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The pros and cons of MS Office System 2003 | |
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| Time: 14:13 EST/19:13 GMT | News Source: E-Mail | Posted By: Kyle Warner | ||
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The concept of the "virtual office" has been a hallmark of discussion since the advent of the minicomputer, which brought computing out of the computer center and into the office. From the 1960s on, "office systems" was a common term used for tools which simply meant "systems for the office." IBM's Office System's division sold typewriters, dictation machines and word processors. |
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Read Only Comments Return to News |
Displaying Comments 1 through 8 of 8 |
This is an archived static copy of ActiveWin.com. |
| #1 By 2960 (156.80.64.137) at Thursday, April 29, 2004 02:38:05 PM |
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I thought I was going to love Outlook 2003. I don't :(
Sure, the features are nice, but MAN has it been turned into a slow, cumbersome PIG in the process! TL |
| #2 By 37 (67.37.29.142) at Thursday, April 29, 2004 03:45:27 PM |
| I love Outlook 2003. And it sure isn't a slow cumbersome pig for me. |
| #3 By 13030 (198.22.121.120) at Friday, April 30, 2004 10:03:54 AM |
| A group of us were just talking about Office 2003 the other day and how Office 6.0, Office 95, and perhaps even Office 97 (for Access) still provide all of the functionality nearly ever user needs. Outlook is, perhaps, moderately useful in its 2000 incarnation, but the rest of the suite is simply feature bloated. For work computers I use Office 2000 only because file compatibility forces me to, otherwise my home PCs use Office 97. Imagine if I had paid for all of the upgrades on my home computers from Office 97 on to Office 2003. Imagine how frustratingly slow Office 2003 would run on my Pentium II home PCs. Interestingly, the most proficient Excel user I have ever known was recently forced by his IT department to upgrade from Office 97 to just Office XP. He has been very frustrated since then. Watching him do his job in Excel 2003 has been enlightening to say the least... |
| #4 By 135 (209.180.28.6) at Friday, April 30, 2004 10:43:30 AM |
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ch - Interesting because Office 2003 is faster and smaller than Office 97.
Isn't it interesting how you've leaped to conclusions about a product without even investigating it? |
| #5 By 13030 (198.22.121.120) at Friday, April 30, 2004 12:42:36 PM |
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sodablue - Interesting how you avoid the topic of unecessary feature bloat and the cost of three upgrades for the same basic functionality.
I have bought or tried each office version (or products therein) beginning with Word 2.0. I have had a MSDN Universal subscription since 1997, so investigating new Office releases has never been a problem. Since I pay for every piece of software on my home computers, I'm not about to pay for unecessary upgrades especially when they have demonstarted no new truly useful features and a steadily degrading performance (at least on other machines). I'll take your word that Office 2003 has reversed the performance trend on low end processors, but I'm still not inclined to pay for nothing substantially new. |
| #6 By 13030 (198.22.121.120) at Friday, April 30, 2004 05:31:09 PM |
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#10, I use Excel for data analysis, reporting, and charting. In most cases, I am pulling the data from SQL Server. I consider myself a pretty heavy Excel user with a decent level of mastery. I have created Access databases with almost a hundred tables. I've worked on systems integrating Excel, Word, Access and SQL Server all through VBA (this has been possible since Office 95).
My point is that no one really needs, or uses, the new features. It's not that I don't need the feature bloat--I can't find anyone else who does either (except for a few here, but that is to be expected). Interestingly, reviews of the Office suites have basically reiterated this unecessary feature bloat beginning somewhat with Office 2000, but with more frequency since then. In fact, PC Magazine said don't bother upgrading unless the new Outlook 2003 features are absolutely required. And Outlook 2003 seems to be the only part of Office 2003 that anyone here really praises. |
| #7 By 7754 (216.160.8.41) at Friday, April 30, 2004 06:20:52 PM |
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My point is that no one really needs, or uses, the new features.
That's a rather ridiculous categorical statement to make. The Reveal Formatting feature in Word 2002 was worth the upgrade for our company, especially since we recently have switched from WordPerfect to Word as our main word processor, and a lot of the secretaries were used to Reveal Codes (granted, it's not the same, but it's a huge help). Smart Tags also helped with the transition greatly, if for no other reason than that users could instantly see what Word was doing when it capitalized the first word in a sentence, started a numbered list, etc., and turn it off for the instance or as the default. The Track Changes feature update with the changes noted clearly in the margins is great. I think "feature bloat" is a pretty subjective term. I haven't noticed any speed degradation personally, and the product is quite stable as a whole, in my experience. If we don't use every new feature, that's fine... there's no reasonable expectation that we would. Funny... you simultaneously complain of "feature bloat" and the lack of new compelling features--so which do you want? If you think the current product is bloated, fine--go back to the one that you didn't think was bloated, if such a thing exists. Microsoft isn't preventing you from doing that. |
| #8 By 13030 (67.163.112.158) at Friday, April 30, 2004 10:00:17 PM |
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#12: "Funny... you simultaneously complain of "feature bloat" and the lack of new compelling features--so which do you want?"
The apparent contradiction is easily explained: Office reached its pinnacle around Office 95 to 97. It had attained "killer app" status and there really was nothing more to be added. MS knows that Office is a cash cow, so how do you improve upon a complete, capable, and basically excellent product? Newer versions with fluff functionality (the good features were already present). Phase out the support for the old versions and stop issuing licenses for older versions so users and companies are forced to upgrade when they add more computers and need to install Office. No support team wants to maintain multiple versions, so the entire company is forced to upgrade. Product Lifecycle Dates - Office Product Family: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;en-us;LifeOfficeFam |
