Microsoft's new product branding for Office for the Macintosh. The newest version, Office 2001, now comes in a clamshell reusable cd case with nothing but the cd and a few extra cd sleeves. This means no manual.

The suite includes:

* Word
* Excel
* Powerpoint
* Entourage


Internet Explorer 5 is also on the CD, but it is downloadable free, so it's really not an Office application. The product includes better stability and is for the most part a performance boost over Office 98. There are a pile of new features, including better list object support in Excel, PIM integration with Entourage (a mac-only app), and Save as Quicktime Movie in PowerPoint.

Of course, despite their stated commitment to the Macintosh, Office:Mac is a gigantic step backwards in more ways than one. First of all, it's not a Cocoa application. It's not even Carbon compliant. Excuse me?!?!?! MacOS X PB is out, the server edition has been out for over a year, and MS claims this is the newest thing for Macs? Come on. This means that it has to run in the Classic environment, or compatibility mode, in OS X...and boy, it's dog slow. The interface has been changed with no apparent plan. Entourage is okay, but on the whole, the experience reminds me uncomfortably of the hideous days of Office 4.2.1 for the Macintosh...truly a sorry, sad experience if there ever was one.

Nearly $400 US for this?? I pine for WriteNow...

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