Meet the “Mini-Me” counterparts of Office 2007

To some of you seasoned road warriors, this will be old news. Alas, I meet people each and every week who are blissfully unaware of a convenient option to take their Office documents and files on the road with them — without lugging around a laptop PC. If, like some of my co-workers and friends, you are still busy copying files onto USB drives to take work home, to catch up on reading specs and documents, and to fill out spreadsheets and rehearse PowerPoint presentations, consider the smartphone option.

As a member of the OneNote team, I was well aware of OneNote Mobile since it was released a few months ago. But I didn't own a smartphone and couldn’t really experience it for myself. I also hadn't looked at the other small-screen Office counterparts since I owned a first-generation Pocket PC some years ago. Happily, that’s all changed. In my April column on our Office Hours Web site, I’m documenting my own recent (re-)discovery of the Office Mobile programs in hopes of introducing more people to this wonderful option.

In the OneNote Mobile-specific section of the April column, I’ve linked to the “OneNote Mobile quick start guide” on Office Online for additional information. This guide was written prior to the advent of Windows Vista and Windows Mobile 6, and I've recently received lots of feedback from our site visitors asking for an updated version of the guide that addresses this newer configuration. I’m happy to announce that I’ll be publishing such an update within the next week or so, at which point I’ll change the link in the Office Hours column and I’ll announce the new guide here as well. I’d like to point out that this is another great example of how valuable your continued feedback about our documentation really is. It may not always seem like it, but the star ratings and comments that you leave for articles and other publications on Office Online don’t go into a black hole. They’re read by writers and editors like me, and we do our best to prioritize needs for updated and supplemental information in the online Help for our Office programs based on such feedback. So, if our articles, training courses, and video demos don’t quite hit the mark now and then, please tell us what you’d like to see. And, of course, whenever we’ve done our job well, positive feedback is always appreciated, too. ;-)

Below are the links to my current (and previous) column, as well as the other published Office Hours columns:

Office Hours: Use Office 2007 on your mobile phone (my April 2008 column)

Office Hours: How OneNote made friends in a corner office (my June 2007 column)

Office Hours (the official Web site and the full catalog of available columns)

PS I’ve just returned from vacation, so if you’ve recently written me and are waiting to hear back, please be patient while I catch up on messages. As always, thank you kindly for your interest in OneNote and in my blog — it’s always good to hear from our customers and my readers!