Microsoft Office Beta Testdrive

Microsoft has launched a test site where you can try out beta 2 of Office 2007. Based on a Citrix setup you can try it out without installing anything locally, except the Citrix Web Client. You need a Windows Live account to be able to logon, as well as Internet Explorer 5.5+. Check out http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/beta/testdrive.mspx for a no-install test of the upcoming Office 2007 release. There is also a full set of tutorials to help you walk through the preview. I'm pretty sure this setup will also be a testing ground for Microsoft and their pay-as-you-go service announced earlier this year. Again this is a perfect example of how to separate the local computer from the applications and provide a safe test environment utilizing virtualization techniques. I know this isn't virtualized in the true sense, but it does go a long way in providing a test environment where your own local client isn't affected by running the software locally. By the way, the servers are running Windows Server 2003 R2 with the Luna theme. Pretty spiffy!

Posted by Christian Mohn aka h0bbel