Sometimes Microsoft and Apple seem like a dysfunctional old
married couple; they often fight, and they've got the kids taking
sides. But you know that down deep each of them really needs the
other.
Microsoft needs a strong Apple to show the world that Microsoft
doesn't have a complete monopoly on desktop computing. And Apple
often seems to function as the research-and-development team for
Microsoft and the rest of the PC industry. Besides, it's long been
suggested that Microsoft makes more profit, on average, from each
Mac owner than it does from each PC owner.
Apple needs Microsoft to continue to develop and market products
for the Mac. The availability of Mac versions of Microsoft Office,
in particular, lets Mac users exchange files with their PC
counterparts and lets the Mac continue to appear to be a credible
alternative in offices and schools. So with Apple touting its
OS X operating system as its future, the release this fall of
an OS X version of Microsoft Office was welcomed as a vote of
confidence in Apple's new direction.
Office v. X (US$460) required a year's effort by Microsoft's
Macintosh Business Unit to "carbonize" Mac Office 2001. rewrite it
to support the new operating system. Along the way they brushed up
Office's interface, bringing it in line with OS X's Aqua look
and feel, complete with new and colourful buttons, icons, and
dialogue boxes. The result is the most attractive and most
fun-to-use version of Office for any platform. The programs are
able to take advantage of Aqua support for transparency - not only
for the eye candy of see-through menus and dialogue boxes, but to
add to charts and graphics in Excel, PowerPoint and Word.
Despite the attractive new look, however, Office v. X does not
come with an overwhelming number of new features compared with its
predecessor, Office 2001. There are some nice improvements,
though.
The new version of Word makes it easy, for example, to format or
spell-check unconnected blocks of text by selecting them using the
Command key. Word's new Contact tool bar makes it easy to exchange
addresses with Entourage (Mac Office's email and calendar
application) even when Entourage isn't open. A "clear formatting"
option nicely resets a selection to the paragraph default.
A longtime Word feature, the ability to edit keyboard commands,
has finally been added to Excel, as has the ability to import
FileMaker database data. Unfortunately, Excel still can't import
data from Microsoft's own Windows Office database, Access, and
there still isn't a Mac version of Access.
PowerPoint can now save its files into a neat little package and
does a better job exporting presentations to QuickTime, but it is
otherwise little changed from the previous version.
Entourage, which premiered in Office 2001, gets a beefed-up
calendar and an all-new interface, making it easier to manoeuvre
between email, calendar, and address list views. Microsoft is
waiting for Palm's release of OS X-native software before making it
possible to sync Entourage data with Palm PDAs.
Microsoft has done a great job of making Office v. X look
and work with Apple's stylish OS X. The previous version,
Office 2001, also gets the job done in the new operating system,
although it only runs in that OS's old-style Classic-mode.
Users getting a new Mac and wanting to work in OS X will
find the newest Office a must-have. But despite the new version's
classy appearance, there's little to make owners of Office 2001
feel like they need to rush out and upgrade.
This article was first published in Alan Zisman's
"High Tech Office" column in
Business in Vancouver.
