Windows Phone Mango and Microsoft Office 365

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Even if you’re not a tech geek like me, you’ve certainly heard about cloud computing. Being able to access your documents from anywhere has been feasible for a while, but the phenomenal growth of smartphones and the availability of bandwidth is really making things interesting. Imagine what you could do if you had access to colleagues and business information through the cloud with your smartphone. It will be possible with the upcoming version of Windows Phone (code-named Mango) and Microsoft Office 365!

For anyone who isn’t aware, Office 365 is a Microsoft cloud subscription service currently in beta release that includes the following services accessible via a browser:

  • Email and calendar services powered by Microsoft Exchange Online
  • Instant messaging and presence of coworkers powered by Lync Online
  • Websites, collaboration services, and Office Web Apps powered by Microsoft SharePoint Online

Windows Phone is the only phone with Outlook Mobile and Office Mobile built in, and when Mango is available it will work seamlessly with the Exchange Online, Lync Online, and SharePoint Online services in Office 365. The combination will allow you to stay organized and connected to your email, colleagues, and content while on the go. And you will abe ble to act on the latest information because your phone is synced to a team site in Office 365 while you’re out and about.

Here’s how quick and easy it will be to connect to Office 365 with Windows Phone Mango: you will enter a Office 365 login and password, and Outlook Mobile will configure your email, contacts, calendars, and team site right on the Windows Phone.

After setup, you can stay on top of emails by grouping them by conversation for easy viewing and following. And let’s say there’s a really useful email folder that you access frequently; you can pin it to the Start screen for glance-and-go viewing. These and other new features that are coming in the next version of Windows Phone are designed to help you stay organized and connected to your business.

With the SharePoint Team site in Office 365, colleagues will be able to share the latest documents with you even when you’re on the go. The latest versions are automatically synced to your Windows Phone when you open SharePoint Workspace Mobile, which makes version control much easier. If you’re going offline, like getting on an airplane, you can save a copy on your phone to edit and upload it back to the cloud when you’re online again. Best of all, you can open, edit, or comment on Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents and see them in the same formatting that you’d expect on a PC. That’s the power of Office Mobile built in. Again. these are just glimpses of the new capabilities. I hope you’re as excited as I am about the potential of Windows Phone and Office 365.

For more info on Windows Phone, visit www.windowsphone.com, and for more info on Microsoft Office 365, visit www.office365.com.