Introducing
Microsoft Office XP
The successor to Office 2000
includes hundreds of new
S
omeone at Microsoft clearly doesn't read marketing textbooks. Such books
always advise you to capitalise on your brand names, and to build them up.
Yet just a couple of years after launching the 2000" brand for Windows and
Office, its two most popular products, Microsoft is writing off the investment and
features for users and
embarking on a new brand image. The successor to Office 2000 is known as Office
support staff alike. But
XP, and features many hundreds of improvements, both big and small, to help users
and support staff.
installation is unlikely to
One of the most startling pieces of information which came forth from Microsoft
be straightforward.
during my interview with the product manager for Office XP was regarding some
research done after the launch of Office 2000. In the US, Microsoft operates a wish
By Robert Schifreen
list on its Web site so that users can suggest new features they'd like to see added
to Office. Of the one million hits to the site, some 78% of requests were for features
actually already in the product. Microsoft has taken this to heart. In addition to
adding yet more features to Office, the company also says that it has concentrated
on improving access to features which already exist but which users are clearly
unable to find.
In addition, many features in Office XP have been rewritten in response to user
demand. For example, circulating a Word document for review among a group of
workers is Web based in Office 2000, but is email based in XP. This change of heart
is apparently because of overwhelming user demand, though Microsoft refuses to
acknowledge that this means they got it wrong last time. Times and people change,
says the company. The way that reviewers' comments are displayed in documents
has been improved, too, so that they take up less space on the printed page. One
feature noticeable by its absence is a warning box to alert users that the document
they are sending to someone contains reviewers' comments. Such a facility would
be useful to ensure that comments are not sent to people who should not be able to
see them.
Task Panes
The primary new feature in OXP to address the 78% problem is something called
Task Panes. Effectively, these are additional menus that appear on the right hand
side of the screen and provide links to whatever Office thinks you might want.
They're also customisable if you wish. For example, if you select Open from the File
menu, a Task Pane opens (assuming you haven't turned off the feature) which lets
you re open a recent file, create a new document or template etc. The entries in the
Task Panes are much more numerous than you'd find on the standard menu, which
is good. However, maybe Microsoft should have expanded and clarified the existing
menu system rather than adding yet another.
Smart Tags
The other big new usability feature is something called Smart Tags. For example, if
you type a Word document that happens to include the name of someone in your
Outlook address book, the name will be underlined with a wavy purple line, in a
similar way to how the grammar and spelling checkers use red and green. Click on
the name, and up pops a menu from which you can send the person email, check
his or her calendar, send the current document for review, book a meeting, and so
on. The system comes with a built in amount of Smart Tag functionality, though
companies can also write their own as part of an office automation facility. In
Update 151:June 2001
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