But is anyone ready to move in? Migration to Office System–the latest version of Microsoft’s widely used Office package–is expected to be slow, given the software’s complexity. Still, backers from SAP to the U.S. Postal Service are ready for the housewarming.
New Office Opens its Doors
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Has anybody out there used this yet? In my opinion, it looks like the latest and greatest bloatware known as Office. How many people really use features that have been added since Office 97? I am willing to bet that it is a very small number.
What really scares me is MS’s backhanded way of locking more and more into their products. To use the DRM, you have to have Windows Server 2003. To use Outlook to its fullest, you have to have an Exchange server. It never ends. We can argue the merits of having DRM built in another time. My point is that MS is working to make sure that everything you use is their stuff.
One final thing that really bothers. Since it seems XML is the wave of the future (honestly, I am not convinced yet but I will not pass judgement just yet…), the level of XML support in Office 03 seems pretty pathetic. Anybody have any experience with MS’s version of XML yet? I am interested to hear what the real scoop is instead of what I have read secondhand.
I find outlook 2003 a step forward in many ways, but a step back in others. Take the junk filtering for example – good attempt, but still not what I would expect of an office suite that costs that much!
It should be interesting to see the interopability between the xml based word docs I’ve been creating, and filters for OO.org, or Abiword. Something I’ll look forward to seeing how well it works.
Excel hasn’t really changed much from my perspective, nor powerpoint, and I don’t use Access.
OneNote is incredibly useful – I now can’t remember how I survived without it! Its like i’ve digitised all the little notes I make on paper etc, and categorised them into a searchable, ordered fashion. Hats off to MS for that little App.
I can’t see a real reason for existing office XP users to upgrade if all they do is basic word processing, presentations and calculations etc. OneNote should be bought if you need the organisation I do though!
I have to agree with the comments on Outlook 2003 and OneNote.
I’m very pleased with the new features in Outlook 2003, Microsoft has finally addressed a lot of the security concerns which previous versions suffered from.
And OneNote is a wonderful app! It’s truly useful! I already find myself using it to take notes about just about everything. From school and work related things to my personal life. It really is a nifty little app!
The other office apps?? I’m not very impressed with them. As far as I can tell, not much has changed with them since office 2000. If you’re still using Word 2000, you’re not missing out on anything!
In my opinion the only useful upgrades to office have been OnNote and the improvements to Outlook.
And really Office 2003 doesn’t seem anymore bloated than Office XP is.
I plan on buying Office 2003 now that it’s been released. Been playing with a beta copy here..
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Well why can’t you use notepad to write small notes other than OneNote? Office 2003 looks better but is that a good enough reason to spend all that money when technically is not much different than say Office 2000. I don’t understand this lust for upgrading when most of the time is unjustifed.
Well I haven’t personally used Office 2003 yet but I can say that Office XP has rather good XML support from my experiences at least for Excel and it sure looked like it had the same support for Word.
I have written several programs that output to Excel XML files and the only feature that I have found that I have not been able to specify is creating new macros in the XML, but that makes sense to me as that is a much more complicated task. As far as I can tell that is the only feature missing, and note this gave me more flexibility than any of the Java or Perl packages (POI, WriteExcel, etc.) that I found at the time, e.g. the ability to specify AutoSort, and auto fit the column widths.
Will
Well why can’t you use notepad to write small notes other than OneNote?
Use the app for a month, you’ll grow to love it if you work with documents, web pages, code, images, anything!
Imagine an electronic way to maintain all the contents of your desk, it saves a lot of time, and is surprisingly incredibly productive!
I beta tested Office 2k3 since Beta 1.
1. Its sloooow. I have a P4 2Ghz and 256MB of RDRAM, and XP Home. This system SHOULD be able to run an office suite easily, but it drags w/ Office 2k3 (only 2k3, not XP).
2. OneNote is really bad. I just find it useless, and it uses way too much memory. Couldn’t I just write something down in Word?
3. Outlook is better. Its faster than XP, but Its got too many features for me. I don’t need a calender, etc (not a fault though).
4. Word has a bunch of useless features. Most of the features are for “group sharing”, but they’re not easy to use/setup. People aren’t going to use them if they aren’t intuitive.
5. I dont do anything advanced in Excel, so I can’t compare.
This just doesnt seem worth an upgrade if you have OfficeXP, which is BEYOND feature complete.
Hey JCooper,
you’re wasting your breath here. MS never did a thing for computing for many of the people here. If you keep up with OSNews “comment” sections long you’ll find that (among other things):
MS doesn’t know anything about XML
Java is dying
Oracle is doomed by MySQL
“Services” will replace shrink-wrap software.
Blah, blah, blah.
If you like arguing, then have at it. But if you want to use logic, historical fact, or research (not to mention GRAMMAR), better look somewhere else.
peace.
Well why can’t you use notepad to write small notes other than OneNote?
Mainly organization … with OneNote, you can keep & organize 5,000 notes in one file if you want. However, for this purpose, I still prefer Keynote over OneNote:
http://www.tranglos.com/free/keynote.html
It doesn’t have as many features as OneNote, but I like its organization structure better. Plus, for all you open source zealots out there, it’s free .. both as in speech and beer.
What really scares me is MS’s backhanded way of locking more and more into their products. To use the DRM, you have to have Windows Server 2003. To use Outlook to its fullest, you have to have an Exchange server. It never ends. We can argue the merits of having DRM built in another time. My point is that MS is working to make sure that everything you use is their stuff.
That’s exactly what I hate about Microsoft’s development tools. Everything they do is tightly congealed into a festering pustule of technology that is nearly inutile.
Contrast this with Borland’s latest development tools (especially C++Builder); very open and useful.
No vendor lock-in for me, not if I can possibly avoid it.
If MS-Office has some unique feature that you truly need, then your stuck. But, if you can get by with OpenOffice or StarOffice, then I think you’d be crazy not to do so.
Msft wants to put you on the treadmill of forced upgrades. Also, if you buy one msft product, msft will try to force you to buy another. For example, you can’t run ms-office on linux or freebsd, you have to buy XP.
“What really scares me is MS’s backhanded way of locking more and more into their products.”
Is it possible that MS could have already been convicted on anti-trust charges in the U.S. and be looking at new charges in Europe, and are still not taking it seriously, still not getting the message?
Ok, the company I work for, believe it or not, nearly runs its entire business on Outlook 2002 and Exchange 2000. The company I work for has an Executive Search Firm, an IT Consulting Firm, a Temporary Placement Firm, and a Healthcare IT Consulting Firm. We manage all the databases for all our companies with custom app developed for Exchange on the backend and Outlook as the client. My uptime is usually months at a time (or however long it is before an update is released that requires a reboot, ok usually its at least once a month)
Now yes Outlook can be a “virus distribution client”, but if you actually bother to install the service packs and security updates when they come out, and run at least basic antivirus software on the client, it is largely a non-issue. Reason being, if you use Outlook along with Exchange you can specify what kind of attachments Outlook is allowed access too. For instance, I block access to exe files and vbs files among other. That being the case, the only viruses that are going to get through are ones that are in a zip file or document macro. With a decent antivirus software, you don’t have to worry about them because the av is going to get them before the user even sees the attachment. With just basic precautions, my company has not had a virus or worm infection in at least 3 years.
Many of the updates available in new releases of office are ones targeted at the developer and not necessarily the user. And believe me as someone who develops apps for my company to integrate office with the back office, many times these new features are worth the upgrade. And I might add the developer features with Office are completely unmatched by any of its competitors.
Now, I dislike Microsoft as much as the next guy does, but some of these arguments given against Office really aren’t fair.
Everything I have read has said “not a necessary upgrade”.
Everything I have read has said “not a necessary upgrade”.
What really scares me is MS’s backhanded way of locking more and more into their products. To use the DRM, you have to have Windows Server 2003. To use Outlook to its fullest, you have to have an Exchange server. It never ends. We can argue the merits of having DRM built in another time. My point is that MS is working to make sure that everything you use is their stuff.
Don’t use those features then.
There is this thing called competition and choice. Its a good thing.
Now I’m going to sit back and watch this turn into a standard issue rant fest from a bunch of bozos who probably don’t run office anyway.
Sorry to bring you back on earth, but when Exchange starts to be the same way open and flexible and fast and stable like IBM Domino, then you can talk about Exchange again.
Tell me how much time you need to restart Exchange in your environment? 1 hour? 2 hour? In Domino this is an taks of less then an minute (but you normaly do not care about this, because you almost never need to restart the server).
And please tell me if you are able to backup and restore an single user database?
And please tell me when was the last time you had serval months of uptime with Exchange?
I don’t like MS very much, but Exchange is no way stable! And please don’t start to talk about Outlook!
Just for your amusement: I have an Windows NT 4 Server with Service Pack 6a and an runing IBM Lotus Domino 4.6.7a runing since serval days:
Elapsed time: 284 days 00:59:24
And this IBM Lotus Domino release is OLD! VERY OLD (not supported any more)! And if I would not have an HW failure on the server, then the uptime would probably be much much higer. And I don’t want to post uptime numbers for R5 or R6 of Domino (powered by Linux). I do not want to frustrate you.
anyway… I never ever heard of an company beeing complete dependent (I mean business wise) on Outlook/Exchange and Office. Your current turnover is depending on Outlook/Exchange and Office? I have trouble to understand that. Could you please explain that to me?
What really scares me is MS’s backhanded way of locking more and more into their products. To use the DRM, you have to have Windows Server 2003.
Yes….. so if they come up with any new features, they must backport them…. right…..
Since it seems XML is the wave of the future (honestly, I am not convinced yet but I will not pass judgement just yet…), the level of XML support in Office 03 seems pretty pathetic.
If what you are expecting is a hippie-lovin’ free-for-all XML format and not just the next type of format for Office that makes it easier to integrate with other Microsoft applications, you’re in for a dissapointment.
How many companies are getting their “free” upgrades because they paid out the $$$ for SA? The point of the SA thing was to pay your $$$ yearly, then get “free” access to any upgrades during the term. Lots of shops should be getting this for “free” and installing it soon under this plan.
Are they really getting it right now?
Is it really free, or has MS changed the deal for the new stuff?
Did anybody “run-out” of SA [3 years paid] before this came out?
Just curious how MS is living up to it’s promises…
hey buddy ever heard of real world? there is no alternative to exchange because open source can’t make one. they’ve tried but failed. in the real world people need exchange. people need microsoft software. linux just isn’t up to cheese. neither is openoffice. evolution, with novell connector to exchange server, maybe, but it needs exchange server still to be useful
xml data format is useless. why? word is THE word processing app. no one uses anything else, period, except open office zealots who use it because it’s open source and not from microsoft. doc format is the universal word processor format for documents. xml would just slow things down. plus how do you do ole with xml. u can’t, that’s how
why does everyone hate microsoft. they are doing good job. open source certainly isn’t doing a better job. apple is trying but they can’t. u just can’t beat microsoft
hey buddy ever heard of real world? there is no alternative to exchange because open source can’t make one. they’ve tried but failed. in the real world people need exchange. people need microsoft software. linux just isn’t up to cheese. neither is openoffice. evolution, with novell connector to exchange server, maybe, but it needs exchange server still to be useful
How many times must you repost the same trash over the number of thread that involve any relating to Microsoft?
http://wwws.sun.com/software/solutions/cbp/index.html
There is the alternative to Exchange. It even includes a much touted “Sun Instant Messaging server” which is Microsoft is trying to make out as a big thing even though its competition already has it, aka, Domino 6.5 and Sun ONE Collaborative Business Platform.
http://wwws.sun.com/software/download/products/3e3afa5a.html
” Sun ONE Synchronization 1.1 is now available to Sun ONE Calendar Server Users. Synchronization 1.1 supports Sun ONE Calendar Server 5.1.1 and the following PC applications:Microsoft Outlook 98, 2000 and Palm Desktop 3.0, 3.01.”
So you can use Outlook and SUN Calender Server together.
This is more uptodate:
http://wwws.sun.com/software/download/products/3eb6ef85.html
Description: SunONE Synchronization 1.1 patch 1 is now available as a free download to SunONE Calendar Server Users. Synchronization 1.1 patch 1 supports Calendar Server 5.1.1 and the following PC applications: Microsoft Outlook 98, 2000 and Palm Desktop 3.0, 3.01.
http://javashoplm.sun.com/ECom/docs/Welcome.jsp?StoreId=8&PartDetai…
If a company or entity wants these DRM features they should just pay a organization of programers to implement it, probably using OOo and gnupg. It would turn out, well, right…
http://www.tranglos.com/free/keynote.html
It doesn’t have as many features as OneNote, but I like its organization structure better
It is far from being even close to OneNote – can I, for example, drag and drop jpg’s onto a notes page and annotate them using free text (ie click anywhere on the page and type?)
I stopped counting the times that I used OpenOffice to recover Excel files when our users show up in the IT room crying that their loved Excel crashed and can’t reopen the “corrupted file”. OpenGroupware.org is doing a remarkable job but if you want one of the most powerfull groupware software server around you can find it here http://www.samsungcontact.com/en/ . Samsung toke the Openmail business from HP and continues developing the code. I firmely believe that HP never put it’s sales and marketing power behind Openmail to not hanger Microshot. Openmail outperform Exchange so clearly…oh, and you can use “free” up to 5 users…
Well, KDE has Knotes for a long time…not a complex app but it works fine
I have to say that so far, the only things that are really going to be a big deal from the end-user perspective are Outlook and OneNote.
Comparing KeyNote and KNotes to OneNote is like comparing Notepad to emacs. Notepad may be simpler, but emacs can do much more. I only messed with everything for a short while, but in OneNote it was rather simple to just type anywhere, reorganize things on the fly, and scribble or draw diagrams into the notes. Then you can drag in images and record sound into your notes (if you want to record a meeting or lecture, for example, though I haven’t explored this part thoroughly in terms of how much audio it can handle).
Outlook just seems to have a much better default organization to it, and seems to connect to hotmail better. The junk mail filter caught an item in my hotmail account right away, and hasn’t filtered anything I wanted out yet. The preview pane also seems to do a lot more blocking for HTML-based e-mail, including images (and you can load the images with a right-click), and has a very clean-looking layout in displaying emails. By default it seperates different email accounts into different folder groups and groups emails into days/weeks/months (for instance there are dynamic groups for Today, Yesterday, Last Week, etc). I haven’t customized Outlook at all since first opening the 2k3 version, which should be telling since I used to spend a fair amount of time getting Outlook 2k and XP to look and behave the way I wanted them to.
Word and Excel only offer minor visual changes, mostly noticable by the fact that they adopt XP visuals very well (all of my Office windows adopted the Silver theme, which I’ve been using for quite some time, down to the menus, so the theme isn’t just about pretty title bars any more). Most of the major changes to these applications are in the DRM and XML support, which is all invisible to most users (especially home users; businesses will need a lot of other infrastructure to do the DRM properly, so it’s unlikely this portion will affect businesses for a while, unless they’ve already started upgrading to Windows Server 2003).
In short, if you already use Outlook, the 2003 upgrade is almost a must-have. All of the other applications are a take-it or leave-it, although if you’re still using Office 2000, then 2003 may be a good upgrade (at the very least, Office 2000 apps startup much more slowly than XP and 2003). Everyone that uses Windows frequently should check out the trial version of OneNote to see if it’s something they would use. For some it may be worth the price of the full version, for others it won’t be. At the very least, for those that don’t mind rebate programs, you can get half the price back through rebate if you also own a recent version of Office. I’m not even sure I could justify the full price of OneNote, even though I think it’s probably the most compelling application in the Office 2003 suite (though Outlook is close behind).