The increasing reliance on the remote work model and (hybrid work) has increased the importance of productivity tools and applications that facilitate smooth collaboration between employees. This prompted Microsoft to intensify its efforts to integrate generative artificial intelligence technologies into its products and introduce new products such as the (Loop) application.
Last week, Microsoft released the public preview of its Loop collaborative workspace app, which aims to make it easier for teams to work on and organize tasks and projects.
So what is the new Microsoft Loop app, what features does it offer, and how can you use it?
Firstly; What is Microsoft Loop?
The Microsoft Loop application offers a new way to work through Microsoft Office applications to seamlessly manage tasks and projects and collaborate on them across all devices. Through the application, users can create collaborative documents using any Microsoft Office application. Such as: Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, allowing teams to think, plan, and create together.
Loop simulates the collaborative nature of Google Workspace desktop applications by allowing up to 50 people to collaborate on a single document at the same time.
The Loop application consists of three basic elements: Components, Workspaces, and Pages.
Loop's main feature is shareable components that allow you to share and collaborate on any page with your team in real time. It can also be shared in Teams or Outlook, and the component will stay in sync across all of them, and can be edited directly within any of them.
Components shared in the Loop app are always up to date and can be modified by team members, for example, if you and your teammates are working on a spreadsheet, you can include that table as a component in a message in Teams or as an email in Outlook, and any changes will appear in table in all applications.
While Pages is where components can be created with ready-made templates to get you started quickly, when creating new pages you'll be suggested templates, designs, and images based on the keywords you type.
Workspaces provide collaborative areas where you and your team can organize all the information relevant to your project in one place, making it easy to see what everyone is doing and how far they are progressing on their respective tasks.
secondly; How do you use Microsoft Loop?
Microsoft has launched the public preview version of the Loop app for all users, and to access it, all you have to do is go to the Microsoft Loop website , then sign in with your Microsoft account.
to start your new collaborative project; You can start with workspaces, where you can enter keywords relevant to your project and Loop will suggest tools for you to use.
after that; The app will create pages to organize your content, and new pages will suggest templates, designs, and images based on your keywords. And if your project requires input from someone outside of your team, you can share only certain information, or a component, with people outside your organization.
In addition, you can copy and paste components into any Microsoft Office application, and pages can be shared as web links or a direct page. Users can comment directly on the page or choose to comment from their Outlook email, similar to (Google Docs).
You can also add progress tracking tools within a project to keep people in the know of what needs to be done next, and certain tasks in the Loop app can be synced to Microsoft Planner and To Do, creating a to-do list for you.
The Loop app can provide notifications on desktop and mobile devices, letting you know about mentions, specific tasks, and replies to comments. The app also provides security and permission controls to protect your data.
In addition, the Loop application integrates with the new artificial intelligence features called (Copilot) that Microsoft offers in its office applications, to help users write texts, find new ideas, and get answers to questions, as you can ask Copilot to make suggestions, or change the style of Typing, or reformatting the text.
Once Copilot has created what you're looking for, you can share it as a Loop component in any Microsoft 365 app , and this feature can help you summarize information within the Loop, edit summaries, and share them with others in real time.