Microsoft trumpets Office 12

Office 12 will feature new collaboration and content management technologies

Microsoft's upcoming Office 12 will offer enterprises a new level of content and document management, the company said in a keynote presentation at the Professional Developer Conference in Los Angeles.

"This is the deepest framework for enterprise content management that we've ever introduced," Steven Sinofsky, senior vice president for Office, told delegates.

The new Office Server will add support for blogs and wikis to Microsoft's existing collaboration tools. It will also incorporate a new version of Windows Sharepoint Services, Microsoft's current content management application for Office.

By adding support for the company's new workflow technology unveiled earlier at the developer event, Office 12 will allow organisations to route documents. This could enable the approval of a Word document through an Outlook message, for example.

Sinofsky promised other new collaboration and content management technologies, including the ability for users to be informed about new documents added to a shared folder through the use of RSS feeds.

Office 12 is scheduled for release in late 2006. A first beta is due out later this year.

• Click here for photos of Sinofsky's keynote at PDC