Office 2007 overall is easier to use than previous versions; the items are in more logical places (headers and footers under “format,” for instance).
Anyone using it for their first Word Processor will find it much easier to learn. And it only takes a few minutes to learn the differences between it and earlier versions of Word if you already use it.
The conversion software so older versions of Office can read Office 2007 files is a part of your standard updates. And if you haven’t installed it, it will offer to do so the very first time you open an Office 2007 file.
The built-in .zip functionality is worth the change, but there’s also much better formatting options.
Overall, the only people complaining about Office are those who complain about any change to anything. Once you use it, you’ll see it’s an improvement.
Office 2010 Betais available free, for people that like to use Beta versions. I tried it and could discern few differences from 2007, although has a little more supoprt for user customization.
2010 Beta allows you to install 2010 versions and keep 2007 (or 2003) versions, except for Outlook. You must replace any existing version of Outlook. And it doesn’t warn you about that if you select the option to keep existing versions. This is a problem because on installation, you can’t select specific applications to install for Beta. You can’t for example, install Word and Excel but leave Outlook alone. After I installed it, Outlook 2003 no longer worked. The only thing I could do was completely back out of 2010 and give up.
>As for OO, I suspect that is exactly why MS changed the look and feel.
Haha, right. MS changed the entire look of their flagship application to compete with something with marketshare so low no one bothers figuring out how low it is? OO isnt the threat a lot of people think it is. MS locks in users via about a dozen ways (Outlook/Exchange intergration, scripting languages, etc), but look and feel isnt one of them.
Office and several big GUI apps have been sufferings from the menu within a menu problem for years. Arbitrary placement of items with very little organization and logic is one of the larger problems of the office suite.
This interface is a game changer for new users. The problem is that old users dislike any form of change and will complain about the most minor UI change. This reminds me when companies and schools started migrating to GUI based programs. The old users didnt like that they had to relearn their shortcuts and had to use a mouse. New users loved seeing an easy interface that didnt require the memorization of a few dozen macros to work. We’re now in the same situation where the GUI has gotten out of control and MS cleaned it up to make it easier.
lissener, I went through the same thing about a year ago. Longtime advanced user of Office. They forced my machine to upgrade and I couldn’t find anything. I refused to try to learn it. After a few months, though, I got in the swing of using the tabs and like it. The only problem I have is that some things are hidden behind the pulsing button in the Program Options instead of being on a tab where I’d expect it. When I’m in the pulsing button, I add the buttons for the functions I use infrequently to the tool bar so I don’t have to remember where they are. It seems easier to do in this version than previous versions.
That little blue circle with the white question mark in the upper right? Use it. It’ll usually tell you where to find what you’re looking for. That’s my crutch.
If you really really can’t adjust to the ribbons (and I fully sympathise - I’ve been using them more than a year now and I still dislike them, finding them clumsy, patronising and awkward - and I have always considered myself reasonably adaptable), there’s a third-party add-in (maybe several different competing ones actually) available to give you the old menu structure back.
My new work laptop came with windows 7 and office 07. I have been avoiding upgrading office for ages and have had good success with the converter. Transition to win7 has been painless and I love it. Transition to office’s ribbon has been a dog and I am constantly frustrated.
I have gotten around many problems by avoiding the ribbon altogether and relying on keyboard shortcuts. I format all of my text, tables and drawing objects that way. It has taken a bit of effort, but it has been worth it.
i would love to be able to customise the toolbar the way i have done with word07. I designed nice little buttons that did the things that i wanted and removed all of the junk i don’t use, knowing i can find it when I need it by drilling through menus. I have researched ways of customising the ribbon – which requires a bit of fiddling around but can be done. However, given that we will be upgrading to Office10 as soon as it comes out i will stall on that plan until I know I will get more than a couple of months out of my efforts.
In summary, I sympathise fully. I recommend keyboard shortcuts for whatever job you are doing. But if you are trying to work against a deadline – good luck.
Office 10 has the ribbon - I’m pretty sure any custom ribbon stuff you do in 07 with work in 10.
The transition to 07 is causing me a lot of headaches at work though - there’s stuff I need to implement that is dependent on features in Office 2007 and there are documents/systems - some of them third party - in place that will not work in 07 (largely because they have custom toolbars)
I have been using it for almost a year and like everyone else I know it isn’t an improvement nor is it easy to learn. But that is just me and the dozen or so people I work with.
agreed that OO has a very small market share-but it is the only other office suite that is occasionally selected over MS Office. While it is very minor competition to MSO, it is the only one out there.
As I said before, 2007 isn’t easy for many people to learn-none of the people I work with like it for instance.
I’m finding the same here (a large government office ~4,500 users) - nobody really likes it, and who can blame them? I think people can be rightly criticised for being resistant to change when that change isn’t just change for its own sake - as appears largely the case here.
What convinces you that the ribbon is to most users advantage? I have been working with it for about two year now and I still see no advantage to the interface change though I learned it benefits the handful of touchscreen users.
It takes up more space on screen, the icons are not particularly useful or helpful, and it’s not always clear in which tab a function will appear, or if it will be on the Office button.
I’ll pipe down if someone can show me what these beneficial changes I’m resisting actually are.
No, its ultimately for Microsoft’s benefit (profit.) Cash is king. They are not a public service organization.
If they were doing it for the user’s benefit, they would offer upgrades on a break-even basis, which they do not. To my knowledge even the lower-priced upgrade versions are a profit center. If someone has data to the contrary I’d be glad to revise my belief.
Oddly enough, I understand profit was not the key motive here.
Now, before I go on, please understand I cannot back up any of this with documentation. It’s all rumor and “friend-of-a-friend” whispers down the tech pipeline. So take it for what it’s worth.
However, what I do hear says that there were two factions arguing over how it should be done. Both agreed the program needed and overhaul (it can support a variety of things it once couldn’t and IIRC documents are usually smaller, which is important with large corporate excel files and so forth).
In one sense, the current version is more “efficient”. If you understand its principles, it makes a certain amnount more sense. However, it isn’t actually as intuitive and the logic used to create it isn’t really explained or documented anywhere, so even experienced users may need to hunt for hours to find seemingly simple options. The other faction favoed keeping thigns as familiar as opssible: it had been set up over the years with whatever people seemed to want, and while it was klunky, everyone knew it and things tended to get plopped down where they were needed. The first faction won with their emphasis on “elegance” and theoretical approach to user interface.
Basically, they meant well, but some of them really outsmarted themselves trying to deliver something insanely great, when the market was for something easy.
On Office 2008 for Mac it’s fairly easy to change the default file type in all applications to the older format. I have no objection to new things but, particularly when I first upgraded to 2008, nobody else was able to open them. I can open docx files no problem but I never save or create them.
One of the main problems with the ribbon for me (in the few times I’ve tried it) is that it takes up a cubic fuckload of screenspace for stuff I don’t regularly use.
Other than the “File/Edit/View” bar, I rarely (if ever) have other toolbars open. If I’m doing something font intensive, I’ll open the font toolbar for that document, then close it again when I’m done. In Excel, I usually have one toolbar open (the one with autosum/formula/etc) and that’s it.
I don’t like clutter on my screen. All that crap in the ribbon is distracting and space-hogging. (It’s the same reason I hate Window7’s new start menu. Put all that shit away.
I think Microsoft could have avoided annoying a lot of customers if the **included **a simple little option to return to Menu Bars. I understand there are some add-ins that can effectively do this, but it should be included. I have learned to put up with the ribbon but it is especially bad on my laptop where screen space is a premium. Ironically my home PC with 24" screen I still use Office 2000.
Once again Microsoft shows they fit the old joke about AT&T from Lilly Tomlin. To update it: “We Don’t Care, We Don’t have to Care, We are Microsoft.” See Vista if Office 2007 is not enough reason.