Mossberg reviews, recommends Office for Mac 2011

2

Comments

  • Reply 21 of 52
    grkinggrking Posts: 533member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by lales View Post


    There are many of us who DON'T need to worry about Exchange or Outlook. Is there an opinion (and I'm sure there are), on how iWorks stacks up against Office for those who aren't worried about business integration or backwards Office compatibility? I'm not interested in iWorks vs MS Works.



    As background: I first was an Win Office user, then Office w/Entourage on a Mac in 2005, and for the last few years, iWorks with Apple Mail & iCal. Am I wrong to feel that I'm not missing anything by uninstalling the last Mac version of Office?



    Thanks!



    If your needs do not exceed that of a High School level or maybe a college freshman, Office is overkill and iWork is just fine.
  • Reply 22 of 52
    I won't be upgrading until we move to exchange 2010 in a couple of months. We get it for free as part of our software license agreement with The Vole. I do very very basic things in word and extremely rarely deal with excel or PowerPoint.
  • Reply 23 of 52
    mr. memr. me Posts: 3,221member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by lales View Post


    There are many of us who DON'T need to worry about Exchange or Outlook. Is there an opinion (and I'm sure there are), on how iWorks stacks up against Office for those who aren't worried about business integration or backwards Office compatibility? I'm not interested in iWorks vs MS Works.



    As background: I first was an Win Office user, then Office w/Entourage on a Mac in 2005, and for the last few years, iWorks with Apple Mail & iCal. Am I wrong to feel that I'm not missing anything by uninstalling the last Mac version of Office?



    Thanks!



    You asked a much better question than you may have realized. There is the implication that you either need Office or you don't need power. Unfortunately, today's market equates power and Office. You may hate Microsoft with a passion, but you really have very little choice expect to use its products. Even OpenOffice.org is now little more than a half-step behind clone of Microsoft Office. So, even if you choose not to use Microsoft's products, then you are still doing things the Microsoft way.



    It is really a shame.
  • Reply 24 of 52
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Mr. Me View Post


    You asked a much better question than you may have realized. There is the implication that you either need Office or you don't need power. Unfortunately, today's market equates power and Office. You may hate Microsoft with a passion, but you really have very little choice expect to use its products. Even OpenOffice.org is now little more than a half-step behind clone of Microsoft Office. So, even if you choose not to use Microsoft's products, then you are still doing things the Microsoft way.



    It is really a shame.



    You need Office if you need to interact with the business world. Numbers can only read about 20% of the Excel files I get from coworkers, and they're not that complex. In fact one of our company's standard document templates won't open properly in Pages; the graphics end up on the wrong page with lots of inexplicable whitespace in them. Keynote seems like the best substitute, but since I need to open PowerPoint documents, edit them and send them back to coworkers in a PowerPoint format, I might as well just use PowerPoint.
  • Reply 25 of 52
    Outlook does not sync calendars with MobileMe - ONLY EXCHANGE. So that leaves us with just replacing Mac Mail and at this point, what's the use?... I will just stick with Powerpoint, Word and Excel and leave Outlook out of view since it's really only mostly there.. not complete and therefore not worth using.
  • Reply 26 of 52
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by bdkennedy1 View Post


    You know what hasn't changed? The apps taking 2 minutes to open if you have a lot of fonts on your machine.



    Every time you launch an Office app, it has to go through all of your fonts to make sure none of them are corrupt. Isn't that nice of them? I mean, no other Mac software has to do that but Microsoft felt that they had to.





    I've only seen that if you CHANGE your fonts. That said if you have lots of fonts, this is why you use a font manager. Suitcase Fusion, FontExplorer.



    Adobe doesn't check your fonts each time, but it also has much more robust font handing capability and assumes that you're in good control of your fonts as its a professional suite and assumes you're professional about your fonts too.
  • Reply 27 of 52
    docno42docno42 Posts: 3,755member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by msuberly View Post


    Wish I could disable the ribbon on my work computer. After 3 years I still cannot find some of the more obscure commands.



    http://office.microsoft.com/en-au/wo...010074432.aspx



    There is a similar one for Excel.



    One of the first things I did was move the quick reference bar below the ribbon and add several commands I use frequently (like set print area and page preview in Excel). That helped quite a bit, combined with the above file for word and the corresponding one for Excel. Now that I'm finally used to it, I prefer the ribbon to the menus. That doesn't mean I don't occasionally get frustrated when looking for something, but after a couple of weeks it wasn't that bad.
  • Reply 28 of 52
    Outlook 2011 looks great but the calander function can not sinc whit ical or google calander

    big bummer
  • Reply 29 of 52
    grkinggrking Posts: 533member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Appletosh View Post


    Outlook 2011 looks great but the calander function can not sinc whit ical or google calander

    big bummer



    I hoping that is only in the Beta, and that it will be fixed in the final version. I also hope iTunes gets an update to let me sync to Outlook, like they do in Windows.
  • Reply 30 of 52
    dave k.dave k. Posts: 1,306member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by bdkennedy1 View Post


    You know what hasn't changed? The apps taking 2 minutes to open if you have a lot of fonts on your machine.



    Every time you launch an Office app, it has to go through all of your fonts to make sure none of them are corrupt. Isn't that nice of them? I mean, no other Mac software has to do that but Microsoft felt that they had to.



    Thanks for the info... I will probably pass now.





    Quote:
    Originally Posted by maccherry View Post


    I don't believe a word you just wrote. And I'm sure I'm not the only one.



    iWork is meant as an AppleWorks replacement. iWork is for consumers not businesses. Go ahead and compare Apple's best offering to MS Office 2010 Professional... See what applications/features would be better for a business. You want to write letters, resume, home budgets, and vacation presentations, than iWork is your suite.
  • Reply 31 of 52
    hill60hill60 Posts: 6,992member
    Claris Works?



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by bloggerblog View Post


    Microsoft's bread and butter is Windows and Office, they will NEVER make a Mac version of Office on the same level as the Windows version, and Apple will never make a suite that competes with Office because Microsoft will kill Office for the Mac. The iWork suite is in competition with Microsoft Works and not Office, hence it's previous name Apple Works.



  • Reply 32 of 52
    mr. memr. me Posts: 3,221member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by skittlebrau79 View Post


    You need Office if you need to interact with the business world. Numbers can only read about 20% of the Excel files I get from coworkers, and they're not that complex. In fact one of our company's standard document templates won't open properly in Pages; the graphics end up on the wrong page with lots of inexplicable whitespace in them. Keynote seems like the best substitute, but since I need to open PowerPoint documents, edit them and send them back to coworkers in a PowerPoint format, I might as well just use PowerPoint.



    I thought I was clear, but I guess you missed my point. There was a time when users decided what was the best word processor or spreadsheet for them. Now, that question is not asked. Buyers want to choose between Microsoft and the best substitute for Microsoft. On this forum, the questions about Apple's Pages are about how good it is as a Word substitute/reader and Apple's Numbers; as a substitute/reader for Excel spreadsheets. The thing is that Apple's iWork applications are neither designed nor intended to be substitutes for Microsoft products.



    Everyone clearly understands the need for Word and the other Microsoft applications. However, not everyone has that need. Those who don't have the need should do all they can to support Microsoft's competition.
  • Reply 33 of 52
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by msuberly View Post


    Wish I could disable the ribbon on my work computer. After 3 years I still cannot find some of the more obscure commands.



    So far, there is no word about update pricing from Office 2008



    Good News for you re Ribbon - in Office for Mac 2011, you csan show or hide the ribbon (visual menu) as you wish.



    Pricing is reduced all round, so they are using the same approach as Apple, in that there are no 'uprgrade specific' versions.



    Having used the beta for some time... the suit's great to use, and there are plenty of excellent (impartial) reviews out there from 'Apple' centric journalists..



    see Macworld (4.5 mice and Walt Mossberg reviews as per the title article here).

    http://www.macworld.com/reviews/prod...ml?expand=true
  • Reply 34 of 52
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by DESuserIGN View Post


    No pivot tables! Really?

    I guess I'll continue to use use NeoOffice and donate money to them rather than get ripped off by Microsoft.

    They've had a pretty mac-like interface for quite a while now and they didn't have to be begged and cajoled!



    Excel on the Mac DOES have pivot tables... and I don't think you can say the pricing is a rip off (well you can say it - but it's not a very reasonable view...



    Office H&S is about $100 to $120 or so, for software you'll use for circa 3 years - mabe more. so, $33 to 35 bucks per year, for Word, Excel, PPT, three mainline apps (can I say that or has Apple trademarked it ;-)



    so that's maybe $10 an App - about the same as you'll pay Apple for one on the iPad.. but Office is far richer in terms of capability.



    Seems OK (actually very good) value to me
  • Reply 35 of 52
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by salamandyr View Post


    i agree. lack of pivot tables is absurd. maybe MS doesn't want Excel used to do exploratory or serious statistical data work? what i don't get is why they wouldn't want Excel to compete on the Mac platform in this way. i'll switch to SPSS for all my pivot table needs, i guess.



    the initial poster was WRONG... Pivot tables ARE supported (and were on the outgoing 2008 version too come to that!



    2011 add's in a whole lot of great new analysis capability to excel (sparklines / new conditional formatting etc.) - plus a big speed increase too.. try it, you won't regret it.
  • Reply 36 of 52
    gustavgustav Posts: 827member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by bloggerblog View Post


    Microsoft's bread and butter is Windows and Office, they will NEVER make a Mac version of Office on the same level as the Windows version, and Apple will never make a suite that competes with Office because Microsoft will kill Office for the Mac. The iWork suite is in competition with Microsoft Works and not Office, hence it's previous name Apple Works.



    iWork is not an update to AppleWorks. iWork is aimed at the home business person, not a corporate cubicle dweller who exchanges Office files with their coworkers all day.
  • Reply 37 of 52
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by msuberly View Post


    Wish I could disable the ribbon on my work computer. After 3 years I still cannot find some of the more obscure commands.



    So far, there is no word about update pricing from Office 2008



    I've just joined a company using Office 2007 so have just started using the ribbon, and have to admit I really like it. It's taken me a little while to get used to it, but I find it better than the menu system, which has surprised me, given a lot of the negative press I saw about it.



    That said, I'm not really a power user.
  • Reply 38 of 52
    gustavgustav Posts: 827member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by skittlebrau79 View Post


    You need Office if you need to interact with the business world. Numbers can only read about 20% of the Excel files I get from coworkers, and they're not that complex. In fact one of our company's standard document templates won't open properly in Pages; the graphics end up on the wrong page with lots of inexplicable whitespace in them. Keynote seems like the best substitute, but since I need to open PowerPoint documents, edit them and send them back to coworkers in a PowerPoint format, I might as well just use PowerPoint.



    I have to wonder just how much sharing of Office files goes on. Is my plumber sharing Office files with my electrician? Does a small business share files with other businesses that often? What do they share with other businesses that needs to be edited and sent back?



    Outside of a corporate environment, I have to wonder how necessary it is to have 100% compatibility.
  • Reply 39 of 52
    gustavgustav Posts: 827member
    In Mossberg's review there's a screen shot of a "full screen view" of Word. My first thought was "that's what it would look like if it was on an iPad."



    Hmmm...
  • Reply 40 of 52
    Well, if Walt says it's good....
Sign In or Register to comment.