $500, according to reports.
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