|
|
| Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead |
 |
|
Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:04 AM EST
|
You can take a look at the new MS Office 2007 Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and Outlook in some screenshots on Jensen Harris' blog. Microsoft has a few on its site as well. After you take a look, tell me, if you can, that the disabled in Massachusetts aren't going to have to be totally retrained, not to mention everyone else that uses Microsoft products.
You have a choice in their new Word between two colors now, black and blue. I know. But I'm trying to be nice. They've worked hard, and they are naturally proud of their work, and it's not the FOSS way to be mean-spirited and tear down others just to get a leg up in the marketplace. We don't think like that, which is part of why we are winning. Decency matters. I call it the GNU/Linux value add. Even the Mob wants to know they can trust a business partner. That's the part I think Microsoft doesn't get, and so they badmouth people, like the poor trustee in the EU antitrust litigation, who merely told the truth as he saw it, for which he was rewarded by having his skills publicly demeaned. I've experienced that too. I would hope we never see such low blows coming from the FOSS side. I know I never want to sink that low. And the Microsoft colors in Word 2007 are nice. They've done some lovely design work, and it's pretty. That is commendable. No doubt there is much to like, and I'm not at all interested in raining on their parade. But I must just tell you that in GNU/Linux you can have a lot more color choices than that, if you like to have choices. For example, in Mandriva, in KDE, I have a choice of 30 different color schemes, and I can set it so that if I use KWrite, for example, or OpenOffice.org, the color scheme I like best will be the one that shows up in both of them. In Mandriva (I am still in 10.1), I just go to System
Configure
Configure your desktop
LookNFeel
Colors
and try them all. Try it. It's fun. You can do it in command line too, but it's all GUI'd up nicely. When I get sick of one color scheme, I just switch to another. And another. Right now, I'm in Digital CDE as my color scheme, and I think it's pretty. If someone has screenshots of all the color schemes, let me know and I'll link to it. Any distro will do. Here's our first contribution, from Dan, showing his desktop, "openSuSE 10.1 beta 8, running on gnome and using the new xgl and compiz toys from Novell". It's beautiful. It's the Grand Canyon theme, default theme from Gnome 2.12. And of course if I really wanted to and knew how, I could probably invent my own color scheme. The code is mine to play with, so the only limitations are within me, and if I can't do it, and I really want to, I can just hire someone to implement my design, so there really is no limit, other than what your own creativity can come up with. That is part of what free as in freedom means. Speaking of Massachusetts, the ODF Alliance has some white papers available now on their Resources page, one making the business case for ODF, "Emerging Business Value of OpenDocument format v1.0" [PDF] and another, "ODF for Governments: An Overview of Why ODF is Critical for the Public Sector" [PDF], on why ODF is vital for governments. There is a third, "Refuting the Myths About ODF [PDF]," that includes this paragraph: Myth #3 – Migration to ODF is technically challenging. Reality – Nothing in particular about ODF makes it technically challenging to implement. Conversion to any new product or migration to a new product upgrade may present some technical challenges, largely in the area of training. For example, the research company Gartner published that “Office 12,” the name for next year's update to Microsoft Office 2003 (which will use a new XML-based Microsoft proprietary document format), "will differ significantly from its current form," and concludes that migration may be rough for some users and the IT departments which support them. Moving to an ODF implementation involves the same, if not less, technical complexity, training and compatibility challenges than migrating to Office 12. As you can see, the complete picture is provided. FUD says that it's hard to switch to an application using ODF. The simple truth is, you are going to have an adjustment whether you stay with Microsoft or move to an ODF-supportive environment. Look at the screenshots and ask yourself: which side told me the truth? And speaking of being demeaned unjustly, we have video of what the IBM representative said at the Copenhagen conference. Our report was accurate. So was IBM's "contradiction." What *was* inaccurate were media reports in the middle. I've put a link to the video and a transcript in the article, so the record is clear.
|
|
|
|
| Authored by: capt.Hij on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:13 AM EST |
| Please put corrections here. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Office 12 video - Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, March 21 2006 @ 07:43 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:14 AM EST |
Well, frankly I don't like the "pretty". I imagine it get's hard on
the eyes (ok ok... I like simple, there is no place like gnome ;))
As for their formats... I shudder to think receiving those as attachments.
Reminds of this article by Richard Stallman:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html
If the interface isn't inviting, (I believe one can revert to the previous gui
layout...), just makes things like OpenOffice.org look better...
Anyway, only time will tell... In my case, MS helped me move to Linux. It's like
they add incentives to switch to Linux with every new release/idea.
sbans[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: capt.Hij on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:15 AM EST |
Off topic commments here please. Also, please do the
<a
href="http:www.location.com">clicky</a> thing.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:17 AM EST |
I can't speak for the disabled, because I don't know how the features for
disabled users work in Office but I've never heard of anybody having to be
retrained because of a software upgrade.
Personally, if I had staff who couldn't figure out how to figure out changes
from Microsoft's copious online help facility, I'd suggest they might be better
off working beneath the Golden Arches.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:41 AM EST
- Retraining - Authored by: davcefai on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 07:11 AM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: Steve Martin on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 07:44 AM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: kenryan on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 08:24 AM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 08:45 AM EST
- I agree - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:02 AM EST
- huh? - Authored by: grouch on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:29 AM EST
- I agree - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:36 AM EST
- Do you work for - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:35 AM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: jerven on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:55 AM EST
- Production slowdown, how much will this cost your company? - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 10:03 AM EST
- Retraining = reading online help - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 10:26 AM EST
- Depends On Your Complexity - Authored by: TheBlueSkyRanger on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 11:45 AM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: PJ on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 12:06 PM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: Tufty on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 03:20 PM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 03:20 PM EST
- Microsoft Office 2007 Screenshots: Retraining Ahead - Authored by: wordsofwonder on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 11:37 AM EST
- Retraining Ahead - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 02:05 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:18 AM EST |
Windows 3.1 had more colour schemes to choose from than that. In fact, until
Windows 2000 the number of colour schemes available was pretty similar to
Mandriva.
Windows XP has 3 to choose from.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: pogson on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:35 AM EST |
They have changed the menu bar! Why??!? Has it not been more or less unchanged
since Windows 3? The kind of people who say they like Windows (without having
tried anything else) say they like it because that menu bar never changes...
This is like SCOG suing their customers. Microsoft is kicking their subservient
eye-candy-loving addicts in the teeth. OO and abiword may get some converts. I
expect it will take less to retrain current users to FLOSS than to stay with
MSFT. Those customers that use Office now will stick to what they have as long
as they can, by which time GNU/Linux will be much more in their face.
I suppose this is another attempt to maintain the myth of innovation. To me it
looks more like MSFT assume customers will make the transition to the new,
improved product and further lock themselves in.
---
http://www.skyweb.ca/~alicia/ , my homepage, an eclectic survey of topics:
berries, mushrooms, teaching in N. Canada, Linux, firearms and hunting...[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:52 AM EST |
Then, if we go back to a link to a Groklaw OT post last Friday,
the
anti-OpenDocument forces are out in force, in a forum that is read widely by
those who run the world's corporations, with both big fat lies and FUD! I
wonder if we go around to the Microsoft Lobby groups and see if we can get in
the door and walk around without hitting noses that are growing and growing and
growing...?
Citizens
Against Government Waste is at it again, Wall St.
Journal Letter to
Editor against ODF.
Has anyone written to the
Wall St. Journal to tell them that they were
duped?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: dyfet on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 07:13 AM EST |
| I have some difficulty seeing. I actually have tried all the color/font schemes
in the past in KDE, and none of the default ones worked well for me,
particularly with earlier LCD panels. But it was easy enough to mix my own
color settings though the control panel. The same can be said for GNOME, of
course.
Being able to change font sizes and styles is also important.
Selecting default font styles is particularly important to find ones that do not
need strong anti-aliasing, which can cause headaches on some displays. It would
take a long time to find a color and font scheme I could work with for any
length of time on any given machine, and each one was different. I am not sure
I would even be able to use a system for any length of time that only offered a
choice of "normal" and "large" fonts, or two color schemes, so I do consider
that a very valid point to consider.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: PeteS on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 07:46 AM EST |
A very widely used tool in the electronic design industry is OrCad CIS. This
product (although somewhat old and being superseded) helpfully links things like
schematic symbols, part numbers, layout symbols etc., via any ODBC compliant
database. There are numerous other products that take this approach, and they
are available for multiple platforms (typically the various UNIX, Linux and
Windows).
As the majority of Windows installations have Office, Access is typically used
for the database (I have worked in 3 different companies that used CIS and all
used Access for Win platforms).
So now, the interface (and quite probably data format) of Access is changed.
That's not going to go down very well amongst engineers who have to maintain and
use it.
Having to change the way they work with the database is a major issue.
I would note we are not talking about the typical office worker here, either.
Most hardware designers are power users on various systems (when using Windows
all of us had, at a minimum, Cygwin for scripting) and incurring their
displeasure by changing their tools is not smart, to say the least.
Typical designs are very time contrained, and adding a new time waster
(otherwise known as retraining time) is not going to make the management happy
either.
My personal view is the new interface will act as a bar to adoption of Office
2007 in the design industry, and perhaps make the management more agreeable to
switching to Linux completely. After all, the only reason they have stuck with
Windows is the tools were still supported by the base OS and databases. With all
those now available on Linux, there's little reason to stay with it if M$
changes one of their fundamental tools - if retraining has to occur, why not
just retrain on a system that's more reliable and cheaper, to boot.
Instead of doing eye candy (and this is still years behind the configurability
of a typical Linux setup), M$ should perhaps focus more on substance (I know, I
know).
So let us thank M$ for helping the designers of the world have yet another
reason to ditch Windows.
PeteS
---
Artificial Intelligence is no match for Natural Stupidity[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Having commented on formats for EDA... - Authored by: Steve Martin on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 07:59 AM EST
- Having commented on formats for EDA... - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:02 AM EST
- Changing Access - Authored by: PeteS on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 10:09 AM EST
- Powerpoint? - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 06:34 PM EST
- Powerpoint? - Authored by: Altair_IV on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 04:02 AM EST
- Brilliant - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 08:20 AM EST
- Powerpoint? - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 08:12 AM EST
- Powerpoint? - Authored by: Wol on Tuesday, March 21 2006 @ 05:46 AM EST
- Having commented on formats for EDA... - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 09:27 AM EST
- Having commented on formats for EDA... - Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, March 21 2006 @ 12:52 PM EST
- Having commented on formats for EDA... - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, March 22 2006 @ 08:33 AM EST
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 08:51 AM EST |
I agree that the "now ye got two colors, yaaarrr" part isn't really
that exiting when I'm used to running Ubuntu on my corporate laptop (quite
contrary to company policy I'm afraid). Since we (the company) is a Microsoft
partner (one of their best according to some prices we've recieved) we also get
access to betas and stuff.
After trying out the new Office (have to be ahead of the clients, all the time)
for some week I actually have to say that unless you are one of those
Excel-macro gurus the transition will be pretty transparent.
The first impression will, due to pesky old habits, always be "WTF?".
The same way it was for me when i left KDE for Gnome. All the normal stuff you
use is still there but you may not see it directly.
The new GUI of Office is actually the best change office has had... ever. Give
it a day or two to get rid of habits and then i think you will be quite
comfortable using it. Much less "klutter" and the important funktions
is pretty much always at hand.
MS should have redesigned their GUI a long time ago but i guess they were cought
up "fixing" security issues. :o)
I felt the need to say this since some changes has to be rather drastic to be
able to improve something and get you out of that corner and I think this is
what Microsoft is trying to do right now. I've complained about their GUI for
quite some time (coming from Mac once in the lifetime) and I can't really bring
myself to complain about it now since they actually change things to the
better.
Despite being the source of all evil. ;P[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 08:52 AM EST |
Regardless the source and MS tactics, their GUI looks excellent. I don't see
any need for retraining based on this. There's an excellent blend of the
familiar and new stuff. Nope, can't force myself to think negative about what I
saw.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 08:57 AM EST |
Well it is gawd awful ugly if you ask me. There toolbar or whatever they call is
now is bigger then the work area. However bringing in a rallying cry around it's
effect on the disabled is rather ludicrous considering the majority of OSS
products bomb in that department as well. Thats one of the few areas FOSS
development is playing catchup to MS. Not that I dont think PJ is right about
the retraining issue. I think there will be a few re-sent to room 101. I just
dont think scores of the blind are going to be calling in to order there copy of
Suse Pro.
Anyway what does this have to do with anything again? More anti-MS FUD sounds
like to me.
RT Smith
Making tinkles in Cheerios one bowl at a time.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: grouch on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:00 AM EST |
| Sorry. I just can't click an msdn or microsoft link. Haven't been able to for
years. Blood pressure rises and my teeth start grinding together just thinking
about it. Just weak, I guess.
I couldn't do the MOG link yesterday, either.
While I'm confessing, I may as well admit that I've never scrubbed myself with
briars while bathing in turpentine, either.
Just have to depend on those
with more fortitude to give the low-down on such places.
---
--
grouch
http://edge-op.org/links1.html
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: rsmith on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 09:06 AM EST |
just eye candy.
I'll stick with emacs & pdfLaTeX, thanks.
---
Intellectual Property is an oxymoron.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: RichardR on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 10:06 AM EST |
During my efforts to get people acquainted with (and migrating to) Linux, I
found that for most people, familiarity is one of the most important factors in
everyday computer use. They simply don't like changes, especially with things
they rely on and use on a daily basis.
Even now that I got a local computer shop to sell preinstalled Linux boxes, I
see that people who previously owned a Windows PC will not easily buy a Mandriva
box - even though the latter is about $80 cheaper than the same box with
Windows, comes with thousands of applications, is for all intents and purposes
invulnerable to malware, and offers several other advantages.
When asked why Linux is no viable option, they invariably say that "they
don't know how to use Linux", and that "everything is different",
and "it's just too difficult".
Even after showing that Linux is in fact much easier when it comes to installing
software (just a few mouse clicks, no cost, no stupid wizards, no hassle),
dealing with viruses and the likes (no need to), and that it's almost 100%
Windows compatible in terms of Office applications, they still think that
learning "all those new names" of applications is too much work,
etcetera. And their doubtful, worrying look tells me that they just don't feel
comfortable with the prospect of switching to something they don't know, and
don't know whether they can trust.
Now they *know* they can't trust Windows either, but at least they're familiar
with it. They know that Windows gets viruses and malware, and that actually
solving a problem with their machines is a frustrating game of "shooting in
the dark", quite often requiring a reinstall, and that applications either
cost a lot of money, or must be obtained through less-than-legal channels. Still
they're reluctant to even give a modern Linux distribution an honest try. At
best, they click around in KDE for perhaps five minutes before deciding that
"it's nothing for them".
And in fact, I'm not really surprised. I hate profound changes too, and for most
people, changing to another OS is like moving house -- something which I myself
try avoiding as much as possible.
And, of course, these people have spent countless hours getting familiar with
their current OS (or office suite, for that matter), its workings, and its
quirks. Appararently, there's some unconscious mechanism which has logged all
those hours invested in getting to grips with the current tools and environment,
and gives a surreptitious, yet hard to ignore warning against just throwing
overboard all that invested time and effort.
To cut a long story short: I think that this "new" MS Office is an
excellent opportunity to present users with the OpenOffice.org alternative. The
only problem is that people should at least be familiar with the OOo name, and
that Microsoft with its multi-billion dollar marketing campaigns can easily
drown out any low-cost attempt to spread OOo's name and fame. (Although I think
that their latest campaign, portraying their office suite users as ugly,
backward, B-movie dinosaurs, was a Bad Move.)
So perhaps we should also look into ways to make Linux in general, and OOo in
particular into a more familiar name, especially with ordinary users.
Ideas, anyone?
Richard Rasker[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: PolR on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 10:24 AM EST |
Training, format compatibility, accessibility and trasition complexity are all
good points. But how about hardware requirements. Upgrading a few hundreds or
thousands PC to be able to run the Office suite adds to the hardware and
manpower costs.
Does aanyone knows of a good reference comparing the hardware requirements of
Office (especially the upcoming Office 12) and other suites like Open Office and
Star Office? This would be good material to add to this list.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Edgyllama on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 10:53 AM EST |
Let me weigh in as someone who works with the disabled on a regular basis,
especially training them on computers. This change will be huge: we will have
to buy the new Office for all our new clients and upgrades for the old, then
retrain them all. We are a not for profit so money doesn't grow on trees; it's a
cost in labor to do the retraining. On top of this, many of our clients use
Dragon Naturally Speaking to work at their computers. Dragon will have to be
upgraded to work with the new Office. More money.<br>
<br>
The OSS community can play a huge part in all this if they would come out
with decent voice regonition software, not only to work with an application
like OpenOffice but to be able to use a computer only with their voice as
Dragon allows you. It's a huge hurdle and until this happens, there is no way I
can talk my boss into giving out loaners with Linux pre installed. I would love
to; I use Linux all the time and this a huge gap the OSS community can fill.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 11:47 AM EST |
Yep, that's MS...never learn from your mistakes.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 11:51 AM EST |
Every update of software requires some level of retraining. Major updates
require a lot of retraining.
I don't see a problem with that. It is the nature of things.
Progress requires retraining.
When OS X 10.5 comes along, users will need retraining. When a new version
of Adobe Photoshop comes around, users need retraining. If the users shift to
open office or other software, they will need retraining.
I looked at the new screenshots of office. I like it. Clearly Microsoft has
made an effort to make the menubar easier to understand, more organized.
The colors will probably be customizable - as part of the system preferences
on appearance - just like it is now with Windows XP.
If you keep your eye on the ball - so to speak, the main controversy is over
the document file format. What does one choose - ODF, PDF, or Microsoft's
XML format? The menubar and interface arguments are off the mark. It's the
file format that counts. Thus let's keep our eye on the ball.
If anything, the fact that having adobe acrobat allows you to save Microsoft
files as PDF files means it should be possible for someone to create a utility
that converts Microsoft files into ODF files, and vice versa. Whether Microsoft
does this or someone else does this, it doesn't matter. The one thing that
matters is that one can choose ODF to maintain compatibility with everyone
else - just as PDF is a standard format, which Microsoft doesn't support,
which Adobe allows us to use within Microsoft's products.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 11:52 AM EST |
totally agree - the old argument about retraining can be thrown out the window.
in fact I think if a company switches to openoffice they won't have to retrain.
but with windows I think you will have to.
but hey stick with windows document format too. it will be around forever and
you will never have to convert you documents to whatever they want you to. and
of course we all know that a independent third party is in control of their
document formats.
I just hope corporations wake up and smell the coffee - switch to open office.
it has open document formats that are in control by a third party committee and
you won't have to spend for retraining when microsoft wants you to.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 01:37 PM EST |
This may be the wrong thing to say here, but I kind of like the Office 2007 new
look. It appears they're setting up for Office Live with the new interface.
The screen shots have a very browser-based look.
Fortunately, I don't make decisions on productivity software based on how it
looks. I'm more concerned with value. What value am I getting for the upgrade
cost? In that regard Office 2007 is already a failure. I wouldn't even think
of buying Office for home use, it's just not worth the $$$ no matter how pretty
it is.
Looks like MSFT finally learned a lesson from Apple. That style is important to
many consumers. Not to me, but I'm not the typical consumer, either. For
people influenced by style, I think Office 2007 will do very well. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 02:06 PM EST |
All BS aside, It's nice to see the issue being addressed after falling so far
behind winderz. I have a blind friend whom we do some specialized software work
and were stuck with a MS solution. (Win98 due to legacy hardware and a school
with a low budget). It's really not even a windows - linux issue to be honest
but more from the idea that most development on software for people with
disabilities is still scoped around a computer centralized on a visual
interface. I would dare to say this is still more a underdeveloped hardware
issue more then software at this point.
RT Smith
I ate a tornado last week and it gave me gas.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: geoff lane on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 02:51 PM EST |
As far as Microsoft is concerned, change equals profit.
It doesn't matter if the change is for the good or bad.
---
I'm not a Windows user, consequently I'm not
afraid of receiving email from total strangers.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Tufty on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 03:23 PM EST |
FAR too cluttered. The header is twice as tall as the one I use. Why on earth do
they add more and more around what you are working on and reduce your workspace.
Soon the working area will be the size of a postage stamp on a 21" monitor
and you will be scrolling every time you type a word.
---
There has to be a rabbit down this rabbit hole somewhere!
Now I want its hide.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 07:17 PM EST |
Had to use IE to even view the blog.
So much for interoperability ;)[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Ninthwave on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 10:48 PM EST |
In the shots of the ribbon I saw their are no keyboard shortcut labels. Did
they get rid of this? Talk about a feature for the disabled, I know of users
with poor eyesite or bad motor skills that use nothing but keyboard shortcuts.
Oh well probably just part of the skin options. In fact it has been awhile
since I was in a Windows machine but I think you can turn off the menu keyboard
shortcuts in the OS. Though I didn't think that extended to applications menus.
But then this is MS so Office and OS are probably married in some unholy
trinity to curse all other applications.
---
I was, I am, I will be.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: vryl on Sunday, March 19 2006 @ 11:11 PM EST |
| I am the only one who thinks it looks like Indesign or Photoshop CS ? [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 02:00 AM EST |
Here's a comment: who cares about Microsoft Office? Why is this interesting, or
even news?[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: fempisces on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 09:08 AM EST |
I have had various PCs since I was 9, I have used Windows v. 3.11 through to
XP & various Linux distros for the last 6 years in vairying amounts. All the
systems have had a customise area for the desktop allowing you to change the
look & feel of the desktop to your chosen colours including setting the
background colour to off white for all programs, which personally I prefer. In
XP you have to click the advance button, but it's still there. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 09:18 AM EST |
Wordpad has all the features I need, except a spell checker.
What great new features will Word-2007 provide that will make users so much more
productive?
I suppose there a few - very few - specialists, who can use whatever new
feature. But, for the most part, who needs it?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 09:50 AM EST |
PJ - pointless articles like this jeopardize your credibility. I'm with you on
the ridiculous SCO antics, but this just makes you look like the 14 year old
Linux militants making comments on slashdot. The only people who care about
having gillions of color schemes are the hobbiests and tinkerers that Linux
already caters to. Microsoft doesn't understand a lot of the compelling reasons
for using open formats and software, but they do understand business needs. The
open source world has been clueless about most business needs. As business
becomes more involved in OSS, more business needs are being met and it is being
more adopted by businesses. The militant zelots have a hard time understanding
this, and it looks like you'd like to be included in their ranks.
P.S. You can customize the color schemes in windows just as much as gnome or
kde---it's hardly an advantage of the linux world. Right click on your desktop,
select properties, click the appearance tab, click the advanced button and go
nuts. Click on whatever font text or window bar/line you want to customize and
change it's settings.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Zak3056 on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 09:56 AM EST |
In Mandriva (I am still in 10.1), I just go
to
- System
- Configure
- Configure your
desktop
- LookNFeel
- Colors
In windows, I just
right click on the desktop and
Then
you can select one of the twenty or so color schemes available by default, or
create your own. I fail to see what's so hard about this, or why Mandriva is
superior here.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 10:17 AM EST |
| teletubbi
es [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 02:52 PM EST |
M$ has claimed that OpenOffice is ten years behind. ... I had occasion this past
week to use M$ Office 97 on a Windows 98 box. I think these might be
representative of decade-old M$ products. In two hours I experienced two Blue
Screens of Death and one M$ Word hang. Not to mention all the M$ Word
"features" that just didn't work. It was a truly bletcherous
experience.
On another topic, I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the terrible mess that
M$ made of the Visio interface after purchasing that product. Before the M$
"usability" wizards got their hands on it, Visio was intuitive, quick
and slick. M$ made it brain dead, slow and slimy.
Maybe that's their problem: the inability to distinguish between slick and
slimy.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, March 20 2006 @ 06:47 PM EST |
I work for a Fortune 100 company. Last week we rolled out Office 2003. At that
rate, corporate America (and MS) have until 2010 to get the bugs out of Office
2007.....and who knows, by then the Linux desktop and OpenOffice might be
corporate standards, and no one will need to worry![ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, March 25 2006 @ 09:32 AM EST |
First off, let me say that I am not an employee of Microsoft and I am not
going enter any kind of argument as to what products are better. I will say that
in most corporate settings, relearning the new GUI in Office 2007 is not a valid
argument against the product. To give you a little backgrond on myself, I have
two AAS degrees. One is in electronics and the other is in programming. I have
been using a computer since age 13, that was in 1983 on Tandy 1000 that my
parents bought me.
After working in several Fortune 500 comapnaines, I have found that just
about any new release of a commercial software product required minimal
relearning. This is compared to the internal software created that employees use
much more frequently. The tools I have used in the past, and even right now, to
access back end databases are horrid at best. The entire front ends have always
been some ad hoc GUI that the internal development teams deem "good enough
to get the job done".
Here is a case in point. I used to work for a very large semiconductor
company. We used a program called PROMIS on a VAX to handle product tracking
through the fab. This ran fine from the command line on the VT-340 terminals
that were scattered accross the plant. Someone upstairs decided that since we
had VAX terminals and PCs they should just combine the VT-340 capabilities into
the PC. Instead of just loading in a terminal program, they created a program
running on a UNIX server to access the VAX that used an X Windows GUI. They then
installed Hummingbird's Exceed software on the Windows PCs to run the custom
UNIX program. After 40 hrs of training per employee we had a system that
everyone was still confused about and it ran at least 10 times slower than the
command line terminals.
Case in point number 2. The company I currently work for has an Oracle
database that I spend about 90 percent of my time using. I am a technical sales
rep so I have to track sales leads, opportunities, quotes, and orders in the
database. The front end is a Java app that was a canned solution provided by
Oracle that our developers have made modifications to that helps it tie into our
business model. Recently we made a change to the selling structure of one of our
products and that required extensive changes to the quoting process. They
trained a few of the reps to be power users and then they were supposed to be
there for assistance to the rest of us. After the power users were pulling their
hair out for requests for assistance, they gave everybody a short 1 hr training
session. That failed and they retrained everybody again for a half a day. We are
getting more used to it, but it is not an easy, nor elegant, process.
Case in point number 3. Every one here should know that in Office 2003 there
were extensive changes to Outlook. I went through the change from Outlook 2000
to 2003 at my last job. It was painless, and after a day or so of playing with
and learning the new features by myself, I actually was rewarded by being able
to be more efficient with my email. At my current job, I am forced to use Lotus
Notes. After 2 years, I still hate that program and cannot seem to come to grips
with it.
All in all, at least for the large companies, learning to use the new
version of Office should not be all that difficult when compared to other tools
that are probably being used by the company. Internal developer staffs
frequently churn out programs that would never pass usability tests for a
commercial product. This has been my observation in the six 5000+ employee
companies, and one 20 employee internet provider company, I have worked for. If
there is a argument to be made against Office, then stick to the file formats
issue. I believe that has more weight than GUI changes. In fact, if you are to
stay in business today, adapting to change rapidly is a necessity. That is just
the nature of beast in today's corporate world. Learning new software tools,
good or bad, is something that just has to accepted and is part of job. Face it,
no matter what tools you use today, you will be learning new tools a few years
from now. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
|
|
|
|
