[NewsPoster]

Promised iOS and Android versions of Office won't launch until the fall of 2014, according to a leaked roadmap obtained by CNet. The document describes a project called "Gemini," said to be Microsoft's plan to incorporate the Metro user interface into Office. The first "wave" in Gemini is expected to be an October 2013 update of the core apps -- Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote -- that will run on mobile versions of Windows 8 and Windows RT. The software will allegedly supplement the desktop Windows suite, instead of replacing it.

A "1.5" wave is scheduled for April 2014, and will bring the next Office for Mac, an updated Office for Windows Phone, a suite for LSX ("large screen experience") hardware, and some form of Office RT update. iOS/Android apps are due in October 2014, alongside the first version of Outlook for Windows RT.

An iOS version of Office has been rumored for well over a year, but the expected launch window has shifted continuously. Even suite's contents are unclear, although it's commonly believed that it will be a simplified version of Office, for instance lacking Outlook entirely.

[Spheric Harlot]

Well then.

They are absolutely intent on missing the boat on mobile computing, in hopes of somehow establishing Windows through leveraging Office exclusivity.

Except by then, Office will be irrelevant to the future of home computing.

[MacMan2000]

VAPORWARE!

[dwlayman]

You have to be kidding. This isn't a late April Fool's joke, no?

Not sure if I'll even be using MS Office for Mac by Fall 2014. By then various iOS apps might well fill its place. Maybe Apple will have introduced a killer version of iWork by then (although I'm not holding by breath on that one, either).

[Mr. Strat]

If they make the OS X and/or iOS versions look like Windows 8, I'll pass.

[Arne_Saknussemm]

you can bet it will only run full screen and have an even taller ribbon bar robbing your (now almost inevitably wide screen) desktop of even more vertical pixels.

[OldManMac]

That's another year and a half! They don't get! The iPad, on which this would usable, is already on it's third anniversary, and now they expect people to wait even longer? I don't think so! Why Ballmer is still CEO of that company baffles me.

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by Arne_Saknussemm 

you can bet it will only run full screen and have an even taller ribbon bar robbing your (now almost inevitably wide screen) desktop of even more vertical pixels.

Desktop? This is about the iPad version.

[gprovida]

In an effort to keep the Office cash cow, MS is loosing the opportunity to disrupt itself. Instead grabbing the opportunity, MS remains trapped in sustaining its past successes and will be disrupted by others similar to iTunes, iPod, iPhone, and now iPad. While timing is bad, the intent to use mobile office as an extension (sustaining innovation) is the deeper strategy flaw.

[pairof9s]

Trying to forever push the Windows agenda, no matter comically inept it seems at this point. What a buffoon!