Office mobile apps

Microsoft Office Mobile is an office suite by Microsoft for mobile phone platforms. It is meant to be compatible with desktop versions of the office suite.

Core applications, including Word Mobile, Excel Mobile, and PowerPoint Mobile. The suite is on Windows Phone and is available for Android and iOS through Office 365 licensing program.

Lync Mobile, OneNote Mobile, and SharePoint Newsfeed are not included in the Office Mobile suite, but are available as standalone apps that can be downloaded separately from app stores. An Office 365 subscription is not required to access these three apps on any mobile platform.

Office Mobile originally debuted as Pocket Office on Windows CE 1.0 Handheld PCs in 1996. It has since been updated several times. The latest version, Microsoft Office Mobile 2013, was released on October 29, 2012, with the launch of Windows Phone 8.

History
Office Mobile originally shipped as "Pocket Office", and was released by Microsoft with the Windows CE 1.0 operating system in 1996. This release was specifically for the Handheld PC hardware platform, as Microsoft's Smartphone and Pocket PC hardware specifications had not yet been released. It consisted of Pocket Word and Pocket Excel; PowerPoint, Access, and Outlook were added later. With steady updates throughout subsequent releases of Windows Mobile, Office Mobile was rebranded as its current name after the release of the Windows Mobile 5.0 operating system. This release of Office Mobile also included PowerPoint Mobile for the first time. Accompanying the release of Microsoft OneNote 2007, a new optional addition to the Office Mobile line of programs was released as OneNote Mobile. With the release of Windows Mobile 6 Standard, Office Mobile became available for the Smartphone hardware platform, however unlike Office Mobile for the Professional and Classic versions of Windows Mobile, creation of new documents is not an added feature. A popular workaround is to create a new blank document in a desktop version of Office, synchronize it to the device, and then edit and save on the Windows Mobile device.

In June 2007, Microsoft announced a new version of the office suite, Office Mobile 2007. It became available as "Office Mobile 6.1" on September 26, 2007 as a free upgrade download to current Windows Mobile 5.0 and 6 users. However, "Office Mobile 6.1 Upgrade" is not compatible with Windows Mobile 5.0 powered devices running builds earlier than 14847. It will also be a pre-installed feature in subsequent releases of Windows Mobile 6 devices. Office Mobile 6.1 is compatible with the Office Open XML specification like its desktop counterpart.

On August 12, 2009, it was announced that Office Mobile would also be released for the Symbian platform as a joint agreement between Microsoft and Nokia. The first application to appear on Nokia E Series Smartphones was Microsoft Office Communicator. In February 2012, Microsoft released OneNote, Lync 2010, Document Connection and PowerPoint Broadcast for Symbian. In April, Word Mobile, PowerPoint Mobile and Excel Mobile joined the Office Suite.

On October 21, 2010, Microsoft debuted Office Mobile 2010 with the release of Windows Phone 7. In Windows Phone, users can access and edit documents directly off of their SkyDrive or Office 365 accounts in a dedicated Office hub. The Office Hub, which is preinstalled into the operating system, contains Word, PowerPoint and Excel. Also, the operating system includes OneNote, although not as a part of the Office Hub. Lync is not included, but can be downloaded as standalone app from the Windows Phone Store free of charge. In October 2012, Microsoft released Microsoft Office Mobile 2013, which updated all Office Mobile apps to their Office 2013 equivalent. The update is available for all phones running Windows Phone 8 or Windows Phone 7.8.

Core applications
Office Mobile's core applications include mobile versions of Word, PowerPoint and Excel.

Word Mobile
Word Mobile, originally called Pocket Word, has been included with the Office Mobile suite since the release of the Handheld PC in 1996. It is a word processor program with similar functions to its desktop counterpart, Microsoft Word. Word Mobile allows for basic formatting of documents, and has the ability to save documents in multiple formats including Rich Text Format, Microsoft's DOCX format for reading on desktop versions of Word, and simple Text files. While it is possible to open legacy PSW (Pocket Word) or DOC files on the current version of Word Mobile, such files must be saved as another supported format in order to enable editing capabilities. Word Mobile also allows for insertion of pictures, lists, and tables to documents, however pictures must be added on the desktop version of Word, and cannot be moved with copy/paste. Additionally, Word Mobile includes a spell checker, word count tool, and a "Find and Replace" command. Footnotes, endnotes, headers, footers, page breaks, certain indentation of lists, and certain fonts, while not displayed nor able to be inserted while working on a document in Word Mobile, such features are retained if the original document has them.

Excel Mobile
Excel Mobile is one of the original programs included in Office Mobile at its release. It is a spreadsheet program that is compatible with Microsoft Excel, and can create, open, edit, and save in Microsoft's '.xlsx' spreadsheet format, and can read documents saved in the legacy '.xls' format. Excel Mobile allows for formatting of cells, basic calculations of formulas, and the creation of charts or graphs. As a means of dealing with limited screen resolution, Excel Mobile also has the ability to use a full-screen mode. In addition, it supports filtering of data and split panes to view different parts of a worksheet at one time. Protection settings, zoom settings, autofilter settings, certain chart formatting, hidden sheets, and other features are not supported on Excel Mobile, and will be modified upon opening and saving a workbook.

PowerPoint Mobile
PowerPoint Mobile is included with Windows Mobile 5.0. It is a presentation program capable of reading and editing Microsoft PowerPoint presentations, although authoring abilities are limited to adding notes and editing text. Versions of PowerPoint Mobile for Windows Phone 7.0 and later can also watch presentation broadcasts streamed from the Internet.

Office 365 and SkyDrive integration
Office Mobile integrates with SkyDrive, Microsoft's cloud storage service. All documents edited from Office Mobile programs are automatically saved to SkyDrive, and a list of recent documents saved to SkyDrive appears on the home screen of the Office Hub. Office Mobile also includes a file manager that can be used to browse for Word, PowerPoint, or Excel files saved on a SkyDrive account. In addition, Office Mobile can also open and edit documents saved on an Office 365 account.

Standalone applications
Mobile versions of Lync, OneNote, and SharePoint Newsfeed are not bundled with the core Office suite, but can be downloaded separately on the Windows Phone Store and iOS AppStore. Lync and OneNote are available on Google Play for Android devices, but SharePoint Newsfeed is not.

OneNote Mobile
Originally released with Microsoft Office 2003, OneNote Mobile is a notetaking program that synchronizes with Microsoft OneNote. OneNote Mobile allows for basic formatting of text, the insertion of media such as pictures or audio recordings, creation of lists, and the use of hyperlinks within documents. Pictures and audio recordings may be taken directly from within the program using a built-in camera and microphone respectively.

Outlook Mobile
Outlook Mobile is a personal information manager on Windows Mobile, and is replaced by Windows Mail app for Windows Phone devices. Unlike the rest of the Office Mobile suite, Outlook Mobile does not consist of a single application on Windows Mobile platform, but instead has several separate programs: Messaging, Calendar, Contacts, and Tasks. It synchronizes e-mail, appointments, contacts, and tasks from the desktop version of Outlook. It is not compatible with Windows Calendar, Windows Mail, or Windows Contacts. Outlook Mobile is capable of bypassing synchronization with its desktop counterpart by interacting directly with Microsoft Exchange Server. This direct interaction allows for an always-on E-mail connection, commonly referred to as Push e-mail. Push e-mail is also available to users with a Windows Live Hotmail account while logged onto Windows Live via their phone.

Messaging
Outlook Mobile's Messaging application includes the following features:
 * Push e-mail using Microsoft Exchange Server
 * Microsoft Outlook folder synchronization
 * SMS messaging on phones
 * MMS messaging on phones
 * Windows Live Hotmail support
 * POP support
 * IMAP support
 * E-mail attachment support
 * HTML e-mail support
 * Exchange searching

Calendar
Outlook Mobile's Calendar application includes the following features:
 * vCal support
 * Agenda, Day and Monthviews
 * Category support
 * Microsoft Exchange Server support
 * Reminders and Alarms

Contacts
Outlook Mobile's Contacts application includes the following features:
 * vCard support
 * Category support
 * Contact searching
 * Exchange searching
 * Contact photos
 * Ringtone assignment for contacts on phones

Tasks
Outlook Mobile's Tasks application includes the following features:
 * Category support
 * Priority status of tasks
 * Sensitivity status of tasks
 * Reminders