Platinum Edition Using Microsoft Office 2000

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Summary: Easy to follow and well organized
Review: Most manuals and technical books are very tedious and a dry read. This one is not. There has been great effort to make this book user friendly and still convey the changes accurately. I found the descriptions of changes in Access and Excel, in which I work most extensively, very well planned and explained. I also like the VBA snippets.

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Summary: Shows Office 2000 users all the power they could ever want!
Review: Moving up from Office 97 to Office 2000 is a major jump in power applications. I looked at least 14 books on Office 2000, and I got the Platinum Edition from QUE. It has more depth and visuals than any other book I looked at, and with it I can get a lot more out of Office 2000 than I knew the program had. Five Stars!!!

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Summary: The Biggest and Most Complete book I have ever purchased!
Review: Platinum Edition Using Microsoft Office 2000 has an incredible wealth of information to provide for even the seasoned user. Even I was astonished at the level of expertise and in depth coverage. Besides complete coverage of every application in the Office Suite, I found the VB snippets, the extra information on the interoperablity between the different operating systems to be most helpful. Great book, great buy. Especially for people who want the really great tips, tricks and secrets that can't be found anywhere else. For me it has been the best investment I've made all year!

Rating:
Summary: Not for the beginner
Review: This book contains all the information one would expect from an endeavor to comprehensively explain an intricate and complex suite of programs. Better editing would have reduced the size of the tome and made it more readable, hence only four stars. My book came with a CD that would not run on my computer. Laura Stewart, the author, and Macmillan took this problem very seriously. Macmillan worked diligently to promptly provide a fully functional CD. These people know what they are doing.

Rating:
Summary: Comprehensive and Accurate: Will Boost Confidence of any Office 2000 User
Review: This book contains all the information one would expect from an endeavor to comprehensively explain an intricate and complex suite of programs. Better editing would have reduced the size of the tome and made it more readable, hence only four stars. My book came with a CD that would not run on my computer. Laura Stewart, the author, and Macmillan took this problem very seriously. Macmillan worked diligently to promptly provide a fully functional CD. These people know what they are doing.

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Summary: A must-have roadmap for converting to Office 2000
Review: This book is a comprehensive yet also richly detailed body of knowledge about implementing and using Office 2000 that excels on a number of levels. 1) It is a great reference manual: I've gone to it with specific questions and immediately found straight-forward, clear, and concise answers. 2) It's a superb learning tool for mastering new concepts: I'm an experienced computer professional but am just starting to move my clients to browsing the corporate intranet for a number of reports we share. For people like me it's an invaluable guide for adapting to and succeeding in the rapidly changing "webification" of the office environment. 3) It is the most comprehensive yet detailed volume I've found for getting up to speed with the new productivity tools in the Office 2000 suite of products. 4) It's chock full of tips from seasoned professionals and liberally sprinkled with productivity macros you can create on the spot, even if you don't know Visual Basic. I heartily endorse this book.

Dr. Tim Pyron (author, "Special Edition Using Microsoft Project 98")

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Summary: The best book on the market for experienced Office users!
Review: Welcome! I'm Laura Stewart, author of Platinum Edition Using Microsoft Office 2000. If you have mastered the basics of Office and want to take advantage of the inherent power in the advanced features, then this is the book for you! Most computer reference books contain a lot of information that experienced Office users already know. Our goal has been to develop a book that would enlighten even the seasoned Office user - and I believe we have succeeded in doing just that. In fact, I think this is the best book on the market for veteran Microsoft Office users. I know what you're thinking - every author says their book is the best book. So what makes this book so much better? Actually, there are several things.

One of the most important items that makes this book stand head and shoulders above any other Office 2000 book, is the expertise of the people who contributed to it. The dynamic team of experienced writers and technical editors (many of whom are certified by Microsoft as MCSEs, MCPSs, MCTs, and MCPs) brought together their collective experience to develop a book that is a cut above any other Office 2000 book. I have more than 7 years experience as a software instructor, teaching Office applications to business professionals. I am a certified Microsoft Office Expert Specialist in Excel and PowerPoint, and an award winning Microsoft Office 2000 Beta tester. When you teach application classes you are introduced to a wide range of users, each of whom use the software for different purposes. Over the years, I have gained a broad understanding of the various ways people use Microsoft Office and have incorporated that knowledge into the examples in this book. Additionally, each year Microsoft recognizes a handful of people who have been responsive to and accurate in answering users questions on the public newsgroups that Microsoft sponsors. These people are designated as Microsoft Most Valuable Professionals (MVPs). Five Microsoft MVPs assisted in the writing and editing of this book: · Ben Schorr · Daryl Lucas · Herb Tyson · Kyle Bryant · Vincent Averello III

Another aspect in which this book surpasses the other Office 2000 books, is in the depth and breadth of the items it covers (in fact there are several topics that no other Office book dares to cover - such as OLAP cubes in Excel). To show how easy VBA can be used in the Office applications, many of the chapters have short, timesaving snippets of VBA code that you can put to use immediately, to make working with the Office 2000 applications more effective. These are ready-to-go snippets, no prior VBA experience required. You'll find plenty of notes, tips, and cautions in each chapter that expand beyond the traditional numbered steps for performing tasks. There are in-depth explanations and useful information about what's going on behind the scenes. And because many people upgrade from earlier versions, you will find references or comparisons to features in Office 95 and Office 97. There are several chapters and appendices in the Platinum Edition book that are written specifically for people responsible for installing and supporting Office 2000 in a business environment.

All the applications in Office 2000 are discussed in this book regardless of the version of Office 2000 you are using, with two exceptions: Small Business Tools and features unique to the Developer's version. The CD accompanying this book is packed full of example files, copies of the VBA snippets of code, and more than 400 pages of additional information we included about Office 2000. The CD also contains WOPR (a full retail version that previously sold for the price of the book alone).

I encourage you to review the outline and some of the sample draft chapters from this book, by going to the following site - www.mcp.com/resources/integratedapps/office/beta_frame.html

FYI - the book is actually 2000 pages hardcover. It is the largest single volume computer reference books ever published by QUE. (And the Surgeon General advises that you bend at the knees while lifting it <g>).

Rating:
Summary: Not for the beginner
Review: Well, I bought this book on line hoping I could learn how to use office 2000. Needless to say, unless you already know this product at an intermediate level, this book is absolutely useless to you. It goes over thing that perhaps an expert/sysadmin for the product might need...
The sad thing is that I actually do know VBA and the author writes two chapters on it that are the most rushed, senseless approach possible.
Unless you want to know every god-damned command line switch and useless piece of info on office 2000 don't bother.