Office software

It might seem strange to you that downloading Office software is an administrative component on the dashboard. Doesn't downloading your own software seem like something you do as a user, rather than as an administrator? The truth is, administrators are more likely to interact with the administration portal than they are with the Office 365 home page, where you'd normally find your software download link.

Clicking on the name of the component takes you to the my software download page, which you'd otherwise access via the Office 365 end user home page. It's not part of the administration portal at all at that point. But there are also links on the component for various administrative functions that have to do with Office software installation:

• Install my software: This is, confusingly, not the link that takes you to a place to install your own software. It's actually a link for setting up manual deployment of software for the users in your company. If there are any issues with internet speed (or worse, metering) at the physical offices where your users work, we highly recommend following the instructions here to perform a manual deployment, as it lets you get away with performing the download once, rather than once per user. That's outside of the scope of this book, but Microsoft provides instructions right on the Manually deploy user software popup.
• Share the download link: This opens an email in your default mail client, which has the link to the Office software download page in it.
• Software download settings: Here, you can exert some control over what software your users can install for themselves. At one point, the options included Office 2013 products, but they've been discontinued for most customers as of February 2017:
  • For PC, you can choose to block or allow the Office suite as a whole, the extra products that don't come with the Office suite (Project and Visio), SharePoint Designer, and standalone Skype for Business. You can also choose whether your users get upgrades to Office every month or every 6 months.
  • For macOS, you can block or allow Office itself, additional Office applications that need separate downloads, and Skype for Business.
• Troubleshoot installation: This opens a link on Microsoft's Office 365 Admin Help, covering how to deal with installations gone wrong.