LinkedIn announces full Office 2013 integration

Enterprise social network joins YouTube, Facebook, Flickr with built-in support

Microsoft has added another partner for Microsoft Office 2013, with yesterday's announcement by LinkedIn product manager David Breger that Outlook's Social Connector will now no longer require external downloads to interface with LinkedIn – it'll be there from the start.

"You just have to sign-in once with your LinkedIn credentials and immediately you'll start seeing rich profile information, like photos and LinkedIn network activity for any connection that emails you," wrote Breger on LinkedIn's company blog.

"You'll also see LinkedIn profile data surface when you view a People Card throughout the new Office experience."

Breger said users will be able to keep track of what connections are discussing and sharing, and access and update photos, contact information and profile details, all from within Office.

Breger also announced that LinkedIn will be jumping on board with Microsoft's Apps for Office, which succeeds previous versions' Visual Basic for Applications.

Breger wrote how the App plugin "packs some new functionality and features for today's busy professionals. We'll be talking more about that in the coming weeks".

Previously announced additions to Microsoft's built-in features range include YouTube, Facebook and Flickr, components from which can be integrated into Word documents, PowerPoint presentations and more.

More information on Office 2013's new feature sets are available in Computing's in-depth, hands-on with Office 2013 in tablet form, running on Windows 8.