I've been getting a bunch of inquiries on Office 2010 recently, so I decided it was time to blog on what I currently know about the status of the project.

According to several rumors, Microsoft Office 2010 will be released in June of this year. Microsoft has a history of pushing back release dates but has stayed pretty close to schedule on its last few major releases.

The new Office suite includes updates to all of Microsoft's major productivity apps - including Word 2010, Excel 2010, Outlook 2010, PowerPoint 2010, OneNote 2010, Access 2010, Publisher 2010, InfoPath 2010 - and will be available in 32bit and 64 bit versions.

An excellent source for learning more about Office 2010 enhancements can be found on Microsoft’s site HERE. The company released a test version of Office Professional Plus 2010 a couple of months ago, and has yet to reveal the expiration date of the trial period.

The updated Office will be available in two separate formats: a traditional PC-based edition and a completely web-based version.

Office Web Apps includes lightweight versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint and will be made available to millions free of charge.

People who participate in the Office 2010 beta program can try out the public preview of Office Web Apps by using a Windows Live account to create, edit, store and retrieve documents online.

Office Web Apps require Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) or later on Windows; Firefox 3.5 or later on Windows, Mac and Linux; or Safari 4.0 or later on the Mac.

This article contains the following links:

http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/reviews/index.cfm?ReviewID=118363

http://www.microsoft.com/office/2010/en/default.aspx

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2009/sep09/09-17officewebapps.mspx

http://www.microsoft.com/office/2010/en/default.aspx