Microsoft Docs Debuts: Create and Share Office Documents Online for Free

It's getting easier to create and share Office docs -- like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint -- online. This week, Microsoft rolled out a Web-based version of Office 2010 that lets you create, edit, and even share Office documents online, whether you have Office installed on your PC or not. The interesting twist? The sharing happens via Facebook.

First, the bad news: Docs for Facebook is in limited beta, which means you can edit documents by invitation only. But while you can't edit files right off the bat, you can certainly view documents which are already posted on the Docs.com Web site.

Want an invitation to try out Docs? Just go to the site and click the Sign me up link. Because of the service's tight integration with Facebook, you'll need to sign in with your Facebook ID. Eventually, you'll be offered an invitation to try out the full service, at which time you'll be allowed to create new documents, edit docs, and share them with any Facebook contacts. Docs is also connected to your local copy of Office; you can, at any time, choose to edit a document online or move it to your desktop copy of Office and use the full suite of editing tools if you so desire.

As you might expect, there's also a Facebook app for accessing Docs within Facebook.

We'll tell you more about Docs when we get a chance to play with it in more detail. For now, it's interesting -- we certainly welcome any opportunity to use Office on the cheap or for free. But we're not convinced that the Facebook connectivity is a killer Web app; personally, I keep my business life and personal life separate, which limits my interest in a Facebook-based Word editor. What about you?

Dave Johnson was employed by Microsoft Corporation at the time this article was written.