Less than half-a-year after Microsoft’s Office Live Workspace was first announced, the company decided to open up the beta testing to the public, after several months of restricted availability. Starting Tuesday, the beta testing will enable anyone to sign up for tests and at the same time, will offer new features than the October version.

“Today’s announcement moves us further down the path of bringing a software plus services experience to people at home, work and school,” said Stephen Elop, president of the Microsoft Business Division in a statement. “By combining the rich client experience of Microsoft Office with flexible, intuitive service offerings, we’re providing seamless computing experiences for our 500 million Office users worldwide.”

The service is part of Microsoft’s strategy to adjust to customer’s demands, which requires mobility and accessibility at all times, anywhere. Office Live Workspace will be able to save over 1,000 Microsoft Office documents to one place that can later be accessed and shared via Internet. Unlike any other similar services, this one will offer Office customers the possibility to use it online.

Microsoft also added a series of new features to the October version of Office Live Workspace, such as an activity panel showing all the activity in a workspace at once, notifications to let users know about changes made to their documents or workspaces, direct links which allow users to bookmark their workspace and documents via URLs, multi-file upload and improved sharing.

“Microsoft Office Live Workspace combines all the amazing ease of use that you expect from Microsoft Office with the convenience and security of Web-based storage,” said Matthew Jett Hall, assistant vice-chancellor, information technology services and associate chief information architect, enterprise infrastructure at Vanderbilt University in a statement. “The best of both worlds allows you to collaborate, edit and share in ways that previously never existed. This is a great execution of a wonderful concept.”