Bridging the device divide

You may have noticed Microsoft pushing its new Windows 10 operating system of late. It is a fairly heavyweight change in the world of technology, but sneaking in on the undercard is something I would consider is of equal interest: a new version of the Office suite for Apple users, called Office 2016.

Microsoft has never made much of an attempt to give Apple users a version of its document production suite that was comparable to the Windows version but, with 2016, it has delivered a product that on the face of it looks like Office 2013 for Windows.

The previous version of Office for Mac was hit-and-miss. It was clunky and unreliable. But that has now changed, with an up to date and functional program matched by a similarly functional version for iPads.

The new Office for Mac is delivered via the 365 licensing scheme. This may put some people off, but I argue it is the best way to buy into the product. Microsoft has continually reduced the price of their subscriptions to a point where the word value starts to make an appearance.

When you buy a licence, you also get an exchange-based email account and additional facilities, such as a Sharepoint portal and Onenote. You also get access to the full-fat version of collaborative editing, which should prove useful to lawyers drafting documents.

Separate devices

Another useful feature of 365 is that you can run the software on up to five machines. So, if you have a desktop, a laptop, and an iPad, you do not need to buy separate licences, even if they are a mixture of Windows and Mac.

For small firms and start-ups this is an ideal scenario, mixing a world-class email system, flexible application licensing, and a nod to storage. The inclusion of Onenote, for those who use it, is a bonus. What my clients really appreciate, though, is being able to use a mixture of Apple and Windows machines.

However, before this starts to sound too much like a Microsoft advertorial, there are a few quirks and shortcomings to wrestle with.

The biggest drawback is that the underpinning language, visual basic for applications (VBA), does not work consistently between the versions of Windows and Mac. This means that if you have invested in  automating your templates, or customising your ribbons and style galleries on your Windows desktops, you cannot use the same functions in Office 2016 for Mac. This shortcoming needs addressing, although it is unlikely anything will be done as Microsoft want everyone to eventually work in the cloud rather than on a desktop.

Another quirk is Microsoft’s persistent belief that you want to use OneDrive or Sharepoint to store documents and the corresponding attempt to force their use. This is entirely unnecessary on its part, and I suspect public opinion will force them to drop this in time.

While we are talking about Sharepoint, this is still not the product it could and should be, and, as such, adoption by firms has been limited at best. Building a decent synchronisation engine and removing the confusion between it and OneDrive would be a great help in persuading firms to adopt it. It is, after all, a powerful document storage engine.

Killer product

The last word goes to OneNote, yet another worthy product held back by Microsoft shackling it to its storage platforms. This appears to be changing, as more options appear along with proper cross-platform support. To me, this should be a killer product, as most of us use notebooks in some form or other, but it has taken this long to become truly useful, so it remains to be seen if it makes an impact. 

Overall then, the new Office for Mac is pretty good, and rationalisation of the look and feel between the Windows and Mac versions is a great foot forward. Firms toying with the idea of using Apple should be comforted by that, and by the flexibility of the 365 licensing model that delivers it. SJ

Damian Blackburn is director of legal IT consultancy firm SLFtech @Damian_SLFtech 

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