MS Office 2008 for Mac beta: Office 2007 compatibility first look
Office 2004 has given our Intel Mac contingent much to complain about ; speed, interface, did we mention speed? Beyond that, compatibility problems with previous and current versions of Office for Windows -- especially in the area of Outlook PST files -- have plagued all Office for Mac users. With the introduction of the new Office Open XML file type in Office 2007 for Windows, these compatibility problems expanded to all files in the Office family.
Although "total integration with Windows Office users" has always been a promised feature -- and chief selling point -- of Office for Mac, longtime users know that compatibility is easier said than done. While pre-Office 2007 Word, Excel and Access files created in Office for Windows may be viewable or editable on the Mac, the same cannot be said for e-mail data files created in Outlook for Windows. Considering the importance of e-mail in the office, we find the lack of platform synergy both confusing and irritating.
So, how does the Office 2008 beta handle these two hurdles? The results, sadly, are mixed.
On the one hand, we are pleased as punch to access our *docx files natively with write-access and, all formatting correct and intact.
On the other hand, we are frustrated that PST support is still non-existent in Entourage.
The late stage of this beta doesn't give us much hope this is an issue which will be resolved. On the plus side, for Exchange users, Entourage 2008, even in beta, is much, much better at integrating with Exchange Server 2007 than any previous version. For users who rely on server-side storage as opposed to localized PST files, the integration with Entourage 2008 is closer to the corresponding version of Outlook (in this case, Outlook 2007) than ever before.
