Office 2008 for Mac hits beta: lush ‘Escher’ graphics engine revealed

Office 2008 for Mac has gingerly stepped out of the alpha phase of its development as Microsoft works towards a late 2007 release of its overhauled Macintosh suite.

"We're in private betas right now" confirmed Sheridan Jones, Lead Marketing Manager for Microsoft's Mac Business Unit (MacBU), during an exclusive interview with APC magazine.

...

Some of the most impressive touches are Mac-only treats like Word's Publishing Layout View with its DTP-style page layout capabilities. Images can be dragged out of iPhoto and placed directly onto the page with automatic text run-around, while excess copy on any page is automatically spilled into a linked text box that can be drawn elsewhere on that page or on the next page.

*apcmag.com/system/files/images/officeart.img_assist_custom.jpg

The floating Inspector pane combines Word's formatting pallete and toolbox into a single pane which appears and vanishes with a Dock-like ‘Genie effect'.

...

New to the Office 2008 for Mac mix is MyDay, a small stand-alone app which works like a portal into Entourage's appointments and tasks. Users can create and manage those items in the MyDay window, which sits on the desktop but can be hidden and revealed using the Ctrl+spacebar key combo.

*apcmag.com/system/files/images/myday.img_assist_custom.jpg

Read more...

Re: Office 2008 for Mac hits beta: lush ‘Escher’ graphics engine revealed | APC Magaz

It is missing out many things. Such as pure ribbon cos Mac still uses the "File edit menu" in the topmost finder bar. Pure ribbon cannot be given. The interface is streamlined but not as productive as Windows version so far, the future builds hold some potential.

Escher = Office using WPF on Vista for drawing things on screen.

Myday is good addition, but there are gadgets for Sidebar in Vista or for Yahoo widgets doing the same thing. It really is more like a widget to me

Re: Office 2008 for Mac hits beta: lush ‘Escher’ graphics engine revealed | APC Magaz

gx_saurav said:
It is missing out many things. Such as pure ribbon cos Mac still uses the "File edit menu" in the topmost finder bar. Pure ribbon cannot be given. The interface is streamlined but not as productive as Windows version so far

It has a ribbon UI that is almost identical to the Windows version. The menubar, of course, is at the top, detached from the application window so it has no bearing on the application itself. You can avoid using it if you wish to.

The interface is not as productive as the Windows version? You can tell that from a few tiny screenshots! Well, then - do tell us how it is any less productive than the Windows version.

Whatever it may be, that MyDay thing seems to be really fugly. What's remaining is its functionality.

@GX: Don't have to bash everything that comes on the mac. This being a Microsoft product n all...

Re: Office 2008 for Mac hits beta: lush ‘Escher’ graphics engine revealed | APC Magaz

Oh comon milind. Wether a product is from MS or not doesn't means I can't give my remarks for it if I don't like it. It is from MS, so what....compared to Windows version I don't find it that easy & productive.

Ribbon UI in Windows version of office removed menus cos Menus in Windows are per-app based unlike MacOS where they are shown on top in finderbar.

In Windows version, the menubar is compleately gone, means less digging for stuff, in Mac version menubar is still there. It is not the same ribbonUI as Office 2k7 for Windows

P.S. - U R right

, Myday has Vista-ish looks. Even I would have prefered if it had Mac like whitish look when working on a Mac.

I'm not referring to anything particular. I'm saying in general, you have this sort of aversion to anything apple. There's got to be something that's good in your 'honest' opinion.... cause we are left to believe 'the opposite of what you say is true'.

[And don't say iMac G4]

gx_saurav said:
In Windows version, the menubar is compleately gone, means less digging for stuff, in Mac version menubar is still there. It is not the same ribbonUI as Office 2k7 for Windows

You do not need to use it. It is there if you want to use it and not there if you don't. The menu bar will always be there on the screen, so it is not as if the menus are occupying additional screen real estate.

I am willing to bet that had it been the opposite, i.e. the Windows version had both the menu bar and the ribbon UI and the Mac version had only one of the two, you would have posted here that the Windows version is better because it gives the user more choices. Basically, it is 'anthing Apple = bad'.

I like this Office for Mac 2008. Actually, many MS mac products are very nice - they're different from the Windows version, and act like an OS X app - and that's what I like.

The mac team at MS have really worked hard at this and have quite achieved what they wanted to.

Which Microsoft product for the Mac, apart from Office, do you like?

Re: Office 2008 for Mac hits beta: lush ‘Escher’ graphics engine revealed | APC Magazine

Here are some screenshots of Office 2008 for Mac from Appleinsider

So it has menubar, toolbar & sorta, kinda ribbon. Wonder from where it is better then Office for Windows. MS tried the ribbon UI with Mac, but it was rejected as it did not suite the Mac look. It hardly made use of menubar

UI & Escher review

I used to use Virtual PC, but now I use Parallels Desktop.

gx_saurav said:
Here are some screenshots of Office 2008 for Mac from Appleinsider

So it has menubar, toolbar & sorta, kinda ribbon. Wonder from where it is better then Office for Windows. MS tried the ribbon UI with Mac, but it was rejected as it did not suite the Mac look. It hardly made use of menubar

UI & Escher review

The menubar is out of the way, the toolbar can be hidden. So if you want to, you can work with just the ribbon.

Though I am sure I'll use all three.