10 Pretty Impressive Tips for Office 365

We've gotten such positive feedback for the new Office 365 that we are going to focus on that for this issue. Here are some tips and new features we bet you didn't know.

1. Edit online documents as a group
Now Microsoft offers real time online editing for Word, PowerPoint or Excel, just the same as Google apps has for years.

2. Link to files, don't attach them
Emailing attachments is so 2012. Now you can upload the file to your Office 365's cloud storage then use the cloud version of Outlook (known as Outlook Web App) to send a link to that online file.

3. Turn notes into calendar items
You can now use Microsoft's note tool, OneNote, inside of Microsoft Outlook. When you write a to-do list in OneNote, you can easily convert it to a bunch of tasks with deadlines and reminders on your calendar.

4. Convert scribbles to text and drawings
Scribble handwritten notes into OneNote on a device that supports electronic ink (OneNote, Samsung Galaxy Note, etc.) and it will convert that scribble into something meaningful.

5. Teach your inbox to de-clutter itself
Microsoft has launched a new feature called Clutter to Office 365 users. You can set your mailbox to move spam and bulk email messages to the Clutter folder so your more important messages will pop right to the top of your inbox.

6. Ignore annoying reply-all conversations
Office 365 also lets users select an email thread they no longer want to see (such as group discussions and list emails) and say "Ignore."

7. Add a signature to an email
With Office 365, you can now use DocuSign, a free electronic signature app within Outlook. Say goodbye to the old days of printing documents just to sign them -- and then having to scan and fax or mail them.

8. Turn your mouse icon into a laser pointer
If you are giving a presentation using PowerPoint, and you don't have a laser pointer, you can now turn the cursor of your PC's mouse into a little red dot.

9. Speed up formatting in Excel
Excel has another handy feature called Flash Fill which sees how you are formatting and does the rest for you. Just perform one reformat and when you start on the second cell, Excel displays the whole list, reformatted. Just click to accept it.

10. Edit a PDF file
Have you ever needed to edit a PDF? Now you can easily convert it into a Word document to edit. Just open it and respond "OK" when asked if you to convert the PDF.