Microsoft Office 15 Technical Preview
Wednesday, February 1, 2012 at 7:00AM | Print Article Today Microsoft released the first technical preview of Office 15, unfortunately, unlike the Windows 8 Developer Preview, it was not open to the public and instead reserved for select partners.
So what do we know about the new Office? Well, unfortunately very little at the moment. We know that it will fully integrate all Office products, including Enterprise services such as Lync (which is part of the Technical Preview). However it's unclear if we will see any major user interface changes. For example, with Windows 8 we know that Microsoft is pushing "Metro Style" applications, but to migrate an application as complex as Office would be a massive task, therefore I don't expect to see it in this initial release.
Instead I expect a more touch friendly standard user interface (that supplements the Ribbon), that is still accessed through the traditional desktop. I would then guess that Microsoft will follow up this release with standalone "Metro Like" applications, similar to what Apple has done with its iWork suite.
Either way, now that Office 15 is in the wild I fully expect to start seeing a lot more leaked information and screenshots over the next few months, before it is officially made available for all as part of the public beta.