Office 2007

[Stanman]

Hi, just upgraded to the above and not to impressed with layout.
I used to use office 2003 and miss the rulers and layout bars on the side and top, how do I get them back in 2007?

[TheAnimus]

which app? word?

[Funkstar]

For rullers in Word, there is a tiny icon just above the verticle scroll bar.

As for the new look at feel for menus and toolbars, there is no way to change back to the old style. It is gone for good. Takes a bit of getting use to, but the millions of dollars MS spend on usability researc isn't for nothing

[TiG]

Yep agreed with Funkstar, office 2007 is godly once you get used to it.

TIG

[burble]

I hated the look of Office 2007 when I first installed it, now though I much prefer it to 2003 but it definately took some getting used to.

[allosunshine]

you can use the classic toolbar in office 2007. its a 3rd party app, can be found here. Personally I like the new toolbar, alot better organised once you get used to it and its good the way it previews any changes just by hovering over an option.

[MarcLister]

I haven't as yet bought Office 2007 but I have tried it and some mates of mine have bought it and they love the new interface. Sure it'll take some getting used to but I'm sure I'll get used to it after a while.

[benwoodcock]

use OOo instead! free! (I have to too many moral scruples to pirate it)

[peterb]

For those that can't decode OOo - it is the Open Office organisation office suite. Open source software that runs under Windows and Linux (and I think MAC OS). Very powerful and generally MS Office compatable (in that it will save and read .doc files, and opens many other formats too).

http://www.openoffice.org/

[this_is_gav]

use OOo instead! free! (I have to too many moral scruples to pirate it)

OpenOffice is great as a freebie, but it's closest to Office XP and Office 2003 in terms of GUI. It's absolutely nothing like Office 2007, which is just great. When you get used to it the time saved with the new layout really does pay you back. It's a joy to use now.

For those that can't decode OOo - it is the Open Office organisation office suite. Open source software that runs under Windows and Linux (and I think MAC OS). Very powerful and generally MS Office compatable (in that it will save and read .doc files, and opens many other formats too).

http://www.openoffice.org/

Can it open Docx files yet?

[TheAnimus]

To be honest its more office 97 in terms of functionality. The excel replacement is also a total joke (which is a shame, because after having to program inside it, i hate excel with such a passion).

[MarcLister]

Can it open Docx files yet?

Is that the file format for Office 2007? If so I don't think OO has had a major release since Office 2007. The next release (2.2.3 I think) could incorporate them.

Also any students out there might be interested in http://www.theultimatesteal.co.uk/. Its legit and means students who are at UK educational institutions and have email addresses ending in .ac.uk can get Office 2007 Ultimate for £38.95 for a permanent licence or £12.95 for a one year licence. You can order CDs specifically for an extra charge; you download this off a Digital River store and use it as a trial until you get your licence key.

http://www.microsoft.com/uk/educatio...c/default.mspx

[this_is_gav]

Is that the file format for Office 2007? If so I don't think OO has had a major release since Office 2007.

'tis indeed Office 2007's file format (well, the word format to be specific). Excel's is now .xlsx, Powerpoint's is now .pptx (though I doubt has actually changed much) and Publisher's is still .pub, but then Publisher has always struggled to read files from other version of Publisher, and OpenOffice doesn't have a program to open them anyway.

[MarcLister]

Yeah. I don't think OO has been updated for Office 2007 yet. I could be wrong, I don't have any Office 2007 files to test.

[mike_w]

I must admit that I don't think that there's really been a decent open source equivalent to Microsoft Office, especially for Microsoft Word. Having said that, Gnumeric is my favourite spreadsheet - it doesn't have all the features of Excel, but it covers everything I want and more. I've also started playing with LaTeX.

[Dav0s]

I've also started playing with Latex.

whatever floats your boat