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Microsoft Releases Office for iPad Update

Microsoft this week updated its Office for iPad suite, just four months after its initial release.

The 1.1 versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint are now available in Apple's iTunes App Store. Microsoft also updated OneNote for the iPad with its version 2.3 release.

The update is part of an effort to deliver continuous updates to Office for iPad, Microsoft said in a blog post on Thursday. The update includes three highly requested feature additions. The first is the ability to let users save files in the Adobe PDF format, even if they don't have Office 365 subscriptions. Another addition is the ability to edit photos in Word on the iPad. Though limited, the photo-editing feature enables cropping and resetting. The third key feature is support for third-party fonts.

Editing a photo in Word for iPad. (Source: Microsoft)

In Excel, Microsoft has added a new sorting capability that lets users filter, extend, collapse, display details and refresh PivotTables in an Excel workbook, as well as change the way they're displayed. Another new feature called "flick gesture" aims to simplify the use of workbooks, including the selection of data fields with large ranges.

"Simply grab the selection handle, flick it in any direction and Excel will automatically select from where you started to the next blank cell," Microsoft said in the blog, adding that if "you're at the top of a column of data and want to select all the way to the bottom, just flick down and the column is selected automatically."

The new PowerPoint app supports the use of multimedia capabilities on the iPad, specifically audio and video embedded into slides. It also lets users insert videos and photos from their iPad camera rolls. When projecting a presentation from the iPad, users can now enable Presenter View to see their own notes on the device.

About the Author

Jeffrey Schwartz is editor of Redmond magazine and also covers cloud computing for Virtualization Review's Cloud Report. In addition, he writes the Channeling the Cloud column for Redmond Channel Partner. Follow him on Twitter @JeffreySchwartz.

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