[josquin021]

Going back to an earlier part of this thread, does anybody know of a word processor/reference manager combination that is better than today's Word and EndNote?
I would love to stop using Word, but haven't found an alternative to Word/Endnote that will allow me to insert references and have them automatically format in the document I'm working in. Nisus or Mellel (great word processors) combined with Bookends or Sente (great reference managers) both require me to manually "Scan" the word processing document for references and then output a second document with the formatted bibliography. I'm looking to skip the Scan to second document step.

Does anybody have an idea? Macworld, want to write an article?

[whitedog]

A few things to note: I was able to pick up the education version of Office '08 for less than $150 at Macworld, which is the same price as the student/teacher version of Office '04. No proof of eligibility required. The education version lacks a few high-end "media" features I don't need so the price was, in my opinion, quite reasonable. If you buy a full price version of Office, you either need the additional features or you're not paying attention.

You can collapse the Elements Gallery with a single click, making it a narrow strip at the top of the page. Again, a nifty new feature and not much of a problem.

Fonts are, finally, displayed by family in fly-out menu fashion which is, as noted, a big improvement.

You can, indeed, at least in my limited testing so far, use both Office '04 and '08 on the same computer. In fact, I was able to run them simultaneously. How this is managed I don't know, since all the Microsoft files in Applications Support and Preferences now seem to be linked to the new version. Despite this, Word '04 opened with my standard settings, which did not apply in '08. Perhaps it's possible because each version of Office keeps so many of its support files in the Office folder in its own Microsoft Office Applications folder.

Yes, you can set a preference to save files in .doc format (or just about any other format, including PDF) by default. You can access the preference through the Options button at the bottom of the save dialog or in the Save preferences in Word preferences.

The rumor about no live word count is mistaken. It's there at the bottom of the page where it always was. Whether or not the word count limit is as it was in '04, though, I couldn't say. Haven't written anything that long in Word yet.

Among other things included in the Palettes are enhanced reference resources, including the usual dictionary and thesaurus, and access to online resources like the Encarta Encyclopedia, a bilingual dictionary, translations via WordLingo and even web search, all accessible from the contextual menu as well as in the Palettes.

Not mentioned in the review is that Office '08 installs scores of fonts, many apparently new versions of old standbys and some new ones as well. It's been a long time since Microsoft added any fonts to their Office collection so this is interesting, at least. However, this has caused problems for some people because the installer disables many existing fonts above the system level, moving them to Fonts Disabled folders and an Old Fonts folder in the Microsoft folder in Applications support. The reason for this is sound, at least in principle. It is done to avoid font duplication. Earlier versions of Office made no such effort and I've spent many hours removing duplicate fonts from my system over the years. These days Linotype's Font Explorer is the best tool, in my experience, for removing or disabling duplicate fonts because it makes finding a font's location easy. And it's a good idea to know where a font is before you remove or disable it.

It should also be noted that the Office installer makes some serious errors in assigning permissions and every single file it installs is set as an executable. Microsoft has acknowledged these problems and promised a fix but no timeline is available. These issues don't, for the most part, affect the applications' operation but do represent a potential security threat.

I haven't used it extensively yet, and Word is the only app I've tested at all, but this is a svelte new version and it finally looks and acts like a Mac application. For instance, it was unusually easy for me to find out how to set the default document save preference. Finding preference settings was nothing short of a nightmare in previous iterations of Office.

Whether this one is worth buying depends on too many variables so I won't presume to make a recommendation. No one has yet had time to plumb its depths. Like others I will certainly find more things to like and dislike about it. Other than for those people predisposed to disapprove of anything Microsoft does, however, this a significant new version. I expect it will do very well once Microsoft irons out the inevitable bugs.
Message was edited by: whitedog

[paullin2]

A Word/Sente combination is enormously better than a Word/Endnote combination. I don't have Word 2008 so I do not know how Sente works with it, but it works great with Word 2004. True, you have to manually click to format the references at the end, but you only need to do this at the very end when you are finished (ie. you rarely need to do this) and it's pretty fast. As for second document, I'm not sure what you are referring to. The formated references appear in the same document for me.

[seanessy]

I don't think, based on my experience, that any portion of Office 2008 deserves more than a one mouse review in Macworld.
This suite represents more anti-competitive business on the part of Redmond. They know that we have Boot Camp, VMWare, and they want us to buy copies of Windows and Windows Office. It seems pretty transparent to me- the removal of cross platform scripting is a stake in the heart for Mac Office. It could have been included, but a choice was made( likely high up) and it was not.
To be fair, your reviews acknowledge these and other concerns about Office 2008, but I'm really disappointed that Macworld- of all publications- didn't give Microsoft the thrashing it so richly deserves.
This is a bad, buggy, release that removes important features for business users, while adding nothing of any significance.
How is it that these products received 3 1/2 mouse reviews? How am I as a reader supposed to trust that Macworld's reviews are credible? This product should have been SLAMMED by Macworld, and yet it was not.

[mdawson]

I can agree with your point of view as 3-1/2 stars would indicate that a product is between being ‘good’ and ‘very good’. With cross-platform compatibility being poor in this version of Office:mac, Office 2008 should rate no more than 2-1/2 stars overall. On an app-by-app basis, Word 2008 may warrant 3-1/2 stars, but Excel should not get 3 as it is in that application where the lack of VBA hits hardest. Excel 2008 without VBA is unacceptable and should have been given the 1-star rating it deserved for that reason.
The problem here is that few reviewers have chosen to chastise Microsoft for this poor release, so I would not lay too hard into Macworld. Few reviewers rate Office on an application basis, but a quick Google search turned up the following scores for Office:mac 2008,
* Macworld UK: 4/5
* ZDNet: 7.8/10 Very Good
* c|net: 7.8/10 Very Good (editor’s rating); 4.3/10 Mediocre (avg. user review)
* PC Magazine: 3/5 Good (editor’s rating); 1/5 Poor (avg. user review)
Apparently reviewers in general are more concerned with praising the fact that Office 2008 is Universal, which is good, and the new interface than focusing on the fact that for those that either work in a mixed environment or that need collaborate with Windows users—read: most Mac users using Office—Office 2008 is a seriously flawed product.

[whitedog]

I really hate to be in the position of defending Microsoft, but some of this criticism of Office 2008 is nothing more than the standard Mac fan anti-anything Microsoft bias. These folks invariably focus on any flaw and rant as if it was the end of the world.

To begin with, if Microsoft really wanted to move people to Windows on the Mac they would have declined to develop Office '08. Why waste resources on a product they don't want or expect people to use?

The lack of Office macro functionality is a serious problem for some people and I don't wish to downplay it, but the assertion that "most" people who use Office on the Mac need Macros is empty speculation. As an argument it lacks any substance whatsoever.

I know many people who use Office apps on the Mac. None of them use Macros. What can be deduced from this fact? Absolutely nothing. The sample of any one person's experience is simply too small to be statistically significant.

Clearly this version of Office is a work in progress. The same was true of every Mac version of Office when it was released. Some never did stabilize. It's nothing new. We're still getting regular patches for Office 2004. Yet however much Microsoft demonstrates their ongoing commitment to develop and support their products on the Mac, we still have people blathering doom and gloom.

I don't always agree with Macworld product reviews. Nevertheless, to accuse them of showing favoritism to Microsoft is just plain silly. MacAddict they're not, certainly; they don't make a fetish out of ragging on Microsoft. If that's your style then read MacAddict. Macworld tends to take a dull, even-handed approach in their reviews. They could be more exciting and inflammatory, but they choose instead to maintain their credibility. More power to them.

Considering the resources they have to spend on buying and testing every new Mac product that comes along I wish them only the best. No one else is going to do it for us if they drop the ball.

[josquin021]

@whitedog: While I agree with 99% of what you're saying, I want to add that many people may use macros without knowing that they're using them.



Me, I haven't programmed a Word macro in years (though I use plenty of them in Excel). However, almost all of the Word add-ons I use -- Endnote, Adobe Acrobat PDFMaker, Mathtype -- use Word macros to implement their functionality. Word 2008 will no longer support Endnote for easy citations, or automatic equation insertion, etc., simply because third party add-ons no longer have anywhere near the same kind of acccess to the internals of Word that they used to.

I imagine that if you asked people whether they used (a) macros and/or (b) add-ons, the number would be a lot higher than if you asked about macros alone.

[seanessy]

I didn't say most users, I did say business users.

I have many Excel worksheets that my organisation uses which rely on VBA and macros. Some of my third party programs, like MathType, are crippled by the removal of VBA.

And, for the record, I've been a Microsoft user for a long time, and I'm always happy to sing their praises when they get it right.

I've sold people on switching to the Mac, based on how good Office Mac used to be. I can't do that in good conscience with Office 2008.

This is a weak release, and I feel the ratings, here and elsewhere, ought to reflect this a little better.

[mjs24]

Many users of MS Word 2004 will know that this version introduced a problem (bug) in which the scroll wheel will become temporarily unresponsive in scrolling through the document. This is particularly the case in documents with tracked changes or Endnote references entered. After clicking in the document the scroll wheel will often work and in fact past scrolls are then executed. Then the problem returns

Can anyone who has 2008 and who knows about this problem comment on whether this issue has been fixed?

[mdawson]

I really hate to be in the position of defending Microsoft, but some of this criticism of Office 2008 is nothing more than the standard Mac fan anti-anything Microsoft bias. These folks invariably focus on any flaw and rant as if it was the end of the world.

If someone were posting an empty rant, I would be in agreement with you, but that is not the case here. Re-read and comprehend the posts. The reason most people are complaining about Office 2008 is due to either bugs that those have bought the software have encountered or due to reported glaring cross-platform compatibility issues. The former is to be expected to a certain extent in new software, but the latter is getting worse and it is unacceptable.

To begin with, if Microsoft really wanted to move people to Windows on the Mac they would have declined to develop Office '08. Why waste resources on a product they don't want or expect people to use?

Have you not been paying attention for the past 20 years? ;) Before the Intel transition, the Mac market, despite its growth under Jobs tutelage, posed no real threat to Windows dominance. Since 2006, Macs can now run Windows either natively or in virtualization and one of the first concerns of log time Mac users was that developers would just abandon Mac development and tell Mac users to run Windows. Most Mac developers understand that Mac users do not want to use Windows and realize that they will lose the Mac market by making such a bonehead move. Of course, excepting Microsoft, every other developer that produces Mac software does not have a conflict of interest in the form of a monopoly in the desktop operating system market that they have used every underhanded, and often times illegal, tactics to maintain.

People have made the assertion that Microsoft will ultimately attempt to force Mac users to have to use Windows and Office for Windows for compatibility because,
# it is now the case that the level of incompatibility between Office 2008 and any recent version of Office for Windows would require almost any Mac user not living in a vacuum to need the Windows version;
# Microsoft knows that (most) Mac users will never switch to Windows, but the ability to run Windows in virtualization or natively on Intel-based Macs puts Microsoft is in a position to force Mac users to spend more for a copy of Office than Windows users—cost of Office + a Windows license—in order to maintain their ability to collaborate with co-workers, classmates, colleagues, friends, etc., using Office for Windows; and,
# it is well known that Microsoft will do anything, legal or not, to cripple if not outright annihilate any competition to their market position in any market that they dominate.
Offering a (mostly) compatible version of Windows for the Mac when the Mac posed no threat was one thing—that thing mostly being a legal cushion for anti-trust, as Microsoft was considering dropping Office for the Mac just before the pre-Bush DOJ filed suit against them. With the level of Windows compatibility that Intel-based Macs offers, Microsoft has their scapegoat to start down the road to killing Mac development altogether, particularly if user backlash to Office 2008 is akin to that of the Word 6 fiasco. With the number of Switchers that were finally sold on going Mac based on the fact that they would be able to run Office, that scenario is even more likely with the Mac suffering as part of the backlash; win-win for Microsoft.

As to why they would “waste resources on a product they don't want or expect people to use”, again Microsoft will do anything to maintain their current dominance in certain markets or to railroad their way into dominating new markets. Pouring money and resources into dead projects and potential black holes to those ends is nothing new for Microsoft.

The lack of Office macro functionality is a serious problem for some people and I don't wish to downplay it, but the assertion that "most" people who use Office on the Mac need Macros is empty speculation. As an argument it lacks any substance whatsoever.

I know many people who use Office apps on the Mac. None of them use Macros. What can be deduced from this fact? Absolutely nothing. The sample of any one person's experience is simply too small to be statistically significant.

And where did I imply that most people that use Office because they need VBA. Again re-read and comprehend. My exact words was that “reviewers in general are more concerned with praising the fact that Office 2008 is Universal, which is good, and the new interface than focusing on the fact that for those that either work in a mixed environment or that need collaborate with Windows users—read: most Mac users using Office—Office 2008 is a seriously flawed product.” Nowhere in that statement is it implied that most people need VBA; I do not even mention macros. Unlike Windows users who are on a platform where competition in the productivity suite market has been killed off by Microsoft, OS X gives Mac users several open source alternatives to Office as well as a few Mac-only developers that have created alternatives to individual Office apps. Mac users that choose Office:mac generally do so because they need to be able to collaborate with people using Office for Windows, not because they prefer using Office given a choice.

As to where I did mention VBA earlier in the post, I clearly stated that, “Excel should not get 3 as it is in that application where the lack of VBA hits hardest,” which is a statement of fact as josquin021 clarified. You may know many people that use Office:mac and believe that they never use macros, but the fact of the matter is that Office users utilize VBA all the time without realizing it. VBA is not just about power users writing code on the backside of Office applications, but it is also about a number of add-ons and toolkits that are a part of the Office suite that people use day in and day out. As josquin021 stated,

Quote

However, almost all of the Word add-ons I use -- Endnote, Adobe Acrobat PDFMaker, Mathtype -- use Word macros to implement their functionality. Word 2008 will no longer support Endnote for easy citations, or automatic equation insertion, etc., simply because third party add-ons no longer have anywhere near the same kind of acccess (sic) to the internals of Word that they used to.

Jump to Excel and it gets much worse. Many Excel users use macro-enabled workbooks created by co-workers and do not realize that they are using macros because they just use the document. Excel is the one Office app where VBA usage is more extensive because it can cut down on repetitive and redundant computations that would take forever to complete by hand or using cell formulas. Also, add-ons such as Analysis Toolkit, Solver, etc., are no longer options without VBA support.

Clearly this version of Office is a work in progress. The same was true of every Mac version of Office when it was released. Some never did stabilize. It's nothing new. We're still getting regular patches for Office 2004. Yet however much Microsoft demonstrates their ongoing commitment to develop and support their products on the Mac, we still have people blathering doom and gloom.

Where the most hotly debated omitted features are concerned, Office:mac is not a work in progress. VBA support has been dropped from Office:mac, not delayed. The MBU has made no statement of intent to add VBA later, but has instead stated that adding VBA support would have delayed the release of Office 2008 and that VBA was being dropped from the next version of Office for Windows anyway. The latter statement turned out to be a flat out lie. I take nothing from the MBU as a separate entity—they are die-hard Mac fans—but at the end of the day they work for Microsoft and the MBU can only do what Microsoft allows them to do.

seanessy did quantify his assertion about what is going on by stating, “a choice was made( likely high up),” which is always the case in any company.

Microsoft could have poured the resources and staffing into the MBU to make sure that Office:mac had 100% compatibility with Office for Windows excepting those features utilizing Windows-only technologies. They chose not to do so.

Microsoft could have poured the resources and staffing into the MBU to bring Access, OneNote, Project, Publisher, Visio, etc., to the Mac. They chose not to do so.

Microsoft could have poured the resources and staffing into the MBU to develop VirtualPC as the ultimate Windows virtual machine for the Mac as the developer of Windows. They chose not to do so.

Microsoft could have poured the resources and staffing into the MBU to develop and maintain Internet Explorer, WMP, etc., on the Mac with complete parity to the Windows versions. They chose not to do so.

In the end, no matter how dedicated the MBU staff is to providing great products for the Mac, Microsoft is obviously not committed to providing them with the funding and personnel to do so. And again, this has everything to do with the conflict of interest within the company and the fact that the MBU was ultimately only a legal cushion to begin with. If you do not believe that then, you can provide the valid explanation as to why Microsoft can pour infinite resources into potentially fruitless, high-risk projects on the Windows side, yet consistently fails to put as much effort into providing the means to offer and support their software and technologies already in wide use only for the unit that develops for the Mac.

I don't always agree with Macworld product reviews. Nevertheless, to accuse them of showing favoritism to Microsoft is just plain silly. MacAddict they're not, certainly; they don't make a fetish out of ragging on Microsoft. If that's your style then read MacAddict. Macworld tends to take a dull, even-handed approach in their reviews. They could be more exciting and inflammatory, but they choose instead to maintain their credibility. More power to them.

Where in my post do I so much as insinuate that Macworld showed favoritism to Microsoft? If anything, I pointed out that no review of Office 2008 has been (highly) unfavorable given the potential cross-platform issues. Ironically, the lowest score for Office 2008 comes from a PC publication at 60%?effectively an F?while others have effectively rated Office 2008 at C/B- or better. I also stated that I did not agree with Macworld’s rating of Excel+ given that VBA support, which is used by quite a few people in Excel whether they realize that they are using it or not, is now absent. Lastly, I stated that I feel that Office 2008 overall warrants less than 3 stars for numerous reasons that center around poor cross-platform compatibility. You seem to have a knack for reading my posts and paraphrasing what I never stated or implied.

As to credibility, how does Mac|Life’s (née MacAddict) having the chutzpah to rate crap as crap lessen their credibility. I would find reviewers that rarely or never give poor ratings to be less credible. Besides, I never questioned Macworld’s credibility in the first place. Compatibility with Office for Windows is huge, and no reviewer to date seems to have felt the need to heavily penalize Office 2008 based on that. Such scoring is hardly reserved for Microsoft and the fact that reviewers in general rarely poorly rate a product is a general trend across-the-board. Again, nothing against Macworld, but the question of harshly reviewing products that come from companies that provide ad revenue is nothing new and the reason why independent product review organizations such as Consumer Reports came into existence.

Regardless of any potential bias on that part, reviewers will always have a certain degree of bias based on what they want in a product. Based on my experience, and clearly the experience of several others here, my disagreement is with the 3-star rating of Excel 2008. I do not see that rating to be any collusion on the part of the Macworld staff to not chastise Microsoft, nor did I state or insinuate such a thing anywhere in my post.

[folklore]

mjs24 said:

Many users of MS Word 2004 will know that this version introduced a problem (bug) in which the scroll wheel will become temporarily unresponsive in scrolling through the document. This is particularly the case in documents with tracked changes or Endnote references entered. After clicking in the document the scroll wheel will often work and in fact past scrolls are then executed. Then the problem returns


Can anyone who has 2008 and who knows about this problem comment on whether this issue has been fixed?

Well, the problem with Endnote is "fixed" because Endnote doesn't work with Word 2008. I believe it uses VBA to work, and as we all know, VBA is MIA in Office 2008. See this page for the vague explanation from Endnote.

And that's why I'm probably not "upgrading" to Office 2008.

[mdawson]

Quote

seanessy wrote:

>

Quote

I didn't say most users, I did say business users.

You definitely did not. I did, but it was not in reference to VBA. Where VBA is concerned it is more than business users that are negatively impacted. Anyone that collaborates with Windows users or that just uses features like Equation Editor or any number of Office add-ons is hurt by the absence of VBA in Office 2008. The omission of VBA can hurt Mac using students—particularly those at the collegiate level in technical fields—, academic and corporate researchers, etc. Add up the people that can incidentally be hurt by breaking Equation Editor, MathType, Analysis Toolkit, Solver, etc., and it could quickly become a great many if not most Office:mac users. Few Mac users, particularly those using Office, live in a bubble.

Quote

seanessy wrote:

>

Quote

And, for the record, I've been a Microsoft user for a long time, and I'm always happy to sing their praises when they get it right.

Ditto. Except for weak VBA support, which has been a longstanding, unrectified problem with the Mac version of Office, I am very happy with Office:mac 2004. When writing papers I can brag to my Windows using friends about features like the built-in dictionary/thesaurus that has been present since Office:mac 2001 and is still, to the best of my knowledge, absent from Office for Windows. Even when I am not doing work or (previously) school-related things I often find myself using Word and Excel for numerous tasks by default.

Quote

seanessy wrote:

>
I've sold people on switching to the Mac, based on how good Office Mac used to be. I can't do that in good conscience with Office 2008.

Ditto again. God forbid the people I have turned on to the Mac using Office compatibility as the final stroke ever migrate to Office 2008. Not only do these people need to be able to collaborate with others using Windows, or just work between their Mac at home and PC at work/school, but many also rely on VBA either directly or as a matter of the tools they use in Office.

[gruth]

Design Science has posted an article on their web site about their future plans for MathType and Word. The short version is that they expect to release an updated version of MathType in June '08 to interface with Word '08. I'm unsure/unclear how they could do this without VBA -- anyone else know?



http://www.dessci.co.../office2008.htm

[whitedog]

josquin021, good point. Endnote users have already begun to make their displeasure known; no doubt it will be some time before a viable substitute is available, if it ever is. As for the PDFMaker plug-in, Office '08 has native PDF support. It's not fancy, but you don't have the plug-ins using up another line in your toolbar, which I found to be a nuisance.

I still haven't read a convincing explanation from Microsoft of why they did not include Macro support in Office '08. The lack of same no doubt contributes to the paranoia on the subject exhibited by some Mac users. The Mac BU has only themselves to blame for this entirely foreseeable response.

At the same time, I don't think we can pan the whole Office '08 suite on the basis of this shortcoming. In my opinion it would be more effective, if the goal is to get Macro support restored, to focus one's displeasure on that topic. I suspect the broadside attacks will simply not be taken seriously.