Microsoft Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, Office Web Apps and Docs.com: 5 Questions to Ask NOW

Microsoft announced on May 12 that premise-based versions of its long-awaited Office 2010 communication/collaboration suite and SharePoint 2010 collaboration solution are available now. Microsoft also announced and made available to business users Office Web Apps, pared-down, Web-based free tools based on its Office applications. Business users can run Office Web Apps from premise-based servers if they want to do so; Web-based versions will be available at no cost to Windows Live registrants and for sale in June.

Separately, Microsoft has also launched Docs.com, a Web site that combines Facebook with Office Web Apps. The site allows groups of Facebook friends to access, share and collaborate on documents created with Office or Office Web Apps. The site is apparently as much for Microsoft to learn about how users collaborate over documents as it is to enable such sharing or to compete with Google Docs. If and how Docs.com will be integrated with Office 2010 and/or Office Web Apps remains to be seen.

How best to decide if and when your business should adopt these new offerings?

Focus has followed the promises of Office 2010 and Office Web Apps since they were originally discussed by Microsoft and others. Now that the offerings have been officially announced and some have begun shipping, a closer look at specific changes and challenges is in order. (The lists below are by no means comprehensive -- some published reports indicate that Office 2010 has more than 100 enhancements and new features. Further, the accuracy of the lists below is definitely subject to change, particularly where the not-yet-completely-available Office Web Apps are concerned.)

Office 2010's new and/or improved features include the following, according to published reports.

• Support for co-authoring, or letting multiple people work on the same document simultaneously.
• A Social Connector for integration with Facebook and/or LinkedIn.
• A modified, customizable version of the much-loved-and-much-hated "ribbon" interface found in Office 2007 for all Office 2010 applications.
• Inclusion of the popular OneNote note-taking program.
• A revised Outlook e-mail client with greater management abilities and support for threaded "conversations" similar to those supported by, for example, Google's Gmail.
• Easier integration of video into PowerPoint presentations.
• Improved video and photo support across all applications in the suite.

New SharePoint 2010 features reportedly include the following.

• Easier site editing.
• Data aggregation and tagging abilities.
• Twitter- and Facebook-like tools for sharing information among groups and teams.
• Improved integration with Microsoft's Fast search engine.
• Improved integration with Microsoft's PerformancePoint business intelligence (BI) software.

Challenges to Microsoft's new offerings identified in early coverage of the new releases include the following.

• Printing can be slow and inconsistent; pre-print preview of documents can't be skipped, and can slow printing considerably, especially of graphics-intensive content.
• The Web Apps interface is difficult to use, with files either not opening at all or requiring users to save them in different formats before being able to open or edit them.
• Web Apps editing features not always as robust as those found in premise-based Office applications.
• Microsoft's frequently maligned spam filter reportedly shows little to no improvement.
• Microsoft's Business Process Online Suite (BPOS), a combination of online version of the Exchange e-mail server and SharePoint, will not be available as a fully hosted offering until 2011.
• Pricing -- retail pricing for Office 2010 is as high as $500 for a packaged copy of Office Professional, with no upgrade pricing available. (Downloaded versions and other editions are less costly.)

Focus believes there are five questions every business decision-maker considering Office 2010, SharePoint 2010 and/or Office Web Apps should ask and answer. The answers to these questions will help you to determine whether, where and when to consider these solutions, or perhaps alternatives to them.

Are the new features worth the challenges to a successful upgrade? Those challenges can range from a need to upgrade user hardware to run or take full advantage of the new software to potential training and support costs.

Do Office Web Apps matter to our business? According to "PC World," a July 2009 survey conducted by IT market-watchers IDC found that approximately 97 percent of respondents had at least one version of Microsoft Office in use at their organizations. The same survey found that the organizations of 19.5 percent of respondents were using Google Docs in some form, compared with 5.8 percent of respondents to a similar survey question in 2008. If your organization uses both, might there be advantages to settling upon a single solution? If you're trying to rein in licensing and support costs for premise-based solutions, is Office Web Apps a viable way to do that?

Are there any compelling reasons to upgrade as soon as possible? Do any of the new features make you or your colleagues scream "gotta have it NOW?" More seriously, are there any specific business opportunities or pains that can be addressed effectively and economically by any of the new offerings or features Microsoft has debuted?

Are there any compelling reasons not to upgrade as soon as possible? Taking maximum advantage of new premise-based software often requires upgrades of the hardware on which that software runs. Is your company prepared for the costs and challenges required to upgrade multiple client and/or server systems? And what about file formats and other issues related to version upgrades? A lot of businesses are still happily running Office 2007 on Windows XP, despite Microsoft's near-constant promotion of Windows 7 and other more modern alternatives.

Should we consider adjuncts or alternatives to Office? If your company's considering moving to Office 2010 and/or SharePoint 2010, and especially if there are significant costs or challenges likely or possible with such a move, it may be worth considering some alternatives. Also, if your company's licensing and support costs for premise-based software are rising unacceptably, alternatives can help to slow or even stop that growth. Further, the inflection point represented by Microsoft's latest offerings presents an opportunity to consider alternatives that offer additional features unavailable or unaffordable from Microsoft.

Targeted deployment of free or low-cost premise-based or cloud-based offerings can be effective adjuncts and/or alternatives to premise-based Office deployments. Focus believes examples of such offerings worth considering include Acrobat.com, Google Docs, the Zoho.com office suite (which offers integration with SharePoint) and emerging solutions such as EnterpriseWizard. Perhaps ironically, at many businesses, Office Web Apps and hosted services based on Microsoft Office, SharePoint and/or Exchange may also represent alternatives to expanded or even new premise-based Office deployments.

Focus believes that Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, Office Web Apps and Docs.com represent a powerful, flexible and dynamic set of communication and collaboration solutions. However, no one answer meets every business' every need. Every department of every company must use these new solutions as opportunities to heighten the alignment of business-critical IT-empowered solutions such as those used for content creation, communication and collaboration with business goals and needs. Improvement of that alignment should then drive every decision about investments in such solutions. The five questions above are a good start on this necessary journey.