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Converters Coming! Free and (Fairly) Fast.

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There's been some pretty alarmist news stories this morning (apcstart.com; CrunchGear) about file format converters and Office for Mac. Because some of these stories seem designed more to inflame than inform, I want to reiterate our previously reported intention to provide free converters, clarify our timing for their release, and also give some direction on how best to avoid incompatibility until they are available.

Be it resolved: The Mac BU WILL issue free, downloadable file format converters that allow users to read the new Microsoft Office Open XML Format. We announced that publicly at WWDC, and nothing has changed.

Timing: We’re working on our file format converters as I write. We had to wait until Office 2007 bits and the new file format itself were locked down. During this time, we spent the last year and a half prepping and planning for our own development of file format converters for Office for Mac. This included the basic supporting work of a rich and compatible XML parser, code to understand the new package structure, and beginning work on reading and writing early development versions of the file format. So now that Office for Windows has been released, we are working on completing compatibility with the released formats, while also completing other major work such as moving our codebase to the Intel platform, which we have discussed at some length on this very blog and elsewhere. We are running on target and expect to release a free public beta version of the file format converters in Spring 2007, with final converters available six to eight weeks after we launch our next version of Office for Mac (which, as previously reported, will be available 6-8 months after general availability of Win Office.) The next version of Office for Mac will natively read the Open XML Format; users of the current version of Office will have converters in order to maintain compatibility with the new Office for Windows.

There will be a delta between general availability of Win Office (January) and converters from MacBU (expected late March/early April.) We realize this will be an inconvenience for some of you (trust me, we know - 90% of Microsoft has been dogfooding Office 2007 for many months, and we in the MacBU are well used to asking for down-reved versions ourselves). For now, we recommend that Mac users advise their friends and colleagues using Office 2007 to save their documents as a “Word/Excel/PowerPoint 97-2003 Document” (.doc, .xls, .ppt) to ensure the documents can be shared across platforms.

Comments

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    and these will support v.X yes

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    It would be even better to just publish the specs for the "Open" XML file fomats. Trust me, converters would appear, and probably more quickly.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Thank you for letting us know.  While having to wait 6-8 weeks after the next version of Office:mac for the final version of free converters isn't perfect (that's looking like November 2007 in a worst case scenario assuming that "general availability" of Office 2007 means end-January 2007 and Office:mac (2008?) appearing in September 2007) it is certainly really useful to have an idea of your timescales.  In any case, I am very much looking forward to the next version of Office:mac.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Hi Chuck, The specifications are published here: http://www.ecma-international.org/news/TC45_current_work/TC45-2006-50_final_draft.htm It's not just a question of reading and writing a file out to disk. It's a question of fidelity. Users are going to have a seamless experience with these converters, and the document they open in Office 2004 is going to look as much like the same  document in Office 2007 as we can possibly make it. The reverse needs to be true also, a file that's created in Office 2004 using the new converters needs to look nearly exactly the same in Office 2007. There's a lot of work that goes into this, and I think everyone is going to be happy with the final result. Best regards, Brian -- Brian Johnson Product Manager Mac Business Unit

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    OpenOffice still seems to work, as does NeoOffice.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Tell me again why it's called "Open"XML format if even your own company's software can't read it when it comes out? My current theory is that you have one very ironic guy who makes up these names intending them to be sarcastic. I mean, come on... "Genuine Advantage"? And "PlaysForSure" -- good one. I think he must have been off sick when you invented Microsoft Points. He would have called them Microsoft "It's Your Money" Points and Wi-You're-In-Control-Not-the-Music-Companies-Fi.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    "Alarmist? More to inflame than inform?" How insulting. We made an enquiry to Microsoft Australia's PR agency about timing on the converters and the response was that they were coming but no ETA. "I don't have any additional details to share on timing on the availability of the converters at present." We then made an enquiry directly to you, Sheridan, at MacBU in Redmond, however you were on holidays at the time so you passed it on to Tammy Hovey at Edelman PR in the States. On 17 November she said, "it is still too early for us to say when the converters will be available." We then further quarantined the story for a couple of weeks to give you the opportunity to make a statement coinciding with the release of Office 2007 to business volume licence customers. None was forthcoming. So, essentially, we approached Microsoft Australia's PR agency, Microsoft US directly and Microsoft US' PR agency. We asked everyone we could find in every way we could think of, and got no date. Now that the story is published, a date come out straight away! Is this how Microsoft plays the game with media? I think what you should have said is that it IS alarming to Mac users that no converter info has been available. Not that our report is alarmist. Further, your advice is to do exactly what we said in the story was going to be a real pain: ask all your co-workers to save into a different format. That's great service for your Mac Office customers! You do work for the same company that develops Office for Windows, right? Is it unreasonable to expect that you might have some 'insider access' to the file format specs as they are developed and going to RTM? How about your commitment to communicating openly with customers and the media?

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    It is too bad that it will take so long to get these converters out when the same converters are already available in beta form for Windows at: http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/beta/converter.mspx Nonetheless, good move to make it known that you are at least working on them: it certainly helps counterbalance the alarmist articles to all the macsurfer faithfuls out there (seriously, where would we get our mac news from, if it wasn't for macsurfer??)

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    I think its awesome to see Microsoft bring these out. To all the nay sayers get a life - This is the real world not everything works how you think it should!

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    So the converters are coming months after the release of Office 2007 Win? Truly disgraceful. Aren't the converters for the current version of Office Win already available? Why are you guys so far behind? I'm sure you have the coding talent, so poitical reasons must be to blame. You suggest the delay is becasue the spec took a while to be nailed down, but why then are the converters for the Windows version ready now? This is another slap in the face for an already "2nd class citizen" experience. I'm sure all users have had issues with bad WMF image rendering of Win Office files opened with Office for Mac (I have to suffer the troubles with this almost daily). Now you're telling us we can't even open the file for 3 months! You have got to be kidding.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    "The next version of Office for Mac will natively read the Open XML Format" Wait, you said "read" not "read and write". Does this mean that the next version of Office for Mac will not use the same "Open XML" file format as Office 2007 for Windows? Could you please clarify?

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    The converters will read and write the new formats, JGrey.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Dan, I'm not sure I understand you.  You couldn't get some semblence of dates out of Microsoft, so that justifies a story that contains no facts that weren't already known by the entire online Macintosh community under a  headline that reads, "The lock-out begins for Office Mac users"?

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Please wait 6 to 8 weeks for my comments. Thank you.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Schwleb, Thanks for the reply, but that only half answered the question (at least for me). Your reply seems to imply that there will always be conversion involved when using docx, etc. My question is, will the new Mac Office apps use the same default file format as Office 2007 for Windows? i.e. will the Open XML formats be the native formats of the next Office for Mac suite?

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    I think you guys do a good job overall and are going to take a bit of heat for the late converters. Please  understand the frustration of Mac users and not take it personal. It was quite brave to ask others to hold off on an upgrade. Good luck with the converters and I hope they are finished quickly. Cheers

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    How many back versions of Office on Windows and the Mac will MS support? Nothing but the (previously) latest versions? Suddenly Office 2000 for Windows is dogfood? Or Word:Mac?  I hope not...  perfectly functioning software on perfectly functioning hardware...

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    OK, no worries Sheridan. Glad you weren't referring to our story as the alarmist one.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Ok, I don't like to blame people that work very hard to bring office compatibility to Mac users. But this time, I can see something illogic in the statements make by MacBU. Why are you developing a converter from scratch at all? Since the objective is to obtain a standard .doc file from a .docx file, why you don't try to reuse the code of Converter for Win Office 2003? Since the input are the same, the output are the same and the processing don't seem to involve any OS API call (at least from a logical point of view), why don't you get the C++ code, make a little porting and recompile it? Given your abilities (not mine), it will take 10 days max; heck, you're porting the entire Office suite to XCode, translating in UB, writing an AppleScript layer. To me this problem, appear a lot more simple than port VB scripting to UB ;). If I'm wrong, can you explain to me, where? Thanks

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    WOW!!! It should take a whole millisecond to develop these convertors when the code is already available for older Windows Office versions. This is only a ploy to make Microsoft products appear more compatible and is a ploy to help Vista. ... But then again - this brain dead company can't even make their Zune music player Vista compatible right out of the gate, maybe they really can't see that far ahead - it is POSSIBLE. IDIOTS!!!

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Brian, Why not have Microsoft put up a website that would allow anyone to upload an MSOffice 2007 file and have it down-converted to 97-2003 Document format? No development would be necessary - just a bank of XP or Vista machines running Office 2007.  This would be a much better interim step than telling Mac users to go tell Office 2007 users to re-save their files and re-send them.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    I work for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner so we have now had access to Office 2007 since November. Our users who are still using Office 2003 are now using the beta converters for the new document formats. I was expecting (as others have based on the previous comments) that the Mac office converters would be coming out in a similiar timeframe. To have the converters for Office v.X/2004 released after Mac Office 12 is absolute madness! You will really be causing great erosion of your market. If you think that Mac users just deal with Mac Users and Win users just deal with win users, then you are really out of date. We are in a homogenous connected world and the reality is that the pain of getting people to save in the older format is going to drive many users (especially the more technically competent) to other alternatives like:

  • Win Office 2003/2007 on Windows (using Parallels/VMware Fusion/Virtual PC for PPC), MacBU gets nothing
  • Win Office 2003/2007 on WINE/Crossover Office etc, MacBU gets nothing
  • OpenOffice/NeoOffice (once Novell gets the converters sorted out), MS gets nothing Just remember that the above anger and vitrol is not coming from the usual slashdot crowd - it is from your paying customers. There is already pent up anger over the Virtual PC/Office VBA decisions - so don't add to it please. In a nutshell, you need to release (at least betas of) your converters for the current versions of Office before the end of January.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    You guys that want to defend the macBU - it's the same company. If the company doesn't communicate, it's the entire companies fault and they should maybe fix things. I guess the Vista group doesn't talk with the Zune group as the Windows Office group doesn't talk with MacBU. But in the end - I DON'T CARE what their excuses are, after all it's just an excuse and since I'm a customer, I just want something that actually works and solves my problems. Microsoft first creates the problem and then pat themselves on their collect backs for fixing it at some future date - I DON'T THINK SO, I won't be cheering this incompetent bunch.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Sorry JGrey, I missed that part of the question in your post. To clarify, Mac Office 12 will be supporting the same new file formats as in Win Office 2007.  They will indeed be the new defaults, although I believe you might be able to set a preference to change the default back to the older formats (I'm not positive, though.)  The old formats will also continue to be supported. I'll be putting up a post on my own blog tonight or tomorrow about the work involved in the new formats as well.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Heck, I'll call the APC story alarmist. First, the title: "The lock-out begins for Office Mac users" Let's look at the definition for lock - out, hmm? lock out vt

  1. to prevent somebody from entering a place by locking the door
  2. to prevent workers from entering their workplace, usually as a strategy in an industrial dispute Lock-out implies, and rather blatantly, that this is a deliberate tactic by Microsoft to force Mac users into an inferior situation. It makes no allowance for any kind of mitigating circumstances. You say "lock-out", you're saying that Microsoft is deliberately taking action to keep Mac users from working with Office 2007 users by design. Don't like that? Change your headline, because the current one is alarmist as all heck. From your story: "A spokesperson for the MBU reminded APC of its promise at WWDC that "free downloadable converters would be available" following the release of Office 2007 for Windows, but was unable to tell us when. "Unfortunately it is still to early for us to say when the converters will be available", she said." Yet you somehow didn't mention that the last time you talked to the Mac BU was in November, and that you were basing your statements on that, and waiting for an updated statement. Alarmist? Not as much as the title, but it's definitely leading readers to a conclusion. So maybe if you don't want to be labeled alarmist, you should reconsider writing alarmist titles. Just a thought.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Jeez -- what a lot of flaming over formats that less than 2 or 3 percent of the computing universe will be using for the next several months. Really, folks, for those of us in the real world the old .doc .xls etc. are going to be the formats of choice until we are certain the people to whom we will be sending documents have upgraded. My question comes from Erik's last post: Will that default format setting be there or not? Attn: MBU, that is a crucial feature.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    A big thanks to the MacBU for getting this information out to us. We've discussed this transition in-house, too.  Our Mac admins are understandably concerned.  However, in discussions with our Windows team, it's clear that the move to docx is going to be a substantial headache for them, too.  The transition on the Windows side will take some time and these tools from the MacBU will likely become available in what will be the very early stages of the move. To all the angry abusive types who have left comments - let's stop and think here.  Upgrading to a new version of Office isn't something that any of us take lightly or do quickly.  Those with limited finances will avoid it as long as they can, perhaps years.  Those with extensive resources are going to take their time and do it in a measured manner backed with plenty of advance testing over many months.  By early April when the Mac converters become available, I doubt I will have seen even a single docx file. The good people at the MacBU work their tails off for our benefit.  I, for one, appreciate that. Happy coding, folks!

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Also: Windows users have at least an option - they can upgrade to Office 2007, yet Microsoft still made a previous version converter. For their Mac customers - they have no options -  NOTHING, and the converter is more of an after thought then of a planned solution for their customers.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    @ andrew s I think the issue for MacBU isn't one of resources, as much as it is the molasses pace at which development takes place at a large company. Check out this article on the design of Vista's shutdown feature: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/11/21.html Somewhere on Mac Mojo, there was a post about how MacBU can't fill open positions. That means that Microsoft "higher ups" gave MacBU the go-ahead to create a new position and to look for someone to fill it, but no one (qualified enough) is showing up for interviews. Definitely not an issue of MacBU being resource deprived from higher ups.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    To further clarify, the work going on now is also not just about the new file formats, or even just about Intel, but involves lots of new functionality which the new file formats must tie into. Office for Windows made extensive changes during their final months of work (e.g. in response to feedback from their customers); with their final release we can complete our work and begin the final suite-wide testing and security pass on our end (which in itself takes more time than one might intuitively expect, given the scope.) We think it will be worth the wait, but we have a lot to finish. We'll continue to talk about the look of things from our vantage in MacBU on this blog and others, for those who are interested, however we do understand that as customers you'd primarily just like the software to work when you need it. We apologize for this delay in compatibility.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    I've added some discussion on my own blog with more detail about the scope of the work Geoff mentions. http://www.schwieb.com/blog/2006/12/05/conversion-factors/

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    frankly it is pathetic that one company with two flagship products would neglect one so badly. does this article imply the windows version of the format wasn't at least fixed when office was shipped to QA months ago? you forgot, you should have done it on time for release, shame on you

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Thanks for the heads up Sheridan!  I got a lot of emails over the last 24hrs from concerned Office for Mac users due to that article. One thing that is getting lost in this shuffle is how EASY it is to save in Office 97-2003 file formats in Office 2007!!  As an Office 2007 tester and user for months now...I've had to do this throughout.  It is really simple and I do not believe a significant barrier.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    I understand that writing good software is hard work, and I do not want to critize the MacBU people who have been doing this work, but MS in general. The policy of MS is astounding: Many OS projects manage to roll out products for multiple platforms at the same time or with little delay (think Firefox), and MS, the biggest, richest software house on the entire planet cannot get its flagship product out for two platform? Of course, Firefox is a smaller project, but it's a smaller development team as well with only a fraction of Microsofts resources. Microsofts products in the last year have been very weak, and this is just one more gaffe: IE7 cannot hold a candle to Firefox. IE for Mac is dead, pity, it was a good browser. Zune is a bad joke compared to the iPod and not even compatible to Vista. Vista will only sell if preinstalled.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    They have to lie, too. Don't call something "open" when it's not. It is not an open format: it is a format that belongs to Microsoft. If Microsoft had wanted to be open it would have used the truly open format Open Document, like virtually every other software vendor that writes office software will be. Deliberately coming up with yet another proprietary format is bad enough. Lying about it is worse.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
    Dan Warne, I've read your apc rags via digg.com, and your stories are sensationslistic garbage, particularly when it comes to Microsoft. I recall your story about Microsoft "backing off" of the new Office 2007 UI, where you implied that adding the option of minimizing the ribbon was the same as removing it altogether and going back to menus. I recall your nonsense that Vista wouldn't be able to play protected HD-DVD discs.  Another lie. And yes, this last story regarding Mac Office users being "locked out" regarding OpenXML was just more sensationalistic "MS = evil" malarky.

  • Anonymous
    December 05, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    Why should I care? I left Microsoft Word behind years ago. Whether it was meant to or not, this change in file formats will likely cause a flag day with regard to work processors and end up breaking Word's hold on the industry. It'll be interesting to see which word processor format rises to the top.

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    Yeah, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict that all the people bemoaning the death of Mac Office will never encounter a .docx file before the converter hits unless they specifically go looking for one.

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    Greetings and Thanks for keeping us compatible cross platform.  I look forward to the converters and the Mac Version of Office next fall.  Meanwhile, how come you guys don't take over development of Windows Media Player and make one for Intel Macs?  

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    Brutus: > Dan Warne, I've read your apc rags via > digg.com, and your stories are > sensationslistic garbage, particularly > when it comes to Microsoft. Thanks for your feedback. > I recall your story about Microsoft "backing > off" of the new Office 2007 UI, where you > implied that adding the option of minimizing > the ribbon was the same as removing it > altogether and going back to menus. Not my story, or one published by us I'm afraid. You've confused me with someone else. > I recall your nonsense that Vista wouldn't > be able to play protected HD-DVD discs. > Another lie. I reported exactly what the Microsoft USA spokesman at TechEd said, and had a followup meeting with him before publishing the story to double-check the info. Microsoft actually issued the wrong information itself. Not a "lie" from me. > And yes, this last story regarding Mac > Office users being "locked out" regarding > OpenXML was just more sensationalistic "MS = > evil" malarky. Our story doesn't say Microsoft is evil. And if you read the actual story, you'll see it's quite a level-headed look at the problem of O2K7 file format incompatibility with Office:Mac.

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    You said: "we recommend that Mac users advise their friends and colleagues using Office 2007 to save their documents as a "Word/Excel/PowerPoint 97-2003 Document" (.doc, .xls, .ppt) to ensure the documents can be shared across platforms." Maybe you should be advising "our friends" to use obsolete file formats on our behalf, rather than expecting us to handle this, o great software monopoly.

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    Al least it's good to know, THAT Converters are coming.... But am I really expected to tell my clients, that I cannot open a Word document? That's heavy stuff...better keep hurrying... Yours Stefan Schobesberger

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    Ok... As a PM for another MAJOR cross-platoform application I find it hard to believe that the file format wasn't frozen LONG AGO and work could have been done in parallel with the Office Window's team.   The "fidelity" issues need to be addressed on the Windows Office side just as under the Mac version and given they share a common file format it should be a no brainer. In other words the issues have been found and the solution defined. Now, on the other hand if MS is using Windows OS specific technologies in any of the areas, which obviously we don't do, then it all bets are off as you have to recreate these on the Mac. Otherwise, "should be" a fairly simple process. The idea that this will take you until spring, especially when one adds in the format freeze date, just seems to be omitting some important facts in your story. To be fair, I do love your stuff for the most part, STILL use Entourage even though I'm one of those poor souls that gets the crash upon opening if you close and reopen on an Intel Mac, but seriously this delta, to me, seems much to great. IMHO! Your code may vary....    

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    (I said this over on Schweib where he detailed the XML parsing issue which is a part of the big old story here...) One of Mac Office’s drawbacks I think lies in the conservative approach you guys often take in decisions just such as the MSXML one we’re kind of talking about here. Bringing something like that to the table, porting it, testing it, and basically doing the implementation cha cha for something which surely you must itch could be done a simpler way … it delays release and it makes for bigger apps and more lag. I appreciate the almost Sisyphean efforts the Mac BU undertake to bring us our premium suite. But sometimes it really does seem to even a sympathetic observer like me that for whatever reasons you forever end up doing things the hard way! Fingers crossed for a great Office 12 … “2008″ maybe? So long as it comes out in ‘07!

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
    "For now, we recommend that Mac users advise their friends and colleagues not ot use Office 2007." That's more like it!

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
    Hey, doesn't textedit.app in OS X Tiger read and write Word XML formats? And it's been out...what...a year and a half?

  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
    There’s been a bit of flak about the Office Open XML file format converters for Mac Office. Sheridan

  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
    Rick M, two points:

  1. TextEdit reads the 2003 XML format.  The Open XML format in Office 2007 is very different; and
  2. There are a number of fidelity issues with TextEdit's support of the old XML format, revision marking is just one example, that a number of Mac Office users would find completely unacceptable.

  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
    What's the problem here?  Mac users won't be able to read all 5 people's documents who are actually using the new format in O12?   Geez guys, just save in the compatible format like everyone else does.  I've been using Office 12 since the first beta and have been doing just that.

  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
    One of my biggest bugaboos is communications, or more specifically, a lack thereof from the people and companies I do business with. Well, personally too. One of the biggest signs that I had to marry Melissa and (relatively) fast, was that when I told

  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
    Great stuff! Keep up the good work, looking forward both to these new formats and the 2007 edition of Office!

  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2006
    Re: Jeremy Thanks for the kind words. I'd be lying if I said that it hasn't been a little rough for me this week reading the comments here, but the benefits of blogging far outweigh any frustrations.

  1. All of our press releases are on Mactopia, but I don't believe we've talked publicly about that kind of info.
  2.  Our team monitors the microsoft newsgroups (microsoft.public.mac.office) and there is usually some pretty lively discussion in there. Each app has its own group too (.excel, .entourage, etc.) A number of MVPs will frequently respond to questions and offer suggestions. I would start there.

  • Anonymous
    December 08, 2006
    We really do appreciate your efforts, which have produced excellent software in recent years. But it's important that you understand that any delay, especially as long as 2 months, is a very great problem for your users. My clients (I am an attorney) tolerate my 'mac-ness' only because it's invisible to them - they deal with too many people simultaneously to accept an obligation on their part to transmit documents in a different format (even an older Word format) for my particular benefit. My hope is that they will be slow to adopt the new Office, giving me an opportunity to 'catch up' - otherwise, I really will have to switch (whether via Parallels, Boot Camp (ugh) or a separate machine I can't say at this point). Thanks for all your efforts, and here's hoping you surprise us by shipping the converters early. Aloha, Ken Marcus

  • Anonymous
    December 08, 2006
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  • Anonymous
    December 09, 2006
    Hi guys (and gals), I'm very glad that MacBU exists, and I run Office 2004 on my PowerBook. Thanks for all your efforts on the new format converters and I totally understand your frustrations, and those shown on this blog by your customers. I do wish that MS could just formally open the existing Office 97 formats which continue to serve just fine, witness the great interoperability with OpenOffice. In fact, I have used Calc to repair Excel 2003 files that even Excel crashed on whilst trying to open. Best Wishes, Jonathan Watmough

  • Anonymous
    December 09, 2006
    I don't mind waiting, necessarily, though it will no doubt cause some trouble.  Could you actually confirm that the converters will be available for Office X, as well?  I would be quite unhappy if I were forced to upgrade just to be able to read office documents. Thanks, I'd appreciate it.

  • Anonymous
    December 10, 2006
    Come on people! Probably one of MS best keep secret is the actual adoption rate and speed of adoption of new versions. We all know that today just no company have made the deployement of Office 2007! Look around! Win 2000 is still quite popular. How often do you still see Office 97 around? And you think those company will deploy the Office 2007 converter? No way! So until Office 2007 is actually used and you start receiving documents... I am sure many OfficeWin users will already have requested those person to do some "save as..." See you in march/april !

  • Anonymous
    December 10, 2006
    Ever so slack not to get the converters much sooner. Also the removal of VB is totally way off and is a much need part of the office suite. What is this the beinging if the end for the Mac Office Suite?

  • Anonymous
    December 11, 2006
    With Office 2007 now being made available to businesses it is worth noting that the default file save

  • Anonymous
    December 11, 2006
    Some people are wondering how Microsoft Office for the Mac will support Open XML, and there has been

  • Anonymous
    December 11, 2006
    why?  why is visual basic compatibility being left out of office 2007 for mac?  this makes the software useless for many users who have be compatible with windows macros.  if you have to raise the price, or delay the release that is fine, just tell us and we will understand.  if you release office 2007 for mac without visual basic compatibility then office 2007 will be DOA...sales will decline and so will the funding microsoft puts into the MacBU.  Please include this to keep your jobs and give mac users a quality product...it is a win-win!

  • Anonymous
    December 11, 2006
    Jeeseeeeze, the DRAMA people! You'd swear that 6-7 weeks is somehow life threatening. OMG some Windows user might send me a file that can only be opened by WinOffice2007. Oh the humanity. Get some perspective everyone. I strongly doubt I'll have one *.docx file sent to me for MONTHS, let alone just mere weeks. It's not like there will be some huge wave of uptake for Vista, heck my company probably won't roll out Vista and apps for 18 to 24 months yet. One might have to worry 10 months from today but it's just not a meaningful issue in the here and now.

  • Anonymous
    December 12, 2006
    This is somewhat off-topic, but a long-standing thorn in the side of the Mac professional community. Adobe has stated that they are unable to provide feature parity with the Mac versions of their "Convert to PDF" macros because Mac Office lacks a robust enough API to do things like (especially) TOC to Bookmark conversion. Will the new version include API enhancements to alleviate this situation, and has the MacBU been in communication with Adobe about this?

  • Anonymous
    December 13, 2006
    What gets me the most about this isn't so much the fact that there's a time delay as that the poster had the audacity to emphasize the fact that the converter would be free.  Are you implying that there was a chance of charging for it?  Your post implied that we would be excited about the fact that it's free.  That would be like a car buyer being excited that a new car comes with tires.

  • Anonymous
    December 15, 2006
    One of the first articles that went up on the .docx format- still handy for those that are stuck with them. http://www.eightysevenfour.com/?p=14

  • Anonymous
    December 17, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    December 17, 2006
    Understand that Adobe's not being quite 100% honest with that statement. If they were to use AppleScript, they can indeed get to the TOC info for their macros. however, they refuse to do anything that isn't VBA or Javascript. The proof of this is in my article on it: <http://www.bynkii.com/archives/2006/09/one_reason_why_acrobat_irritat.html>

  • Anonymous
    December 17, 2006
    Say what you want about Microsoft; good or bad. The reality of it all is Microsoft continues to move forward and pushes the industry into progress. Yes, there are some steps back, but overall Microsoft has done more for the IT industry and the worlds industries in general. Without software the hardware is nothing without it. A two way street, but since us human interface devices are in the software side, here we are. I applaud Microsoft in its efforts, progress and marketing. To the Mac Business Unit... keep striving, keep inventing, keep going. Well done. ~Steve

  • Anonymous
    December 22, 2006
    http://docx-converter.com/widget/ Converter available!  Anyone have docs they can test?  Any good?

  • Anonymous
    December 25, 2006
    Steve - thank you. While we read and appreciate all comments (the good, the bad, AND the "ugly"), some days it just really helps to have straightforward encouragement like yours - thanks also for including marketing :-). Thanks too to everyone who has commented, and continuing to comment, on this and other posts. Know that you are being heard.

  • Anonymous
    December 27, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    December 29, 2006
    Wow, some peoples' comments are pretty rough! With the businesses and organizations that I work with, the adoption of Office 2007 for Windows will be a gradual process. I won't be receiving any .docx files for at least a little while - plenty of time for the MacBU to get their converters ready. I'd imagine that many of you complaining can stand to wait too. It's not like every Windows user is switching to Office 2007 as we speak; I highly doubt you'll be completely SOL. Simply requesting a .doc file is no big deal for me. I appreciate the hard work and effort of everyone at the Mac Business Unit, I do love your products; it's sad to see you folks get flamed when you're obviously trying your hardest to satisfy everyone with the resources available.

  • Anonymous
    January 06, 2007
    Hi Thanks for the heads-up - personally, not a biggie for me as most of the people around me won't be on 2007 for a few months anyway. On the other hand, will the next office for Mac be able to read and write arabic and other right-to-left text? The current versions can't do it, as the letters come out separated, which makes working with some of our clients impossible using your app!

  • Anonymous
    January 11, 2007
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    January 13, 2007
    The Mac BU WILL issue free, downloadable file format converters that allow users to read the new Microsoft Office Open XML Format. Will these be available to users of the student and teacher edition or only to pro users?

  • Anonymous
    January 15, 2007
    Geordie, the converters will be available for all versions of Office 2004.

  • Anonymous
    January 24, 2007
    Hmmm...does the fact that you haven't mentioned Office X mean that you're not planning on releasing converters for it?

  • Anonymous
    January 27, 2007
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 15, 2007
    Technet will windows meeting space have clients written for xp machines, or will it not be a useable

  • Anonymous
    March 15, 2007
    Technet will windows meeting space have clients written for xp machines, or will it not be a useable

  • Anonymous
    June 03, 2007
    The dealers-of-lightning over at Parallels put out a new beta (build 3094) of their must-have Desktop For Mac product last week. Holy smokes, it's cool. First, a bit of history. Parallels Desktop for Mac ("Parallels" for the rest of this article) is a