Office for Mac 2011 Launches October 26th

[Cosmo M3]

I've been using Office 2011 for some time now and I love it.

However I prefer the simple interface on 2007, but this upgrade is leaps and bounds ahead of 2008.

My main complaints so far, however:

1.) Sorting the inbox by conversation need some work. If the subject has the same title, then the threaded design becomes useless.

2.) the scrolling in Excel is very slow and not as responsive. Looking at all those cells on the MBP is overwhelming due to the smaller screen and some of the keyboard shortcuts are very different from the Windows version.

The ribbon interface is useful, but it takes up way too much screen real estate on the MBP. Recommend using an external display.

 

[tbob]

Anyone else notice how clunky the page-turn 'effect' is (around 1:55)? Yuck. Not that my documents are built on how smoothly the page turns, but I think it's indicative of all the overhead of the software.

 

[gflinch]

Oh my god, I've used office 2011 beta for quite some time now and it looks really promising. But this video, it sucks big time! The guy on the right with the mustache looks as though he was transported there from the mid nineties, and he speaks even stiffer. The guy on the left tries so hard to speak cool about his new product, but somehow it's not very convincing even though I know he's right about some things.

Another thing i noticed was that the transition between pages in full screen mode seemed to be rather jumpy. Not a good thing if you want to promote the speed and light feeling of the product.

The last sentence is a rather good one though.

Yeah, he looks like he has the proverbial board up the a**.

 

[pdjudd]

So I guess having Outlook 2010 on the PC support Exchange 2003 is completely insane, right?
Is that your logic?
What if MS took that support away, do you think there would be a small outrage?
I'm guessing yes.
So expecting the SAME support in their OS X product is not so "out on the ledge".

Exchange and MAPI was never written for the Mac - that's just more work for the Office for Mac team and that assumes that is possible. Microsoft hasn't sold Exchange 2003 for years.

EWS was written for multi-platform. It just wasn't all that practical for the MBU. Lets not forget that Apple is limited to this limitation too.

 

[GoodWatch]

Anyone else notice how clunky the page-turn 'effect' is (around 1:55)? Yuck. Not that my documents are built on how smoothly the page turns, but I think it's indicative of all the overhead of the software.

Yes, on par with iTunes MS will never, ever do anything good. Not now, not in 10 years. It's become a self perpetuating and self fulfilling saga in the Kingdom of Apple. The phone number for the MS help desk is 666, we all know that. It's a company that never develops anything by itself, it just buys other companies and uses their technology. (Mmmm, that sounds familiar). It only produces crapware that cannot hold a candle to what Apple bestowes on this world. It's a miracle that they even exist. And they stole the whole GUI concept from Apple! (Or was it PARC?). And Bill Gates hates Steve!

 

[Elbon]

I don't want new features. I want less features. I want a smaller memory and hard drive footprint and faster speed - e.g., drop the feature bloat.

My thoughts exactly. I read "30 new features" and immediately lost interest. How about "300 less features"? Now then I might be interested.

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

I'm glad this is Intel-only. I've been trying to convince people at work to dump their old PPC Macs, and this just might be enough to finally convince the last few holdouts.

So you enjoy trying to make people get rid of their computers before there is a need to? WTF for? Does Apple send you a check for getting people to buy a newer computer sooner or what? Frankly, Office 2004 runs perfectly fine on my upgraded PowerMac and 2008 is just plain slow on ALL Macs (relative to 2004 on a native Mac). It would have been nice to see how it would have run on PPC machine with the improvements (just fine, I'm sure since it's just a fraking word processor for goodness sake). I'm just glad I never bought a Mac G5 Quad. Those users got so screwed by Apple dropping support early for what is still a VERY viable machine. I can only assume with will continue to drop support for older Intel machines just out of convenience to them (i.e. try and force more sales of newer hardware) since they've already started doing it with iOS devices, some that aren't even 3 years old.

 

[gazelips]

Keyboard shortcuts? Especially for Excel!

Do they match Office 2007? That's one of the most infuriating things about 2008 - you can just hit F2 on Windows and edit in the cell, but for the Mac you have to click in the cell, or the edit field, or cmd+U I think. Gah.

All power Excel users that I know really use the keyboard and the Mac version constantly forces you back to the mouse - slowing things down.

 

[Westside guy]

If you're interested check out OpenOffice.org. It's all I've had installed on my machine for the last couple of years as far as office suites go. I just tweak the preferences to automatically save in XLS or DOC format and then pretend I have MS Office - for free. Compatibility is very near 100% from my experience.

Didn't you get the memo? It's OpenOffice no more - it's now called LibreOffice.

 

[rolphi]

Such a dramatic statement too. You don't have to FORGET everything you know (oh woe is me!) Its just a matter of taking a few minutes to look at the Ribbon. Most professionals use short cut keys anyways.

It was not well received when we moved from 2003 to 2007. Our users now have no issues with it.

I agree. I think that, if you never learned any previous interface, you would prefer the interface in 2007.

Now that I've switched, I wouldn't want to go back.

 

[EricBrian]

Woohoo! I can't wait.

 

[impierced]

Exchange and MAPI was never written for the Mac - that's just more work for the Office for Mac team and that assumes that is possible. Microsoft hasn't sold Exchange 2003 for years.

EWS was written for multi-platform. It just wasn't all that practical for the MBU. Lets not forget that Apple is limited to this limitation too.

Not true, Microsoft released Outlook 2001 for Mac that was full MAPI:

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2001/Jun01/06-27MacPR.mspx

It was pretty much dead on release, development never continued. If memory serves, it wasn't even written by the MBU.

 

[Mal67]

Well, it looks like they've managed to mess up the user interface as badly on the Mac version as on the Windows version. Fortunately there's NeoOffice.org, which doesn't require forgetting everything you know about how to use an office suite, and starting from scratch.

I use office 2007 and 2010 regularly (in preference to 04 and 08) and have no issues whatsoever with the user interface as a matter of fact I would go so far as to say I prefer it. But it is great to see that users can customize the interface to better suit their own preferences if they need to. Perhaps the most important thing though is that MS has now taken the opportunity to bring the mac version more into line with its windows counterpart which is great for mac users in all sorts of environments as well as for getting the mac into more of those environments.

 

[nadyne]

I won't upgrade simply because I hate the "ribbon" toolbars.

In Office 2011, you can turn off the Ribbon. For that matter, you can also turn off the standard toolbar. Personally, this is my standard view in Excel, since I know the keyboard shortcuts and the formulas that I use. I just want to see as big of a grid as possible 'cause I'm a geek.

No Category color syncing
No PST archiving
No PST opening (only importing)
No Side by side calendar view (WTF is this overlay crap)
No Server side rules

All of these are things we're aware of, and they're definitely things we want to improve. For example, category colours and server-side rules are features that we're working with the Exchange team to be able to get into a future release. Mac users can create and edit server-side rules using Outlook Web Access for Exchange 2010, which is a workaround for now. For category colours, I took a couple of minutes and set them up in OWA so that I'd have the same view when I check my mail from home.

Does Word still take forever to launch?

We put a huge amount of work into improving performance. I'm currently typing this from the original Intel Mac Mini: Core Solo processor, 1 GB of RAM, and I'm running Snow Leopard on it. I think it's the slowest Intel Mac that was made. From a cold boot, Word launches in three or four bounces.

Another member of my team is planning on writing a blog post about the performance work that we did, so stay tuned to our blog for that.

So, no upgrade price from Office 2008?

We dropped our prices from those of Office 2008. In fact, all of our prices for Office 2011 are below the upgrade prices that we had for Office 2008. In effect, everyone's getting upgrade pricing.

Regards,
Nadyne.

 

[impierced]

All of these are things we're aware of, and they're definitely things we want to improve. For example, category colours and server-side rules are features that we're working with the Exchange team to be able to get into a future release. Mac users can create and edit server-side rules using Outlook Web Access for Exchange 2010, which is a workaround for now. For category colours, I took a couple of minutes and set them up in OWA so that I'd have the same view when I check my mail from home.

Thank you for the reply Nadyne...

In all seriousness, I cannot fathom the thought behind the calendar overlay between different calendars. It has the be the single most confusing thing in the new client. Side by side calendar view has been a staple in Outlook for Windows for decades and to not implement basic views between platforms similarly is quite maddening.

I will say I know that MS has a great track record for providing significant updates to Entourage in the form of free Service Packs. I hope that continues with Outlook.

PS When one deletes a mail item the selection is completely the opposite now - the message below it gets selected. In Entourage the message above was automatically selected. If you're going to change basic behavior like this - please create a preference item to revert it back.

 

[DeepIn2U]

Thank you for the reply Nadyne...

In all seriousness, I cannot fathom the thought behind the calendar overlay between different calendars. It has the be the single most confusing thing in the new client. Side by side calendar view has been a staple in Outlook for Windows for decades and to not implement basic views between platforms similarly is quite maddening.

I will say I know that MS has a great track record for providing significant updates to Entourage in the form of free Service Packs. I hope that continues with Outlook.

I'll try to respond to this - without rereading the past few pages. IF you're used to opening Outlook to view 2 or more MAPI's simultaneously to manage different accounts you have full access to or as a delegate merging the view may be more efficient and less stress on Exchange when you have full editor rights for more than one calendar - to which you accept on "behalf of" and also edit existing appointments and attendees within. I've seen some BAD habits and issues that for checking in OWA for 4 users 1 being the full editor delegate for 3 others drive me nutso over.

I HAVE to hand it to this Microsoft team. Positive experience using this on my Mac Mini - saving my MacBook for official release which I WILL PAY for!

Outlook … we have Exchange 2007 with a BB environment but no restrictions for iPhone/iPad/Mac. Our WinXP users use Outlook 2007 and few on 2010 (IT we're testing 2010), yet it our auto mapi setup allows for users to double-click on Outlook the first time and its auto set; no manual configuration. Once completed allows synch'ing & access to update cache mode WITHOUT VPN. testing this at home along with OSC works FLAWLESSLY and I'm VERY VERY happy.

Microsoft, PLEASE allow for PST creations for Mac users - there is NO reason to hold us back any further (for now importing is great).

 

[Richard1028]

I did a test drive on the most recent 2011 beta.

It's mostly great but I came across a few design anomalies:

There is no "true" print preview. You have to use some stupid facsimile on the ribbon which only generates a pdf and pops open Apple's preview app.

I can't seem to find a way to assign a keyboard shortcut to a macro script placed on a menu.

The "Find outlook items" doesn't search all outlook items like it's supposed to.

The above things might sound minor but they are indeed frustrating.

And the best feature though is the ability to dump the ribbon all together. I hate it. Not enough screen real estate on a 13 inch MB.

 

[jon08]

Two questions:

1. Did they fix the attachment "bug" that was present in Entourage? The "bug" was that you couldn't view pics larger than, what, 400 KB or so within Entourage even after downloading them. Has this been fixed in Outlook?

2. Still no offline msgs in Messenger?

 

[Perdification]

I guess i'll still be loyal to iWork. It's not worth the upgrade to MS Office 2011.

 

[batchtaster]

I won't upgrade simply because I hate the "ribbon" toolbars.

That's just plain ignorant and bloody-minded. You haven't even tried the Mac implementation, and you're conveniently ignoring the fact it can be turned off entirely. If you want to live with the well-documented and known limitations and problems in 2008 just because you want to be pigheaded just for the sake of it, then whatever on that. A feature you've never even used that can be disabled? That's the most ridiculous reason of all not to upgrade.

No Category color syncing
No PST archiving
No PST opening (only importing)
No Side by side calendar view (WTF is this overlay crap)
No Server side rules

It's the first version. And it has already made far more progress than any version of Entourage ever did. You're not happy? Then stay on Entourage and wait for the first service pack.

And if you absolutely must have all those features, then you'll already be using Outlook for Windows, either virtually or on an actual PC. Because clearly your job requires it.

 

[bigjobby]

Really looking forward to the release after using various betas. The PC's killer app is finally coming to Apple with a decent and more reliable release! No more using betas or switching to Windows to do simple things like filling in macro'd work forms, opening complex spreadsheets etc etc. Woohoo!

I'm sure Mr. Jobs will be watching Apple's penetration figures into the business/corporate market with intrigue.

 

[German]

Office 2011: Mac-Version with Outlook, but without Opendocument
http://www.golem.de/1009/78257-2.html



---
What is OpenDocument?
Reject proprietary formats! Pledge to use OpenDocument!

 

[Perdification]

That's just plain ignorant and bloody-minded. You haven't even tried the Mac implementation, and you're conveniently ignoring the fact it can be turned off entirely. If you want to live with the well-documented and known limitations and problems in 2008 just because you want to be pigheaded just for the sake of it, then whatever on that. A feature you've never even used that can be disabled? That's the most ridiculous reason of all not to upgrade.



It's the first version. And it has already made far more progress than any version of Entourage ever did. You're not happy? Then stay on Entourage and wait for the first service pack.

And if you absolutely must have all those features, then you'll already be using Outlook for Windows, either virtually or on an actual PC. Because clearly your job requires it.

Relax pal, chill...

 

[Mattie Num Nums]

Office 2011: Mac-Version with Outlook, but without Opendocument
http://www.golem.de/1009/78257-2.html



---
What is OpenDocument?
Reject proprietary formats! Pledge to use OpenDocument!

Why would they need to. .Doc is the industry standard.

 

[pdjudd]

Why would they need to. .Doc is the industry standard.

WEll MS went out of their way to do it on office 2010. Of course Office 2010 is a released product - my guess is the MBU will release a patch like they did with the Docx add-on in 2008 - the features are almost never in parity if they are offered at all.