Microsoft officially acknowledges the rollout of Outlook Spaces (‘Project Moca’) | ZDNet


Credit: Microsoft

In February 2020, images, video and information about Microsoft’s ‘Project Moca’ productivity feature for Outlook started leaking. But it wasn’t until very late August that Microsoft finally acknowledged officially — via a blog post — that the preview of Project Moca has started rolling out, beginning with some Outlook for the Web users.

Earlier leaks referred to Project Moca as Outlook Spaces. I’ve heard over the past few months from several people (most, if not all, of whom seem to be Office Insider testers) who said they’ve used the Spaces preview inside Outlook. (It has never showed up for me.) Microsoft repeatedly has declined to comment on Spaces/Moca over the last several months.

In an August 28 Tech Community blog post, Microsoft officials described how users will be able to “organize your content your way” with Project Moca. Moca acts like a centralized hub for users to put their To Do lists, documents, Sticky Notes, contacts, emails and events. Each space has its own flexible canvas, allowing users to customize and view content in their preferred way. For those wondering, “Notes” in Project Moca are saved as Sticky Notes.

Customers can create a new space from scratch or use a template which Microsoft provides. Once inside a space, users can click on “Bucket” to create an organizational ‘drawer’ and add content to it.

Microsoft officials said users who get the Moca preview will be able to access it in the module switcher in Outlook for the Web or by clicking on the ellipsis menu. (Both of these are located at the bottom of the far-left navigational pane in Outlook for the Web.)

Microsoft has a lot of different list/planning tools and other organizational tools. Moca reminds me in some ways of the new “Collections” feature in Chrome-based Edge. Microsoft also is close to introducing its “Project Cortex” knowledge-management service, which includes other types of organizational tools and techniques. (One commentator on the Moca post said he thought the Moca UI looked like Cortex Topic Cards.)

I’ve asked Microsoft for the planned rollout schedule for Project Moca, its official name and other details. No word back so far.



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