MS Office 2010 Thread - Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community

FanIn80 · 06-09-2010, 08:28 PM

Weird that no one's made this one yet...

Anyone else using it? I know it's just Office, and it's not a video game or something cool... but a lot of us use various Office applications every day. I know I still get excited when a new version comes out...

Anyway, I've been using it for a bit now. I think it's great. I haven't been this impressed with a new Office version in a long time.

Some of the things I like so far:

- Customizable ribbons! Finally! I especially like the fact I can create my own ribbon from scratch, with all the things I use in one place. I still don't know why they didn't do this in 2007.

- Cancel button on the Outlook loading screen. How awesome is that? My school blocks IMAP, so whenever I accidentally launch Outlook it hangs for 5 minutes before timing out and then popping up an error message... now I just hit the cancel button on the loading screen, and it stops loading altogether.

- That whole sidebar File Menu thing. I don't know exactly what they call it, but I'm a fan. I like how it's laid out and organized. It's a lot easier to find things now.

- Better integration. One of the things that always bugged me about Office 2007 was how only some of the apps seemed to be part of the overall suite. Outlook didn't have a ribbon, neither did Visio or Project... etc etc. Now everything looks the same, and they all look like they are part of the same version and same suite. It might not sound like much, but it's a pretty big deal when you're doing something in Viso and you switch over to Word and have an entirely different interface to deal with. Now, everything's the same.

- IMAP works a little better finally. Some nice things like auto-delete, instead of having to re-sync folders etc. It's also a lot snappier. Folders seem to respond faster, although this could very well just be a "new version" illusion.

- Visio! Finally, I can just move objects around without having to click once to select, and then a second time to drag!

Some things I don't like:

- Conversation view in Outlook. They're promoting this as a major feature, but I turned it off right away. I get that it's something some people want, but it's the main reason I refuse to use Gmail for anything serious. I find that whole conversation/thread view very disorienting. I need my messages one at a time. I can put a conversation together just fine on my own.

- Templates are getting better, but still have a ways to go to catch up with the ones from iWork.

- This one's a bit petty, but the formula icons in Excel bugged me a lot in 2007, and they're using them again in 2010. All the ribbons have these nicely done, professional looking icons... but when you click on the formula ribbon in Excel, you get these weird cartoon-looking books as icons. I don't get why they can't make new ones. They look like they're left over from Office 97.

Anyway... I can't imagine this thread being overly exciting for a lot of people, but I'm hoping to see some new things you guys discover as you start to upgrade.

Rathji · 06-09-2010, 08:32 PM

I am anxiously awaiting a cheap download of this available for students.

Until then I will just suck it up with my 2007.

Any idea what kind of resources it uses? That is, on what kind of machine running Windows 7 it would take to be happy running it?

FanIn80 · 06-09-2010, 08:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rathji

I am anxiously awaiting a cheap download of this available for students.

Until then I will just suck it up with my 2007.

Any idea what kind of resources it uses? That is, on what kind of machine running Windows 7 it would take to be happy running it?

I'm not sure about resources. My machine isn't a very good test bed, as it's a bit of a beast.

If you're a student and you're looking for a cheap download... you should buy the Student deal Office 2007. It comes with a free upgrade to 2010.

http://www.microsoft.com/student/dis...a/default.aspx

Rathji · 06-09-2010, 08:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FanIn80

I'm not sure about resources. My machine isn't a very good test bed, as it's a bit of a beast.

If you're a student and you're looking for a cheap download... you should buy the Student deal Office 2007. It comes with a free upgrade to 2010.

http://www.microsoft.com/student/dis...a/default.aspx

That is where I got my 2007. Wonder if they would let me do it twice!

FanIn80 · 06-09-2010, 08:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rathji

That is where I got my 2007. Wonder if they would let me do it twice!

Was it before March?

Just use another school email address, and a second credit card!

dobbles · 06-09-2010, 08:43 PM

I use office a lot at work, but our IT department is super awful and we won't get office 10 for probably about 8 more years! however, a lot of the things FI8 mentions sound like good changes.

As for home use, I am cheap and will wait till I feel adventurous and go find a download on usenet.

Rathji · 06-09-2010, 08:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FanIn80

Was it before March?

Just use another school email address, and a second credit card!

It was probably before March ... 2007

FanIn80 · 06-09-2010, 08:55 PM

Ha. I guess it's safe to say it was before the free upgrade to 2010 offer then.

kyuusei · 06-09-2010, 10:06 PM

Damn, I bought 2007 in January.

kermitology · 06-10-2010, 09:18 AM

My company is still using office 2003. I had to beg and plead to get Outlook 2007 on my machine.

Regorium · 06-10-2010, 12:54 PM

I like Office 2010, but I don't think 2007-2010 is as big of a leap as 2003-2007 was.

I am also incredibly surprised that customizable ribbons didn't make it into 2007, and I would have to say that I think it is the best feature of 2010 that I've seen so far.

Barnes · 06-10-2010, 04:58 PM

I hope that customizable Ribbons stay only within Office. It will cause me great grief to have users mess with Ribbon layouts I have designed. A lot of thought went into the laying out Ribbons and will I will have to do a lot of work on re-creating icons that I only planned to have as 16x16 if someone decides to make it a 32x32 icon for some reason.

So much for a unified fluent UX.

I would have rather they worked on the Ribbon and allowed much more flexibility for choosing how groups collapse, how button groups can be laid out and how items within rows can be grouped with larger or smaller controls above and below.

The File tab is way better than the Application button though.

FanIn80 · 06-15-2010, 01:31 PM

/bump

Happy Office Day!

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us

3 Justin 3 · 06-15-2010, 04:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FanIn80

I'm not sure about resources. My machine isn't a very good test bed, as it's a bit of a beast.

If you're a student and you're looking for a cheap download... you should buy the Student deal Office 2007. It comes with a free upgrade to 2010.

http://www.microsoft.com/student/dis...a/default.aspx

Nice, I can get it for $89. Isn't it worth like $500 at bestbuy?

FanIn80 · 06-15-2010, 04:22 PM

Something like that. It's a pretty good deal, for sure.