Register now for November 5 webcast: Use Project with Visio to boost project management efficiency

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Join us Tuesday, November 5 at 10:30am PT/1:30pm ET to learn how to enhance the power of Project by using Visio at the same time. Whether you're a project manager, team member or stakeholder, this 90-minute session will show you an easy way to communicate, visualize and share data across the enterprise.

You'll learn how to use the Visio 2013 project scheduler template to create linear timelines with milestones, interval markers and extended timelines and then export them to Project. Plus, you'll see the custom shape data reports, data graphics, legends, and stencils in Visio, and using the Visio data pivot diagrams in Project, you'll learn to create graphical project reports.

Register here for our free Visio webcast series to attend this session.

Presenter: Matt Roderman, Tips & Techniques LLC

To see the complete Visio webcast series agenda, go to aka.ms/VisioWebcastSeries.

To see the complete Project webcast series agenda, go to aka.ms/ProjectWebcastSeries.

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Boost your productivity of working with social media...?

You may find that headline counter-intuitive. The common perception is that social media are only updates posting, images, and connect with friends and family. If you have "social media" in your job title, you might think there is no way it can be part of the working day. However, social tools in the Office are to be adopted. In a recent independent survey of Rwandan professionals and students of age 18 and older social media under the direction of MarketTools Inc., 35 percent of respondents selected as an effective method of communication with colleagues, customers and suppliers. Some other interesting data points from the survey: 25% of respondents use social media to communicate and build relationships with colleagues. This figure was agreed up to 37% of the age group 18 - 24. 19% of respondents that social networking has helped to meet people who have made offline in valuable business relationships online. 89 Percent said their use of social media for personal communication increased or remained the same during the last Jahres.Es is no surprise that people use social media in their personal communication, but here at Microsoft, we believe that social networking can deliver real business value for all types of organizations. We have this with the social connector Outlook and SharePoint enable invested. And we have in cooperation with companies such as LinkedIn and Facebook. How can companies benefit from social networking? When used with a purpose, social tools in the Office with cooperation can help. Companies such as Getronics/Kpn and Catapult Systems have used social Outlook Connector professional social interaction and exchange of knowledge between the staff in different offices to promote that. James Sinclair of On-location advice used to build the social Outlook Connector and LinkedIn better business relationships and stay productive. James shared some thoughts with us recently: "Outlook of social connector (OSC) and LinkedIn work for me because it is an easy way to keep me informed of the people in my network." "I use this tool to interact with potential customers, employees and partners." "Nothing replaces face-to-face meetings, but OSC is part of my natural process of doing business, because it just there made in Outlook." "Often I find a degree of separation from someone I would like to do with business, and I use an introduction of a common contact, I discover by the OSC and LinkedIn."Of course we should take as for any communications platform, with social networking privacy and security to heart. With the social Outlook Connector, administrators can control and configure what networks with connect staff. Also, the social Outlook Connector users can choose which to bring social networks in their Inbox. He respects the privacy settings that have chosen users on social networks. The information that you see above your contacts depends on how much they have decided to share with you on social sites. Therefore, we have seen great examples of user acceptance of the Outlook social connector and social networking at work. You can to know you more, such as the Outlook social connector in this article on Office.com. I believe that social tools are a part of the workplace. With the right planning and the right tools, they can actually increase productivity. I encourage you to check out the Outlook social connector and think about how you use it in your company. Download the social network provider for Outlook social connector. Drop me a note, if you want to share your own experience! -Paco Contreras HerreraGroup product manager, Microsoft Office

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New free add-in the boost accessibility for Office 2010

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Do you know anyone with hearing, sight, or reading disabilities? The public beta starts today for two add-ins that help make Office documents more accessible: STAMP and DAISY:  

STAMP, the Subtitling Add-In for Microsoft PowerPoint, lets you add closed captions to the video and audio files in your PowerPoint presentations, so no one misses a word of what you have to say. 

Save as DAISY for Office 2010 helps you convert Word Open XML files to the Digital Accessible Information System (DAISY) format. DAISY powers digital talking books and compatible software and Braille readers for people with print disabilities or limited vision. This beta supports Office 2003, 2007 and 2010.

You can download the betas now. You can also download the betas directly from SourceForge: STAMP beta and DAISY beta. Try them out and let us know what you think.

Both betas work in all of the languages that Office currently supports. 

We're managing both add-ins as open source collaborations through the SourceForge project. We'll announce key development milestones, and the code will be available to anyone who wants it for their own implementations.

Ready to jump right in?

Donna Platt, a Seattle-based advocate for people with hearing disabilities, trains emergency personnel on how to help 911 callers who have hearing loss. She's deaf herself. Here's what she expects from STAMP: 

"Now that video clips in PowerPoint 2010 can be closed captioned, I'll experience a huge time savings since I won't have to use multiple programs to conduct a presentation for my trainees. STAMP allows me to caption my own videos for 9-1-1 call takers--some of whom might not understand sign language--bridging the gap between our two methods of communication seamlessly."  

As for DAISY? Here's what Michael Mello has to say. Michael is an adaptive technology specialist with the Washington State Department of Services for the Blind:

"As an adaptive technology specialist for the Washington State Department of Services for the Blind, I work with blind individuals on all aspects of technology related to their career planning. This includes job site evaluations to determine the level of accessibility of the employer's equipment, software and assistive technology. I also conduct in-house evaluations for clients to determine what software and devices would be an appropriate fit for them.

And, I am blind myself. It is important that I have the same access to complex information as my sighted colleagues have, so that I am able to do my job and help my clients land their dream jobs. Save as DAISY for Office 2010 provides me with the freedom to access many types of information both on my computer and on-the-go via text to speech. I am able to take the same document that I was working on at my computer and transfer it to a DAISY-compatible device to review as if I were working on it in Office 2010 on my computer--even complex files that include tables and photos. Providing the ability for anyone to author content using Save as DAISY for Office 2010 makes it easy for the general public to make information accessible to the blind--this is a valuable productivity resource."

Here are a few more details, plus links to info about more accessibility features in Microsoft Office.   

STAMP helps Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 users to quickly and easily add closed captions to any video and audio files included in their presentations, either by creating the captions within PowerPoint or by importing an existing industry-standard Timed Text Mark-up Language (TTML) file. If you don't have access to an existing TTML file but still need to create captions (or adjust imported captions), you can use the simple caption editor STAMP provides.

Find the how-to info here: Sub-titling text add-in for Microsoft PowerPoint (STAMP)

 

With STAMP you can also subtitle videos or audio files in another language, for example, for a training program. Our own Office Training team is using STAMP to subtitle our training videos for audiences around the world, and to help our subsidiaries localize those videos into many different languages.

At Towson University, professors and presenters are using STAMP to caption educational presentations that help the hearing disabled and others learn more efficiently

People with hearing disabilities can also use STAMP to caption their own videos for those who don't understand sign language, opening up whole new communication possibilities.

We had Save as DAISY add ins for Word 2003 and 2007, thanks to our ongoing partnership with the DAISY Consortium. Now it's Word 2010's turn.

With Save as DAISY for Office 2010, you can transform Word 2003, 2007, and 2010 Open XML documents into accessible multimedia formats for people who can't read print.  These formats include synchronized text and .MP3 audio that can be played directly within Windows 7 or DAISY XML, which works with compatible software readers and talking book/Braille reading devices. 

Find the how-to info here: Using the Save as DAISY add-in for Word

 

DAISY Consortium members are already using Save as DAISY for Office 2010 to create digital talking books for business and personal needs.

The DAISY and STAMP add-ins make sense for us practically, ethically, and financially. Word and PowerPoint are crucial communication tools, and with these add-ins, more people can use them. It's as fundamental as that.

But they're far from being the only accessibility features in Office 2010. Microsoft has been investing in accessibility for more than 20 years, and we designed Office 2010 to advance our position as an accessibility leader. 

Here are a few of the Office 2010 features that help people create and consume all kinds of accessible content: 

An accessibility checker (like a spelling checker, but for accessibility) as a feature of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint that provides step-by-step instructions for how to correct accessibility errors. An on-the-fly translation feature called Mini Translator, which allows you to translate single words or many paragraphs simply by hovering over the text that you want to translate. Mini Translator also includes the ability to speak that text using Microsoft's Text-to-Speech (TTS) engine. A Full Screen Reading view that is optimized for reading a document on the computer screen. In Full Screen Reading view, you also have the option of seeing the document as it would appear on a printed page. 

Learn more about the accessibility features in Office 2010. That's also where you can download the free DAISY and STAMP add-in betas.

Also check out the Crabby Office Lady blog's recent series on accessibility in Office. 

-- Andrew Howard and Holly Thomas

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