I have mentioned before (in a post which might have been accidentally deleted) that although I am very much into Macs, I don’t instinctively hate all things Microsoft.
This doesn’t mean that I particularly like Microsoft. I use Windows XP at work (I am contemptuously familiar with that operating system) and Panther at home, and there is absolutely no comparison between the two. XP doesn’t deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as Panther. Moreover I despise the way Microsoft won the browser war, and then once it had the most popular browser, it proceeded to neglect it so that it is now the most atrophied browser that is also the most popular browser.
All that said, once in a while Microsoft makes some decent software and it deserves credit when this happens.
I am referring to Office 2004 (the newest version for the Mac).
Yes, there are ethical issues with Office as well. It is another of Microsoft’s de facto monopolies and because of this, it is usually overpriced. I wish OpenOffice and WordPerfect well, but my preference for using Office is an example of pragmatism triumphing over idealism. Because I am currently looking for work and send most of my applications via email, compatibility with the Windows working world is of crucial importance for me. I cannot take the risk that my carefully formatted resumé is going to look crappy on a Windows version of Word. I know that OpenOffice and WordPerfect claim to be almost completely compatible with Word, but I’ve had some experience opening complex documents between different word processors and I have noticed that there are still problems.
Before I start writing about the actual software, I want to address the pricing issue. I’m lucky because I’ve never paid full price for Office. I’ve always managed to get the education discount. The regular version of Office is expensive but the Student and Teacher version is much more reasonably priced. Here’s a little secret: If you go into an Apple store and pick the Student and Teacher version of Office 2004 off the shelf, they aren’t going to ask to see your student / faculty ID. Please note, I am not encouraging people to be dishonest when buying Microsoft products. Never! All I’m saying is, think creatively about whether you might be a student or teacher in some capacity. If I stay at Vodafone for a year, I will qualify for a certificate in working at call centres. This is a real nationally-recognized qualification, awarded by a legitimate training organization which has an agreement with Vodafone. Working towards this certificate makes me enough of a student to buy the Student and Teacher version of Office 2004.
I haven’t yet had Office 2004 for a week, and I’ve only really been using Word and Entourage in this time, so those are the two applications which I’ll be writing about. Other reviewers and the mactopia website have mentioned what’s new with Excel and PowerPoint.
One of the first things that I noticed about Word 2004 was how much faster it loaded and acted on my computer, a humble G3 iBook. The other thing is that Word 2004 is not terribly different from Word X (its worthy predecessor). There are a few new features, some of which I’ll describe below, but this update hasn’t been about making changes for the sake of change or cramming in lots of new features which nobody would ever use.
The most welcome new addition for me is the Compatibility Report. This checks my document with its compatibility with the Windows versions of Word (2003, XP, 2000, 1997) as well as the older Mac versions (X, 2001 and 1998) and lists any problems and describes how the compatibility problems can be fixed. As I mentioned before, this has provided me with great piece of mind in my current job search.
The other change that I’ve noticed are the autocorrect options – that it is now much easier to stop Word from automatically correcting a word when this is not wanted. There are a few new features which I look forward to playing around with – I almost wish that I could take minutes at a meeting so that I could try out the notebook layout view. It is a good idea, to have simplified interface made for taking notes. It is also possible to easily scribble diagrams and add audio notes.
I’ll now move onto Entourage 2004. Again, this application loads much faster than its predecessor. The upgrade from Entourage X was a breeze and it brought in all my old emails, notes, calendars and tasks without any hassles.
One interesting feature in Entourage 2004 is that allows you to choose a 3 three-vertical column interfacing for browsing through emails. I’m not sure why I like it, maybe just because it’s different. Actually, it’s not that the previewed emails look better in a tall narrow column. It’s that it makes more sense to have the list of emails in tall, narrow column than a short, wide pane. Because I am notorious for never clearing my in-box, I really like the feature which allows you to collapse your list of emails by date. It just seems to make it more manageable and less overwhelming.
The old Entourage X had atrocious spam filtering. It was so bad that it drove me away to Apple’s Mail program for while. Then I got SpamSieve, a great little Mac spam filter, and after that, spam was never a problem on Entourage. Supposedly, Entourage 2004 has improved spam filtering. I haven’t yet tried it, because I’m still using SpamSieve – which works fine on Entourage 2004.
My favourite new feature in Office 2004, which is a part of Entourage but is also integrated with Word, Excel and PowerPoint, is the Project Center. It’s a way of linking together everything relevant to a particular project. I have already found this to be ideal with organizing my job applications. First, I paste the text of the job ad into a note and assign the note with the new project. Then I give myself a deadline for applying for the job or calling somebody to get more information about the position, so this task goes into the Schedule section of the project center. If there’s a pdf job description, I can download and store it in the Files section. When I write the cover letter and adapt my resumé for that position, I will also keep those Word documents in the Files section of the project center. If I find a person whom I may need to communicate with about this job, I can create a new contact in the address book and assign that contact to this project. Furthermore, any emails to or from a project-related contact can themselves be added to the project center, if that’s what I want.
I’m sure that I’ll find other uses for the project center. The idea of linking together related Office documents, emails, contacts, tasks and calendar items is quite brilliant. Even better, the project center isn’t available on the most recent Windows equivalent, Outlook 2003.
I can’t think of many things that I don’t like about Office 2004. It is inconvenient that Microsoft hasn’t yet released a conduit for syncing Entourage 2004 with Palm OS PDAs. If syncing Entourage with Palm is very important, stay with Entourage X for the time being. The other thing is that I miss all of the old office assistants. R.I.P. Rocky and Mother Nature! Office 2004 only has the boring Mac office assistant. Most people that I know hate those office assistants, so for them, this is probably an improvement.
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