Microsoft Office 2007

Microsoft Office 2007

File:Microsoft Office Word 2007.png Microsoft Word 2007
Developer(s)	Microsoft
Operating system	Microsoft Windows
Type	Office suite
License	Proprietary
Website	office.microsoft.com

The 2007 Microsoft Office System, also known as Microsoft Office 2007, is the most recent version of Microsoft's productivity suite. Formerly known as Office 12 in the initial stages of its beta cycle, it was released to business customers on November 30 2006, with availability for retail customers following in early 2007. Office 2007 contains a number of new features, the most notable of which is the entirely new graphical user interface called the Ribbon, replacing the menus and toolbars that have been the cornerstone of Office since its inception.

Office 2007 also includes new applications and server-side tools. Chief amongst these is Groove, a collaboration and communication suite for smaller businesses which was originally developed by Groove Networks before being acquired by Microsoft in 2005. Also included is Office Sharepoint Server 2007, a major revision to the server platform for Office applications, which supports "Excel Services", a client-server architecture for supporting Excel workbooks that are shared in real time between multiple machines, and are also viewable and editable through a web page.

While Office 2007 includes many new features, one has been removed entirely: Microsoft Office FrontPage is no longer being developed; its successor is the Microsoft Expression line of products.

Development

The first beta of Microsoft Office 2007, referred to as Beta-1 in emails sent to a limited number of testers, was released on November 16, 2005. The Beta-1 Technical Refresh was released to testers on March 13, 2006. The Technical Refresh fixed issues in installing with Windows Vista build 5308. Office 2007 Beta 2 was announced by Bill Gates at WinHEC 2006, and was initially released to the public at no cost from Microsoft's web site. However, because of an unprecedented number of downloads, a fee of $1.50 (£0.79) was introduced for each product downloaded after Wednesday, August 2, 2006. The beta was updated on September 14, 2006 in Beta 2 Technical Refresh (Beta2TR). It included an updated user interface, better accessibility support, improvements in the robustness of the platform, and greater functionality. The beta applications will continue to function after February 1, 2007, but in a reduced functionality mode. If users download the Technical Refresh to update Beta 2, then users can use its full functionality until March 15, 2007 for client products and May 31, 2007 for server products. The Beta program ended on November 8, 2006, when Microsoft declared the product "Released to Manufacturing" (RTM) and started manufacturing the final product. After RTM, the availability of the beta download ended. Office 2007 was released to enterprise users on November 30, 2006. It will be released to the end users in the beginning of 2007.

Editions and pricing

The 2007 Microsoft Office system will be distributed in eight editions: Office 2007 is not available for purchase yet

Microsoft Office 2007 System Editions and U.S. Pricing

Edition	Availability	U.S. Pricing		Retail box
		Retail	Upgrade
Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007	Retail	$679	$539	No box shot available
Microsoft Office Enterprise 2007	Volume License only	N/A	N/A	No box shot available
Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2007	Volume License only	N/A	N/A	No box shot available
Microsoft Office Professional 2007	Retail	$499	$329	File:Office2007 Professional.jpg
Microsoft Office Small Business 2007	Retail	$449	$279	No box shot available
Microsoft Office Standard 2007	Retail	$399	$239	No box shot available
Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007	Retail / OEM	$149	N/A	File:Office2007 home and student.jpg
Microsoft Office Basic 2007	OEM only	N/A	N/A	No box shot available

Notes:

1. Additional tools include: Enterprise Content Management, Electronic Forms, and Windows Rights Management Services capabilities

• Microsoft Office Suite Comparison

New features

User interface

The new result-oriented user interface, "Ribbon", will be featured in the core applications of Microsoft Office: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and the mail editor of Outlook. These applications have been selected for the UI overhaul, because those applications center around document authoring and present a multitude of options to the same regard. The rest of the applications in the suite will also be upgraded to the new UI in subsequent versions. According to Microsoft, the new UI centers on the principle of helping people focus on what they want to do, rather than bothering with the details of how to do it.

The Office Button

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Office Button

The Office 2007 button, located on the top-left of the window, replaces the File menu and provides access to functionality common across all Office applications, including but not limited to Opening, Saving, Printing, and Sharing a file. Users can also choose color schemes for the interface.

The Ribbon

The Ribbon, a panel that houses the command buttons and icons, organizes commands as a set of Tabs, each grouping relevant commands. Each application has a different set of tabs which expose the functionality that application offers. For example, while Excel has a tab for the Graphing capabilities, Word does not feature the same. Instead it has tabs to control the formatting of the document. Within each tab, various related options may be grouped together. The Ribbon is designed to make the features of the application more discoverable and accessible with fewer mouse clicks as compared to the menu-based UI used until Office 2007.

Ribbon in Microsoft Word 2007

Contextual Tabs

Some tabs, called Contextual Tabs, appear only when certain objects are selected. Contextual Tabs expose functionality specific only to the object with focus. For example, selecting a picture brings up the Pictures tab, which presents options for dealing with the picture. Similarly, focusing on a table exposes table-related options in a specific tab. Contextual tabs remain hidden when the object it works on are not selected.

Galleries

File:SmartArt2007.png

Gallery in a contextual tab for a SmartArt

Galleries are a new UI construct which show, as graphic representations, formatting options that can be applied to various elements. For example, document styles, document title page styles, slide designs etc are presented as galleries, which let people have an idea of what they are selecting, rather than sifting through multitude of options, as would have been the case had the UI design been a dialog-box centric one. Galleries help by presenting a much larger list of pre-rendered potential formatting options, rather than have the user figure them out by mixing and matching dialog box options.

The use of Galleries to simplify document layout production has appeared previously in Microsoft's low-end office suite Microsoft Works and in other desktop publishing software, such as The Print Shop.

Live Preview

Microsoft Office 2007 also introduces a feature called "Live Preview", which temporarily applies formatting on the focused text or object, when any formatting button is moused-over. The temporary formatting is removed when the mouse pointer is moved from the button. This allows users to have a preview of how the option would affect the appearance of the object, without actually applying it.

Mini Toolbar

Mini toolbar, which pops up near the selected text whenever some text is selected, provides easy access to most used formatting commands. When the mouse pointer is away from it, the toolbar becomes semi-transparent to allow an almost unobstructed view of what's beneath. But when the mouse pointer moves over it, it becomes opaque and ready for use. It also appears above the right-click menu when a user right-clicks on a selection of words.

Other UI features

• Super-tooltips, that can house formatted text as well as images, are used to provide detailed descriptions of what most buttons do.
• The Quick Access toolbar, which sits in the title bar, serves as a repository of most used functions, regardless of which application is being used, such as save, undo/redo and print.
• Zoom slider present in the bottom-right corner, allowing for dynamic and rapid magnification of a document.

SmartArt

SmartArt, found under the Insert tab in the ribbon in PowerPoint, Word, Excel, and Outlook, is a new group of easily editable and formatted diagrams. There are 115 preset SmartArt graphics layout templates (as of Beta 2 Technical Refresh) in categories such as list, process, cycle, and hierarchy. When an instance of a SmartArt is inserted, a Text Pane appears next to it to guide the user through entering text in the hierarchical levels. Each SmartArt graphic, based on its design, maps the text outline, automatically resized for best fit, onto the graphic. There are a number of "quick styles" for each graphic that apply largely different 3D effects to the graphic, and the graphic's shapes and text can be formatted through shape styles and WordArt styles. In addition, SmartArt graphics change their colors, fonts, and effects to match the document's theme.

Microsoft Word 2007's help feature recommends SmartArt graphics for organization charts of fewer than 30 shapes that have 3D effects (such as bevels and glows) applied to them. It suggests Microsoft Visio organization charts for charts of up to 1000 shapes that must be precisely customizable.

File formats

Main article: Microsoft Office Open XML

Microsoft Office will use a new file format, OpenXML as the default file format. It is based on XML and uses the ZIP file container. According to Microsoft, this file format, which is compressed, will be up to 75% smaller than the current Microsoft Office file formats.

Word documents will now be saved using a .docx extension rather than the traditional .doc extension. You can save your 2007 Word documents in the old format so that they will still be usable in previous versions of Word. If not, you will have to download a converter from Microsoft for older versions of Word to be able to open documents created under the new format.

Microsoft had initially announced that it will support export to Portable Document Format in Office 2007. However, due to legal objections from Adobe Systems, Office 2007 will not have PDF support out of the box, but rather as a separate free download. Office 2007 documents can also be exported as XPS documents, via a plug-in that also has to be separately downloaded.

User Assistance System

In Microsoft Office 2007, the Office Assistants have been completely removed because of the much improved help system. One feature of the new help system is the extensive use of Super Tooltips which explains in about one paragraph what each function performs. Some of them also use diagrams or pictures. These appear and disappear like normal tooltips, and replace normal tooltips in many areas.

Collaboration features

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Microsoft Office Groove 2007

Microsoft Office 2007 includes features geared towards collaboration and data sharing. As such, Microsoft Office 2007 features server components for applications such as Excel, which work in conjunction with SharePoint Services, to provide a collaboration platform. SharePoint works with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, which is used to host a SharePoint site, and uses IIS and ASP.NET 2.0. Excel server exposes Excel Services, which allows any worksheet to be created, edited and maintained via web browsers. it features Excel Web Access, the client-side component which is used to render the workseet on a browser, Excel Calculation Service which is the server side component which populates the worksheet with data and perform calculations, and Excel Web Service that exposes Excel functionalities as individual web services. Sharepoint can also be used to host Word documents for collaborative editing, by sharing a document. SharePoint can also be used to hold PowerPoint slides in a Slide Library, from which the slides can be used as a formatting template. It will also notify users of a slide automatically in case the source slide is modified. Also by using SharePoint, Powerpoint can manage shared review of presentations. Any SharePoint hosted document can be accessed from the application which created the document or from other applications such as a browser or Microsoft Office Outlook.

Microsoft Office 2007 also includes Groove, which brings collaborative features to a peer-to-peer paradigm. Groove can host documents, including presentations, workbooks and others, created in Microsoft Office 2007 application in a shared workspace, which can then be used in collaborative editing of documents. Groove can also be used in managing workspace sessions, including access control of the workspace. To collaborate on one or more documents, a Workspace has to be created, and then those who are to work on it have to be invited. Any file shared on the workspace are automatically shared among all participants. The application also provides real-time messaging, including one-to-one as well as group messaging, and presence features, as well as monitoring workspace activities with alerts, which are raised when pre-defined set of activities are detected. Groove also provides features for conflict resolution for conflicting edits. Schedules for a collaboration can also be decided by using a built-in shared calendar, which can also be used to keep track of the progress of a project. However, the calendar is not compatible with Microsoft Outlook.

Themes and Quick Styles

Microsoft Office 2007 puts a huge emphasis on Document Themes and Quick Styles. The Document Theme defines the colors, fonts and graphic effects for a document. The new Office Theme file format (.THMX) is shared between Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook email messages. Almost everything that can be inserted into a document is automatically styled to match the overall document theme creating a consistent document design. Similar themes are also available for data reports in Access and Project or shapes in Visio.

Quick Styles are galleries with a range of styles based on the current theme. There are quick styles galleries for text, tables, charts, SmartArt, WordArt and more. The style range goes from simple/light to more graphically/darker.

Application-specific changes

Microsoft Office Word

File:OfficeWord.png

Microsoft Word 2007 icon

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Blog authoring using Word 2007 (also, note the word count displayed in the bottom-left)

• Blog entries can be authored in Word itself and uploaded directly to a blog. Supported blogging sites include Windows Live Spaces, SharePoint, Blogger, Community Server etc.
• All new professional style sheets (quick styles) and ability to switch easily among them.
• Word count listed by default in the status bar. The word count dynamically updates as you type.
• New contextual spell checker sometimes catches incorrect usage of correctly spelled words, such as in "I think we will loose this battle".
• Translation tool tip option available for English (U.S.), French (France), and Spanish (International Sort). When selected, hovering the mouse cursor over a word will display its translation in the particular language. Non-English versions have different sets of languages. Other languages can be added by using a separate multilingual pack.
• Automated generation of citations and bibliographies according to defined style rules, including APA, Chicago, and MLA. Changing style updates all references automatically. Connect to web services to access online reference databases.
• Rearchitected native mathematical equation support with TeX-like linear input/edit language or GUI interface. Also supports the Unicode Plain Text Encoding of Mathematics.
• Preset gallery of cover pages with fields for Author, Title, Date, Abstract, etc. Cover pages follow the theme of the document (found under the Page Layout tab).
• Document comparison engine updated to support moves, differences in tables, and also easy to follow tri-pane view of original document, new document, and differences.
• Full screen reading layout that shows two pages at a time with maximal screen usage, plus a few critical tools for reviewing.
• Document Inspector which strips Word documents of information such as author name and comments and other "metadata".
• Building Blocks, which lets one save frequently used content, so that they are easily accessible for further use. Building blocks can have data mapped controls in them to allow for form building or structured document authoring.

Microsoft Office Outlook

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RSS reader in Outlook 2007

• As a major change in Outlook 2007, Exchange 5.5 support has been dropped. Like Evolution, OE and Entourage, Outlook now works only with Exchange 2000 and above.
• Outlook now indexes the e-mails, contacts, tasks, calendar entries, RSS feeds and other items, to speed up searches. As such, it features word-wheeled search, which displays results as characters are being typed in.
• Search folders, which are saved searches, have been updated to include RSS feeds as well. Search folders can be created with a specific search criteria, specifying the subject, type and other attributes of the information being searched. When a search folder is opened, all matching items for the search are automatically retrieved and grouped up.
• Outlook now supports text-messages and SMSs, when used in conjunction with Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging.
• Outlook includes a reader for RSS feeds, which used the Windows Common Feeds Store. RSS subscription URLs can be shared via e-mails. RSS feed updates can also be pushed to a mobile device.
• Outlook can now support multiple calendars being worked with, simultaneously. It also includes a side-by-side view for calendars, where each calendar is displayed in a different tab, and allows easy comparison of them. Outlook also supports web calendars. Calendars can be shared with other users.
• Calendar view shows which tasks are due.
• Flagged e-mails and notes can also be converted to Task items.
• Outlook includes a To Do Bar, which integrates the calendar, appointments and tasks items, in a concise view.
• Online or Offline editing of all Microsoft office 2007 documents via a SharePoint site. All edits are automatically synchronized.
• Contacts can be shared among users, via e-mail, Exchange server or a SharePoint site.
• Attachment preview allows users to view Office e-mail attachments in the reading pane rather than having to open another program.
• HTML in e-mails is now rendered using the Microsoft Word rendering engine which [1] several HTML tags like object, script, iframe etc along with several CSS properties.

Microsoft Office Outlook can also include an optional Business Contact Manager which allows management of business contacts and their sales and marketing activities. Phone calls, e-mails, appointments, notes and other business metrics can be managed for each contact. It can also keep a track of billable time for each contact on the Outlook Calendar. Based on these data, a consolidated report view can be generated by Microsoft Office Outlook with Business Contact Manager. The data can be further analyzed using Microsoft Office Excel. This data can also be shared using SharePoint services.

Microsoft Office OneNote

File:Onenote2007.PNG

Microsoft Office OneNote 2007

• OneNote now supports multiple notebooks.
• Notebooks can be shared across multiple computers. Anyone can edit even while not connected and changes are merged automatically across machines when a connection is made. Changes are labeled with author and change time/date.
• Notebook templates.
• Word-wheeled search is also present in OneNote, which also indexes notes.
• Synchronization of Tasks with Outlook 2007. Also Outlook can send mails to OneNote, or open pages in OneNote that are linked to tasks, contacts, appointments/meetings.
• Support for tables. Using tabs to create tabular structure automatically converts it to a table.
• OCR is performed on images (screen clips, photos, scans) so that any text in them is searchable.
• Audio and video recordings are also tagged and indexed, so that they can be searched.
• Notes can have hyperlinks among themselves, or from outside OneNote to a specific point on a page.
• Embedding documents in notes.
• Extensibility support for add-ins.
• Drawing tools for creating diagrams in OneNote.
• Typing any arithmetic expression, followed by "=" results in the result of the calculation being displayed.
• Send to Microsoft OneNote, via which any application can print to a virtual printer for OneNote and the "printed" document is imported to the notebook, and any text is indexed for searching.
• OneNote Mobile is included for Smartphones and some PocketPC devices. Syncs notes two-way with OneNote. Takes text, voice, and photo notes.

Microsoft Office Access

File:Access2007.PNG

Microsoft Office Access 2007

• Access now includes support for a broader range of data types, including documents and images.
• Referential integrity checks. If any information is entered which doesn't have a related entry in another table, Access offers to either remove the entry or update the other table. (Note: This feature has existed since Access 2.0)
• Whenever any table is updated, all reports referencing the table are also updated.
• Dropdown lists for a table can be modified in place.
• Lookup Fields, which get their values by "looking up" some value in a table, have been updated to support multi valued lookups.
• Many new preset schemata are included.
• Access can synchronize with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and Office SharePoint Server 2007. This is a compelling feature that enables a user to use Access reports while using a server-based, backed-up, IT managed version of the data.

Microsoft Office Excel

File:Databar.PNG

Color Scales and Data Bars

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Excel 2007, showing function completion and shortcut key tooltips

• Support up to 1,048,576 rows and 16,384 columns in a single worksheet.
• Conditional Formatting introduces support for three new features — Color Scales, Icon Sets and Data Bars
  • Color Scales, which automatically color the background of a group of cells with different colors according to the values.
  • Icon sets, which precede the text in a cell with an icon that represent some aspect of the value of the cell with respect to other values in a group of cells, can also be applied. Icons can be conditionally applied to show up only when certain criteria is met, such as a cross showing up on an invalid value, where the condition for invalidity can be specified by the user.
  • Data Bars show as a gradient bar in the background of a cell the contribution of the cell value in the group.
• Column titles can optionally show options to control the layout of the column.
• Multithreaded calculation of formulae, to speed up large calculations, especially on multi-core/multi-processor systems.
• User Defined Functions (UDF), which are custom functions written to supplement Excel's set of built-in functions, supports the increased number of cells and columns. UDFs now can also be multithreaded. Server side UDFs are based on the .NET Managed code.
• Importing data from external sources, such as a database, has been upgraded. Data can also be imported from formatted tables and reports, which do not have a regular grid structure.
• Formula Autocomplete, automatically suggests function names, arguments and named ranges, and automatically completing them if desired, based on the characters entered. Formulae can refer to a table as well.
• CUBE functions which allow importing data, including set aggregated data, from data analysis services, such as SQL Server Analysis Services.
• Page Layout view, to author spreadsheets in a way that mirrors the formatting that will be applied when printed.
• PivotTables, which are used to create analysis reports out of sets of data, can now support hierarchical data by displaying a row in the table with a "+" icon, which, when clicked, shows more rows regarding it, which can also be hierarchical. PivotTables can also be sorted and filtered independently, and conditional formatting used to highlight trends in the data.
• Filters, now includes a Quick filter option allowing the selection of multiple items from a drop down list of items in the column. The option to filter based on color has been added to the choices available.
• Excel features a new charting engine, which supports advanced formatting, including 3D rendering, transparencies and shadows. Chart layouts can also be customized to highlight various trends in the data.

Microsoft Office PowerPoint

File:Office2007powerpoint.png

Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007

• Improvements to text rendering to support text based graphics.
• Rendering of 3D graphics.
• Support for tables and enhanced support for table pasting from Excel.
• Slide Library, which lets you reuse any slide or presentation as a template. Any presentation or slide can be published to the Slide Library.
• Any custom-designed slide library can be saved.
• Presentations can be digitally signed.
• Improved Presenter View.
• Added support for Widescreen Slides.
• Allows addition of custom placeholders.

Microsoft Office InfoPath

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Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007

• InfoPath designed forms can now be used from a browser.
• A form can be sent out to people via e-mail. Such forms can be filled out from Outlook 2007 itself.
• Automatic conversion of forms in Word and Excel to InfoPath forms. Forms can also be exported to Excel.
• Forms can be published to a network share or to SharePoint server.
• Adding data validation, using validation formulae, and conditional formatting features without manually writing code.
• Print Layout view for designing forms in a view that mirror the printed layout. Such forms can be opened using Word as well.
• Ability to use Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft Office Access, or other databases as back-end data repository.
• Multiple views for the same forms, to expose different features to different class of users.
• Template Parts, used to group Office InfoPath controls for use later. Template parts retain its XML schema.

Microsoft Office Visio

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Microsoft Office Visio 2007

• PivotDiagrams, which are used to visualize data, show data groups and hierarchichal relationships.
• Visual modification of PivotDiagrams by dragging data around levels, to restructure the data relationships.
• PivotDiagrams can show aggregate statistical summaries for the data and show them.
• Shapes can be linked with external data sources. Doing so, the shapes are formatted according to the data. The data, and hence the shapes, are updated periodically. Such shapes can also be formatted manually using the Data Graphics feature.
• AutoConnect : Link easily two shapes.
• Data Link : Link data to shapes.
• Data Graphics : Dynamic objects (text and images) linked with external data.
• New Theme behaviour and new shapes.

Microsoft Office Publisher

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Microsoft Office Publisher 2007

• Templates automatically fill out with information such as company name, logo etc, wherever applicable.
• Frequently used content can be stored in Content Store for quick access.
• A document can be automatically converted from one publication type, such as a newsletter, to another publication type, say a web page.
• Save as PDF supports Commercial printing quality PDF.
• Catalog Merge can create publication content automatically by retrieving data, including text, images and other supported types, from an external data source.
• Design Checker, which is used to find design inconsistencies, has been updated.

Microsoft Office Project

• Ability to create custom templates.
• Any change in the project plan or schedule highlights everything else that is affected.
• Analyze changes without actually committing them. Changes can also be done and undone programmatically, to automate analysis of different changes.
• Improved cost resource management and analysis for projects.
• Project data can be used to automatically create charts and diagrams in Microsoft Office Excel and Microsoft Office Visio, respectively.
• The project schedule can be managed as 3D Gantt chart.
• Sharing project data with the help of SharePoint services.

Microsoft SharePoint Designer

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Microsoft office SharePoint Designer 2007

Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 is new addition to the Office suite replacing discontinued Frontpage.

• Supports features and constructs that expose SharePoint functionality.
• Supports ASP.NET 2.0 and Windows Workflow Foundation.
• Support for creating workflows and data reports, from external data sources.
• Allows XML data to be displayed using XSLT

Server Components

SharePoint Server 2007

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 allows sharing and collaborative editing of Office 2007 documents. It allows central storage of documents and management of Office documents, throughout the enterprise. These documents can be accessed either by the applications which created them, Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, or a web browser. Documents can also be managed through pre-defined policies that let users create and publish shared content, through a SharePoint site.

SharePoint server allows searching of all Office documents which are being managed by it, centrally, thereby making data more accessible. It also provides access control for documents. Specialized server components can plug into the SharePoint server to extend the functionality of the server, such as Excel Services exposing data analysis services for Excel services. Data from other data sources can also be merged with Office data.

SharePoint also lets users personalize the SharePoint sites, filtering content they are interested in. SharePoint documents can also be locally cached by clients for offline editing; the changes are later merged.

Forms Server 2007

Microsoft Office Forms Server 2007 allows InfoPath forms to be accessed and filled out using any browser, including mobile phone browsers. Forms Server 2007 also supports using a database or other data source as the back-end for the form. Additionally, it allows centralized deployment and management of forms. Forms Server 2007 hosted forms also support data validation and conditional formatting, as does their InfoPath counterpart. It also supports advanced controls like Repeating section and Repeating table. However, some InfoPath controls cannot be used if it has to be hosted on a Forms server.

Groove Server 2007

Microsoft Office Groove Server 2007 is for centrally managing all deployments of Microsoft Office Groove 2007 in the enterprise. It enables using Active Directory for Groove user accounts, and create Groove Domains, with individual policy settings.

Project Server 2007

Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 allows one to centrally manage and coordinate projects. It allows budget and resource tracking, and activity plan management. The project data and reports can also be further analyzed using Cube Building Service. The project management data can be accessed from a browser as well.

Project Portfolio Server 2007

Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server 2007 allows creation of a project portfolio, including workflows, hosted centrally, so that the information is available throughout the enterprise, even from a browser. It also aids in centralized data aggregation regarding the project planning and execution, and in visualizing and analyzing the data to optimize the project plan. It can also support multiple portfolios per project, to track different aspects of it. It also includes reporting tools to create consolidated reports out of the project data.

PerformancePoint Server 2007

Microsoft Performance Management allows customers to monitor, analyze, and plan their business as well as drive alignment, accountability, and actionable insight across the entire organization.

With Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 server:

Business executives can drive accountability and alignment across and up-and-down the organization. Information workers can monitor, analyze, and plan activities with an integrated and collaborative solution. IT managers can drive better adoption and compliance by enabling organizations to better associate business intelligence and corporate performance. Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 provides all of the functionality that is needed for performance management including scorecards, dashboards, management reporting, analytics, planning, budgeting, forecasting, and consolidation. The application reaches all employees, across all business functions (finance, operations, marketing, sales, and human resources).

Decisions makers need to drive performance by accelerating business decision making, while adapting to changing business conditions and enforcing corporate governance. Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 allows the organization to build reliable plans faster and execute against them by aligning and driving accountability across business operations.

Related Products

• Microsoft Expression suite, aimed at designers.

Macintosh Version

A Mac OS X version of Office 2007 is also being developed, by Microsoft's Macintosh Business Unit called Office 2008 and slated for release in the second half of 2007.

Office for the Mac does not include many of the programs included for the Windows version as they do not have Mac equivalents (such as Microsoft Access). Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Equation Editor are included, as is a Mac-only e-mail program, Microsoft Entourage. Emulation software Microsoft Virtual PC was included in Professional edition of Office 2004 for Mac, but it has been announced that the software is no longer in development. Mac-only features announced to be included include a publishing layout view, which offers functionality similar to Microsoft Publisher for Windows, a Ledger Sheet mode in Excel to ease financial tasks, and a light and small "My Day" application offering a quick way to view the day's events.

The new version of Mac Office will support the new Office Open-XML standard format; however, it has also been announced that Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications will not be supported in this and future versions.

See also

• Structured data interchange - Microsofts XML model for Office 2007
• List of office suites
• Comparison of office suites
• OpenOffice.org

External links

Microsoft

• Download the system trial
• [2] Main information site of 2007 Microsoft Office system
• [3] 2007 Microsoft Office system UI preview
• [4] MSDN: What’s New for Developers in the 2007 Microsoft Office System
• [5] New Office "12" UI showcase
• [6] PDC 2005 downloads, including Office "12" presentations
• [7] Office "12" & Business Intelligence
• [8] Microsoft Releases Technical Beta of Office "12"
• Description of Microsoft Office 2007 "reduced functionality mode"

Other resources

• How to customize & deploy Office 2007 (Software Repackaging.com)
• Office 2007 repackaging and deployment (Appdeploy.com)

Internal bloggers and Evangelists

• [9] Jensen Harris: in depth Office "12" UI design overview
• [10] Brian Jones: Office "12" XML file formats
• [11] David Gainer: Excel "12"
• [12] Official Word 2007 Team Blog
• [13] Joe Friend: Word "12"
• [14] Program Management Team: PowerPoint "12"
• [15] Erik Rucker: Access "12"
• [16] Chris Pratley: OneNote "12" WebLog
• [17] Owen Braun: another OneNote "12" blog
• [18] Dieter Zirkler: ProjBlog, including Project "12" news
• [19] Lidiane Souza: a new Project "12" blog
• [20] Cyndy Wessling: PDF support in Office "12"
• [21] Jeff Bell: Publisher "12" and PDF support in Office "12"
• [22] Andy Simonds: XPS and digital documents team
• [23] Rob Mauceri: FrontPage "12"
• [24] Mike Kelly: Office Assistance team
• [25] Marc Olson: integration of Groove into Office "12"
• [26] Will Kennedy: Outlook "12"
• [27] Michael Affronti: Outlook "12" RSS aggregation and search
• [28] Melissa MacBeth: Outlook "12" task and time management
• [29] Ryan Gregg: Outlook "12" programmability
• [30] Eric Rockey: Visio "12"
• [31] Tudor Toma: InfoPath "12"
• [32] PJ Hough: Windows SharePoint Services
• [33] Office "12" Web Content Management blog
• [34] Brian Kennemer: Project Server and Deployment Issues
• [35] Larry Duff: Project and Project Server Development
• [36] Erika Ehrli: MSDN Office Developer Center
• [37] Chris Boyd: Project and Project Server Development

Channel 9 videos

• [38] New Office UI
• [39] Outlook Express
• [40] Sharepoint
• [41] Infopath
• [42] Sharepoint & Windows Workflow Foundation
• [43] Word to PDF File Translation
• [44] Business Intelligence in Excel 2007

Other reviews

• [45] TECH REVIEW - Review of Microsoft Office 2007
• [46] NeoSmart Technologies: Review of Office 2007's new fonts.
• [47] ZDNet.com.au: review of the Office "12" pre-Beta 1
• [48] xBetas @ PDC 05: new UI screenshots
• [49] Bink.nu: more UI screenshots
• [50] ActiveWin: more screenshots of FrontPage and OneNote
• [51] ActiveWin: review of the Office "12" Beta 1 (a lot of details and screenshots)
• [52] CNET News on Office beta & native PDF support
• [53] SQL BI blog: Excel "12" BI revealed (by Marco Russo)
• [54] PC Magazine's review of the Office "12" Technical Beta 1 release (over 25 screenshots)
• [55] Paul Thurrott: PDC 2005 coverage
• [56] Paul Thurrott: Office "12" pre-beta 1 screenshot galleries
• [57] Paul Thurrott: Inside Office 12, Part 1
• [58] Paul Thurrott: Inside Office 12, Part 2
• [59] Office 12 Watch blog
• [60] OfficeZealot's Office 12 zone
• [61] Sharepoint 3.0 features blog post
• [62] List of Excel "12" articles (maintained by Debra Dalgleish)
• [63] Microsoft Project Reporter
• [64] SharePoint Reporter
• [65] Collaboration SharePoint
• [66] Paul Thurrott's review of Office 2007 Beta 2
• [67] Computerworld.com's Review and Visual Tour: Microsoft's 2007 Office Beta 2
• [68] eWeek.com's Microsoft's 2007 Office Beta 2 review