Microsoft has launched a range of free online
productivity tools to aidcollaborationon documents among
enterprise users and consumers.
Microsoft Office Live Workspace is a new Web-based feature of
the Microsoft Office suite that lets people access their documents
online and share their work with others.
Those with no version of Office on their desktops can view and
comment on the documents stored online for sharing in a web
browser, but cannot modify them.
The service allows users to save more than 1,000 Microsoft
Office documents in one place online and access them via any web
browser on any computer.
Users can work collaboratively on a project with others in a
password-protected, invitation-only online workspace.
The document formats supported include Microsoft Office Word,
PowerPoint, Excel and Outlook.
The service follows a similar system recently launched by IBM.
Big Blue's Symphony service saw 100,000 software downloads within a
week of its launch.
The availability of the Microsoft service has yet to be
confirmed by Redmond.
Anyone can now pre-register for the English language
beta of Office Live
Workspace.