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Topic: Software

About time! Office 2010 'academic edition'; Microsoft actually listens

Summary: Microsoft have finally added a dedicated academic edition for the next release of Office. Have they finally started listening to the student minority?

Zack Whittaker

By for iGeneration |

Microsoft have been listening, dear readers. It's difficult for me to splutter the words out loud, however it does seem that the technological evolution of words on paper can just about squeeze in.

Previous Office editions included Home & Student, but this was geared towards the home user, rather than that of the latter student. Office 2010 will include a dedicated academic edition, called Office Professional Academic 2010.

This edition will include Outlook for the first time, which suggests they may have finally realised the importance that email has with students of this generation. Alongside this, they are noticing the increase in web email and the rise of Google Docs and corresponding email services. Even though Live@edu (with Moodle integration as an added bonus) is on the increase and surprisingly taking over in the race with Google, Outlook would seemingly act as an additional element to the email experience. One would hope, at least.

With the loss of student-focused 'Equipt' which seemed to die just before it was really getting started, the company was aware that students were an important market to impress and have finally followed suit.

It will not include Office Web Apps by standard as this will be for the individual university to roll out should they see fit, to integrate with existing SharePoint systems. Students can still use the free version which will be available in SkyDrive.

One worry though is that the price of the academic edition will rise from the standard, non-discounted version due to the increase in applications it provides. While it is solely for academic use, there is nothing physically stopping the less social-economically viable users purchasing it.

I will sleep tonight a very happy chappy. What do you think? A good move on the part of Microsoft or is this an ancient Trojan horse promotion hiding something rather sinister?

Topics: Software, Collaboration, Microsoft

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46 comments
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  • Looks great

    hopefully, then can offer it at a great price.
    The one and only, Cylon Centurion
    Reply Vote

    • No doubt the Ulimate Steal will be back

      But maybe not including this edition of Office - it doesn't have the Ultimate tag on it y'see.
      zwhittaker
      Reply Vote

      • Zack, you're a bit late to this story.

        Academic editions of Office Professional have been sold in previous versions before:

        http://www.trustprice.com/593599/microsoft-ae-microsoft-office-2007.html

        http://www1.uk.shopping.com/xPO-Microsoft-Office-2003-Professional-Academic-v-269-06753
        Joe_Raby
        Reply Vote

      • RE: About time! Office 2010 'academic edition'; Microsoft actually listens

        Some people, although very good at what they do, cannot teach to save their life. It is likely your supervisor fits into this category. I would be tempted not to say anything negative about your supervisor.
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        digbycory
        Reply Vote

      • RE: About time! Office 2010 'academic edition'; Microsoft actually listens

        Unfourtanatly, every thing has gone up. I really don't buy into all the hype. I have 3 "babies" who are healthy, happy, & muched loved. We do have a low cost vet we go to.
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        TeofilUrban
        Reply Vote

      • RE: About time! Office 2010 'academic edition'; Microsoft actually listens

        Unfourtanatly, every thing has gone up. I really don't buy into all the hype. I have 3 "babies" who are healthy, happy, & muched loved. We do have a low cost vet we go to.
        <a href="http://www.gecigarette.com/">Electronic Cigarette</a>
        TeofilUrban
        Reply Vote

      • RE: About time! Office 2010 'academic edition'; Microsoft actually listens

        Earning the professional certification in customer service tends the applicants to exhibit their knowledge and acquisitions in work areas that a company values and show evidence of loyalty to proficient growth.
        <a href="http://www.opensesame.com/courses/readytomanage/improving-customer-service-rapid-skill-builder-course">customer service training</a> | <a href="http://www.opensesame.com/courses/readytomanage/improving-customer-service-rapid-skill-builder-course">customer service courses</a> | <a href="http://www.opensesame.com/courses/readytomanage/improving-customer-service-rapid-skill-builder-course">customer service training courses</a>
        MILTONMITCH
        Reply Vote

  • I'll wait for the Mac version,

    Office 2008 has a couple of stability issues (like anyone is surprised, and I was able to repeat one of those in Word 2007 too), but otherwise is preferable.

    Also why do the people of the UK treat companies as a plural entity? "Microsoft have...". They are one company, a grouping. A grouping is a singular term. (I often prefer British vernacular, but this is one of the few times America gets something right... :D )
    HypnoToad72
    Reply Vote

  • I [Heart] Outlook

    "This edition will include Outlook for the first time"

    I (for home use) wouldn't buy any version of MS Office that didn't include Outlook.

    In addition to the great e-mail client, I constantly use the Task function.
    Tom12Tom
    Reply Vote

  • Shocker - Microsoft listens!

    Good for them! I also (heart) Outlook and while I have a copy of Office 2007 professional, I dread upgrading if I have to lose outlook in the process.
    LarryPTL
    Reply Vote

  • I would wait for the ??OpenOffice.org 3.2

    I would wait for the release of ?OpenOffice.org
    3.2,? http://download.openoffice.org/next/
    way_z
    Reply Vote

  • RE: About time! Office 2010 'academic edition'; Microsoft actually listens

    i am not certain why outlook is important.i had used eudora for years and switched a couple of years ago to gmail. both free and the latter is as good an email as one can get.the really nice thing about gmail is that you can get to your email from any computer and when one changes computers your email is not lost. a final advantage is having gmail pick up any other legal email one owns. because i have two other addresses complementsn of my universities, this is really a convenience
    erglazier
    Reply Vote

    • Outlook is MUCH more than just email.

      Outlook holds contacts, calendar, tasks, notes, email and integrates seamlessly into the rest of office to provide a really amazing set of functionality. It also provides really amazing functionality when used in conjunction with exchange server. Gmail has about 1/1000000th of the functionality of Outlook.
      condelirios
      Reply Vote

      • Actually....

        Gmail basically has contacts, calendar, tasks, notes and email. What it doesn't do is integrate into your office suite. But on that point I have never really used the integration and haven't seen many other people use it either outside of a mail merge...which then can be done on other email apps as well.

        Outlook does have nice integration with Exchange. But after that its not 1000's of times ahead of Gmail or any other mail system in terms of functionality.

        For that matter I don't find Office as a whole to be worth writing an article such as this. It just isn't THAT amazing to get excited about.
        storm14k
        Reply Vote

    • gmail is a service, not a canned product...

      Don't confuse the two. A more apt comparison would be gmail with hotmail.

      Outlook is a fully featured client that can connect to pretty much any email service. It works both on line and offline seamlessly.

      And yes, it works with GMail:

      http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=77689
      PollyProteus
      Reply Vote

    • Local email is faster

      Set up your Gmail account in Outlook and get the best of both worlds. You can't beat the speed of your entire inbox being right on your hard drive. If you work in email a lot, you can do better than webmail.
      cgarrett
      Reply Vote

  • RE: About time! Office 2010 'academic edition'; Microsoft actually listens

    If you're a student don't waste your money, OpenOffice works great and there are a hundreds of email clients out there.
    dwright@...
    Reply Vote

    • On a resume...

      On a resume, what looks better:

      Know how to use Microsoft Office, or

      Know how to use OpenOffice?

      I think the former, because Microsoft Office is a business standard.

      Besides, MS Office is considered to be the superior program, by a long shot.
      Tom12Tom
      Reply Vote

      • depends on the resume

        I would question if you should even include
        such a statement on a resume. To me it seems
        more like filler.

        Plus using 'Office' is really dependent upon
        the version - there was a HUGH shift between
        2003 and 2007. In the business world, a person
        should be able to use a word processor or an
        email client and adapt to different ones. I
        have had quite a few large clients that still
        use Lotus Notes for email/scheduling.
        tbuccelli
        Reply Vote

        • I agree...

          I actually kinda laugh when I see "Knows Office" on a resume. I mean you SHOULD know how to get around any office suite in my opinion. I don't think much of a person that puts Office on their resume nor the person that thinks its better to know MS Office over Open Office. Not because I dislike MS Office at all but because I think both people are just "trained" and don't really have the analytical skills to work with whatever is put in front of them.
          storm14k
          Reply Vote
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