Microsoft has officially announced the relaunch of their cloud computing service, OneDrive, which would give all current and future users to access all files from a single course, OneDrive.com.
This is an unsurprising piece of news. New CEO Satya Nadella was once the head of the cloud operations, and so this seems a natural focus for a change. Especially since they were legally required to change the name of what once used to be SkyDrive following a lawsuit by BSkyB.
According to their press release, they are now very much focused on allowing full device integration. OneDrive creates a full cloud service that backs up any kind of file and is accessible from all devices. They claim that 77% of cloud users still have devices holding content that hasn’t been backed up elsewhere, and they want to change that.
Perhaps the best news about OneDrive is that is isn’t just a cross-platform between Windows desktops and phone, but also XBox 360 and One, and Office. Then there are other brand compatibilities, which so far also include Android and Apple devices. So far there is no compatibility with non-Microsoft consoles, but if things go well with their mobile integration, who knows what could be in store in the future?
Sharing documents and co-authoring files has been a unique way they are competing against services like Google Drive. The free version of Office is no co-author compatible, so two people from two locations and pick up where the other left off, on any device.
If you are planning on trying OneDrive, now is the time to do it. From their press release:
To celebrate the official launch of OneDrive, today we will also give 100,000 people 100 GB of free storage for 1 year. That’s 10 PB of free storage—enough storage space for a photo of everyone on the planet. If you want to be one of those 100,000, keep an eye on @OneDrive for clues.
So it might be worth jumping onto Twitter and monitoring that profile for today. A year of that much data storage is a helpful addition to anyone’s online organization. I know I could really benefit from it, given the haphazard way everything is thrust onto my many devices with no hope if one of them fails.
Source: OneDrive Blog
