Microsoft Office: Mac 2001 Upgrade

Rating:
Summary: MS Office for Mac 2001 Upgrade Needed with Mac OS 9.1
Review: As a dedicated Mac user, I approach new Microsoft products with healthy skepticism. However, I must have cross-platform reliability since I use Windows NT, too. In the past, I took what I needed from MS Office 98, and I disabled the rest. Then I upgraded my Mac OS from 8.6 to 9.0 to 9.1. While Word 6.01a and PowerPoint 8.0 still worked, Excel 5.0 would not work with Mac OS 9x. Thus, I had to purchase the MS Office for Mac 2001 upgrade in order to get an Excel program that would work with Mac OS 9.1, and that I hope will interface well with Mac OS X. This software upgrade comes in a cute round plastic box, but there is no written manual included. I have found that it takes about a week or two to complete the usual de-bugging processes.

As with most "Value Packs" or "CD Extras," one needs to do a "custom install" because some of these "free" applications might be earlier versions than those which one is already running (if one has kept current with updates). For example, I have been running Internet Explorer 5 for some time. I did not need to re-install it (and re-configure my plug-ins and preferences.) Also, I have Outlook Express 5.02; I did not need to re-install it. I do not like the way that these two applications interface, so I have to keep tweaking them so they that do not grab information from each other, thereby causing a potential exposure of all of the OE e-mail addresses to websites that one might surf, which may result in a lot of spam. (I highly recommend Aladdin Systems software (Mac) "Spring Cleaning 3.5"; its "iClean™" feature assists with this issue by tossing cookies and munchies, and by removing web cache and internet history files from your browsers.)

With MS Office for Mac 2001, PowerPoint documents can now be "saved as" QuickTime Movies, which is a timesaver for creating presentations. This feature is quite an improvement over MS Office 98, even if it does grab a considerable amount of RAM. (Do check to see if you need to add more RAM to your Mac before installation of this software.) I have been keeping Virtual Memory turned on, with which I boost my RAM by 150 percent, with only a slightly detectable slowing of processing speed.

My vote is still out on the new Entourage program. I need to test it more to see if I like it, and if it will work efficiently with e-mail applications with proxies and with those behind firewalls. One bonus for Mac users has been the relative immunity to most e-mail-generated viruses, worms, and trojan horses, so I plan to make the transition to Entourage with all due discretion. The ability to integrate with Palm OS is nothing new for Mac users; however, Entourage may simplify the process.

The instant access to "Encarta Dictionary" through Word may appeal to some users. I do not like "Encarta Dictionary" very much, although it is a vast improvement over the dictionary that was included in Word 6.01a. I prefer to use the the "OED2 on CD-ROM for Apple Macintosh®" [ISBN: 0199617279]. (However, it is necessary to keep it as the resident CD-ROM for it to work with Mac OS.) "Merriam-Webster's College Dictionary & Thesaurus" [ASIN: B00004Y3VM] is on CD-ROM, with Mac and Windows platforms, but I have no information yet on whether it will interface with Mac OS 9.1 and OS X.

Finally, the main drawback to MS Office for Mac 2001 is that there are almost no up-to-date manuals in print now for users who run Mac OS 9.1. So be prepared to do some de-bugging, tweaking, and navigating without too much written help until the various "after-market" print manuals are updated and reissued. (Although I am not an "expert," I hope to review several of the updated Mac OS 9.1 and Mac OS X "bibles," "guides," and reference books, as they come to print, because I know it can be very frustrating and time-consuming for Mac users who have to de-bug new system software and applications when they do not have a tech support staff to do it for them.)

Rating:
Summary: Check your keyboard before upgrading
Review: I've been a loyal Office user for as long as I can remember, and I was psyched for this upgrade from Office 98. While there are some nice new items, I've got a big-time beef with the Excel package. Have you grown used to all those keyboard shortcuts like command-D (fill down), command-I (insert) and several others? They stopped working when I "upgraded." I went to www.microsoft.com/mac and checked the Office 2001 part of the downloads section. There, I found a file titled: Microsoft Excel 2001 Keyboard Shortcuts, which I downloaded. Here's what it says at the beginning of the file:

"Some keyboard shortcuts may not be available if you are using the Apple USB keyboard model number M2452 included with iMac, Power Mac G4, or Macintosh Server G4 computers."

I'm hosed! I suspect this is the blue & white keyboard that shipped with a zillion iMacs, G4's and G3's (like mine). Before you pay for this upgrade, turn your keyboard over and check the model number!!! Microsoft needs to come up with a patch, or it's back to Office 98 for me. Bum the coconut.

Rating:
Summary: Check your keyboard before upgrading
Review: I've been a loyal Office user for as long as I can remember, and I was psyched for this upgrade from Office 98. While there are some nice new items, I've got a big-time beef with the Excel package. Have you grown used to all those keyboard shortcuts like command-D (fill down), command-I (insert) and several others? They stopped working when I "upgraded." I went to www.microsoft.com/mac and checked the Office 2001 part of the downloads section. There, I found a file titled: Microsoft Excel 2001 Keyboard Shortcuts, which I downloaded. Here's what it says at the beginning of the file:

"Some keyboard shortcuts may not be available if you are using the Apple USB keyboard model number M2452 included with iMac, Power Mac G4, or Macintosh Server G4 computers."

I'm hosed! I suspect this is the blue & white keyboard that shipped with a zillion iMacs, G4's and G3's (like mine). Before you pay for this upgrade, turn your keyboard over and check the model number!!! Microsoft needs to come up with a patch, or it's back to Office 98 for me. Bum the coconut.

Rating:
Summary: Too much Windows; not enough Mac.
Review: Like a good boy, I had been regularly purchasing my MicroSoft Excel upgrades for a very long time. How long has it been? It's been so long that my first copy of Excel (1.0, in 1985) was free, because at the time I possessed registered copies of MS Multiplan and MS Chart. That's a long time by anyone's measure.

My most recent Excel upgrade prior to MS Office for the Mac 2001 was Excel 95; I took a bye on Office 98 principally because I've never been particularly fond of MS Word (even in the Mac versions that had worked reasonably well). For most of the fifteen years or so that I've been using Macs almost exclusively, my word processor of choice has been WriteNow: Lean, mean, full of most of the features that I need, still running on OS 9.2.2, and, regrettably, discontinued (abandoned would be a more appropriate term) several years ago.

However, with the ever-increasing hegemony of Windows-based business networks, and with the fact that Excel 95 cannot run on a G4 Mac with OS 9.0 or newer, I bit the bullet and purchased this Office 2001 upgrade. And, while I've now pretty much climbed its learning curve, the experience hasn't exactly been one that I'd rave about.

Here are a few nits I choose to pick (some small, some not so small):

* Somewhere between Excel 95 and Office 2001, Microsoft programmers seem to have lost track of the fact that Macs have both "Return" and "Enter" keys. (Wintel machines have no "Return" key.) The "Return" key no longer functions as it did, scrolling down one cell in an Excel spreadsheet; it now does precisely the same thing the "Enter" key does (which is limited to whatever one chooses from the "Preferences" menu). Dumb!

* In like fashion, the MS programmers decided to reassign several of the common "Command" key functions (Fill Down, Fill Across, Insert, Delete, Clear, etc.) to the "Control" key, again in some ill-founded effort at "cross-platform"compatibility. (Imagine my surprise when I first went to insert a row or column, only to find that my selection was formatted in italics!) In the process, the ergonomic superiority of the Mac keyboard, requiring less "stretch" effort to activate these keyboard shortcuts, has now been sacrificed to the Bill Gates God of Uniformity. And Microsoft continues to place the Font menu on a toolbar, not as a Mac-standard menu. Dumb!

* While tools have been added to the toolbox library, the ability to customize toolbars for one's own use has actually been reduced! And the tools don't always load consistently, suggesting some bugginess that requires a Microsoft patch or two, not yet available. And, unlike previous Excel upgrades in my experience, this one appears to provide no additional chart types. Dumb!

* Word is incompatible with RamDoubler 9.0 (another patch still not available). But, for once, my newest (G4) Mac has more memory than RamDoubler can deal with. Nevertheless: Dumb!

* Word files - as always - are bloated for reasons that have little to do with content or formatting. (As a comparison, a 25-page file, containing a few tables and some minor formatting, which occupies 91K of HD space as a WriteNow 4.0 file and 96K as a WordPerfect 3.5e file, occupies 194K as a Word 2001 file.) If not "Dumb!", then "Why?"

* The ubiquitous Wintel paperclip "Advisor" has been transmogrified to a less-than-winsome "flex-toy Mac." Gimmee a break!

* Entourage is incompatible with Outlook or Outlook Express. Its inclusion is specious at best, and one wonders how many will use this module.

* Once again, as far as a database module is concerned, Mac users are left in the lurch. Access continues to be notable by its absence (not that it is every database user's "dream program"), and FoxPro has long been history as far as Microsoft support is concerned. Moreover, a Mac port of SQL is just a fantasy. And VisualBasic is only present in crippled form, to support the modules that are VB-capable.

There are a few (very few, I'm sad to say) gains:

* PowerPoint works fine. But I have little need for it, save for the odd PP file that gets attached to my e-mail thanks to some chain letter or other.

* The modules run acceptably fast. But I think this has as much or more to do with G4 speed and available RAM as it does to "tight" coding by software engineers.

* Word works acceptably well (but not particularly great) as a platform for HTML coding.

* I've got the cross-platform compatibility that my business-related activities require.

For those G4 users needing Excel but not needing "full" cross-platform compatibility for other applications, my advice is to limit yourselves to just the Excel 2001 upgrade (saving some bucks), hang on to your WriteNow 4.0 program (it'll run just fine on OS 9.x G4's) or download a free copy of WordPerfect 3.5e, take a bye on Entourage (Outlook Express works just fine, and is bundled free with Explorer), and, if you need a database program, there's always FileMaker Pro.

Summary: A "forced" upgrade for G4 Mac users who must use Excel. More steps backward than forward for those of us who prefer Macs but need the cross-platform compatibility. At best, three stars, and then only with the greatest of reluctance.

Bob Zeidler

Rating:
Summary: Too much Windows; not enough Mac.
Review: Like a good boy, I had been regularly purchasing my MS Excel upgrades for a very long time. How long has it been? It's been so long that my first copy of Excel (1.0, in 1985) was free, because at the time I possessed registered copies of MS Multiplan and MS Chart. That's a long time by anyone's measure.

My most recent Excel upgrade prior to MS Office for the Mac 2001 was Excel 95; I took a bye on Office 98 principally because I've never been particularly fond of MS Word (even in the Mac versions that had worked reasonably well). For most of the fifteen years or so that I've been using Macs almost exclusively, my word processor of choice has been WriteNow: Lean, mean, full of most of the features that I need, still running on OS 9.2.2, and, regrettably, discontinued (abandoned would be a more appropriate term) several years ago.

However, with the ever-increasing hegemony of Windows-based business networks, and with the fact that Excel 95 cannot run on a G4 Mac with OS 9.0 or newer, I bit the bullet and purchased this Office 2001 upgrade. And, while I've now pretty much climbed its learning curve, the experience hasn't exactly been one that I'd rave about.

Here are a few nits I choose to pick (some small, some not so small):

* Somewhere between Excel 95 and Office 2001, Microsoft programmers seem to have lost track of the fact that Macs have both "Return" and "Enter" keys. (Wintel machines have no "Return" key.) The "Return" key no longer functions as it did, scrolling down one cell in an Excel spreadsheet; it now does precisely the same thing the "Enter" key does (which is limited to whatever one chooses from the "Preferences" menu). Dumb!

* In like fashion, the MS programmers decided to reassign several of the common "Command" key functions (Fill Down, Fill Across, Insert, Delete, Clear, etc.) to the "Control" key, again in some ill-founded effort at "cross-platform"compatibility. (Imagine my surprise when I first went to insert a row or column, only to find that my selection was formatted in italics!) In the process, the ergonomic superiority of the Mac keyboard, requiring less "stretch" effort to activate these keyboard shortcuts, has now been sacrificed to the Bill Gates God of Uniformity. And Microsoft continues to place the Font menu on a toolbar, not as a Mac-standard menu. Dumb!

* While tools have been added to the toolbox library, the ability to customize toolbars for one's own use has actually been reduced! And the tools don't always load consistently, suggesting some bugginess that requires a Microsoft patch or two, not yet available. And, unlike previous Excel upgrades in my experience, this one appears to provide no additional chart types. Dumb!

* Word is incompatible with RamDoubler 9.0 (another patch still not available). But, for once, my newest (G4) Mac has more memory than RamDoubler can deal with. Nevertheless: Dumb!

* Word files - as always - are bloated for reasons that have little to do with content or formatting. (As a comparison, a 25-page file, containing a few tables and some minor formatting, which occupies 91K of HD space as a WriteNow 4.0 file and 96K as a WordPerfect 3.5e file, occupies 194K as a Word 2001 file.) If not "Dumb!", then "Why?"

* The ubiquitous Wintel paperclip "Advisor" has been transmogrified to a less-than-winsome "flex-toy Mac." Gimmee a break!

* Entourage is incompatible with Outlook or Outlook Express. Its inclusion is specious at best, and one wonders how many will use this module.

* Once again, as far as a database module is concerned, Mac users are left in the lurch. Access continues to be notable by its absence (not that it is every database user's "dream program"), and FoxPro has long been history as far as Microsoft support is concerned. Moreover, a Mac port of SQL is just a fantasy. And VisualBasic is only present in crippled form, to support the modules that are VB-capable.

There are a few (very few, I'm sad to say) gains:

* PowerPoint works fine. But I have little need for it, save for the odd PP file that gets attached to my e-mail thanks to some chain letter or other.

* The modules run acceptably fast. But I think this has as much or more to do with G4 speed and available RAM as it does to "tight" coding by software engineers.

* Word works acceptably well (but not particularly great) as a platform for HTML coding.

* I've got the cross-platform compatibility that my business-related activities require.

For those G4 users needing Excel but not needing "full" cross-platform compatibility for other applications, my advice is to limit yourselves to just the Excel 2001 upgrade (saving some bucks), hang on to your WriteNow 4.0 program (it'll run just fine on OS 9.x G4's) or download a free copy of WordPerfect 3.5e, take a bye on Entourage (Outlook Express works just fine, and is bundled free with Explorer), and, if you need a database program, there's always FileMaker Pro.

Summary: A "forced" upgrade for G4 Mac users who must use Excel. More steps backward than forward for those of us who prefer Macs but need the cross-platform compatibility. At best, three stars, and then only with the greatest of reluctance.