
Microsoft Fluid Framework Preview - aspenmayer
https://fluidpreview.com
======
localhost
I like to think about Fluid as "OLE 3.0" (I used to own COM in Windows a few
years ago - also disclaimer - I don't work on this team but am a big fan of
their work). It's about making it easy to create components that can connect
with each other through a cloud message queue service. So this "collaborative
OneNote" experience shows just one aspect of that. You can build much more
granular things using the SDK.

This video is the best explanation of it that I know of:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMzXmkrlFNg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMzXmkrlFNg)

~~~
jpalomaki
This is exactly the feeling I got as well. Being able to take components and
paste them to other containers.

Reminded me the experience of editing for example Visio picture inside Word
document.

------
aspenmayer
Is this Google Wave coming back in the form of Office.com? Open-source!
Definitely a different Microsoft than the one I grew up with.

Announcement support page

[https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-started-
with-...](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-started-with-fluid-
framework-preview-d05278db-b82b-4d1f-8523-cf0c9c2fb2df)

In the news

[https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/19/21260005/microsoft-
office...](https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/19/21260005/microsoft-office-fluid-
web-document-features-build)

'Microsoft is creating a new kind of Office document. Instead of Word, Excel,
or PowerPoint, the company has created Lego blocks of Office content that live
on the web. The tables, graphs, and lists that you typically find in Office
documents are transforming into living, collaborative modules that exist
outside of traditional documents.

'Microsoft calls its Lego blocks Fluid components, and they can be edited in
real time by anyone in any app. The idea is that you could create things like
a table without having to switch to multiple apps to get it done, and the
table will persist on the web like a Lego block, free for anyone to use and
edit.

'“Imagine you could take those Lego pieces and put them in any place you
wanted: in emails, in chats, in other apps,” explains Jared Spataro, head of
Microsoft 365, in an interview with The Verge. “As people work on them, they
will always be updated and contain the latest information.”

'Microsoft’s Fluid Framework sounds a lot like Google Docs, but it’s actually
Google Docs on steroids. Microsoft is so confident it has built the future of
productivity, it’s now open-sourcing its Fluid Framework so the rest of the
world can help shape what it has created. Some Office.com users will even be
able to start getting a taste of this Fluid future in the coming months.'

~~~
ocdtrekkie
It sounds a lot to me like OneNote, where you paste in bits and bobs of
standard Office formats.

It feels like we see a new Office app every few years that's supposed to
enable some magical flow of business, but every Office app I actually see used
in offices has been around since 1995 or earlier.

------
aboringusername
Am I crazy for wanting more than ever to fully embrace offline, privacy
preserving technology? I'm okay with my Excel file on my HDD that I am in
control over (and I've been spending time migrating away from the 'cloud' to a
fully offline experience, where I can do anything I need without an internet
connection, possibly for months at a time).

This sounds like it ties you further into the MS ecosystem; it's likely you'll
need an MS account and be willing to agree to their privacy policy to use this
feature - hopefully there is an "opt out" at least if it's integrated into
their applications. And I'm not seeing anything that says this can work if you
disable your internet connection, which is crucial for many people.

I also wonder about the longevity of these things. Imagine if an email was
"alive" and could be "edited" after it was sent by anyone, like a 'module' as
they're proposing.

There's a value into having a static, in-time thing, like an email, that will
contain the same content 50 years from when it was sent and isn't reliant on
some database to get the content (and can be easily exported/imported at
will).

Dislike this. Moving everything to an online service sounds cool, except there
are drawbacks to this approach.

~~~
nojito
>Am I crazy for wanting more than ever to fully embrace offline, privacy
preserving technology?

Yes because great work gets done collaboratively.

------
techntoke
I get the following message:

> The Fluid preview experience is available on desktop versions of Edge
> Chromium and Chrome. Please use one of these browsers on your computer to
> access the preview.

Guess not so fluid afterall.

~~~
avolcano
FWIW, their docs[1] mention it should work on desktop Safari and Firefox, they
just haven't built a mobile UI yet I Guess.

[1] [https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-started-
with-...](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-started-with-fluid-
framework-preview-d05278db-b82b-4d1f-8523-cf0c9c2fb2df)

~~~
techntoke
It's just the name fluid generally refers to design patterns that scale from
desktop to mobile automatically.

------
SpaceL10n
I get this message:

Microsoft Sign in

Sorry, but we’re having trouble signing you in. AADSTS50020: User account
'<redacted>@live.com' from identity provider 'live.com' does not exist in
tenant 'Microsoft Services' and cannot access the application
'660d4be7-2665-497f-9611-a42c2668dbce'(Microsoft Fluid Framework Preview) in
that tenant. The account needs to be added as an external user in the tenant
first. Sign out and sign in again with a different Azure Active Directory user
account.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
I think you're expected to be using an Office 365 account, not a generic
Microsoft account.

~~~
victor106
Using my Office365 account, the screen continuously refreshes on Mac Chrome

------
nsriv
The best explanation of this I've encountered is from The Verge:
[https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/19/21260005/microsoft-
office...](https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/19/21260005/microsoft-office-fluid-
web-document-features-build)

------
hadrien01
I'm endlessly redirected between
[https://fluidpreview.office.net/#access_token=somethingveryl...](https://fluidpreview.office.net/#access_token=somethingverylong)
and [https://fluidpreview.office.net/](https://fluidpreview.office.net/), is
there something I'm missing?

Edit: in a Private Window it asks me to log in my Microsoft account, so I
guess it has detected I was logged in, but goes in an authentication loop?

~~~
Mouse47
This is a well-known bug with ADAL.js that I've personally struggled with on
our own corporate sites. It's a library that enables OAuth integration with
Azure AD for single-page apps. Switching browsers can fix it. If they're using
MSAL instead, it's possible that copying the link and pasting it into a new
window will fix it as well...

------
archagon
"Steve Lucco looked at it from the fundamental level of 'What if we built
every experience on top of a data structure that was inherently distributed?'"

CRDTs under the hood?

------
mcgroarty
So far, it basically looks like it wants to become Atlassian Confluence.
Presumably it will become more tightly integrated with Office 365 than
Confluence can be.

------
agumonkey
3 announcements about this, first 2 it was fluff with barely any details. Now
account required. Not good MS

~~~
kyriakos
It's an office 365 product why would you expect it to work without an account?
Especially when it's purpose is collaboration

~~~
agumonkey
a framework is a user level product ?

------
kungato
Didn't someone mention this is open source? Where is the code?

~~~
nojito
Will be available next month on Github.

[https://www.techrepublic.com/article/microsoft-
build-2020-te...](https://www.techrepublic.com/article/microsoft-
build-2020-teams-gets-more-versatile-and-fluid-framework-goes-open-source/)

------
staz
it seems like what dropbox paper was supposed to be? or not never sure what
was supposed to be the unique value of it

------
Hamuko
What is it?

~~~
mingabunga
[https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-started-
with-...](https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-started-with-fluid-
framework-preview-d05278db-b82b-4d1f-8523-cf0c9c2fb2df)

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adontz
Is it something like Notion?

~~~
MikusR
It's ole objects but for web

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exdsq
Thought this was a framework for fluid dynamics :(

