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#21
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
Sat, 7 Apr 2007 11:48:03 -0500 from Beth Melton :
Commands on the QAT have automatic accelerators. Alt+1 accesses the first command, Alt+2 accesses the next, and so on. I gotta ask, how do you access the tenth and eleventh? :-) -- Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA http://OakRoadSystems.com/ |
#22
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
Beth, since you were involved in feedback during the development process,
can you tell us why they also eliminated the Blue background option? Many people liked that. I don't use it all the time, but I do like to use it occasonally. What do they gain by eliminating it? Why not just leave it there for the minority of people who like it and prefer it, who in many cases need it because it's easier on the eyes? "Beth Melton" wrote in message ... I've been using Office 2007 for over 18 months and at first, like the majority I hated it. I thought MS made a bad move, it was going to fail, and so on. I don't feel that way anymore. (Heh, you should have seen some of my "persuasive feedback" - the comments you've made are mild in comparison - especially when it came to removing the ease in toolbar/menu customization. g). But you know, even though I know how to customize the Ribbon it's really not necessary for me to customize it for my every day work. I have come up with alternate methods that fit my needs. For example I have several templates that have a customized QAT with commands for specific tasks and I load/unload them as global templates according the task at hand. (I still have a complaint about the inability to float toolbars....) After using the new interface I can now honestly see how it actually does improve work flow and I can perform tasks in Word that used to take a half hour or more in a few simple clicks. And it places capabilities that were once used exclusively by power users into the hands of everyone. Plus those who were familiar with some of the advanced features will likely find them easier to use. One quick example is AutoText. Previously you had to create a style and associate the entries with the style in order to create an organized AutoText menu. Now it's a matter of creating what is now called a Building Blocks and assigning it to a gallery and a specific category using a dialog box. And there was difficulty remembering what you called them, now they are more visually oriented for insertion (and yes you can still assign keyboard shortcuts if you want). Form development is another example. The ability to easily create bound forms in Word has been a long standing request and that functionality is now available using Content Controls AND they automatically update without the need to add extra steps or use a macro. Content Controls also resolve another long standing request, to protect portions of a document for data entry without losing spell check and other functionality. Oh, and Styles have been lifted up and are easier for beginners to use. Even the basic beginner books are including how to use and modify styles. And I've noticed many of the beginning Word books are encouraging users to use formatted space between paragraphs instead of empty paragraphs due to the new defaults. (Thank goodness!!) BUT in order to fully see and understand these capabilities one can't be resistant to change. That was my stumbling block for several months. I wanted Word (and the other Office apps) to function as I was accustomed to them functioning for over the last 15 years. To use the new versions effectively it does require a bit of change, such as change how you may have previously accomplished a task but in the end it is faster and more efficient. The key is if you want to embrace the change or fight the change. If you fight it then you'll hate it and find it lacking. If you embrace it you may just find what I have found, that change can indeed be a "good thing". Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for assistance by email can not be acknowledged. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beth Melton Microsoft Office MVP Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out: http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/boo...x#AboutTheBook Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/ MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/ "Larry" wrote in message ... Beth, You've opened my eyes. Now I understand the logic behind Microsoft's destruction of Word. By the same logic by which the menus were eliminated, since the "majority" of users don't create custom toolbars and custom menus, MS just did away with them as well. Or at least made it much harder to create and install them--I haven't figured this all out yet. In any case, the former beautiful feature by which you opened the Customize dialog box and could effortllessly create a new toolbar and give it a name put on it what you wanted seems to be gone. Hey, folks, the "majority" of users also never create a macro, never edit a macro, and never assign a custom keystroke to a macro or to a built-in command. So, by MS's logic of only keeping features that "most" users use, how come MS didn't eliminate VBA, eliminate macro recording, eliminate macros, eliminate the Macro dialog box, eliminate the VBA editing interface, and eliminate the Customize Keyboard dialog box??? The great thing about Word was that it had thousands of capabilities, and each user, depending on his interests, might only deal with a small part of them. So each person could in effect have his own "Word." But now we've moved away from such diversity toward a single uniformity. A single "majority rule" determines what will be in Word. Only what the 90 percent of users who are mediocre users will determine what is in Word. Everything that a more skilled and creative or just idiosyncratic user of Word might want to access is to be eliminated. That appears to be the logic. The only thing that saves the situation from total disaster is that MS has not yet been completely consistent in its program of destruction, so it has still left some "non-popular" features in place. Larry |
#23
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
I know the answer to that one: far too few users used it and it was actually
removed as a result of major coding issues. In other words, another feature enhancement was in jeopardy because of the white text on blue background legacy. So after extensive consultation, the decision was made to kill it off. Of course, you can sort of work around it with W2007 by creating a custom Style Set based on your usual Style Set but with a blue background and fonts set to white. Terry "Larry" wrote in message ... Beth, since you were involved in feedback during the development process, can you tell us why they also eliminated the Blue background option? Many people liked that. I don't use it all the time, but I do like to use it occasonally. What do they gain by eliminating it? Why not just leave it there for the minority of people who like it and prefer it, who in many cases need it because it's easier on the eyes? "Beth Melton" wrote in message ... I've been using Office 2007 for over 18 months and at first, like the majority I hated it. I thought MS made a bad move, it was going to fail, and so on. I don't feel that way anymore. (Heh, you should have seen some of my "persuasive feedback" - the comments you've made are mild in comparison - especially when it came to removing the ease in toolbar/menu customization. g). But you know, even though I know how to customize the Ribbon it's really not necessary for me to customize it for my every day work. I have come up with alternate methods that fit my needs. For example I have several templates that have a customized QAT with commands for specific tasks and I load/unload them as global templates according the task at hand. (I still have a complaint about the inability to float toolbars....) After using the new interface I can now honestly see how it actually does improve work flow and I can perform tasks in Word that used to take a half hour or more in a few simple clicks. And it places capabilities that were once used exclusively by power users into the hands of everyone. Plus those who were familiar with some of the advanced features will likely find them easier to use. One quick example is AutoText. Previously you had to create a style and associate the entries with the style in order to create an organized AutoText menu. Now it's a matter of creating what is now called a Building Blocks and assigning it to a gallery and a specific category using a dialog box. And there was difficulty remembering what you called them, now they are more visually oriented for insertion (and yes you can still assign keyboard shortcuts if you want). Form development is another example. The ability to easily create bound forms in Word has been a long standing request and that functionality is now available using Content Controls AND they automatically update without the need to add extra steps or use a macro. Content Controls also resolve another long standing request, to protect portions of a document for data entry without losing spell check and other functionality. Oh, and Styles have been lifted up and are easier for beginners to use. Even the basic beginner books are including how to use and modify styles. And I've noticed many of the beginning Word books are encouraging users to use formatted space between paragraphs instead of empty paragraphs due to the new defaults. (Thank goodness!!) BUT in order to fully see and understand these capabilities one can't be resistant to change. That was my stumbling block for several months. I wanted Word (and the other Office apps) to function as I was accustomed to them functioning for over the last 15 years. To use the new versions effectively it does require a bit of change, such as change how you may have previously accomplished a task but in the end it is faster and more efficient. The key is if you want to embrace the change or fight the change. If you fight it then you'll hate it and find it lacking. If you embrace it you may just find what I have found, that change can indeed be a "good thing". Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for assistance by email can not be acknowledged. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beth Melton Microsoft Office MVP Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out: http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/boo...x#AboutTheBook Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/ MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/ "Larry" wrote in message ... Beth, You've opened my eyes. Now I understand the logic behind Microsoft's destruction of Word. By the same logic by which the menus were eliminated, since the "majority" of users don't create custom toolbars and custom menus, MS just did away with them as well. Or at least made it much harder to create and install them--I haven't figured this all out yet. In any case, the former beautiful feature by which you opened the Customize dialog box and could effortllessly create a new toolbar and give it a name put on it what you wanted seems to be gone. Hey, folks, the "majority" of users also never create a macro, never edit a macro, and never assign a custom keystroke to a macro or to a built-in command. So, by MS's logic of only keeping features that "most" users use, how come MS didn't eliminate VBA, eliminate macro recording, eliminate macros, eliminate the Macro dialog box, eliminate the VBA editing interface, and eliminate the Customize Keyboard dialog box??? The great thing about Word was that it had thousands of capabilities, and each user, depending on his interests, might only deal with a small part of them. So each person could in effect have his own "Word." But now we've moved away from such diversity toward a single uniformity. A single "majority rule" determines what will be in Word. Only what the 90 percent of users who are mediocre users will determine what is in Word. Everything that a more skilled and creative or just idiosyncratic user of Word might want to access is to be eliminated. That appears to be the logic. The only thing that saves the situation from total disaster is that MS has not yet been completely consistent in its program of destruction, so it has still left some "non-popular" features in place. Larry |
#24
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
Stan
When the number of commands has reached 9, the next number is 09, 08... until 01 where the next number becomes 0A, 0B... and so on. -- Terry Farrell - MS Word MVP "Stan Brown" wrote in message t... Sat, 7 Apr 2007 11:48:03 -0500 from Beth Melton : Commands on the QAT have automatic accelerators. Alt+1 accesses the first command, Alt+2 accesses the next, and so on. I gotta ask, how do you access the tenth and eleventh? :-) -- Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA http://OakRoadSystems.com/ |
#25
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
You don't necessarily need to go that far, you can use the Page Color and
the font will automatically change to a white text, provided you are using theme colors, that is. Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for assistance by email can not be acknowledged. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beth Melton Microsoft Office MVP Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out: http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/boo...x#AboutTheBook Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/ MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/ "Terry Farrell" wrote in message ... Of course, you can sort of work around it with W2007 by creating a custom Style Set based on your usual Style Set but with a blue background and fonts set to white. Terry |
#26
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closerto the surface"
Larry wrote:
Beth, You've opened my eyes. Now I understand the logic behind Microsoft's destruction of Word. By the same logic by which the menus were eliminated, since the "majority" of users don't create custom toolbars and custom menus, MS just did away with them as well. Or at least made it much harder to create and install them--I haven't figured this all out yet. In any case, the former beautiful feature by which you opened the Customize dialog box and could effortllessly create a new toolbar and give it a name put on it what you wanted seems to be gone. Hey, folks, the "majority" of users also never create a macro, never edit a macro, and never assign a custom keystroke to a macro or to a built-in command. So, by MS's logic of only keeping features that "most" users use, how come MS didn't eliminate VBA, eliminate macro recording, eliminate macros, eliminate the Macro dialog box, eliminate the VBA editing interface, and eliminate the Customize Keyboard dialog box??? The great thing about Word was that it had thousands of capabilities, and each user, depending on his interests, might only deal with a small part of them. So each person could in effect have his own "Word." But now we've moved away from such diversity toward a single uniformity. A single "majority rule" determines what will be in Word. Only what the 90 percent of users who are mediocre users will determine what is in Word. Everything that a more skilled and creative or just idiosyncratic user of Word might want to access is to be eliminated. That appears to be the logic. The only thing that saves the situation from total disaster is that MS has not yet been completely consistent in its program of destruction, so it has still left some "non-popular" features in place. Now that Microsoft has abandoned you, WordPerfect welcomes you with open arms. You can customize WordPerfect to the point that not even Corel itself would recognize it! |
#27
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closerto the surface"
Larry wrote:
Beth, since you were involved in feedback during the development process, can you tell us why they also eliminated the Blue background option? Many people liked that. I don't use it all the time, but I do like to use it occasonally. What do they gain by eliminating it? Why not just leave it there for the minority of people who like it and prefer it, who in many cases need it because it's easier on the eyes? WordPerfect versions 12 and X3 offer a nice blue background by selecting "Classic Mode." |
#28
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
I didn't say it took months, I was saying that I've spent over 18 months
using Office 2007 and feel as though I have an "educated" opinion of things. I was very opinionated about a few things, just as most who have only scratched the surface, but then I realized I was viewing things as I viewed my switch from WP 5.0 to Word, or WordBasic to Visual Basic. It was then I decided to hold off forming an opinion on various matters until I gained more insight. There are still things I don't like but there were things I didn't like in the older versions as well. To be perfectly honest, I think I could type until my fingers are blue, as opposed to talking until I'm blue in the face (g), and it won't make a bit of difference. Those who want to view the change with an open mind will, those who don't, won't. It's like trying to tell convince a hard-core WP user of the benefits of Word. ;-) Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for assistance by email can not be acknowledged. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beth Melton Microsoft Office MVP Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out: http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/boo...x#AboutTheBook Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/ MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/ "Larry" wrote in message ... Beth, What you're saying is that you had to spend months of your life completely re-learning and re-customizing Word to your needs, with the previous 15 years you had spent learning Word being lost, all for the benefit of some marginal improvements in the efficiency of some tasks. Second, the improvements you mention did NOT require the total redesign of the interface. For example, you write: Plus those who were familiar with some of the advanced features will likely find them easier to use. One quick example is AutoText. Previously you had to create a style and associate the entries with the style in order to create an organized AutoText menu. Now it's a matter of creating what is now called a Building Blocks and assigning it to a gallery and a specific category using a dialog box. Well, AutoText could have been changed without, e.g., getting rid of Toolbars and menus! Similarly, greater ease of use in learning Styles did not require a radically revamped Word. It just required that the Styles feature itself be changed. I have nothing against MS adding new features to Word. But to destroy the basic user interface of Word and basic features and capabilities that millions of people have invested many years of work in, and replace it with another, is just wrong. "Beth Melton" wrote in message ... I've been using Office 2007 for over 18 months and at first, like the majority I hated it. I thought MS made a bad move, it was going to fail, and so on. I don't feel that way anymore. (Heh, you should have seen some of my "persuasive feedback" - the comments you've made are mild in comparison - especially when it came to removing the ease in toolbar/menu customization. g). But you know, even though I know how to customize the Ribbon it's really not necessary for me to customize it for my every day work. I have come up with alternate methods that fit my needs. For example I have several templates that have a customized QAT with commands for specific tasks and I load/unload them as global templates according the task at hand. (I still have a complaint about the inability to float toolbars....) After using the new interface I can now honestly see how it actually does improve work flow and I can perform tasks in Word that used to take a half hour or more in a few simple clicks. And it places capabilities that were once used exclusively by power users into the hands of everyone. Plus those who were familiar with some of the advanced features will likely find them easier to use. One quick example is AutoText. Previously you had to create a style and associate the entries with the style in order to create an organized AutoText menu. Now it's a matter of creating what is now called a Building Blocks and assigning it to a gallery and a specific category using a dialog box. And there was difficulty remembering what you called them, now they are more visually oriented for insertion (and yes you can still assign keyboard shortcuts if you want). Form development is another example. The ability to easily create bound forms in Word has been a long standing request and that functionality is now available using Content Controls AND they automatically update without the need to add extra steps or use a macro. Content Controls also resolve another long standing request, to protect portions of a document for data entry without losing spell check and other functionality. Oh, and Styles have been lifted up and are easier for beginners to use. Even the basic beginner books are including how to use and modify styles. And I've noticed many of the beginning Word books are encouraging users to use formatted space between paragraphs instead of empty paragraphs due to the new defaults. (Thank goodness!!) BUT in order to fully see and understand these capabilities one can't be resistant to change. That was my stumbling block for several months. I wanted Word (and the other Office apps) to function as I was accustomed to them functioning for over the last 15 years. To use the new versions effectively it does require a bit of change, such as change how you may have previously accomplished a task but in the end it is faster and more efficient. The key is if you want to embrace the change or fight the change. If you fight it then you'll hate it and find it lacking. If you embrace it you may just find what I have found, that change can indeed be a "good thing". Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for assistance by email can not be acknowledged. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beth Melton Microsoft Office MVP Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out: http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/boo...x#AboutTheBook Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/ MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/ "Larry" wrote in message ... Beth, You've opened my eyes. Now I understand the logic behind Microsoft's destruction of Word. By the same logic by which the menus were eliminated, since the "majority" of users don't create custom toolbars and custom menus, MS just did away with them as well. Or at least made it much harder to create and install them--I haven't figured this all out yet. In any case, the former beautiful feature by which you opened the Customize dialog box and could effortllessly create a new toolbar and give it a name put on it what you wanted seems to be gone. Hey, folks, the "majority" of users also never create a macro, never edit a macro, and never assign a custom keystroke to a macro or to a built-in command. So, by MS's logic of only keeping features that "most" users use, how come MS didn't eliminate VBA, eliminate macro recording, eliminate macros, eliminate the Macro dialog box, eliminate the VBA editing interface, and eliminate the Customize Keyboard dialog box??? The great thing about Word was that it had thousands of capabilities, and each user, depending on his interests, might only deal with a small part of them. So each person could in effect have his own "Word." But now we've moved away from such diversity toward a single uniformity. A single "majority rule" determines what will be in Word. Only what the 90 percent of users who are mediocre users will determine what is in Word. Everything that a more skilled and creative or just idiosyncratic user of Word might want to access is to be eliminated. That appears to be the logic. The only thing that saves the situation from total disaster is that MS has not yet been completely consistent in its program of destruction, so it has still left some "non-popular" features in place. Larry |
#29
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
If you remember the old UI navigation those commands are still available if
you want to use them. For example Alt+T+O opens Word Options. Oh, and the change to the User Templates location, the removal of the view of the path, was back in Word 2002 - that's not new. Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for assistance by email can not be acknowledged. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beth Melton Microsoft Office MVP Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out: http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/boo...x#AboutTheBook Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/ MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/ "Larry" wrote in message ... Well, that's good news, except that the user would have to remember, which is the third command on the TAC, which is the fourth, etc. That's not as easy to use as the regular menu (which MS has taken away) where it's effortless to remember that Alt+V opens the View menu, Alt+I opens the Insert menu, and so on. An additional problem, but just for me, is that I already have Alt+1, Alt+2, etc. assigned to important macros that I use constantly to assign styles. MS says 2007 is more "intuitive." This is the biggest of Big Lies. The sheer complexity of the Ribbon, its constantly changing, bewildering appearance, creates an informational overload on the user. The hiding away of various dialog boxes—which used to be two instant steps from the Word surface—in completely illogical, arbitrary locations is the very opposite of intuitive or logical or even minimally considerate to the user. For example, folks, try to find the User Template default path. You can find it (though you will probably need Help in order to do so), but once you've found it, see how much harder it is to get to than it used to be, and how senseless and arbitrary its location is. Finally, when you do get there, notice that it will not actually tell you what the current template default path is. In Word 97, you get a "compressed" view of the path, but if you click on the Modify button the complete path is displayed. Nice and simple. One might even call it intuitive. Not so with Word 2007, the "easier," "more intuitive" version of Word! In Word 2007, when you click on Modify, the Template path is NOT displayed and there's no way to get it. Instead, a folder opens with some kind of complicated Explorer type view which does not actually display the default Template path but something else (I couldn't figure it out at all). So I had to keep searching and it took me about 10 minutes last night just to find the Templates folder for Word 2007 in Windows Vista. What is called a more "intuitive" version of Word is actually a bloated bureaucratic monstrosity. |
#30
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Another great example of how Word 2007 "brings commands closer to the surface"
Also, you'll see the accelerators if you press the Alt key in the KeyTips.
Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for assistance by email can not be acknowledged. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beth Melton Microsoft Office MVP Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out: http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/boo...x#AboutTheBook Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/ MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/ "Terry Farrell" wrote in message ... Stan When the number of commands has reached 9, the next number is 09, 08... until 01 where the next number becomes 0A, 0B... and so on. -- Terry Farrell - MS Word MVP "Stan Brown" wrote in message t... Sat, 7 Apr 2007 11:48:03 -0500 from Beth Melton : Commands on the QAT have automatic accelerators. Alt+1 accesses the first command, Alt+2 accesses the next, and so on. I gotta ask, how do you access the tenth and eleventh? :-) -- Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA http://OakRoadSystems.com/ |
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