Category: Software

Apple MacOS 10.14.4 Safari Bug Results in Unwanted Enter/Continue During Login

by Greg Johnson, posted in Software, Tech Tips

Once you’ve updated your Mac to Mojave and have the MacOS 10.14.4 latest version of Mojave, you’ll notice that Safari now provides the username and password for your websites as it did in the past (if you use the feature) but now it will automatically press Enter/Return.

If you’ve recently changed your password, and it hasn’t been updated and saved to the browser yet, you’ll select the login username (perhaps a long email address that you don’t want to manually type) but then instead of being given an opportunity to type in your new password, the browser will immediately attempt to log you in, resulting in a failed login attempt.

Captcha systems will fail because you’ve not been given a chance to validate those.

Assuming the browser provides the correct password, you won’t have an opportunity to click on checkboxes indicating “please keep me logged in” because you’ll be logged in right away.

According to a discussion thread on the Apple support forum, there is no way to fix this.

What’s disappointing about this bug, as with others, is that it’s easily identifiable as a user interface problem within minutes of using the new browser. This suggests that little if any real world testing was done. This happens a lot. Apple will release a new version of something, and users will immediately identify a user interface problem. It’s as if nobody is actually using the software they are developing.

Apple Pay Cash Promo Video Misses Critical First Step of Instructions

by Greg Johnson, posted in Mobile Devices, Software, Tech Tips

With the value of Bitcoin having gone from about $4,000 to $15,000 in recent weeks, there’s  been an increased interest in person-to-person payment systems. Demand for simplified payment systems is at an all time high. On 6 December 2017, Apple announced Apple Pay Cash, a peer-to-peer payment system.

This announcement came just hours after news of a major heist in the cryptocurrency world that resulted in numerous people collectively losing over $50M in money. No doubt, consumers will be looking for more secure ways to exchange money with friends and family.

In the video below, that was posted on YouTube for Apple’s 5.6 million subscribers, the simple instructions leave out a very important step. The user must upgrade their device to Apple iOS 11.2 which adds the Apple Pay Cash capability. At present, over 75,000 people have watched the video and were likely perplexed by it since most people will not have performed the upgrade. Some older devices can’t be upgraded to iOS 11.2 so Apple Pay Cash won’t ever work on those devices.

To enjoy Apple Pay Cash, follow these steps:

  1. Go to Settings > General > Software Update
  2. Click Download and Install
  3. Enter your passcode
  4. Agree to the Terms and Conditions
  5. The update will download.
  6. Then the update will install.
  7. You’ll get a message “Verifying Update” and your device will restart.
  8. You’ll see the Apple logo with a progress bar.
  9. Once your device has restarted, then you should be able to follow the instructions provided in the video below.
  10. Whoever you send money to will also need to perform the above steps to get the money you send them.

Video

The Missing Announcement

An announcement on Apple’s website provides the missing information, but it should have been included at the introduction to the video or at the end.

20171207th0944-apple-pay-cash-ios-11_2

Conclusion

After some initial confusion and possibly frustration, hopefully users will figure out what they need to do to make Apple Pay Cash work.

The release of a major product feature, with incomplete information is disconcerting, particularly just weeks after a major security vulnerability and oversight in Apple’s macOS High Sierra that required an emergency update to 10.13.1. That bug allowed anybody to gain full administrative super-user control over any Apple computer from the login screen. Another less significant oversight recently was the inability to easily enter numbers into their program called Numbers.

Let’s hope that Apple does a better job going forward in fully testing everything they are pushing out to the public.

Evernote Version History – 28 Nov 2017

by Greg Johnson, posted in Software, Tech Tips

Here is the recent version history for Evernote as of 28 Nov 2017.

Version 6.13.1

Fixed:

  • A fix for an issue where reminders overlap text and omit notes on macOS 10.13.1
  • A fix for an issue where sync intermittently fails for some users after clipping content from the web (CDATA error seen in log)
  • An improvement to make it easier to detect and troubleshoot specific notes that are failing to sync – if you see an exclamation mark on a note in the note list (for snippet and card view) and a red dot in the sync status column for the list views, it’s a problematic note

Version 6.13

6.13 and app updates going forwards will be supported on OS X El Capitan (10.11) and above.

Improved:

  • Sharing: consolidated share options under the “Share” button in Evernote. Share a note, choose to create a public link or modify share permissions all from one place.
  • Navigation and Commanding UI: we’ve made some adjustments to provide more space for your content using a narrower toolbar, and making some tweaks to the sidebar to improve legibility. We’ve also improved the Move Note dialog to make it even faster to move a note across accounts by listing all notebooks from both your business and personal accounts directly in the dialog.

Fixed:

We fixed many issues in this release, here are some of the notable issues addressed.

  • Fixed an issue where notebooks are sometimes duplicated on upgrade.
  • Fixed several crashes including intermittent issues around moving notes, app launch, and on PDF annotation.
  • Fixed an issue where the Evernote app window sometimes appears black when in full screen mode.

Version 6.12.3

Fixed:

  • Fixed crash and sync issues some users are encountering.

Version 6.12.2

Fixed:

  • A fix where text when copied from Evernote and pasted into another app sometimes has additional punctuation and other characters added to it.

Version 6.12.1

Fixed:

  • A fix for a crash some users are encountering on quitting the app.

Version 6.12

Major improvements to tables!

Some highlights of what you can do with tables now:

  • Add more rows and columns with a single click: Point to where you want a new column and click the plus button that appears.
  • Select the contents of a cell by clicking and dragging.
  • Choose the entire column or row just by clicking the header.
  • Drag and drop entire rows & columns.
  • Copy and paste multiple cells: Select the cells you want to move, copy them, move cursor to a new spot and paste all the cells with one click.
  • Adjust the width of one column without affecting the width of the column next to it.
  • Scroll horizontally to view a table with many columns without expanding your window.
  • Hover within a cell to activate advanced table options.
    • You can distribute columns evenly
    • Match the table width to the width of your window
    • Change the alignment of items within cells
    • Add and change background colors

Multi-tasking improvements

  • Keep your Evernote content organized using tabs. Create a new tab by selecting the ‘New Tab’ option under the File menu.
  • Pick up from where you left off – if you exit the app and re-open it, you’ll return to your previously opened windows / state.

Separation of Business and Personal

  • No longer intermingle your business and personal content in your Evernote experience but still multi-task when you need to. Improving on 6.11 Beta 1 & 2, we’ve added support for having business and personal notes open side-by-side.

Bug fixes

We’ve fixed several bugs that users reported including:

  • Evernote does not update business tags list after the sync
  • Pasting a large amount of text into a note fails with no error message
  • An intermittent crash on account switching

Version 6.11.1

Fixed:

  • Some notes created in Evernote for Mac would not render after sync
  • Some tables lost formatting after updating Evernote to 6.11
  • Pasting a line of text would add an additional line break
  • Some full width dividers from other clients were not shown as full width
  • Some pasted content were missing styles
  • Various note editor issues were fixed.

Version 6.11

New:

  • Touch Bar support for the latest MacBook Pros allows quick access to key navigation and note editing commands.

Fixed:

We’ve fixed several issues people were having with notes:

  • Search terms weren’t highlighted in notes for some searches
  • Clicking on an attachment sometimes caused the note to scroll up, making it hard to open attachments
  • Shift + arrow up or down did not highlight if the line above or below was blank
  • Shift + enter did not create a non-bulleted line in a bulleted list
  • Couldn’t delete the leftmost column in a table if the top cell is formatted
  • Line breaks were unexpectedly removed after syncing some notes originally created on iPhone
  • Content copied from a PDF sometimes could not be pasted into a note
  • Applying Simplify Formatting to clipped notes removed returns
  • If the last item in a list was blank, it disappeared when users navigated away and then back to the note
  • Couldn’t remove indents from text in some notes created in earlier versions of Evernote
  • In tables, if you triple clicked to select the content and then cut, you would be unable to focus on the cell
  • If you added a new checklist item in the middle of an existing checklist, one character of a checklist item might be unexpectedly deleted

Version 6.10

New:

  • Important under the hood changes to the note editing experience lay the groundwork for even more improvements in the future.

Fixed:

  • Select functionality and crash issues.

Version 6.9.1

New:

  • Various new features

Fixed:

  • Various bug and stability fixes

Version 6.9

This version of Evernote is supported on Mac OS X v10.10 and higher.

New:

  • Evernote will launch automatically when your computer starts. You can change this in Preferences.
  • Search for Google Drive documents by title.
  • The note title and share bar will stay visible at the top of the page when you scroll through a note.
  • Open a note link in a separate window from the note you are viewing by choosing this option when you right click the link.
  • Premium document search now lets you search within attached text files. Supported file types include .txt, .html, .java and .log.

Fixed:

  • You can edit keyboard shortcuts in Preferences.
  • Hidden items in your left sidebar like shortcuts and recents will now stay hidden when you relaunch Evernote.
  • Tags you add or remove from a note will now sync across your devices.
  • Various crash and data sync issues were fixed.

Version 6.8

New:

  • Google Drive integration! Now you can add docs, slides, sheets, and files from Google Drive as attachments or descriptive links without leaving Evernote. Links are formatted as clickable objects when you attach Google Drive files, making them easy to find in a note.
  • Evernote Business users, connect your Salesforce account and save Evernote business card notes directly to Salesforce as Leads or Contacts via the Share menu!
  • A new notebook sharing experience makes it easier to share a notebook and manage permissions.
  • Find your deleted notes more easily via the trash icon in the sidebar.

Fixed:

  • A bug preventing people from connecting an Evernote account with a LinkedIn account is now fixed. Connect your accounts, and business card notes you create with the ScanSnap Evernote Edition Scanner will automatically include your contact’s LinkedIn profile info and photo.
  • A bug preventing people from changing a notebook name from uppercase to lowercase and vice versa is fixed.
  • A bug in Evernote Helper that made text show up as partially cut off is fixed.
  • A bug that sometimes caused screenshots captured via Evernote Helper to include the Helper menu is fixed.
  • Spotlight integration is improved.
  • We’ve made ongoing improvements to stability and sync performance.

Version 6.7.1

Fixed:

  • Fixed various bugs that affect users on OS X 10.10.x.

Version 6.7

New:

  • “⌘J”, which allows you to switch effortlessly between your notes and notebooks, now also works for tags!
  • Also improved is the switcher’s matching algorithm, which now recognizes possible misspelled searches.

Fixed:

  • Fixed several issues that were causing crashes.
  • Made improvements to sync performance.
  • Fixed an issue that prevented users from being able to accurately crop high-DPI images.
  • Fixed an issue that caused certain PDFs to display improperly after being annotated.
  • Fixed an issue that occasionally rendered links as plain text.
  • Enhanced the accuracy of business card scans via ScanSnap Evernote Edition scanners. Users can further improve the accuracy of their business card scans by adjusting their scanner settings. Learn more here: https://help.evernote.com/hc/articles/208431558
  • Fixed an issue with “copy note link” functionality that sometimes prevented users from opening the links.
  • Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented business tags from displaying.

Version 6.6.1

Fixed:

  • Fixed an issue that was sometimes preventing the Evernote Helper from auto-launching on OS X Mavericks (version 10.9).
  • Fixed an issue that was causing the switcher input field to only partially display the search text when users inputted Japanese text.
  • Fixed an issue that was preventing some users from seeing the new switcher feature.
  • Fixed an issue so that users can once again enter presentation mode after multi-selecting notes.
  • Fixed an issue that was preventing some users from upgrading to Plus or Premium accounts through the Mac App Store.
  • Fixed several issues that were causing crashes.

Version 6.6

New:

  • Effortlessly switch between notes. Introducing a new navigation/search feature that lets you switch between notes and notebooks with the tap of a quick key. Just hit “⌘J” to give it a try. (The previous notebook selector is still available with a new shortcut: “⌘⌥J”.)
  • Zoom is here! Now you can use “⌘+” and “⌘-” or pinch gestures on the trackpad to zoom in and out of a note. Two of our developers responded to the call of this long-standing user request and knocked it out in our first ever Hack Week. Enjoy!
  • You can now easily duplicate a note from the “Note” menu.
  • Manage tags from the note view. Right-click a tag in the note editor to bring up a menu that lets you filter your notes by the tag, remove the tag from the note, or delete the tag from all notes.
  • We redesigned the audio recorder for easy, intuitive recording and playback (OS X 10.10+).

Fixed:

  • For a long time the left side nav used to just highlight the “Notes” tab regardless of what you had selected. We know. Now it highlights your current selection.
  • Fixed an issue where local file system URI’s in the source field of a note would open up without notifying you.
  • Fixed several issues that were causing crashes.
  • Ongoing improvements to stability and sync performance.

Version 6.5

New

  • We changed the key command for increasing or decreasing font size. To increase, hit “⌘>” and to decrease, hit “⌘<”. This aligns with other office productivity applications and allows us to use “⌘+” and “⌘-” for a future Zoom feature.

Fixed

  • Fixed an issue where checkboxes didn’t print.
  • Fixed an issue where tags with periods or other symbols wouldn’t be found in the tag filter.
  • Improved initial Mac setup performance for accounts with 1000+ tags.
  • Fixed 7 of the top 10 crashing bugs.

Beta Features

We have a couple of features that are not quite finished yet but are available for beta testing purposes.

  • Zoom – Use “⌘+” and “⌘-” to temporarily zoom in and out. There are a few bugs, including an issue with resizing images when in zoom mode. To try it out, go to Preferences -> Software Update -> Enable zoom.
  • Code Block – This feature basically takes any selected text and converts it to a monospaced font and creates a gray background around the line of text. This also has a few bugs. It’s not recommended to turn this feature on if you’re an Android user because editing the note on Android will undo the code block. This works fine if you’re using the Common Editor beta version of Android, but will break using the standard Android app. To try it out, go to Preferences -> Software Update -> Enable code block.

Version 6.4

New:

  • Start discussions in the Work Chat view with a New Chat button.
  • Improved search behavior:
    • When you clear a search you will be returned to your previous note or view.
    • Search highlighting now highlights only words that start with the search phrase.

Fixed:

  • When you restart Evernote, there was an issue that it sometimes didn’t remember the last note you were on. Now it does.
  • Improved overall stability.

Version 6.3

New:

  • Some people were unwittingly deleting notes by hitting ⌫. Totally our fault for not putting a safety on the deleter. So we changed the key command to ⌘⌫, which is much harder to do on accident (and is equivalent to Finder’s shortcut key).
  • We also added a preference to disable auto-formatting of bulleted lists and emojis, for those who want a little more control.

Fixed:

  • Fixed an issue where font information was lost when copying from Evernote.
  • Fixed an issue where URLs for web-clipped notes wouldn’t appear.
  • Improved tag auto-complete menu performance.
  • Improved El Capitan visual and stability performance.

Version 6.2

  • We’ve added support for El Capitan’s Split View and narrower windows.
  • A new sidebar message area gives you easy access to shared notes and discussions (OS X 10.10 and above).
  • Save time with new text-editing shortcuts.
    • Type an asterisk and hit space to create a bulleted list. (“* ”)
    • Type a number then a period and hit space. Bam. You’ve got a numbered list. (“1. ”)
  • This release is for OS X 10.9 users and above.

Version 6.1.1

  • Various bug and stability fixes

Version 6.1

  • Redesigned sidebar enhances the look and feel of the app
  • Business users can easily find shared notebooks in the new notebook view
  • Lots of fantastic bug fixes and stability improvements

Version 6.0.16

  • Fixed the clarity and legibility of sidebar text
  • Various bug and stability fixes

Version 6.0.15

  • New simplified experience for sharing notes and notebooks
  • Improvements to decryption of text with complex formatting
  • Fixed copy and paste of tables
  • Numerous fixes and stability improvements

Version 6.0.13

  • Various bug and stability fixes

Version 6.0.12

Various bug and stability fixes

  • Fixed a scrolling issue in the note editor for older versions of Mac OS
  • Plus and Premium subscribers can hide Upgrade button
  • Numerous bug fixes

Version 6.0.11

  • Various bug and stability fixes

Version 6.0.10

  • Unlimited monthly uploads with Evernote Premium – Premium subscribers can now keep more notes, more photos, and more files in Evernote without worrying about space.
  • Introducing Evernote Plus – A new subscription tier that gives you many of the fundamentals to unlock more productivity. 1GB of monthly uploads, offline notebooks, mobile passcode, and emailing into Evernote.
  • Improved Work Chat with a new streamlined interface
  • Added several performance improvements
  • Numerous bug fixes

Update and find out more in-app!

Version 6.0.8

  • Various bug and stability fixes

Version 6.0.7

Work Chat

  • Attachments button shows all shared notes and notebooks in a chat

Save from anywhere

  • Click the share icon in many Mac apps to save what you see to Evernote

Customizable toolbar

  • Rearrange or remove options in the toolbar to fit your needs

Performance improvements

Numerous bug fixes

Version 6.0.6

Various bug and stability fixes including search improvements.

New features include:

  • Presentation Mode Auto-Layout – Divide your presentation into multiple slides with a single click.

The search improvements in this version require reindexing notes. Indexing allows for faster searches. This may take some time and could impact performance temporarily.

Version 6.0.5

Bug fixes and other improvements:

  • Fixed an issue which caused note content not to display.
  • Added the ability to export to a PDF from Presentation Mode.
  • Improved toolbar icon visibility.
  • Resolved various sync and crashing issues.

Work Chat improvements:

  • Share content with your Gmail contacts.
  • Added the ability to block contacts in Work Chat.

Version 6.0.3

  • Various bug and stability fixes.

Version 6.0.2

Bug fixes and other improvements:

  • Improved design on Mavericks and older versions of Mac OS.
  • Improved legibility in card and snippet view.
  • Fixed searching within PDFs.
  • Resolved various crashing issues.
  • Improved Work Chat contact search and display in drop down.

Version 6.0.1

New features:

  • Sleek new design inspired by OS X Yosemite
  • Work Chat: a new way to share and collaborate in Evernote
    • Share notes and notebooks in-app
    • Give view or edit permission when you share a single note
    • Chat with individuals or groups about things you’re working on
    • See when others are viewing or editing notes in your account and start chats with them
    • Added ability to filter Work Chats by contacrt name, keywords, and attachments.

Bug and stability fixes:

  • Improve handling of long URLs
  • Fixed a crash on launch issue

Windows 10 Fall Creators Update Version 1709

by Greg Johnson, posted in Software, Tech Tips

Microsoft released a major update for Windows 10 in October 2017. The update is referred to as the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update. The version number is 1709. The update includes some security improvements and feature enhancements.

Here are some links for more information:

How to completely backup and restore your Facebook account.

by Greg Johnson, posted in Social Media, Software, Tech Tips, Tools

In these two videos, you’ll learn how to completely backup and restore your Facebook account — even to another user account — using Acronis software. This is important in case your account gets hacked, suspended, or content is mistakenly deleted. For those wanting to shut down their Facebook presence, it provides a way to keep your content accessible.

Facebook Account Backup

Facebook Account Restore

__________________

Source: Acronis (19 May 2017)

Evernote – Apple iTunes Login on iOS iPhone iPad

by Greg Johnson, posted in Mobile Devices, Software, Tech Tips

If you’re using Evernote on an iOS device like iPhone or iPad, you’ve probably noticed an annoying and persistent pop-up message asking you to login to your Apple iTunes account with your Apple ID password.

As of today, Evernote has finally acknowledged the problem with the following message on their Help page:

Evernote for iOS: If you’re prompted to sign in to iTunes, please tap Cancel to resume use of Evernote. We’re working on a fix. Thank you for your patience.

Last week, Evernote pushed out an update that caused their iOS software to be very slow and barely usable. There were error messages about the server not being available, and synchronization errors.

What’s troubling about these recent problems from such a well established and trusted company like Evernote is that they represent the ‘canary in a coal mine’ phenomenon of system failures, but here we have not a canary but an elephant in the coal mine. Big reputable companies are starting to show system strain and failure.

Across numerous industries, not just tech firms, we’re seeing poorly developed products that have little or no testing before being pushed out to the public. Any user will immediately notice bugs and wonder “Do they even use their own product?” These aren’t difficult to spot or identify problems.

At the risk of offering an oversimplified analysis, it seems that these kinds of problems usually occur when entire industries try to do more with less. Businesses seeking to become more ‘efficient’ go beyond the point of diminishing returns where the quality of products, services, and workplace satisfaction are degraded. Everyone loses.

We all need to do what we can to emphasize the pursuit of optimal quality rather than maximum efficiency. Quality products, quality workplaces, quality services, and the highest quality of life for everyone we work with.

Firefox Browser Plugin Updates for Security

by Greg Johnson, posted in Security, Software, Tech Tools

You should regularly check your Firefox plugins to make sure they aren’t susceptible to security vulnerabilities.

This link will take you to the Firefox Plugins Check page:

https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/plugincheck/

The link only works when using the Firefox browser.

Problems with Neat Receipts Cloud Scanning Software

by Greg Johnson, posted in Computer Support, Consumer News, Products, Services, Software, Tech Tips, Tech Tools, Tools

After 14 years of building a very dedicated customer base and the world’s most successful and popular scanning platform, Neat has decided to scrap everything and start over with a new scanning solution. So far, reviews have been less than enthusiastic. Top company leadership are leaving and many employees are being laid off. (source)

This document lists some of the design problems with their new product as it relates to Apple users. This document will be updated over time with any new developments or discoveries.

  1. Apple Version Not Native. Rather than create an actual OS X application, the Apple version seems to have been developed on a non-standard emulator platform similar Adobe Air in the way it looks and feels. To find the program, you’ll look for it in Applications under the letter ‘N’ for Neat, but you won’t find it there. It’s in a folder named The Neat Company. To find it, look in The Neat Company > Neat Smart Organization System > Helium-shell > HeliumAppShell > and there you’ll find the familiar Neat program icon. This is where you’ll have to go if you need to drag the program icon to the Dock again, but don’t touch any of the other exposed program files because the entire fragile system will break down if you do.
  2. Columns Not Adjustable. The new program is broken into three primary columns. The left column shows the folders. The middle column shows the folder contents or the specifics of a particular entry. The right column is a preview window. These columns aren’t sizable or adjustable.
  3. Database Change. The database files are individually stored as PDF files in Documents > NeatScan > your name. Presumably if you mess with any of these files, the database index will be thrown off.
  4. Drag and Drop. In the previous versions of the Neat scanning software, it was possible to drag PDF files into the program and have them added, being scanned for OCR. In the new version, you must manually add files from the file menu.
  5. Item Type. When you change the item type from Document to Receipt (for example) the software goes through the ‘Processing’ step again.
  6. Slowness. To adequately test the speed of the Neat cloud-based scanning software, use a 100Mbps Internet connection, and a quad-core computer with 8 virtual cores, running on a solid state hard drive. When you test with this blazing fast computer, you’ll notice the system is slow to load receipt images — even with a database of only a dozen receipts.
  7. Zoom Issues. When you try to zoom in on a receipt using two finger zoom, the viewer zooms too fast.

Neat Receipts: Starting a New Year

by Greg Johnson, posted in Mobile Devices, Software, Tech Tips, Tech Tools, Technology Devices

Neat Receipts is a scanning hardware and software solution that integrates cloud services. Over a year or more, the scanning database can grow to over 1GB in size. This can eventually slow down your computer, and cause other problems.

So, it’s a good idea to consider keeping separate Neat Library files for each year. There can only be one default library file, but you can open other library files.

Below are instructions for creating a new Neat Library for a new year.

NOTE: These instructions only work with the older legacy Neat software. Their new cloud-dependent software is entirely different.

  1. Before starting the Neat software, copy the previous year’s library and put it in a folder for the new year giving the file a new name such as Neat Library 2016. It’s also good to have a backup copy of this file in case anything goes wrong, so you may want to put another copy elsewhere.
  2. Set the default library to the file created in step #1 above. Do this by going to the Neat menu, then Preferences. Under the General tab, you’ll find Default Library.
  3. Exit the Neat software.
  4. Start the Neat software.
  5. The recently created library file for the new current year should open as default automatically.
  6. Open the previous year’s file. It will try to synchronize (assuming you pay for the cloud storage). Stop it from synchronizing since you want to only synchronize the current year’s library file. To stop synchronization Double click on sync icon and turn off sync. Then close that file.
  7. Exit the Neat software.
  8. Start the Neat software.
  9. Now when you start Neat, the new year will open. If you open a previous year, it won’t synchronize.
  10. Remove any data from the previous year that still exists in the new year library file. Similarly, you can remove any data in the previous year’s library that belongs in the current year (if you had already started scanning in receipts for the new year while using the previous year’s library).

 

Get $14,000 in Software for $99 with Microsoft Office 365

by Greg Johnson, posted in Software, Tech Tips

Overview

You’ve probably heard of Microsoft Office 365, the $99 per year subscription service that includes the full suite of Microsoft’s latest Office 2016 software, plus some other software.

Is an Annual Subscription a Good Deal?

Most people think of subscription services as a rip-off. Instead of paying annually, they’d rather purchase Microsoft Office for about $130 as a one-time purchase and keep it forever. However, every 2 or 3 years Microsoft releases a new version and it’s generally a good idea to stay current.

Here’s what you get for the $99 per year subscription fee to Office 365.

  • Word, Excel, PowerPoint ($125 on Amazon)
  • Outlook ($220 on Amazon)
  • Publisher ($240 on Amazon)
  • Access ($110 on Amazon)
  • One Note
  • 1,000 GB of cloud storage with OneDrive
  • Email services with Outlook online

TOTAL COST SOLD SEPARATELY: $695

But Wait, There’s More

Using the Microsoft Office 365 subscription, you can install the above software on 5 computers (a $3,475 value), or share the subscription with four other people (or any mix of installs and shares). When you share with others, they can install on 5 of their own computers or devices.

So, if you use the purchasing user account for one of the installations (required), then share your Office 365 subscription with four people, there can be a potential for a total of 21 computers to have the full suite of software listed above.

That’s 21 computers with $695 in software
for a total of $14,595 in value for only $99 per year.

Limitations

Keep in mind that the intention of the Office 365 license is to share among people in the same household or family. It’s not for business use or sharing with acquaintances. Each person with a shared account needs to login on their 5 computers with their own Microsoft account to activate the software. Other than this limitation, for those who are able to take full advantage of the subscription, it’s a great deal.

Video Overview of Office 365 Features

The video below provides an overview of Office 365 features.