Office apps in iOS - Houston, we have a problem

[mhegge]

I wanted to put this out there as we just discovered an issue that we are trying to work around regarding classroom iPads (carts) and the use of the Microsoft Office apps.

Apparently, you need to log into a 365 account in order to edit/create documents. (Oh, it will open a new document or any document, you just cannot do anything with it, so you have that going for you...)

This presents a real issue with these cart iPads. They are not shared ipads, and we cannot have students logging into their 365 accounts. We would have to wipe these iPads daily which seems to be the only solution to clear logged in account. This is NOT an option. Its just not conducive to classroom iPads.

Does anyone know if Microsoft has a solutions or program for this? I am not getting anything solid from their website. https://products.office.com/en-us/academic/compare-office-365-education-plans

[joshuasee]

Short answer to your question: No.

Office is sold on a subscription basis now, so a login is needed to prove you have a subscription. The solutions Microsoft offers for labs aren't available for the iOS versions.

The problem is actually a little worse than you think: Credentials and access to the OneDrive of each user is retained, without further prompts, until all apps are logged out.

Think over what you want to do with the Office suite on iOS. Is viewing enough? If not, would a webclip to Office online, which does work on iPads without the apps, be sufficient?

My solution was to push a web clip and lock screen warning to log out of the Office 365 apps on shared devices, but I am in an HED environment.