Going to be all that great compared to 2010. Could be, but I'm betting on being a metro-style version of Office, for Windows 8, and then basically Office 2010 style for Windows 7, maybe with a few metro-ish looking UI elements.
Seriously, the feature set of 2010 is already ridiculous..
The excel 65536 row limitation alone made office 2007 a must have upgrade. I also much prefer the ribbon UI to digging thru ump-teen million sub menus. I can actually find stuff now. 2007 was a must have for me... I can take or leave 2010.
And, cloud integration is the big one for me. But since I'm currently a dropbox user, an android user as well as a windows user I really wonder if MS is going to come up with a solution that is flexible enough for me.
Exactly. I work in the HR department of a 70,000+ employee organization. Out roster alone was too much for Excel 2003, not counting reports of leave accruals, payments made, etc.
And then on a more personnal level I was taking some physics courses at about the time Office 2007 was release, and these courses required embedding complex formulas into Word documents, and the improvements tot he formula editor alone in Word 2007 over 2003 sold me on that as well. Not to mention the ability to copy Excel graphs into a word document and still have the ability to modify them as if they were still in Excel (thanks to the xml coding behind them now) whereas in 2003 it basically just copied a picture of the graph.
Oh yeah. Office 2007 was just Window dressing /eyeroll.
There are things 07 is far better suited for, and I really can't think of any downsides. The ribbon is superior once you get used to it, the xml base offers far more cross-application usability, and the enhancements to Excel alone are worth the upgrade. That said, I agree that for many users, these benefits my not be readily apparent. But dig in a bit and you may be pleasantly surprised.
I wish we could do away with 2003 altogether so I wouldn't have to design spreadsheets in 03 to ensure backwards compatibility.
Equation editor is a whole new world in Office 2007 or superior.
It's not an external plug-in, it's directly in the file. It supports formatting much better. You can use endless commands like \matrix(@@) or \sqrt (n&x) to write equations.
I successfully keep up with the math teacher who's writing on the board with Word 2007. With my usage, from 2007 to 2010 I saw only a few useful tweaks but nothing revolutionary. From 2003 to 2007 it's a revolution and a huge increase in productivity.
They won't drop the Ribbon UI, the WinRT framework is a whole different runtime that they won't port to. Simple as that. Win 8 means continue to develop the Ribbon UI and other desktop APIs. Which of course means that there won't be any Office (built on Office/MSO at least) for ARM based Windows tablets.
Now, if they were to get rid of that stupid ribbon interface and only charge $15, it might be worth a second thought over OpenOffice. Still using '03 at work, and I'm gonna ride that out as long as I can.
Nope. Not better. "Different" is not equal to "better". The ribbon is nothing but a giant menu bar/toolbar hybrid that also gives you access to the exact same dialog boxes from previous versions of Office.
The amount of productivity that has been lost since the introduction of the ribbon is immeasurable. Take an interface that, while not ideal, had literally millions of experienced users and throw it out the window to accommodate a ridiculously small percentage of users who have never used Office before AND who have absolutely no access to support from someone familiar with Office. From there, start with a brand new interface that leaves that huge percentage of experienced users fumbling around searching for things they used to know how to find, and who are also now unable to provide assistance to the people who are using Office for the first time.
As stated above, old versions already do everything people want. They are just doing window dressing for the last two versions. I still use Office 2003,and if it stopped working would just switch to something free rather than spend big $ for all these features I don't need.
If you are an average consumer who does little more than a mail merge or writing a letter to grandma, yes office does everything you want. In fact for most things you would probably be fine with wordpad, But, if you actually use office in heavy business or research there is still plenty to be done. As with everything automation can get better.
For instance office 2003 does not have the reference function for bibliographies. Even to this day office does not handle the creation of error bars correctly, especially in pivot tables. The people who say office does everything just don't do anything. However, an even more common case I find is people do need office and they do not realize it. This is just basic ignorance. If I run around and ask people in my field if they use pivot tables, almost all say no, and they do not even know what pivot tables are. Well that messed up because in my field pivot tables are extremely useful and save tons of time.
What microsoft really needs to do is drop a rep in local best buys and walmarts that helps people solve their problems. Have the rep teach people how to use the advanced features of office. And most importantly have that rep take feedback about what else can be added.
BTW I gave OOo a try, and it was nice but in the end I still paid for office because it was that much better.
If you're doing scientific research, you should probably be using a LaTeX editor of some kind. Word 2010 still struggles with bibliographies unless you use something like Endnote.
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piroroadkill - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
Going to be all that great compared to 2010. Could be, but I'm betting on being a metro-style version of Office, for Windows 8, and then basically Office 2010 style for Windows 7, maybe with a few metro-ish looking UI elements.Seriously, the feature set of 2010 is already ridiculous..
retrospooty - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
LOL. ya, I cant think of a thing I use that cant be done in Office 2003.Not knocking the app, its great. Its just that it was great a decade ago.
apinkel - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
The excel 65536 row limitation alone made office 2007 a must have upgrade. I also much prefer the ribbon UI to digging thru ump-teen million sub menus. I can actually find stuff now. 2007 was a must have for me... I can take or leave 2010.And, cloud integration is the big one for me. But since I'm currently a dropbox user, an android user as well as a windows user I really wonder if MS is going to come up with a solution that is flexible enough for me.
Akrovah - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
Exactly. I work in the HR department of a 70,000+ employee organization. Out roster alone was too much for Excel 2003, not counting reports of leave accruals, payments made, etc.And then on a more personnal level I was taking some physics courses at about the time Office 2007 was release, and these courses required embedding complex formulas into Word documents, and the improvements tot he formula editor alone in Word 2007 over 2003 sold me on that as well. Not to mention the ability to copy Excel graphs into a word document and still have the ability to modify them as if they were still in Excel (thanks to the xml coding behind them now) whereas in 2003 it basically just copied a picture of the graph.
Oh yeah. Office 2007 was just Window dressing /eyeroll.
dawza - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
There are things 07 is far better suited for, and I really can't think of any downsides. The ribbon is superior once you get used to it, the xml base offers far more cross-application usability, and the enhancements to Excel alone are worth the upgrade. That said, I agree that for many users, these benefits my not be readily apparent. But dig in a bit and you may be pleasantly surprised.I wish we could do away with 2003 altogether so I wouldn't have to design spreadsheets in 03 to ensure backwards compatibility.
Murloc - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
Equation editor is a whole new world in Office 2007 or superior.It's not an external plug-in, it's directly in the file.
It supports formatting much better.
You can use endless commands like \matrix(@@) or \sqrt (n&x) to write equations.
I successfully keep up with the math teacher who's writing on the board with Word 2007.
With my usage, from 2007 to 2010 I saw only a few useful tweaks but nothing revolutionary.
From 2003 to 2007 it's a revolution and a huge increase in productivity.
Penti - Wednesday, February 1, 2012 - link
They won't drop the Ribbon UI, the WinRT framework is a whole different runtime that they won't port to. Simple as that. Win 8 means continue to develop the Ribbon UI and other desktop APIs. Which of course means that there won't be any Office (built on Office/MSO at least) for ARM based Windows tablets.Egglick - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
Now, if they were to get rid of that stupid ribbon interface and only charge $15, it might be worth a second thought over OpenOffice. Still using '03 at work, and I'm gonna ride that out as long as I can.evilspoons - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
Ribbon's here to stay, buddy... it's even in Windows 8's file explorer.Why? Oh yeah, because it's better. I got used to it in a month after Office 2007 hit and I've never looked back.
Tanclearas - Thursday, February 2, 2012 - link
Nope. Not better. "Different" is not equal to "better". The ribbon is nothing but a giant menu bar/toolbar hybrid that also gives you access to the exact same dialog boxes from previous versions of Office.The amount of productivity that has been lost since the introduction of the ribbon is immeasurable. Take an interface that, while not ideal, had literally millions of experienced users and throw it out the window to accommodate a ridiculously small percentage of users who have never used Office before AND who have absolutely no access to support from someone familiar with Office. From there, start with a brand new interface that leaves that huge percentage of experienced users fumbling around searching for things they used to know how to find, and who are also now unable to provide assistance to the people who are using Office for the first time.
lurker22 - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
As stated above, old versions already do everything people want. They are just doing window dressing for the last two versions. I still use Office 2003,and if it stopped working would just switch to something free rather than spend big $ for all these features I don't need.PubFiction - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
If you are an average consumer who does little more than a mail merge or writing a letter to grandma, yes office does everything you want. In fact for most things you would probably be fine with wordpad, But, if you actually use office in heavy business or research there is still plenty to be done. As with everything automation can get better.For instance office 2003 does not have the reference function for bibliographies. Even to this day office does not handle the creation of error bars correctly, especially in pivot tables. The people who say office does everything just don't do anything. However, an even more common case I find is people do need office and they do not realize it. This is just basic ignorance. If I run around and ask people in my field if they use pivot tables, almost all say no, and they do not even know what pivot tables are. Well that messed up because in my field pivot tables are extremely useful and save tons of time.
What microsoft really needs to do is drop a rep in local best buys and walmarts that helps people solve their problems. Have the rep teach people how to use the advanced features of office. And most importantly have that rep take feedback about what else can be added.
BTW I gave OOo a try, and it was nice but in the end I still paid for office because it was that much better.
A5 - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
If you're doing scientific research, you should probably be using a LaTeX editor of some kind. Word 2010 still struggles with bibliographies unless you use something like Endnote.damianrobertjones - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
They tell me: Are you currently using Windows 95 and Office XP?evilspoons - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
When they say "all platforms" does this actually mean Office:mac is getting an update *at the same time* as Office for Windows?! Amazing!etamin - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
an upgrade that allows multiple instance of of Excel to be open at the same time, like for dual monitors. That would be nice.karocage - Wednesday, February 1, 2012 - link
You can already do that. Just open it again from the start menu or right click it in the (Win7) taskbar and hit "Microsoft Excel 2010".somewho - Wednesday, February 1, 2012 - link
Mid clicking works wonder too.larry6hi5 - Friday, February 10, 2012 - link
That's freakin' awesome! I've been wanting to be able to run multiple instances of Excel for years.Leave it to Anandtech users to fill me in on this feature.