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Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office is a set of interrelated desktop applications, servers and services, collectively referred to as an office suite, for the Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X operating systems. Office was introduced by Microsoft in 1989 on Mac OS,[1] with a version for Windows in 1990.[2] Initially a marketing term for a bundled set of applications, the first version of Office contained Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, and Microsoft PowerPoint. Additionally, a "Pro" version of Office included Microsoft Access and Schedule Plus. Over the years, Office applications have grown substantially closer with shared features such as a common spell checker, OLE data integration and Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications scripting language. Microsoft also positions Office as a development platform for line-of-business software under the Office Business Applications (OBA) brand. The current versions are Office 2007 for Windows, launched on January 30, 2007,[3] and Office 2008 for Mac OS X, released January 15, 2008. Office 2007/Office 2008 features a new user interface and a new OOXML-based primary file format (docx, xlsx, pptx). Microsoft has made available a free add-on known as the "Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack" that lets Office 2000-2003 editions open, edit, and save documents created under the new Office 2007 formats.
HistoryThe very first version of Microsoft Office was released in 1989, not for Windows, but for the Apple Macintosh. Microsoft Office has long been the dominant player when it comes to software that offer word-processing, spreadsheet, and presentation tools.[4][5] [6] History of Microsoft Office for Microsoft Windows
History of Microsoft Office for Macintosh
Box cover shot of an early Macintosh version of Office. Microsoft has noted that some features are added to Office for Mac before they appear in Windows versions, such as Office for Mac 2001's Office Project Gallery and PowerPoint Movie feature, which allows users to save presentations as QuickTime movies. [10][11]
Components
Desktop applicationsWordMicrosoft Word is a word processor and was long considered to be the main program in Office, although with the rise of electronic communication that distinction has now passed to Outlook. Word possesses a dominant market share in the word processor market. Microsoft Word utilizes a simple and intuitive interface, similar to a modern airplane cockpit. Its proprietary DOC format is considered a de facto standard, although its most recent version, Word 2007 can also use a new XML-based, Microsoft Office-optimized format called .DOCX which has been standardized by ECMA as Office Open XML. Word is also available in some editions of Microsoft Works. It is available for the Windows and Mac platforms. The first version of Word, released in the fall of 1983, was for the DOS operating system and had the distinction of introducing the mouse to a broad population. Word 1.0 could be purchased with a bundled mouse, though one was not required. The following spring Apple introduced the Mac, and Microsoft released Word for the Mac, which became the most popular Mac application and which, like all Mac apps, required the use of a mouse. ExcelMicrosoft Excel is a spreadsheet program. Like Word, it possesses a dominant market share. It was originally a competitor to the dominant Lotus 1-2-3, but it eventually outsold it and became the de facto standard. It is available for the Windows and Mac platforms. The current Mac version (Office 2008) has removed Visual Basic functionality so macros cannot be used and those generated in previous iterations of Office no longer work. Outlook/EntourageMicrosoft Outlook, not to be confused with Outlook Express, is a personal information manager and e-mail communication software. The replacement for Windows Messaging, Microsoft Mail and Schedule+ (Plus) starting in Office 97, it includes an e-mail client, calendar, task manager and address book. Although historically it has been offered for the Mac, the closest to an equivalent for Mac OS X is Microsoft Entourage, which offers a slightly different feature set. PowerPointMicrosoft PowerPoint is a popular presentation program for Windows and Mac. It is used to create slideshows, composed of text, graphics, movies and other objects, which can be displayed on-screen and navigated through by the presenter or printed out on transparencies or slides. This is convenient for school or work presentations.Office Mobile for Windows Mobile 5.0 and later features a version of PowerPoint called PowerPoint Mobile. It also possesses a dominant market share. Movies, videos, sounds and music, as well as wordart and autoshapes can be added to slideshows. Other desktop applications (Windows version only)
Server applications
Web services
Common featuresMost versions of Microsoft Office (including Office 97 and later, and possibly 4.3) use their own widget set and do not exactly match the native operating system. This is more apparent in the 2002 or XP release of Microsoft Office where the standard menus were replaced with a colored flat looking, shadowed menu style. Visual elements of Office packages' widget systems have been included in next versions of Windows systems and have offered some cues into what user interface (UI) elements a major Windows incarnation would employ in the future: The toolbar, colour buttons and the usually gray-coloured '3D' look of Office 4.3 were added to Windows 95; The gradient title bar and flat buttons in Windows 9x/2000. Similarly, Microsoft Office 2007 introduces a whole new widget system, dubbed "Ribbon", but now known as the "Fluent user interface". [18] The same widget used in Microsoft Office is also used in the Visual Studio product line, though the "Fluent UI" was not announced to be included in future versions of Visual Studio. Later versions of Windows thus inherit the concepts of task-based user activities and easy discoverability of program functions. Both Windows and Office use "Service Packs" to update software, Office used to release non-cumulative "Service Releases", which were discontinued after Office 2000 Service Release 1. Programs in past versions of Office often contained substantial Easter eggs. For example, Excel 97 contained a reasonably functional flight-simulator. Versions starting with Office 2000 have not contained any easter eggs in the name of Trustworthy Computing. ExtensibilityA major feature of the Office suite is the ability for users and third party companies to write add-ins that extend the capabilities of an application by adding custom commands and specialized features. The type of add-ins supported differ by Office versions:
Cross-platformMicrosoft develops Office for Windows and Mac platforms. Beginning with Mac Office 4.2, the Mac and Windows versions of Office share the same file format. Consequently, any Mac with Office 4.2 or later can read documents created with Windows Office 4.2 or later, and vice-versa. Microsoft Office 2008 for the Mac drops VBA support.[22] Microsoft has replaced VBA with support for AppleScript. As a result, macros created with Office for Windows will not run on Office for the Mac, and vice versa. However the version after Microsoft Office for Mac 2008 will bring back VBA support.[23] In addition, Microsoft has also ceased development on Microsoft Virtual PC. http://www.macnn.com/articles/06/08/07/ms.kills.virtualpc/. There were efforts in the mid 1990s to port Office to RISC processors such as NEC / MIPS and IBM / PowerPC, but they met problems such as memory access being hampered by data structure alignment requirements. Difficulties in porting Office may have been a factor in discontinuing Windows NT on non-Intel platforms. Support lifecycleVersion CompatibilityBeginning in 2002, Microsoft instituted a new support lifecycle policy. [24][25]. Versions earlier than Office 97 (including Outlook 97) are no longer supported. For current and future versions of Office mainstream support will end five years after release, or two years after the next release, whichever time is later, and extended support will end five years after that. Last Office versions available for Windows:
Last Office versions available for Macintosh:
Discontinued applications and features
CriticismsMain article: Criticism of Microsoft Office Office has been criticized in the past for using proprietary file formats rather than open standards;[26] However, this has recently improved through the Open Specification Promise[27] and Office Open XML. Microsoft Office for Mac has for long been criticized for its lack of support of Unicode and BiDi languages, notably Arabic and Hebrew.[28][29] See also
ReferencesExternal links
ar:?????????? ????? bs:Microsoft Office bg:Microsoft Office ca:Microsoft Office cs:Microsoft Office da:Microsoft Office de:Microsoft Office el:Microsoft Office es:Microsoft Office eo:Microsoft Office eu:Microsoft Office fa:?????????? ???? fr:Microsoft Office gl:Microsoft Office ko:??????? ??? hi:???????????? ???? hr:Microsoft Office id:Microsoft Office it:Microsoft Office he:Microsoft Office hu:Microsoft Office ml:?????????????? ????? mr:???????????? ???? ms:Microsoft Office nl:Microsoft Office ja:Microsoft Office no:Microsoft Office pl:Microsoft Office pt:Microsoft Office ro:Microsoft Office ru:Microsoft Office simple:Microsoft Office sk:Microsoft Office sl:Microsoft Office sr:?????????? ???? fi:Microsoft Office sv:Microsoft Office tl:Microsoft Office ta:???????????? ????? th:?????????? ?????? tr:Microsoft Office uk:Microsoft Office zh-yue:Microsoft Office zh:Microsoft Office Source: Wikipedia | The above article is available under the GNU FDL. | Edit this article
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