Costs too much!

[Involuntary Microsoft Slave]

Dear Microsoft,

Since you are already a multi-kadrillion world leader in technology and all,
would it be possible to put Microsoft Office back into PC's and charge more
reasonable prices for your software? Microsoft Works stinks. Period.

Oh yeah, call this a little late, but Word 2007 is really not as "intuitive"
as you might like to think. After more than a decade of classic Office menus
and dropdowns, sticking every single thing into a ribbon and clicking all
over the place to access what used to be a click away, to me, is very
'counterintuitive' and counterproductive. Bring back the dropdowns with the
hotkeys listed for each function and call it a day. Sometimes the most
innovative thing to do is to 'keep it simple'.

I'm sure my gripe won't get far in such a heavily matrixed and gargantuan
corporation such as yours and I also know that the myriad users in PC Land
have no choice but to accept whatever "strategic" direction you choose to
pursue with the software that is a staple of their daily business and home
lives, but if you're really concerned about customer satisfaction (although
at this stage in your corporate lifecycle, you appear to be more interested
in impressing yourself than end-users and your aggressive growth strategy to
eradicate the 'little guys' and superimpose your product offerings over every
nook and cranny of this earth so that your reach becomes almost stifling and
inescapable, has already proven wildly successful and grossed you billions.
So who gives a rat's fart what the actual consumers want or need because they
don't really have a choice anyway...right?) then give us reasonable prices
and more useful, user-friendly software.

Respectfully,

Involuntary Mirosoft Slave

----------------
This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to the
suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion, click the "I
Agree" button in the message pane. If you do not see the button, follow this
link to open the suggestion in the Microsoft Web-based Newsreader and then
click "I Agree" in the message pane.

http://www.microsoft.com/office/com...03c6f1&dg=microsoft.public.word.docmanagement

 

[Yves Dhondt]

You claim that Office is too expensive and that the older user interface was
better. If that is the case, why don't you switch to Open Office? It's free,
has the old menu style interface, and can handle almost all Office formats
(doc, docx, ...)

As to the prices being reasonable... The Home and Student version of Office
2010 will cost 150 USD and you can install it on 3 computers. Considering MS
doesn't force you to upgrade your copy of Office, you can probably run the
software for 5 years or more. This would mean that the cost for Office is 10
USD or less a year a computer. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

With regards to the change of user interface:

Yves

"Involuntary Microsoft Slave" <Involuntary Microsoft
(e-mail address removed)> wrote in message

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Alternatively, you can still get Office 2007 HSE for less than $100 at
Amazon and other online retailers; order now and get a free upgrade to
Office 2010.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Although you have posted this as a Suggestion for Microsoft, it is unlikely
that anyone from MS will actually see your post since these forums are
scheduled to be closed on June 1, and response to "suggestions" has
historically been practically nil.

You are certainly not the first (though a bit late to the party) to make the
complaints you're making. Virtually everyone who has upgraded from a
previous version says the same thing. Many of them eventually come to like
Word 2007, even prefer it, and many of the defects of Word 2007 (especially
in the realm of customizability) have been remedied in Word 2010.

I would have to say, though, that, despite your closing, your tone doesn't
sound very "respectful" to me.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

"Involuntary Microsoft Slave" <Involuntary Microsoft
(e-mail address removed)> wrote in message

 

[Worn Out Retread]

I am a "new user" of Office 2007 and am slowly getting used to the ribbon.
There is one thing with the ribbon though that I with eyes that are not what
they used to be would like an answer to or a fix and that is the little "hot
spot" to click on to expand the ribbon with more options. An example is the
Font panel has a little hot spot in the lower left corner. It is very small
on my desktop monitor and is nearly invisible using a laptop computer. Under
some lighting conditions that hot spot can't be seen at all.

Is there a setting that I have missed for this?

Otherwise, my complaints list is getting shorter.....it is the learning
curve for something that is different that is the source of most complaints
I think.

Ron P

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

That "hot spot" (a little curved arrow) is called the "dialog launcher," and
it has been the subject of complaint from early in the beta (maybe even in
pre-beta). I can't imagine why it wasn't fixed. FWIW, many dialogs can be
called up in other ways; for example, the Font and Paragraph dialogs are
almost always on the context menu when you right-click.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

 

[Jay Freedman]

The most commonly used dialogs, for the Font and Paragraph groups, are also
on the right-click context menu in many contexts (although, inexplicably,
not in tables). Also, the Font dialog has a default keyboard shortcut of
Ctrl+Shift+F. There is no default shortcut for the Paragraph dialog, but you
can assign one through Office button > Customize > Keyboard Customize -- in
the category Home Tab, select the FormatParagraph command and assign your
preferred shortcut.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Ctrl+D is even simpler for opening the font dialog, though I've never
understood why it was chosen.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

 

[Peter T. Daniels]

Because it's next to Ctrl-F, which is busy doing something else?

I'm sure Ctrl-M used to open the Paragraph dialog, but now it does
something else (that isn't useful). That can't have been only a
FrameMaker thing, can it?

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I think Ctrl+M has always been used for Indent. I don't use it because I
have it assigned to an em dash.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

Because it's next to Ctrl-F, which is busy doing something else?

I'm sure Ctrl-M used to open the Paragraph dialog, but now it does
something else (that isn't useful). That can't have been only a
FrameMaker thing, can it?

 

[Jerry]

Suzanne S. Barnhill wrote: "these forums are scheduled to be closed on June
1." Exactly what does that mean? Are all of the Office Discussion Groups
going to be closed? Will they be replaced somewhere? I really depend on these
discussion groups to help me find answers to problems I have, and I like the
interaction with other people who know more than I do about Office.

Jerry

 

[Yves Dhondt]

It means Microsoft is going to close down their news server. The groups will
live on but they won't be as popular anymore.

Microsoft is putting all their money on forums now. For Word, see
http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/officeword

If you search for "NNTP bridge" you will find information on how you can
still use a newsreader to access the forums.

Yves

 

[Graham Mayor]

Try the magnifier from Windows Accessibility accessories.It magnifies the
area around the cursor.

--
<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>><<>
Graham Mayor - Word MVP


<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>><<>

 

[Worn Out Retread]

Thank you, I will try and remember that. I will pass it on to my wife too as
she has a worse time trying to find that "dialogue launcher" than I do.

Ron P.

 

[Worn Out Retread]

That does work for fonts but that really is absurd isn't it.

Ron P

 

[Worn Out Retread]

That is something to consider. Thank you.

I don't know if the magnification would be annoying to have everywhere
without trying it because that is the only time that i seem to have a
problem.

Ron P