Office 365

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Author Message Robin E. Snyder Senior Member Username: robin Post Number: 522 Registered: 08-2004 Posted on Wednesday, April 02, 2014 - 11:32 am:    Anyone using it? Would like to pick some brains Liz O'Sullivan Senior Member Username: liz_osullivan Post Number: 138 Registered: 10-2011 Posted on Wednesday, April 02, 2014 - 11:34 am:    I'm considering the same thing, and also hope someone has input and experience with it. William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS Senior Member Username: wpegues Post Number: 911 Registered: 10-2002 Posted on Wednesday, April 02, 2014 - 11:53 am:    We are using it in our 2 offices in DC and Dallas and between the offices. And with a mix of Mac and Windows system. I can't go into too much technical details about it, we have a systems technical group in both offices for that. I can say that it is not a problem in and of itself. When outside the office, one can choose to read email using any email application of choice including the Mac "Mail" application on either full Mac systems or iPads or any table or phone system. But, Microsoft produces a free app for phones and tables (including iPad) that presents the almost same view as reading it with a browser and gives you complete access to the server address book and calendar. This app is clumsy in the way it works, it really just a reformatted version of the web view. Transition was a real problem but probably only due to our converting over timing. Best to do it by turning one off and the other on. We had to have the old mail server running for awhile and email received/sent on it went to the old mail box and not the new. All merged nicely after the final switchover, but there was a week of 2 mail servers that was unpleasant to say the least. So, avoid that. William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS, SCIP Affiliate WDG Architecture, Washington, DC | Dallas, TX Robin E. Snyder Senior Member Username: robin Post Number: 523 Registered: 08-2004 Posted on Wednesday, April 02, 2014 - 12:41 pm:    William: Do you use Outlook for managing your office email? I am trying to learn if 365 moves outlook to the cloud (currently it is a pst folder based on my hard drive) Jeffrey Wilson CSI CCS Senior Member Username: wilsonconsulting Post Number: 136 Registered: 03-2006 Posted on Wednesday, April 02, 2014 - 02:15 pm:    I am also considering 365, and would like to hear others' experiences w/ MasterSpec Word documents. Any glitches or compatibility issues? William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS Senior Member Username: wpegues Post Number: 912 Registered: 10-2002 Posted on Wednesday, April 02, 2014 - 02:17 pm:    Robin, You are probably talking about a single user (even if multiple 'seats') application rather than a server based system. We are running on the Office 365 server system for over 100 people based in 2 different locations. When I open up outlook, and I am NOT connected to the server, I do have access to the last time it was connected, so, all the messages in any particular folder you have for mail, does stay synchronized for offline work. So I can look at old emails, etc. and their attachments just fine offline - say flying on an airplane, or camping in the woods (well, not me doing that with my portable just an extreme example). I can make replies, delete and move messages when offline. Next time I am online, it will first synch with the server automatically and update the server for any differences and then bring in new mail. It synchs automatically behind the scenes anytime you make a change in where a message is stored, or if you send something or when something arrives new. I do note that it tends to do it on a time based interval, but you can force it to synch which it will do rather quickly (a few seconds. Does that help? William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS, SCIP Affiliate WDG Architecture, Washington, DC | Dallas, TX Phil Kabza Senior Member Username: phil_kabza Post Number: 537 Registered: 12-2002 Posted on Friday, April 04, 2014 - 04:47 pm:    We're using it, with 3 users on PCs. Email lives on hard drive plus cloud. Access through Outlook or web-based interface that duplicates your Outlook structure. Clean up your .pst before uploading - it's a good time to get rid of 10 year old mail. It's measurably faster than our previous mail provider. Accessing via iPhone as well with no issues. Had IT help setting up and tweaking. Cost is very reasonable. Robin E. Snyder Senior Member Username: robin Post Number: 525 Registered: 08-2004 Posted on Friday, April 04, 2014 - 06:45 pm:    thanks everyone. Phil - did you use an in house IT person, or a third party IT company that you could recommend? Thanks! Phil Kabza Senior Member Username: phil_kabza Post Number: 539 Registered: 12-2002 Posted on Wednesday, May 07, 2014 - 06:30 pm:    Answering Robin's question here: We have third party IT support who were very experienced at setting it up. It was about as seamless as we could hope for, meaning there were a few glitches but they got ironed out fast enough. Don't try this at home, folks. We have not moved into the SharePoint side of Office 365 yet. We did sign on for the Office software licensing, as I got tired of the costs and mindspace involved in updating or not updating 5 computers. John Bunzick, CCS, CCCA, LEED AP Senior Member Username: bunzick Post Number: 1572 Registered: 03-2002 Posted on Saturday, May 10, 2014 - 12:17 pm:    I have my own email service provided by my webhost. I currently use Outlook as a client side email reader with an IMAP setup. I have no interest in Microsoft being the repository for my email. MS's website says that Outlook can be used with any major email service so I should be able to continue that way. Outlook.com is the email service provided by MS, which is separate from the Outlook client software (though I suppose they try to tightly integrate them). MS's website says that Office 365 subscription allows you to install full versions of the software locally on up to five machines. All this for $10/mo, including all upgrades. This seems quite reasonable. It includes the entire Office Suite: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, Publisher, and Outlook. One single user license to buy Outlook costs the same as a one year subscription. I have Word/Excel/Power Point for 3 machines that also cost much more than a one-year subscription. I probably will go ahead and do this, given that I have three computers, plus one tablet. It does seem like they are pushing you to use the online service because they are competing with everyone else doing this, but it also seems that you wouldn't have to.