Microsoft Releases Office 2008 12.1.3 and Office 2004 11.5.2 Updates

[MacRumors]

Microsoft has released updates for both Office 2008 (12.1.3) and Office 2004 (11.5.2). The updates provide a number of security, stability, and performance-related fixes. The security fixes primarily address file format and formula parsing vulnerabilities in Excel.

Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac 12.1.3 Update weighs in at 154.4 MB and addresses security vulnerabilities and increases stability and reliability throughout the suite of Office applications. The update also provides specific performance improvements for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Entourage. A full list of improvements is included on Microsoft's update description page.

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac 11.5.2 Update weighs in at 13.3 MB and, in addition to addressing security vulnerabilities, fixes two reliability issues in Excel 2004 involving the "SUMIF ()" function and saving backups to network volumes. Microsoft's update description page details these improvements and provides additional information about the update.

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[dr_lha]

Let me guess: Still no fix for Office's Spaces hopping antics?

 

[KingYaba]

Not showing up in the auto update.

 

[JW008]

Let me guess: Still no fix for Office's Spaces hopping antics?

Can anyone confirm this? This is a ridiculously annoying problem.

 

[dr_lha]

Can anyone confirm this? This is a ridiculously annoying problem.

I'll confirm after I finish downloading the huge update!

 

[KingYaba]

Won't work. I have 12.1.2 installed.

 

[Jason Lee]

Sigh, this fixed nothing with Word.

Still have issues with Spaces, still starts up excruciatingly slow.

Also, is it so hard not to make the insertion point disappear when I type/delete?

 

[JW008]

Sigh, this fixed nothing with Word.

Still have issues with Spaces, still starts up excruciatingly slow.

Also, is it so hard not to make the insertion point disappear when I type/delete?

Can someone remind me why I've got 2008 installed instead of v.X??

 

[nadyne]

Won't work. I have 12.1.2 installed.

Have you done anything like run Monolingual or Xslimmer, manually removed any parts of Office, or moved the Office folder to a different location?

Let me guess: Still no fix for Office's Spaces hopping antics?

Sorry, guys. This is a known issue, and we're working with Apple to fix it. I totally feel the pain on this one, since I use Spaces all the time (my basic set-up is Space 1: Entourage; 2: RDC and Word; 3: Safari; 4: iTunes; all: Messenger and Twitterific). Make sure that you update to the latest version of both Office 2008 and Leopard -- we've both made some incremental improvements that will improve things over where they were on launch day, but it's not 100% yet. It's turned out to be a pretty hairy problem.

Regards,
Nadyne.

 

[FoxyKaye]

Somehow, it seems like these are less "updates" and more "complete re-writes" of Office 2008 every time they come.

When's the update the brings back Macros going to hit? It's not like M$ and the Mac BU didn't know this was going to be an issue all the way back in 2006. Oh wait, they're going to sell it back to us in another year instead of making it work in Office 2008 like they should have in the first place.

And you know what, Office 2004 is still faster on most of our workstations, including the Intels.

I know the Mac BU lurks on MR - do you all even use the products you've created?

So sick of this crap.

 

[azdude]

Won't work. I have 12.1.2 installed.

I thought I had the same problem, but it actually appears I already have 12.1.3 installed.

Did this come through AutoUpdate earlier than yesterday's release or something? Weird. Or maybe I installed it yesterday in my sleep.

 

[PURCELL429]

Any word on formula support in word? I hate having to boot up windows anytime I get a new document with formulas in it (and as a Geophysicist... thats quite often). I just don't understand why 08 for mac would not support a feature that was released months earlier in office 07 for windows. My life would be easier if everyone still used office 03.

 

[TheNorthWaves]

MS: thank you for fixing the problem when posting images from a PDF and then crashing on save. It made me reinstall office 08 and revert to 12.1.1 where I currently am now. Probably won't move toward an update until the spaces thing is fixed - it's a horrible problem for me and I've gone back to using expose alone.

 

[walnuts]

Sorry, guys. This is a known issue, and we're working with Apple to fix it. I totally feel the pain on this one, since I use Spaces all the time (my basic set-up is Space 1: Entourage; 2: RDC and Word; 3: Safari; 4: iTunes; all: Messenger and Twitterific). Make sure that you update to the latest version of both Office 2008 and Leopard -- we've both made some incremental improvements that will improve things over where they were on launch day, but it's not 100% yet. It's turned out to be a pretty hairy problem.

I found that setting the Formatting Palette to collapse after a very short interval and essentially only switching spaces after the palette has collapsed acts as a relatively good workaround until the issue can be fixed.

 

[dzhiurgis]

Still missing some Lithuanian characters.. Are we living in 2008, cuz even Office 97 had it..

 

[TheNorthWaves]

I found that setting the Formatting Palette to collapse after a very short interval and essentially only switching spaces after the palette has collapsed acts as a relatively good workaround until the issue can be fixed.

I searched and asked a couple mac nerd friends but I don't have an answer. Do you mind telling me how to set up the palette to do that?

 

[walnuts]

I searched and asked a couple mac nerd friends but I don't have an answer. Do you mind telling me how to set up the palette to do that?

There's a little arrow in the upper right hand corner of the palette- just click the arrow and the palette turns around and reveals settings like a widget.

 

[TheNorthWaves]

thank you walnuts. I am an ex-pc user... still living with the mentality that I have to google everything/dig hard to find an answer to something simple. I should have known it was that simple - that's why I bought all of this stuff!

 

[thedommer]

office 2008 for mac is nothing short of offensive. constant crashes. ridiculously slow, the interface is illogical and needlessly complicated and the spaces hopping is maddening. easily the worst piece of software I have ever used.

 

[balahir]

Won't work. I have 12.1.2 installed.

Doesn't work for me either. Autupdate doesn't find it.

Regarding the long start-up times: They are so annoying I found myself more and more often pressing SPACE to start Quicklook instead of starting up Word, Excel or PowerPoint...

 

[timothyjay2004]

Have you done anything like run Monolingual or Xslimmer, manually removed any parts of Office, or moved the Office folder to a different location?

Thing is, this shouldn't prevent the update from being applied. A lot of us want the ability to clear out the language files we dont need or use. This never was a problem with office 11 (or any other previous version), why have it be one in 12? This is something that should be corrected. Because if you clear out those files that are unneeded across the board, even with apple's applications and the operating system itself, it can return valuable space to those of us that are in desperate need of as much as we can get. Please, pass that along and have it corrected. That shouldn't really be an issue. I'd understand more if there was missing core files etc., but the language files are not at the core of the program and shouldn't hinder an update.

It is also not showing up for me through autoupdate .. so, it was downloaded manually.

 

[illegallydead]

well, looks like NONE of the problems were fixed. Go freakin' figure.
I swear, is this a conspiracy to sell more copies of Office 2007 for Windows (and thus PC's)? Because '07 is an outstanding set of applications, but '08 IS THE LARGEST STINKING PILE OF CRAP THAT IS ON MY SYSTEM. I honestly don't know why I haven't re-installed '04...

nadyne, if the Space hopping issue is a "known issue", why is it not fixed? Why is this one Microsoft application the ONLY APPLICATION IN EXISTENCE for Mac OS X that has this issue? Even freeware pieces of junk written in a basement know to stay in one space. Why is it that a multi-BILLION dollar corporation can't write a piece of software that runs halfway decently?

All I have to say is - thank god I didn't pay a cent for '08. Would have been my worst investment ever.
On a completely unrelated note rolleyes - anyone know if this breaks some of the bit-torrent-ed serials that have been floating around?
[edit] Installed and still working. No updater loop (thank god)[/edit]

 

[illegallydead]

also Nadyne, why is it that '08 boots so painfully slow? Because I am about to time it and I think it is about an equal amount of time to boot up XP under parallels and open Office '07 in there, as it is to simply open a blank document in '08 on OS X...

[edit]
Ok, I actually ran the test.
37 seconds to boot into excel 2007 with a blank document under XP on parallels.
15 seconds average to open excel 2008 with a blank document in OS X.
Honestly, for some reason '08 booted faster for me today. (haven't updated, can't see it in autoupdate)
Still, for business assignments at school, I'd rather wait for XP to boot to get all the functions that Excel '08 doesn't have.
[/edit]

Christ I hope the next revision actually works... Which is sad that you have to sell us another product to get an old one to WORK.

 

[Dreamer2go]

yeah
and please update Mac Messenger.
I hate mac messenger so much, I have to use VMware fusion a lot to use Windows Live Messenger...draining my batteries fast when I'm on the go.

And also
I can't find the update =(

 

[jacg]

Office 2008 is indeed shameful. I don't use it and it drives me mad when I forget to open things in the slightly less shameful 2004 apps.

In Word, does anyone know if you can turn off the pixel-stealing clipart buttons between the top of my window and my page yet? I don't want them there. Who thought that was a good idea? They should get advice from users before inflicting non-optional bad design on us.

Obviously I'd ask about Excel 2008 too except I use macros so that's a non-starter.

As for Powerpoint 2008... I tried opening a .pptx file from Windows for a guy's presentation he was running from my laptop and we got so fed up waiting for it to open I opened it in Keynote, which got him going in no time. When he'd finished, PPT2008 was still working its way through a string of error warnings etc.