Microsoft may be close to launching a public preview version of the next installment of their Office software suite, according to a new report that also says the final version, along with a touch-first Modern UI version of Office, is still on track for a spring 2015 release for Windows.
The report, from the reliable Mary Jo Foley of ZDNet via her unnamed sources, states that the public preview of "Office 16" (the internal code name for the next version of Office) "could be released any time now." Last month, The Verge reported that preview builds of Office 16 were being sent to Microsoft partners, which included features like the "Tell Me" helper utility, automatic image rotation, and a new "dark" theme for its UI.
This news comes just a few hours before Microsoft is scheduled to hold a press event in San Francisco today, where CEO Satya Nadella is supposed to reveal Microsoft's future cloud-based plans. It's possible that the upcoming version of Office might be discussed at the event.
Foley's main article talks about a recent presentation from Microsoft's Igor Zaika at the Facebook @Scale conference, where he talked about how the company is developing Office using C++ at its core for all versions of the software, including Android and iOS ports. Microsoft has already released Office for Apple's iPad and the company is rumored to launch Office for Android tablets before the end of the year.
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