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Our latest Grid User Post comes from Darrell Webster. You can view the original post here.
You are going to a meeting to deliver a proposal to a potential client. You’ve confidently gone to that meeting “Device-Commando-Style,” meaning you’re carrying only the proposal and your smartphone. “Weapon and Ammo,” no tablet, no notebook. Your intention was to make a brief visit and leave the proposal with your client.
While reading through the proposal with your client, you both agree to make a change to the document. Your client agrees to let you use their computer to make the change. You could alter the document by logging into SharePoint Online, where it is saved, and use Word Web App from directly from the browser. But the change requires a few more features than what’s available in the Web App.
- You need to use ‘Find and Replace’ to correct the business name.
- You want to save the altered document as a PDF to give an electronic copy to your client.
- You want to maintain version control, keeping the altered version with the original.
Enter Office on Demand
Office on Demand “provides online access to full rich Office desktop applications, including Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, when you’re using a PC that doesn’t have the latest version of Office installed locally.” – Extract from “Use Office on Demand“
Watch how Office on Demand works in the video below. This demo was recorded on my wife’s Windows 7 Home Premium laptop, currently running Office 2007. Rather than set up Office 2007 and connect it to my Office 365 account and SharePoint resources, I used Office on Demand.
(Please visit the site to view this video)
When to use Office on Demand
- On a PC that you don’t use regularly (you don’t want to use up one of your 5 permissible subscription licenses, for example).
- On a PC where you don’t have admin rights to perform an installation (you’re using a borrowed computer, for example).
- On a PC at home if your IT administrator has disabled your ability to manage your installations (you’d like to install Office, but this option is not available).
Extract from “Use Office on Demand“
Requirements
- The computer you launch Office on Demand from must be running Windows 7 or 8.
- Supported Browsers: Internet Explorer 9 or higher, Mozilla Firefox 12 or higher, Apple Safari 5 or higher, or Google Chrome 18 or higher.
- Office on Demand doesn’t require admin rights on the computer. It streams to the logged in users User folder.
- i.e C:\users\username\Microsoft Office 15
Steps
- Log into the Office 365 – portal.microsoftonline.com
- Select SkyDrive from the blue top menu.
- Select Use Office on Demand
- Choose Word, or the application you want to work with.
- Choose Run when prompted to download “office_en-us.exe”
- Office prepares and streams Word to the computer.
- Sign into Word with Office 365 account, to view recently opened documents, display your document “Places” in the Open document menu.
- Choose the SharePoint place named after your Team Site e.g. SmartStuff.
- Locate and open your document in SharePoint Online.
- Change and Save your document.
- Sign Out.
Tip: Sign into Office
Once the Office application has streamed down to the computer, sign into it using your Office 365 account. There are a number of benefits when you sign into Office.
- Most Recently Used List (MRU) Documents and Places – You can view recently opened documents. Your document “Places” can follow you, showing the common and most recent places you have saved documents.
- MRU Templates
- Office Personalization
- Custom Dictionary
- List of Connected Services
- Word Resume Reading Position – Open to the last place you were working on the document.
- PowerPoint Last Viewed Slide
Office on Demand, another clever use of Click-to-Run deployment technologies.
- Darrell Webster | nz.linkedin.com/in/darrellwebster/ | @DarrellCWebster