Bug still exists in Office 2008

[Michael_W]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

There is a known bug in Office 2008 which manifests itself if you are using two monitors. If you switch between Word and Entourage, the Word window on the secondary monitor shrinks to an unusable size, and then has to be re-sized to see the page again. This is so frustrating.

The update released this week - 12.1.1 - does not fix the problem, which has been known pretty much since Office 2008 was released, as there are a number of posts on various forums reporting its existence.

Is Microsoft addressing this issue?

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Michael:

Microsoft will not tell us whether or not they are working on any given
issue.

Often, they do not know themselves: the way they work, they will open a code
module to "do things" and may fix several issues with the change they make;
some of which they did not even realise were caused by that code module.

The most they will ever tell us is that they have (or have not) got a bug
open on the issue. In this case, they have told us that they do have a bug
on it.

There remains a group of bugs that are caused by Spaces. Office 2008 was
not designed for Spaces, which nobody knew about until OS 10.5 arrived.

So Office 2008 does not work right with Spaces. I think this may be one of
those issues. If it is, then you are waiting for changes by both Apple and
Microsoft.

Microsoft may have already made its changes and be waiting for Apple.

Again: They won't tell us if that is the case.

Cheers

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

There is a known bug in Office 2008 which manifests itself if you are using
two monitors. If you switch between Word and Entourage, the Word window on the
secondary monitor shrinks to an unusable size, and then has to be re-sized to
see the page again. This is so frustrating.

The update released this week - 12.1.1 - does not fix the problem, which has
been known pretty much since Office 2008 was released, as there are a number
of posts on various forums reporting its existence.

Is Microsoft addressing this issue?

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[Phillip Jones]

I'm am still laughing from you comment about MicroSoft. You are the
first person associated in some way with MS to admit that the right hand
doesn't know what the left hand is doing at MS.

I laughed so hard I almost peed in my pants.

Finally someone that can speak with brutal honesty.

Hi Michael:

Microsoft will not tell us whether or not they are working on any given
issue.

Often, they do not know themselves: the way they work, they will open a code
module to "do things" and may fix several issues with the change they make;
some of which they did not even realise were caused by that code module.

The most they will ever tell us is that they have (or have not) got a bug
open on the issue. In this case, they have told us that they do have a bug
on it.

There remains a group of bugs that are caused by Spaces. Office 2008 was
not designed for Spaces, which nobody knew about until OS 10.5 arrived.

So Office 2008 does not work right with Spaces. I think this may be one of
those issues. If it is, then you are waiting for changes by both Apple and
Microsoft.

Microsoft may have already made its changes and be waiting for Apple.

Again: They won't tell us if that is the case.

Cheers

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

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[Michel Bintener]

I'm am still laughing from you comment about MicroSoft. You are the
first person associated in some way with MS to admit that the right hand
doesn't know what the left hand is doing at MS.

Phillip,

I don't know how many times you have already been told that MVPs are *not*
associated with Microsoft. MVPs do not represent Microsoft, nor are they
obliged to defend Microsoft's point of view. The MVP title is an award, a
way of saying "thank you" for the technical support which a number of users
have provided in a number of different ways (such as posting in this
newsgroup here), and that's it.

--
Michel Bintener
Microsoft MVP
Office:mac (Entourage & Word)

*** Please always reply to the newsgroup. ***

 

[CyberTaz]

.... And you've also twisted John's words to support your paranoia He
didn't state - nor did he imply - that the right hand doesn't know what the
left is up to. In fact, his comments weren't about the personnel at all. He
was referring to the nature of revising complex code.

The point made was that revisions to any given module may have an impact on
the behavior of other aspects of the application even though the ones doing
the revision may not have intended or expected it to happen - nor is there
any reasonable expectation that they should. IOW, revising any part of a
body of code as complex as Word's is as likely to cause unexpected fixes as
it is to inadvertently induce new bugs.

I sincerely hope, however, that nobody comes back with a retarded, knee-jerk
reply to the effect of "they *should* know", because that is a literal
impossibility. The overwhelming majority of Word's [millions of lines of]
code was written before most of the current staff even knew what word
processing is, let alone went to work for MS.

Sorry for the rant, but it just irritates the ---- out of me the way some
people (not necessarily you, Phillip) focus on individual, often minor flaws
with such myopic tunnel vision as though it is the end of the world as they
know it - all the while expecting the rest of the world to be omniscient,
omnipotent & flawless - without any effort to consider the enormity or
complexity of the infrastructure in which that little speed bump occurs.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Michael_W]

Nobody has addressed the substance of my issue.

Bob Jones - Microsoft should know about the issue, because this message is posted in a Microsoft-hosted forum. Perhaps some of the good MVP volunteers could volunteer to tell Microsoft about it? Furthermore, it is, with respect, not a minor flaw, but a major impediment to use of the product on dual monitors.

 

[Phillip Jones]

Michael,

You and the rest of the MVP's, I am well aware are not paid personnel of
Microsoft.

But as long as you have the MVP title, even if it is an *Honorary* title
still do represent in some way Microsoft. You (the MVP's) are the first
line of support for MicroSoft Products. As MVP's you represent MS more
than I do. You are the *Cream of the Crop*. And if you used this
*advantage to constantly dis MS you would not have your MVP status
removed when it was time to renew.

Your program is similar to a program Mozilla had called the champions
program.

They all had to sign Non Disclosure Agreements. But by doing so they
were allowed to give support to Netscape and then to Mozilla products.
often times they were allowed to borrow pre-release of products to use
to test for bugs, and they could freely give feedback for any bugs they
encounter. Now that Mozilla products are open source and there are so
many component owners the Champs program is now impractical. Adobe has
something similar to yours for there forums as well.

I guess you could consider yourselves as *Super Users*.

But facts are facts *you do represent MS* whether you want to admit it
or not. Even if not in an *official* capacity.

Phillip,

I don't know how many times you have already been told that MVP's are *not*
associated with Microsoft. MVP's do not represent Microsoft, nor are they
obliged to defend Microsoft's point of view. The MVP title is an award, a
way of saying "thank you" for the technical support which a number of users
have provided in a number of different ways (such as posting in this
newsgroup here), and that's it.

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

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<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>

 

[Phillip Jones]

... And you've also twisted John's words to support your paranoia He
didn't state - nor did he imply - that the right hand doesn't know what the
left is up to. In fact, his comments weren't about the personnel at all. He
was referring to the nature of revising complex code.

The point made was that revisions to any given module may have an impact on
the behavior of other aspects of the application even though the ones doing
the revision may not have intended or expected it to happen - nor is there
any reasonable expectation that they should. IOW, revising any part of a
body of code as complex as Word's is as likely to cause unexpected fixes as
it is to inadvertently induce new bugs.

I sincerely hope, however, that nobody comes back with a retarded, knee-jerk
reply to the effect of "they *should* know", because that is a literal
impossibility. The overwhelming majority of Word's [millions of lines of]
code was written before most of the current staff even knew what word
processing is, let alone went to work for MS.

Sorry for the rant, but it just irritates the ---- out of me the way some
people (not necessarily you, Phillip) focus on individual, often minor flaws
with such myopic tunnel vision as though it is the end of the world as they
know it - all the while expecting the rest of the world to be omniscient,
omnipotent & flawless - without any effort to consider the enormity or
complexity of the infrastructure in which that little speed bump occurs.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

It just the fact that someone associated in someway even if on the
periphery with MS, would actually admit a chink in the Armour of of MS,
ever how small.

I freely admit Apple's not perfect. Never has been never ever will be.
But there is something about the MS following That they can never do
anything wrong. They are the next thing to the second coming. His
comment just struck me funny.

I use Ms Products on my Mac because they are the best currently
available. There is a a lot of free stuff out there and I tinker with
it. But, I always come back. But using Ms Products I don't know why I
feel like am relegated to second class citizenship. And get the
impression that MS is proud of that fact.

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

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<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/90th_Birthday/index.htm>
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<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Harris/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Re: MVPs

I guess you could consider yourselves as *Super Users*.

But facts are facts *you do represent MS* whether you want to admit it
or not. Even if not in an *official* capacity.

This is backwards. It might be fair to say MVPs represent certain kinds
of users to Microsoft, not the other way around.

=Jim

--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

MVPs are independent experts who are not affiliated with Microsoft.


Visit my blog
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[Phillip Jones]

Okay then MS considers you *Super Users*.

Re: MVPs


This is backwards. It might be fair to say MVPs represent certain kinds
of users to Microsoft, not the other way around.

=Jim

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

mailto[email protected]

<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/90th_Birthday/index.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Fulcher/default.html>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Harris/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>

 

[Barry Wainwright]

You are the *Cream of the Crop*. And if you used this
*advantage to constantly dis MS you would not have your MVP status
removed when it was time to renew.

I sat in a conference room listening to Bill G a few years back, when he
stated that "you MVPs are our most respected critics..."!

 

[Barry Wainwright]

But there is something about the MS following That they can never do
anything wrong. They are the next thing to the second coming.

Personally, I find that statement quite insulting.

I am no sort of apologist for MS - they are big enough to fight their
own battles.

I got an MVP award because I was good at helping other users sort out
the problems they were having with MS programmes. I am, at appropriate
times, a voluble critic of MS products, marketing and business
practises. I am here to support users, not MS.

 

[CyberTaz]

Michael -

Sorry if you took it personally, but my reply was to Phillip & made no
reference to your issue whatsoever. I'm sure it is a significant matter for
you as well as quite a few others, but the "substance" of it hasn't been
addressed because nobody here has the where-with-all to address it.

For clarification, MS "provides" the server space, it doesn't "host" the
forum. This is a user-to-user public support newsgroup. Some members of
MacBU do occasionally dip a toe in the water, but this is not monitored by
anyone from MS in the manner some might think. Its sole purpose is to assist
others with the use of the respective app as it currently stands.

If you have a legitimate complaint or reasonable feature request your
comments will be far more effective if you use the Send Feedback feature in
the Help menu of each Office program. The data received through *that* venue
is monitored by the developers, engineers & decision makers at MS who have
real say about what happens down the road.

As John McGhie replied to your op, however, even when MVPs report issues to
MS we are not privy to what they address or when, nor do we have any control
over the matter once it's been reported. I understand your point and I have
no doubt that the matter is being addressed in some way, but we'll all have
to wait for whatever the outcome might be. For anyone here to offer anything
substantive would be irresponsible speculation.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Tim Murray]

Office 2008 was not designed for Spaces, which nobody
knew about until OS 10.5 arrived.

But didn't Microsoft get seed builds? And vice versa: Seems at least a few
folks at Apple would have been on Microsoft's Office beta program.

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Michael:

I addressed your issue

I don't think expecting me to put in your bug reports for you is a useful
expenditure of your time You are as capable of using "Send Feedback" as
I am, and you understand your issue far better than I do.

However, as you state yourself, this issue has been bugged already. So now,
we all simply have to wait for it to come to the top of the list of things
they have to fix (which is sorted by bug impact).

You can accelerate that process by making more reports of this using Send
Feedback. In this case, it's better that you do than that *I* do -- I give
them so much grief that any report from "me" is bound to be shuffled to the
bottom of the pile

Cheers

Nobody has addressed the substance of my issue.

Bob Jones - Microsoft should know about the issue, because this message is
posted in a Microsoft-hosted forum. Perhaps some of the good MVP volunteers
could volunteer to tell Microsoft about it? Furthermore, it is, with respect,
not a minor flaw, but a major impediment to use of the product on dual
monitors.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[John McGhie]

No Phillip:

I do NOT represent Microsoft in ANY way.

I am here to help other users of the software. That's it. And I am
representing ME. Which is why I am complaining about you trying to pretend
that I am representing Microsoft. I am not representing Microsoft. If I
were, I would not be allowed to retain the MVP title.

I think Microsoft personnel would be the first to confirm that I *do*
consistently dis both Microsoft and its products Far more vigorously in
private than I do in public, I might add...

Sorry mate: you got it wrong this time. Please don't do that again

Cheers

Michael,

You and the rest of the MVP's, I am well aware are not paid personnel of
Microsoft.

But as long as you have the MVP title, even if it is an *Honorary* title
still do represent in some way Microsoft. You (the MVP's) are the first
line of support for MicroSoft Products. As MVP's you represent MS more
than I do. You are the *Cream of the Crop*. And if you used this
*advantage to constantly dis MS you would not have your MVP status
removed when it was time to renew.

Your program is similar to a program Mozilla had called the champions
program.

They all had to sign Non Disclosure Agreements. But by doing so they
were allowed to give support to Netscape and then to Mozilla products.
often times they were allowed to borrow pre-release of products to use
to test for bugs, and they could freely give feedback for any bugs they
encounter. Now that Mozilla products are open source and there are so
many component owners the Champs program is now impractical. Adobe has
something similar to yours for there forums as well.

I guess you could consider yourselves as *Super Users*.

But facts are facts *you do represent MS* whether you want to admit it
or not. Even if not in an *official* capacity.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Tim:

I believe they did get seed builds, although I can't confirm that because I
never saw one.

However, seed builds do not usually contain the new WOW!! stuff they want to
"impress" the punters with by making a big splash at release time.

I am sure you can understand that Apple would be somewhat less than likely
to send a build containing a major new and unannounced feature to its major
competitor: Chinese Walls are made of paper, and they know it

The other major issue we all need to understand is that in order to work
correctly with Spaces, an application needs to be designed for it: the
architecture of its user interface must be "Spaces Compatible". Don't ask
me what "spaces compatible" means: but I think many applications 'got lucky'
in that their UI was spaces compatible completely by accident.

Making that kind of change on an application as old as Word is a lengthy
business: probably two years, from beginning of design to end of debugging.

So even if Spaces was included in one of the seed builds sent to Microsoft,
MS would not have had enough time to respond to this feature.

The really bad news is that, given that spaces compatibility requires an
architectural change, and given that a responsible software vendor does not
make major changes such as architectural changes in service releases, what
we have now may be as good as it is going to get until the next version.
Obviously, I cannot be sure. But I would consider it highly likely that
this is as close as Office 2008 will come to spaces compatibility.

Hope that helps.

But didn't Microsoft get seed builds? And vice versa: Seems at least a few
folks at Apple would have been on Microsoft's Office beta program.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[Phillip Jones]

Good, Excellent!

The comment wasn't necessarily meant for you. Nor to any particular
individual, MVP's or not.

But there thousands or perhaps millions of people in MS land that have
that feeling stated.

If everyone would get over the notion that any, one, Software company
can do no wrong, and would actually criticize mistakes then and the
companies be made to listen all software would be better.

Personally, I find that statement quite insulting.

I am no sort of apologist for MS - they are big enough to fight their
own battles.

I got an MVP award because I was good at helping other users sort out
the problems they were having with MS programmers. I am, at appropriate
times, a voluble critic of MS products, marketing and business
practices. I am here to support users, not MS.

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

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<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Harris/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>

 

[CyberTaz]

Truth be told, Phillip, I find that the MS "can do no wrong" camp is far
more sparsely populated than the "MS can do no *right*" legions

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Okay then MS considers you *Super Users*.

Microsoft has never described the MVPs like that and I certainly don't
consider myself a *super user.*

I use Apple and Microsoft products day in and day out. For my job I use
Microsoft Office a lot - probably 4 to 5 hours per day. It's a 25 year
old product, and I've been using it daily for about 15 of those 25
years, so I am familiar with those aspects of it that I use a lot.

I'm also willing to help others if I happen to know something about an
inquiry made in a public forum such as these newsgroups, newly
christened "communities" as well as Yahoo answers and random other forums.

A primary aspect of the MVP program is that it is a "thank you" program
- meaning Microsoft says "thank you" publicly to those who it recognizes
as having given their own time to help out in public forums (or
podcasts, books, magazine articles, the web, or other forum).

My involvement is not all altruism. I learn far more from reading the
Q&A in the newsgroups than I give out. So for me it is a learning
experience. But I only represent myself - not Microsoft. Nor my employer.

In the software business there is a constant exchange and interaction
between the company (product managers, developers, sales, etc) and their
customers. The nature of software allows for greater interaction than
might be possible for an appliance such as a toaster, but the concept is
the same - a consumer panel.

MVPs are only a part of the consumer panel. Yes, we get beta versions
and offer our opinions about the software, but we're only one channel.
If there's one aspect of this that I think the MVPs are good at is that
we can explain to the developers what we we want in their own language.
Sometimes we can help them understand what is going wrong or what we
would like to have happen when they "just don't get it."

My experience has been that anyone who is willing to become an active
participant in developing future versions of software can have a say in
upcoming products.

Apple and Microsoft are incredibly open to this. You can always use Send
feedback on any Microsoft product's help menu, and that gets read by
product managers. Apple and Microsoft often have public betas. People
who send good feedback are sometimes invited into private betas (smaller
groups).

If someone is actively participating in positive ways in betas and
public discussion then chances are good they will be recognized as MVPs.

There's still a great need for more MVPs. The Microsoft newsgroups are
fairly well served right now, and there is an Entourage forum that MVPs
participate in. But daily I cringe when I visit Yahoo Answers and see
hundreds of questions posted getting very uneven response quality.
There's a group of people who answer just about every question regarding
Microsoft products with get OpenOffice (and then recommend inappropriate
versions and sites to download it from!). Or they promote their own
products for sale that sometimes do stuff that can be done for free.

I wish a lot more people would pitch in and help out answering questions
from the public at large. We MVPs don't know it all and welcome all
comers who offer reliable answers consistently over time. Those who do
are likely to be recognized as MVPs.

-Jim

--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

MVPs are independent experts who are not affiliated with Microsoft.


Visit my blog
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-i7JMeio7cqvhotIUwCzaJWq9