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I am currently using a VPS that I use to work on Quickbooks with my 3 employees that all access it from their own home offices for my bookkeeping business. &nbsp;I am going to be using an additional accounting software, Connected and have been informed that in a cloud setting I cannot use it easily with Office 365, i.e. if I wanted to send a report to Excel from Connected I would have to save it as a text file, then open Excel and open the saved text file.<br />
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I'm thinking of moving to a server using either Windows Server 2012 Essentials or Windows Server 2012 Standard and would like to use Office 365 but be able to use it with the Connected software without constantly saving files. &nbsp;Would this work in either O/S, do I have use a specific Office 365 subscription and will I have issues with having 3 to 4 remote users? O/S and hardware suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
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I am currently using a VPS that I use to work on Quickbooks with my 3 employees that all access it from their own home offices for my bookkeeping business.  I am going to be using an additional accounting software, Connected and have been informed that in a cloud setting I cannot use it easily with Office 365, i.e. if I wanted to send a report to Excel from Connected I would have to save it as a text file, then open Excel and open the saved text file.

I'm thinking of moving to a server using either Windows Server 2012 Essentials or Windows Server 2012 Standard and would like to use Office 365 but be able to use it with the Connected software without constantly saving files.  Would this work in either O/S, do I have use a specific Office 365 subscription and will I have issues with having 3 to 4 remote users? O/S and hardware suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Accounting software, Office 365 and new server

Office 365 is a group of software plus services subscriptions that provides productivity software and related services to its subscribers. Office 365 allows the use of Microsoft Office apps on Windows and OS X, provides storage space on Microsoft's cloud storage service OneDrive, and grants 60 Skype minutes per month. Office 365 includes e-mail and social networking services through hosted versions of Exchange Server, Skype for Business Server, SharePoint and Office Online, integration with Yammer, as well as access to the Office software. All of Office 365's components can be managed and configured through an online portal; users can be added manually, imported from a CSV file, or Office 365 can be set up for single sign-on with a local Active Directory using Active Directory Federation Services.

Microsoft 365

A server is a computer program or a machine that waits for requests from other machines or software (clients) and responds to them. This architecture is called the client–server model. The clients may run on the same computer or may connect to the server over a network. The purpose of a server is to share data or hardware and software resources among clients. Typical computing servers are database servers, file servers, mail servers, print servers, web servers, game servers, and application servers.

Server Software

Office Productivity refers both to the act of being productive and efficient in an office or professional environment, as well as the software applications used to "produce" information. This includes the development of professional skills, creating work processes, and almost any program used to create or modify a document, image, audio or video clip. However, business application suites such as Microsoft Office, which include word processing, spreadsheet and presentation programs, are typically called productivity software, as contrasted with a "utility program," such as a file manager, which is used to organize files and folders on the computer. Many office- and business-oriented groups of programs are organized into suites.