Purchased Office for Mac, can I selectively install?

[T. Duprex]

I have no experience with Macs. I have always used PCs with Windows,
presently on Windows XP. I am awaiting deivery of my first ever MAC
(Macbook) and Office for MAC. I only want to install Word and Excel from
Office. I am not interested in nor want to waste resourses installing the
Email handler, Powerpoint , Entourage, or Messenger. I Can this be easily
accomplished on the initial installation setup? Do I have choices on
installation?

TIA

 

[CyberTaz]

Hello - And welcome to Mac & to the newsgroup!

Although you do have custom installation options I strongly recommend that
you do an installation of everything pertaining to Word, Excel & Entourage
at the very least. If you don't want to install PowerPoint that's OK, but...

The fact is that the individual programs in the suite aren't really huge so
you won't be saving that much disk space & could be paying a heavy premium
in the long run. Much in Office 2004 revolves around shared resources &
Entourage so it's better to go ahead & install it all even if you never
launch it. Installing the full suite also enables updates go more smoothly &
makes certain that everything is up-to-snuff in the event you ever change
your mind... Installing an 'original' build from the DVD & then trying to
figure out what updates to apply in order to keep the peace with the
installed apps that have been updated all along can be a troublesome process

 

[Clive Huggan]

Hello T,

Bob is spot on.

All I'm posting for is to let you know, early in your Mac experience, that
"MAC" is something different from "Mac" (I forget what MAC stands for right
now, but it doesn't matter).

And I second Bob's welcome!

Cheers,

Clive Huggan
Canberra, Australia
(My time zone is 5-11 hours different from the US and Europe, so my
follow-on responses to those regions can be delayed)
============================================================
Avoid long delays before your post appears -- use Entourage or newsreader
software -- see http://word.mvps.org/Mac/AccessNewsgroups.html
============================================================

 

[T. Duprex]

"CyberTaz" <typegeneraltaz1ATcomcastdotnet> wrote in

I'm sure I have a lot of de-Windowsafication to go through and appreciate
your input.

One follow up question: Is there a similar scheme on the Mac that contains
a file of applications that run something at startup? I continually had to
monitor any newly installed applications and remove any request from
needlessly running at startup.

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi,

I'm in favor of doing a custom install. I'd suggest you install Word, Excel,
PowerPoint and Entourage. Even if you don't plan to use Excel or Entourage.
Entourage enables a handy Mac-only feature in office called Flag for
Follow-up. There's a button for this on the Word toolbar. If you don't
install Entourage then flag for follow-up might not work. Entourage has a
project gallery that is not in Windows Office. It is an elaborate file
sharing and organization feature that is worth looking into.

Don't install the MSN application from the Office CD. The version on the CD
is old and won't work anymore. If you want to use it, get the latest
version from MacTopia
http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.aspx

There are some programs that ought to be in your startup items, but not
many.

To find the startup items for the entire computer:
Click the blue apple in the uppler left corner of the screen
Choose System Preferences
In the System section click Accounts
Click the Startup Items tab
Add and remove items by clicking the + and - buttons near the bottom of the
list. You probably won't need to adjust this list. I am not aware of any
troublesome Mac applications that put themselves into the list without being
purposefully put there by the user.

The Microsoft daemon should be there after you install office. There may be
one or two others, like iTunes, for example. You might find others there if
you tell the software to open when you start the computer. Typically that
might be messenger applications like Yahoo messenger, MSN Messenger, etc.

Hope this helps.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

"CyberTaz" <typegeneraltaz1ATcomcastdotnet> wrote in

I'm sure I have a lot of de-Windowsafication to go through and appreciate
your input.

One follow up question: Is there a similar scheme on the Mac that contains
a file of applications that run something at startup? I continually had to
monitor any newly installed applications and remove any request from
needlessly running at startup.

--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

MVPs are not Microsoft Employees
MVP info

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Yes, there is a "Startup Items" control panel in Mac OS X. It's part of the
User group in your System Preferences.

However, you do not have to monitor it: in OS X, nothing can install without
asking your permission, and when you give that permission you can determine
whether you want it to run at startup or not.

NOTE: You should always create at least one "user" account for yourself as
well as the "Administrator" account. Then do not use the Administrator
account.

That way, you will be prompted anytime ANYTHING tries to install, and if you
blow up your user identity you have a clean one ready that you can simply
log in to, enabling you to create a new user account for yourself and move
your data over. You'll be back in business in less than a minute.

I recommend that as a proportion if you're new to Mac. It is extremely
difficult to blow up a user account on a Mac. But it is NOT impossible

Similarly, I would not bother trying to do a custom install. The normal way
to install applications on the Mac is to simply put a CD in the hold. It
will open a window showing a picture of a folder that contains the whole
suite. Just drag that folder to your Applications folder.

If you do that, you will have a trouble-free time. If you try to pick and
choose, you will get lots of little problems with things not being available
or not working right.

Your MacBook is ten times more powerful than the Windows machine you may
have been using five years ago. There's no need to cut things back: it
won't make your system operate any better, but it may cause lockups and
crashes.

A modern application is not a solid lump of code: it's a "Shell" and a core.
Vastly over-simplifying things, the shell is tiny compared to the core: just
a few megabytes. It basically contains only some of the user interface.

In Microsoft Office all of the real work is done by the "core" which must be
there for any of the applications to operate. If you leave any of the
applications out, you will not be saving a quarter of the disk space, you
will save only a few megabytes. The shell is tiny compared to the core,
which contains all the common routines used by all the programs.

Put the lot in, then sit back and enjoy. The reason you bought a Mac was so
you didn't have to fret about system maintenance all the time. Enjoy the
fruits of someone else's labour for a change.

Oh: That does not apply to "Backing Up". Hardware still fails, even on a
Mac. Users still delete the wrong thing, even on a Mac. Thieves still
steal laptops and all the data they contain: especially if they're
highly-desirable Macs. Make sure your backup WORKS by TESTING it

Cheers

"CyberTaz" <typegeneraltaz1ATcomcastdotnet> wrote in

I'm sure I have a lot of de-Windowsafication to go through and appreciate
your input.

One follow up question: Is there a similar scheme on the Mac that contains
a file of applications that run something at startup? I continually had to
monitor any newly installed applications and remove any request from
needlessly running at startup.

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Business Analyst, Consultant
Technical Writer.
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[Barry Wainwright [MVP]]

Make sure your backup WORKS by TESTING it

I can't stress that highly enough - just last week I heard from a friend
whose old iMac died over Christmas. My first question was "did you back
up?". Well, he did - a full backup at the start of every month, and
incremental backups every week. Being Christmas, he had missed the full
backup at the start of December, but had continued the weekly incremental
backups.

When he came to restore to a new imac, he found his last full backup was
corrupt and wouldn't restore. Because the full backup wouldn't work, he
couldn't get anything out of the incrementals either. He lost everything.

 

[CyberTaz]

.... What Jim, John & Barry said - even though Jim & John are at odds on
custom installs. FWIW, I tend to side with John - especially if you're not
thoroughly familiar with the real nitty-gritty inner workings of the
software being installed. As I said before, the disk space trade-off can
cost you dearly in the long run...

That's why Heaven gave us such a generous array of external storage devices.
If disk space ever becomes a problem, buy some more In the meantime, buy
some more anyway & keep the primary clean by archiving any files you don't
need frequently or aren't critical rather than trying to skimp on app
installations. There's plenty of other "stand-alone" stuff on the drive that
you can probably dispose of without interfering with the operation of
anything else - and avoid the temptation to d/l a lot of junk from the
'net just to give you an idea, on my G5 I have OS X, fully installed MS
Office, The complete Adobe Professional Suite, the complete Macromedia 8
Suite, Stuff-it, Toast, all the original Apple iStuff along with several
other apps and utilities & everything weighs in at less than 50 GB. I store
all my 'active' files on an external firewire HD and archive everything else
to 750 MB zips, CDs & DVDs for music, video & image libraries... Even if it
were a laptop as my only system I wouldn't need to lug all that stuff around
on a routine basis.

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

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi again,

To make things more comfortable for you, it doesn't really make a whole lot
of difference if you do a custom install or a drag-and-drop install of
Microsoft Office. We're just trying too hard to give you the optimal install
when really it's just easy to do either way.

Probably the most important thing is to use the Remove Office tool to get
rid of the Office Test Drive if it came with your computer. Do that before
installing Office from the CD.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

... What Jim, John & Barry said - even though Jim & John are at odds on

custom installs. FWIW, I tend to side with John - especially if you're not
thoroughly familiar with the real nitty-gritty inner workings of the
software being installed. As I said before, the disk space trade-off can
cost you dearly in the long run...

That's why Heaven gave us such a generous array of external storage devices.
If disk space ever becomes a problem, buy some more In the meantime, buy
some more anyway & keep the primary clean by archiving any files you don't
need frequently or aren't critical rather than trying to skimp on app
installations. There's plenty of other "stand-alone" stuff on the drive that
you can probably dispose of without interfering with the operation of
anything else - and avoid the temptation to d/l a lot of junk from the
'net just to give you an idea, on my G5 I have OS X, fully installed MS
Office, The complete Adobe Professional Suite, the complete Macromedia 8
Suite, Stuff-it, Toast, all the original Apple iStuff along with several
other apps and utilities & everything weighs in at less than 50 GB. I store
all my 'active' files on an external firewire HD and archive everything else
to 750 MB zips, CDs & DVDs for music, video & image libraries... Even if it
were a laptop as my only system I wouldn't need to lug all that stuff around
on a routine basis.

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

--
Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

MVPs are not Microsoft Employees
MVP info