Domain Name Com's Software Microsoft Word 2007 Version Upgrade

Software Microsoft Word 2007 Version Upgrade

Domain Name Com's - Software : Microsoft Word 2007 Version Upgrade

- Insufferably Labyrinthine Productivity Killer
As an instructor for a one credit hour class in Job Search Strategies, one of the primary goals of the course is for each student to develop resumes, cover letters, business cards, and references sheets.

I have a range of students with varying degrees of Microsoft Office proficiency, and this year's progress is significantly slower than previous classes. The new Word Command interface initially impresses the user with it's slick styling and sleek look, until you actually need to find a specific command, and then the user-hostile, maze-like nature of the interface becomes all to apparent.

Despite our school's policy of choosing which software packages we teach based on those that are most prevolent in industry, Word has proven to be such an exercise in frustration for students ranging from novices through experts, that all classes after this one will be using Openoffice.org Writer, which is not only more user friendly but completely free, and available for Windows, MacOSX, and Linux.

I have never had a problem with Microsoft Office software until this the 2007 latest incarnation. Word 2007 is an utter and complete waste of money and time.

Rating:

- Why? Why? Why?
It wasn't broken, so why did they "fix" it? It is a productivity killer. What was once 1 or 2 clicks away is now 3, 5 or 7 clicks away. The ribbon is a frustrating and unnecessary organizational concept. There are a few upgrades I like (e.g., SmartArt in PowerPoint), but the few true upgrades are not worth the complete reorganization of the toolbars / menu bars that business users have relied on for years.

Rating:

- This upgrade will ruin your productivity! Don't!!
If Vista wasn't bad enough, this is even worse.

The huge problem with this upgrade is the dire interface. The ribbon takes up far too much space and can't be customised. Forget all your keyboard shortcuts, they won't work in Word 2007 e.g. when using tables, ALT>I>R to insert a row becomes ALT>J>L>A. It's all like this. The menu structure is gone and there's no option to bring it back!

Instead of menus you get lots of tabs and a ribbon. You can't move the ribbon and it take up 30mm of your screen space. None of the commands is where you expect it to be and doing simple things like bullets and numbering has become tedious. You can only have a single row of custom buttons and this is practically limited to about 25 buttons which can be visible - if you want font or style on the quick access bar then this falls to about a dozen.

Microsoft have enforced a strict inteface that can only be changed by a programmer who can write XML apps for Word!!!

In summary, if you are an experienced user, you will hate and detest this software and wish you had not bothered. This upgrade is the best advert for Open Office that I can imagine. And Open Office is a free download from the Sun Website!

Microsoft shoots itself in the foot - again.

Rating:

- A usability nightmare
I'm a technical writer, so Word is a big part of my life. As Word 2003 is the defacto standard in most business environments, the tech writing community has come to accept its limitations and find ways to use Word as a professional documentation tool.

Honestly, MS did an outstanding job in the past to accommodate both professionals and home users with their Word products. I really took my hat off to MS in this regard. There were a few things that vexxed me, but I always knew that as a technical writer I was in a clear minority of MS Word users.

With Word 2007, all I can say is this... I want to find the Product Manager and strangle him or her. This person is responsible for making my working life a living nightmare. I'm so thankful that our IT Dept is reluctant to roll it out across our company and I can still use 2003 for a little longer.

I know I'm probably not the end-user Microsoft had in mind when designing this ill-concieved experiment in 'usability', but I would like to warn anybody familiar with previous MS Word versions against 'upgrading'.

First of all - where the hell are my styles?! I open an existing 2003 document where I've defined styles for Heading 1, Heading 2, body text, tables etc. In Word 2007, they've disappeared! I can't see any styles beyond what Microsoft 'thinks' I should be using. None of them meet my needs, and any attempts to understand or customise them make me prefer a session with a rectal surgeon.

It took me over an hour to update a tiny entry in my _CV_ in Word 2007! And I'm not a newbie - this is after 3 months of trying to use this damn product, let alone understand it. I've never uttered so many swear words at a computer.

Other people have highlighted the other deficiencies, such as clicking every single ribbon to 'discover' where previously familiar (and logically placed) items are now located. (After 3 months, I still don't know.) So I'm not going to reiterate these issues.

I could go on and on, but at the end of the day, things that I found fast and efficient are now cumbersome and slow. Being forced to use a mouse to click through more screens than I need rather than using familiar keyboard shortcuts frustrates me no end.

But honestly - unlike many people in the IT industry, I usually have a lot of respect for Microsoft products. They might not be the most aesthetically pleasing, but at least they're usually well designed and more than often do the job.

What I see in Microsoft 2007 is an attempt to make MS Word 2007 a 'user friendly consumer product' without understanding what made Word 2003 such an easy product to use. It's like the movie 'the Matrix' - the first one was great, but clearly the producers had no idea why because the sequels were such utter shash.

In summary, if you're a first time user, it will probably make things easier at first - at least until you understand word processing. After that, you'll find things unnecessarily cumbersome and frustrating. For people who have ever used an existing Microsoft Word version, I'd avoid this upgrade like the plague and stick with 2003.

Rating:

- What a mess
If you liked the old DOS era when all applications had different commands and the clerical staff had a stroke when you made them learn a new word processing application, you will absolutely love Word 2007. However, if you liked the modern era of Windows applications whereby they shared familiar drop down menus, you will detest Word 2007. What amazes me are the glowing reviews this mess has received by the "experts." I guess computer geeks are like mathematicians: as long as something is "elegant," that's good enough. Why should one worry about the dumb masses who will use the "elegant" product?

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