Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 sent to manufacturing
Microsoft announced Friday that Office for Mac 2011 is now classified as "Release to Manufacturing." The software should be on track for release by the end of October as previously announced.
The Mac Business Unit team at Microsoft published a celebratory post on their blog Friday announcing that they had "signed off on final testing" and sent the product to production. This latest release was two and a half years in the making, with team members in Redmond, Silicon Valley, Beijing, Dublin Tokyo.
Office for Mac 2011 should be Microsoft's "best release yet," according to Product Unit Manager Geoff Price, who authored the post.
Key features added include Outlook for Mac, co-authoring, ribbons, cloud-based storage, in-document photo editing.
Macworld reported earlier that online retailer Amazon.com had an Oct. 26 availability date listed on its website, but the release date has since been removed. Microsoft had announced in August that the product would ship by the end of October.
Customers who purchase Office 2008 for Mac between Aug. 1, 2010 and Nov. 30, 2010 are eligible for a free upgrade. All other users will have to purchase the standalone versions. Prices start at $119 for the Home and Student version, which lacks Outlook, and $199 for the Home and Business version. An Academic version will also be offered to qualifying students and educators for $99.
For more, see AppleInsider's previous coverage of Office for Mac 2011:
Microsoft showcases co-authoring capabilities of Office 2011 for Mac
Office for Mac 2011 to feature co-authoring, ribbon interface
Road to Office 2011 for Mac: A New Hope
Road to Office 2011: New looks, support for Exchange, VBA
Microsoft officially unveils key Office 2011 for Mac features
The Mac Business Unit team at Microsoft published a celebratory post on their blog Friday announcing that they had "signed off on final testing" and sent the product to production. This latest release was two and a half years in the making, with team members in Redmond, Silicon Valley, Beijing, Dublin Tokyo.
Office for Mac 2011 should be Microsoft's "best release yet," according to Product Unit Manager Geoff Price, who authored the post.
Key features added include Outlook for Mac, co-authoring, ribbons, cloud-based storage, in-document photo editing.
Macworld reported earlier that online retailer Amazon.com had an Oct. 26 availability date listed on its website, but the release date has since been removed. Microsoft had announced in August that the product would ship by the end of October.
Customers who purchase Office 2008 for Mac between Aug. 1, 2010 and Nov. 30, 2010 are eligible for a free upgrade. All other users will have to purchase the standalone versions. Prices start at $119 for the Home and Student version, which lacks Outlook, and $199 for the Home and Business version. An Academic version will also be offered to qualifying students and educators for $99.
For more, see AppleInsider's previous coverage of Office for Mac 2011:
Microsoft showcases co-authoring capabilities of Office 2011 for Mac
Office for Mac 2011 to feature co-authoring, ribbon interface
Road to Office 2011 for Mac: A New Hope
Road to Office 2011: New looks, support for Exchange, VBA
Microsoft officially unveils key Office 2011 for Mac features
Comments
The Mac Business Unit team at Microsoft published a celebratory post on their blog Friday announcing that they had "signed off on final testing" and sent the product to production.
Wow. That is certainly good news for Apple! Microsoft treats them very well, all things considered.
It's not even funny how much better 2011 is than 2008.
You are not kidding. I love the beta.
I am only going to upgrade from 2008 to 2011 if some Windows' user sends me a file that REQUIRES 2001 to open.
08 already opens all Office file formats, including docx. In fact compatibility between docx's is actually pretty good. So I guess you are safe and don't need to upgrade.
I am only going to upgrade from 2008 to 2011 if some Windows' user sends me a file that REQUIRES 2001 to open.
Hopefully Open Office and iWorks will suffice.
Microsoft announced Friday that Office for Mac 2011 is now classified as "Release to Manufacturing." The software should be on track for release by the end of October as previously announced.
The Mac Business Unit team at Microsoft published a celebratory post on their blog Friday announcing that they had "signed off on final testing" and sent the product to production. This latest release was two and a half years in the making, with team members in Redmond, Silicon Valley, Beijing, Dublin, Tokyo.
Now, the Mac Business Unit team at Microsoft can work on a 64 bit Objective C, Cocoa version of Microsoft Office applications for those of us who prefer the speed of 64 bit computing. I am running my late 2009 iMac in 64 bit mode and I sure hope that Microsoft catches up.
Now, the Mac Business Unit team at Microsoft can work on a 64 bit Objective C, Cocoa version of Microsoft Office applications for those of us who prefer the speed of 64 bit computing. I am running my late 2009 iMac in 64 bit mode and I sure hope that Microsoft catches up.
I would like to see iTunes in 64 bit also.
Woot. I am looking forward to this version. I doubt anyone doesn't already know, but in case you don't...Outlook for Mac requires exchange 2008 or above.
No, that is not quite right - Using the Exchange functionality (Corporate email) of Outlook requires Exchange 2007 or above (No such thing as Exchange 2008, you must be thinking of Server 2008 very different). You can still use Outlook with IMAP or POP3 irreguardless.
If you can install and run office 2011, you can run Outlook.
No, that is not quite right - Using the Exchange functionality (Corporate email) of Outlook requires Exchange 2007 or above (No such thing as Exchange 2008, you must be thinking of Server 2008 very different). You can still use Outlook with IMAP or POP3 irreguardless.
If you can install and run office 2011, you can run Outlook.
Yep. I actually like Outlook 2011. It works well, and i like having 1 app for email contacts and calendar instead of 3.
No, that is not quite right - Using the Exchange functionality (Corporate email) of Outlook requires Exchange 2007 or above (No such thing as Exchange 2008, you must be thinking of Server 2008 very different). You can still use Outlook with IMAP or POP3 irreguardless.
If you can install and run office 2011, you can run Outlook.
We have been working on a new XenApp server on Windows 2008 r2 the last two days. I must have gotten that in my head. Yes it is Exchange 2007.....my bad. As for IMAP or POP3, yes I realize that those two options are available. For my tastes, that's half ass doing it. To each their own.
08 already opens all Office file formats, including docx. In fact compatibility between docx's is actually pretty good. So I guess you are safe and don't need to upgrade.
This is simply not true. I believe that you mean that Office 2008 can open Microsoft's new XML-based formats. Office 2008 can most certainly open these and a limited number of the versions of Microsoft's older binary formats. OTOH, Office 2004 cannot open the XML-based formats, but it can open just about every other Microsoft format. This means that Office 2004 can open many more Microsoft formats than Office 2008.
I would like for this situation to improve, but I doubt it. Perhaps someone who has actually used the Office 2011 beta for productive work has updated information. For many of us hoping for improved Exchange support with the new Outlook 2011, this is not to be. If your firm uses Exchange Server 2007, then you will be OK. If your firm is like mine and uses an older version, then you are SOL. Outlook 2011 is the new name for Entourage EWS aka Entourage 13.0, the latest version of Entourage 2008. Entourage EWS is incompatible with all versions of Exchange Server except Exchange Server 2007. Those of us who must access an older version of the Microsoft communications server must stick with the Exchange 12 fork of Entourage 2008.
The ribbon UI looks cluttered. They should have decided which buttons people need to use regularly and put them in there. You're not going to switch theme regularly and the styles palette could have been a drop-down. Insert could have had a single icon.
You shouldn't need submenu groups for items like tables and charts. You just insert a chart and the ribbon should change when you select one. Smart Art doesn't need to be loaded at the start either if you won't be using it.
I've been using OpenOffice 3 recently and it's pretty fast. The UI is not native but the program works well and loads pretty quickly. I'll check out Office 2011 but if it's not much better, I'll just stick to using OO3.
Now, the Mac Business Unit team at Microsoft can work on a 64 bit Objective C, Cocoa version of Microsoft Office applications for those of us who prefer the speed of 64 bit computing. I am running my late 2009 iMac in 64 bit mode and I sure hope that Microsoft catches up.
It would also be great if iTunes and Final Cut Pro were. It think a very small number of Office users need access to more than 4 GB of memory, but almost all FCPro users would benefit, and a lot of folks with big iTunes libraries, as well.
Anyways, there are so few people with more than 4GB (other than professional audio and video types), that this won't really be a general issue for at least a couple years.
This is simply not true. I believe that you mean that Office 2008 can open Microsoft's new XML-based formats. Office 2008 can most certainly open these and a limited number of the versions of Microsoft's older binary formats. OTOH, Office 2004 cannot open the XML-based formats, but it can open just about every other Microsoft format. This means that Office 2004 can open many more Microsoft formats than Office 2008.
I don't know what you're talking about. I've been opening lots of larger files created in Office 95 and 2003 on the Windows side and office 2001 for mac side using Office 2008, and have never experienced any problems other than the occasioning missing font, and some minor issues with tables. These were solved by opening in compatibility mode.
Are you talking about pre-95 file formats?