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Office 2011 for Mac is available today.docx
There are plenty of free, paid, web-based, desktop-bound, cross-platform, or uni-platform alternatives, but there can only be one Office. Microsoft's flagship desktop suite of productivity applications just got a major new update. Office 2011 for Mac replaces Microsoft's Mac-specific Entourage email app with the industry standard Outlook, brings in some interface tweaks from Office 2010 over in PC land, and integrates with those Office Web Apps you've been hearing so much about. The entire "Home & Business" bundle goes for $279, and if you're not so into Outlook, you can get the Word / PowerPoint / Excel "Home & Student" version for $149.
Worldwide Competition on Microsoft Office enters final rounds in Park City, Utah
This week, finalists have gathered in Park City, Utah for the Worldwide Competition on Microsoft Office. After being pared down from a group of over 115,000 contestants, the remaining 50 or so young adults are competing for the top prize in the Worldwide Competition on Microsoft Office. The contest's entire purpose is to determine who is the best at Microsoft Word and Excel, and their work is checked by exam overseers Certiport, who will also validate and determine the winners. Good luck!
Pricing, ship date announced for MS Office For Mac 2011
A few weeks ago Microsoft released the initial preview of Office for Mac 2011. On Monday, the company announced that boxes will hit retail shelves in October (all prices are USD). As usual, there are several editions to chose from. In the case of Office for Mac 2011, there are three. First, Microsoft Office for Mac Home and Student 2011 will retail for $119 and offer Word, Powerpoint, Excel and Messenger. On the next tier is Microsoft Office for Mac Home and Business 2011. For $199 (or $279 for two installs under the same user), Home and Business edition adds Outlook to the mix (you can watch a preview of Outlook '11 here). Finally, the economic Microsoft for Mac 2011 Academic includes Word, Powerpoint, Excel, Outlook and Messenger for $99. It's a single-install edition that will sell at authorized academic stores as well as directly from Microsoft. For more on Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac, watch this space, as the team will be updating it regularly. [Via The Loop]
Office Mobile 2010 released, free upgrade for WinMo 6.5 users (update)
After having gone to public beta late last year, Office Mobile 2010 is now available in conjunction with the retail release of the full desktop version of Office 2010, bringing comprehensive Word, Excel, and PowerPoint editing capabilities to the pocket -- on Windows Mobile 6.5, that is. Yes, granted, Windows Phone 7 is Microsoft's biggest mobile news this year, but there'll be a huge legacy base of 6.5 users out there for a long time to come, and they're pretty much the core audience for the sorts of features that Office Mobile 2010 is offering: SharePoint integration for grabbing documents from the office, a nifty Bluetooth controller mode for PowerPoint presentations, and so on... you know, suit-and-tie stuff. The download is available today from Windows Marketplace for users of 6.5 devices with an older version of Office Mobile installed -- so go on, Tiger, whip up the hottest quarterly reports the world has ever seen. We know you have it in you. Follow the break for Redmond's full Office 2010 press release. Update: Curious what Office 2010 will look like on Windows Phone 7? Get a glimpse into the not-so-distant-future in Microsoft's video presentation, and fast forward to 52:45 for the good stuff. [Thanks, Kamara B.]
Word, Excel and OneNote for Windows Phone 7 Series revealed
We actually haven't seen any official shots of the Office apps for Windows Phone 7 Series, but now that Microsoft's emulator has been hacked and unlocked, we've got a glimpse of what creating a Word doc in OneNote looks like -- and while there's a high probability that this a super-early version of the app, it's still revealing in how drastically minimal it is. Microsoft says most people just want to make minor edits and leave comments to Office docs while on the go, not make large edits with copy and paste, so we'd expect to see track changes in the final version, but something tells us the main interface isn't going to look tremendously different than this. One more shot and the video with Word after the break -- hit the source for the second vid with Excel.
Mac OS X's Automator: I learned it by watching you!
Mac OS X's Automator has the ability to perform specific tasks from its given set of actions. For example, with a Finder-based action, you can batch move copy, move or rename files that fit a certain criteria. Similarly, image-based actions allow you to batch edit images, be it resizing, rotating or changing their file type (i.e., from JPG to PNG or vice versa). However, there may be situations that call for more unique tasks to be performed. And this is where Automator's "Watch Me Do" feature may come in handy. It performs keyboard- and mouse-based actions based on your movements and inputs during a Watch Me Do session. To initiate a Watch Me Do session, launch Automator and choose a template (you can incorporate it into an existing Automator workflow, service or app as well). Then, click on the "Record" button in the upper right hand corner. A small grey translucent window with an Automator icon will now appear in the upper left hand corner indicating that your inputs and movements are being recorded; to stop recording, just click on the stop button. The whole concept is similar to how you'd record a macro in Microsoft Excel. [Whoops, bad example, as macro recording isn't in the VBA-free Excel 2008 version. How about QuicKeys instead? –Ed.] I've found Watch Me Do actions particularly handy, especially when I'm too lazy to figure out how to do something in AppleScript. Watch Me Do requires that you enable access for assistive devices, so you'll need to hop on over to the "Seeing" pane within the Universal Access section of Mac OS X's System Preferences. Yes, Automator really can learn by watching you.
iriver Story reviewed, incites rebellion over price
If you didn't feel you got the whole Story yesterday, here's a pleasing helping of seconds, this time in the form of a full-on review. The PC Pro team rates iriver's Kindle emulator as a "serious contender," and places its readability on par with Sony's touch-less Readers. While congratulations are also meted out for a decent integrated MP3 player, 3.5mm headphone jack, and the wide variety of supported formats, two issues stood out for the reviewers. One was that the support for Word, Excel and Powerpoint files was somewhat hit-and-miss, with zooming sometimes not working and rendering some files unreadable. But the major gripe related to the asking price of £230 including taxes (around $380), which the Story was not considered capable of justifying. Hit the link below for more -- even if your interest is purely academic.
Microsoft Mac Business Unit announces details of next version of Office for Mac
With Microsoft Office for Mac still owning a hefty portion of the Mac software market, it's always news when the Mac Business Unit decides to spill the beans on their product plans for the future.TUAW's Michael Rose was on the press call this morning and noted the headlines, with details in the press release in the 2nd half of the post: Next month, Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac will be trimmed down to 2 editions: Home/Student and Business Edition. The new SKUs for Business Edition 2008 will be available next month. This makes more sense than the 3 editions currently available. The Office 2008 Business Edition includes Entourage Web Services Edition & Microsoft Document Connection Entourage Web Services Edition ships today (August 13, 2009) Office 2008 Business Edition has extra templates, clip art and bundled Lynda.com training lessons Upgrade costs for 2008 Business Edition $240, full licenses $340; Entourage Web Services update will be free for existing Office 2008 users One More Thing: The next Mac Office version will be ready by holiday season 2010, and includes a 'brand new application' -- Microsoft Outlook for Mac (!) Outlook for Mac will be a Cocoa app, will sync tasks and notes, and has a new database supporting Spotlight searches; IRM for confidential data controls. There was no announcement from Microsoft on any Office for iPhone development to date Visual Basic returns in Office 2010 See the continuation of this post for the full press release from the Mac BU.
Patch for Microsoft Office 2008 XML issues now available
As promised, Microsoft has released a patch (dubbed version 12.2.1) to address issues that some Microsoft Office 2008 users have had with opening XML-based documents. When attempting to open a document in Microsoft Office 2008, some users have been presented with an error message that resembles the following: "Microsoft Excel cannot open the file. You may have to download the latest updates for Office for Mac. Do you want to visit the Microsoft Web site for more information?" For those who held off on the Service Pack 2 update, guess what? Surprise! Service Pack 2 is required to install the patch. Unlike many Mac apps, where update checks are found in an app's namesake menu, in Microsoft Office 2008 it's in the "help" menu. So, click on "help," and "check for updates" and you're all set. Well, you're all set if you already had Service Pack 2 installed. You're only halfway there if you didn't have it installed. If this is the case, simply do this again. And there you go. Opening XML on Microsoft Office 2008 is no longer XM-hell. (You can also download the patch from the Mactopia web site.)
Open XML compatiblity issues spring up in Service Pack 2 update for Office 2008
A few weeks back, Microsoft released its Service Pack 2 update for Microsoft Office 2008 for the Mac. While adding a host of features and refinements (such as Custom Path Animation in PowerPoint and increased speed and load times in Word and Excel), the service pack apparently packed too much of a punch. The update has prevented some Open XML files from opening, for which Microsoft provides the following suggestions, and I've done a bit of MS-to-English translation (with apologies to DF)... read on to get the gist.
What to do when the wrong date is pasted in Excel
From Quentin Tarantino's classic, Pulp Fiction: Vincent: ...But you know what the funniest thing about Europe is? Jules: What? Vincent: It's the little differences. I mean, they got the same [things] over there that we got here, but it's just - it's just there it's a little different. Jules: Example? Vincent: ...Do you know what they call a Quarter Pounder with Cheese in Paris? Jules: They don't call it a Quarter Pounder with Cheese? Vincent: Naw, man, they got the metric system, they wouldn't know what the [heck] a Quarter Pounder is. Jules: What do they call it? Vincent: They call it a "Royale with Cheese". Jules: "Royale with Cheese." Vincent: That's right. Although they both use a different versioning nomenclature, the PC and Mac versions of Microsoft Excel are essentially the same app -- except, as in the words of Vincent Vega, they're just "a little bit different." And one of these differences is their respective date systems. By default, Excel for the PC uses the 1900 date system, while its Mac counterpart uses the 1904 date system. In most cases, users won't notice this subtle difference. For example, a file saved by a PC version of Excel using the 1900 date system will be recognized as such when it's read by its Mac counterpart, and vice versa.
Microsoft releases Office 2008 Service Pack 2
Today, Microsoft released the Office 2008 Service Pack 2 update. This update brings many improvements and fixes to Office 2008, including improved speed and stability to Word and Excel, new features in PowerPoint, as well as improvements to connecting to SharePoint servers. A brief list of fixes follows below: Two new features in PowerPoint 2008: Custom Path Animation, which adds the ability to author motion-path animations and Default Theme, which lets users define their default theme, including fonts, color scheme and slide layouts. Increased speed in Word 2008 (launch and scroll times) as well as Excel 2008 with features such as calculation performance. Expanded Mac browser support in Microsoft Office Live Workspace to include Safari 4. Microsoft Document Connection. Document Connection is a new application that improves the SharePoint experience for Mac users, allowing for easier collaboration within a SharePoint environment by simplifying how users can browse, access and manage files online and offline. For a complete lists of changes and fixes, visit this description page. To download this update, run the Microsoft AutoUpdate application on your Mac or go to the Microsoft Mac Downloads page. This update weighs in at 182.6 MB and is available right now.
May Guild of the Month: Dragon Knights on Area 52
We're running late on this one (the beginning of the month was quite busy), but it's not any less exciting: congratulations go out to our latest Guild of the Month for May: the Dragon Knights on Area 52. They sent us a nomination along with many other guilds in the game, and were selected for their originality, community, and raiding performance. Among other interesting things about the guild (which you can read in the second half of this post), they run a guild podcast, an email newsletter, and even a lotto, all along with raiding competitively and leveling up as a guild.In addition to being profiled here on the site, the Dragon Knights will also win a raid pack from Swagdog.com, where they (and you) can pick up customized shirts and hats with their guild name and logo printed on them. Our Guild of the Month contest is ongoing, so stay tuned to the site for the next chance to nominate your guild to be recognized here on WoW.com. Read on to learn more about the Dragon Knights and why they're our winners for May.
Microsoft Office rolls up to 12.1.7, trial edition downloadable
There's an update in town, and it's all about locking it down: the 12.1.7 update to Microsoft Office 2008 (available within the suite via the software update tool, or downloadable from Microsoft) closes two security holes present in multiple versions of Microsoft Excel and first acknowledged by the company in February. These vulnerabilities could allow an attacker to create a specially-configured Excel file that, when opened, would allow full control of the target machine. The update package also bundles up all the previous patches to Office 2008, which lends it heft (it weighs in at over 150 MB) but simplifies matters if you're a few revs behind. Note that there is no 12.1.6 update in the sequence; the previous patch level was 12.1.5. If you haven't made the leap to Office 2008 yet (perhaps you're on a PPC Mac; perhaps you feel that you get better interoperability with Office 2003 users on Windows; perhaps you have to have Visual Basic support for macros), Microsoft is giving you the chance to consider moving up with a full-featured 30-day demo of Office 2008, now available for download in the USA. The package includes all the Office apps and can be upgraded to a paid license in the field without purchasing a boxed copy and reinstalling. Upgrades from previous editions of Office start at $240... of course, there are some less expensive alternatives out there. [h/t Ars Technica]
iPhone app roundup: Quickoffice, Otto Matic, Evernote 2
In the hustle and madness of yesterday's wayback machine activity, there were a couple of App Store introductions (and a notable upgrade) that might have slipped through... First up: The long-awaited version of Quickoffice for iPhone that allows editing of Word and Excel files hit the store today and was demoed at CTIA. [Looks like the new Quicksheet is available now, but the full bundle and the Quickword standalone app aren't on sale yet as of Thursday morning.] While QO has had a 'mobile files' tool on the iPhone for a while now, this is the first build of the venerable portable office suite (which has been a favorite on Palm handhelds for years) that can do editing in both formats. Quickoffice for iPhone can do font formatting and cut, copy and paste within Word documents -- presumably to be tied in with system-wide C/P in the OS 3.0 world-to-come. Both the Excel and Word tools will support landscape mode for extra editing area. Files on the iPhone can be transferred off the device using WiFi to a local Mac, or straight to a MobileMe account. Quickoffice for iPhone is shipping now for an "introductory price" of $19.99, but if you just want the Excel spreadsheet editor (formerly MobileFiles Pro) you can have it for $12.99; the Word document editor is also $12.99. Quickoffice Files (previously known as MobileFiles 2.0) is $3.99 and offers similar file transfer capability to Readdle and other file managers. We're getting a review copy for a more thorough walkthrough later this week. It's worth noting that a Microsoft exec hinted at a version of Office itself for the iPhone that may be coming sometime in the not-too-distant future. Second... who doesn't love a good robot game? For $4.99, you can now dive into Pangea's classic Otto Matic series with the company's new title for iPhone, Otto Matic: Alien Invasion. The B-movie style game pits Otto against the attacking Brain Aliens from Planet X; his job is to save as many humans as possible. Otto Matic: Alien Invasion features 10 levels and 25 different enemies, multiple weapons and activities, and quite a bit of fun. Lastly, the TUAW top pick Evernote has been updated with a nifty landscape mode, thumbnail viewing, improved performance, favorites sorting, and an embedded web browser to reduce the tap a link --> Safari --> back to home screen --> scroll around --> relaunch Evernote loop-the-loop annoyances. Evernote 2.0 for iPhone remains a free download, and the basic Evernote service is also free; a year of pro-level service costs $45.
Microsoft and FrontLine Release Solver for Excel 2008
If you've been miffed with Microsoft since Excel 2008 hit the stores due to the removal of Solver from the popular spreadsheet application, it may be time to lighten up. You can now download Solver for Excel 2008 for free from the FrontLine Systems Web site. FrontLine developed the original Solver for Excel 2004, and developed the Excel 2008 version at the request of the Microsoft Mac Business Unit (Mac BU).Solver is a linear programming / analysis tool for Excel that was included with Excel 2004 as an add-in, but dropped from Excel 2008 since it required Visual Basic for Applications (VBA). The Mac BU has noted that VBA is going to return in the next version of Office. In the meantime, Mac Excel users who rely on Solver's powerful analysis capabilities are now able to use the free download to perform their linear programming tasks.[via MacRumors]
Mariner Calc for iPhone
The upcoming iPhone 2.0 software is providing more document viewing capabilities in the form of readers for PowerPoint, Keynote, Pages, and Numbers, but Apple still isn't providing a way to edit docs on the run. Mariner Software announced at WWDC 2008 that they'll be resolving at least part of that dilemma with the release of Mariner Calc for iPhone. Mariner Calc is the software firm's popular Excel-compatible spreadsheet for the Mac.Mariner Calc for iPhone is about 80% of the way to completion at this time and is expected to ship about the time the virtual doors open on the App Store. If you like to work on huge spreadsheets, you'll love this app since it sports a maximum of 1,000,000 rows and 32,000 columns.Mariner Software President Mike Wray mentioned to Macworld.com's Dan Frakes that Mariner Calc for iPhone will support multiple sheets per document, charts, and objects. It's expected that the application will integrate with new versions of Mariner Calc for Mac. No price has been set for Mariner Calc for iPhone, but expect this little spreadsheet to be a popular purchase from the App Store. [Via Macworld]
Mac Automation: automating Microsoft Word 2008
When Microsoft released Office 2008 for Mac, they did something that I must applaud -- they joined the ranks of Mac developers creating Automator-able applications. When you do a search in Automator for "Microsoft," it will reveal all of the Automator actions that ship with Microsoft Office 2008. There is lots of great stuff included, so we'll be covering some of it in this four part Mac Automation series. I will take you through how to automate each of the Microsoft Office applications: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Entourage.First off, let's take a look at what you can automate in Word 2008. Doing a search for "Word" in Automator will display the available actions for Microsoft Word. As you can see, there are plenty of actions that you can automate. For this how-to, we'll focus on a workflow that does the following: Creates a new document Sets document properties Gathers text from the clipboard Places a watermark in the document Saves the document Prints the document Continue reading to learn how to create this workflow.
Walt Mossberg tackles Apple's iWork '08
The Moss-man has gotten into a down-and-dirty review of Apple's latest version of its Office-battling software suite iWork '08 (which includes Pages, Keynote, and the new spreadsheet program Numbers) and delivers a one-two punch to the new package. Apparently, Cupertino's entry just can't match up to Office's triple power play of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, though Walt says that iWork '08 is an elegant and sophisticated solution for users looking for something with a little less power -- which should come as no surprise to most. Mossberg's not all doom and gloom though, happily noting that Pages has reined in its desktop publishing aspect and become more of a dedicated word processor, Numbers is a "refreshing innovation," that's more "approachable" than its competitor, and Keynote actually bests PowerPoint in ease of use. In the end, however, Mossy says all the flair and high design doesn't make up for the succulent and unbridled power in Office -- but you knew that already, right?[Via Techmeme]
APC reports Office 2008 in private beta
Happy Friday everyone! From Down Under it emerges (via APC, the Aussie computer magazine): a preview article on Office 2008, including the tempting tidbit that the suite is now in private beta, with the 'Escher' graphics engine and plenty of shiny bits. MBU managers also admit that the initial attempts at a new, more Windows-ish interface for the Mac productivity suite met with blank stares and frustration:"[T]he Mac developers had already had one radical redesign tested and rejected after user feedback, said MacBU group product manager Mary Starman. 'We had what we thought was going to be this perfect UI solution, and the first time we put it in the labs, no-one understood it! It was so different they were completely confused!'"I don't know whether to be happy that they listened to the test groups, or discouraged that they were surprised when a radical UI change caused user confusion. *sigh* Check out the full APC article for screenshots and more.Thanks Dave and Bryce!
